In a Facebook feed, the other day came a post about a large modern-day church’s creed that went something like this: “The purpose of my life is to win souls; I best fulfil my purpose in a group.”
It all sounded rather good…until we started to think a bit deeper about it.
The term “soul-winning” leaves us uncomfortable. We are much more comfortable with “evangelization” than “soul-winning” because we cannot “win” souls for two reasons:
- Nobody “chooses” God. God chooses us (e.g. John 15:16 and Ephesians 1:4).
- When it comes to calling, regeneration, repentance, faith and justification matters are solely, wholely and completely the work of God (e.g., John 14:15-18 and 16:4-15).
“Soul-winning” is not our purpose in life. Scripturally, our purpose in life is to glorify God and everything else flows forth from the doing of this ultimate purpose.
Allow us to explain. We glorify God when we obey and live the holy God-glorifying life to which we are called. We witness as we live on the basis of His love, saving grace, perfection and achievement (Ephesians 2:1-10). We witness as we intentionally share the Good News of Jesus Christ through word, deed and faith. The Holy Spirit makes use of our witnessing to convict and convince those who are being witnessed to; giving the gift of life and faith through His grace which enables the person to turn to Jesus as his/her Saviour (Hebrews 12:1-2).
We can understand that many believers or a church form a group but without the specific purpose of glorifying God, a believer cannot fulfil his/her ultimate purpose in a group. Meaning, that as born-again believers, we are in Christ and from this position, we can fulfil our ultimate purpose in various contexts, such as in a group.
Having said this, the Christian also has a responsibility to the community of faith (group). The purpose here, however, is the building up of the whole community so that the whole Body of Christ matures in the faith.A follower of Jesus needs to make use of every opportunity to glorify God, to witness of His grace and to live a life of obedience. Living the Christian life consequently entails both an individual and a corporate purpose of glorifying God every day and in everything we do. Our lives need to be more about God and less about us!
(thanks to Rika Roeland for her input).