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The command to “live sent” may or may not be a familiar phrase in today’s church vernacular. Same goes for another phrase: “It’s not about our seating capacity but our sending capacity.”
Basically, they both mean that being mobile and ready to follow God’s direction in our lives is a charge for every follower of Christ. When he tells you, “follow me” there should be no limitations on the location or the address, no matter if it’s in your zip code or on another mission field.
Here is what living sent involves:
- Living surrendered to the leadership of the Holy Spirit
- Living submitted to God’s guidance on where he wants you to serve him
- Living with a willingness to go
- Living on mission in your zip code
- Living determined to share the gospel
There are many testimonies of those who have not just talked about living sent but have lived it out in their lives, families who have sold out, found jobs where God was calling, and helped a church planter by being part of a launch team.
Barnabas had Saul, Paul had Silas, and church planters have those who are willing to live sent. These launch team members are willing to pull up their tent stakes, step away from the comfort of family, and begin representing Christ in a new zip code because God asked them to “follow Him.”
Recently while visiting a church plant, I heard another story of “living sent” from a young lady who grew up in the church planter’s youth group. She shared with me how she willingly moved to the city where the new church was being planted and found a job teaching in a public school just so she could help.
When I asked her where she worked, she named a town thirty minutes away. After noticing my surprise, she explained: “Oh, I live here and drive to work because I knew I needed to live near the people God sent me to reach.” That is living sent!
Church planters are blessed when other followers of Christ are willing to listen to his call to move to a new location, find a new job, and begin a new, exciting journey. Each one of them has an amazing testimony of how God provided people who stepped out in faith believing God had called them to live sent.
Maybe God is calling you to live sent and has placed a burden on your heart to follow in their footsteps? Are you willing to follow him wherever he is calling you?
In Breaking the Missional Code: You Can Become a Missionary in Your Community, Ed Stetzer and David Putman say, “One of the defining issues that we have observed over the years is that leaders who break the code seldom if ever do it alone. Working with church planters, you never have a shortage of people with big dreams and visions. It is the nature of those who plant churches or desire to plant churches to want to be paradigm breakers. However, this thing of not doing it alone seems to be the decisive difference in those who want to do it and those who actually get it done.”
Is God asking you to live sent and help a church planting couple reach their community for Christ. Living sent also requires:
- Living the Great Commission
- Focusing on People Far From God
- Praying for Your Neighbors and Co-Workers
- Engaging in Spiritual Conversations
- Having the Ability to Share the Gospel
In The Leadership Ladder: Developing Missional Leaders in the Church Steven Ogne and Kenneth Priddy ask us to evaluate our missional living by asking, “Does it make a disciple?
Having good missional activities leads to the making of disciples.
Expressing God’s love through service is good.
Expressing God’s love through relationship is better.
Expressing God’s love by leading someone to faith in Jesus Christ is best.
The best missional activities put us in relationship with someone long enough that he or she can, through us, experience Christ and become his follower.”
Live sent!
Copyright © 2020 by Larry Barker @ http://larryjbarker.com . Used with permission. No part of this article may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from Lifeword.org.