We need to go where people are already hanging out and be prepared to have conversations with them about great love of our lives. This will require our shifting our efforts from growing churches into transforming communities. They're not coming to us. We've got to go to them.

The first Reformation was about freeing church. The new Reformation is about freeing God's people from church (the institution). The original Reformation decentralized church. The new Reformation decentralizes ministry.

The historic Reformation distinguished Christians one from other. The current Reformation distinguishes followers of Jesus Christ from religious people. In India and other places these people are called "Great Commission Christians" to distinguish them from mere pew sitters.

Today, ministry is being defined largely in church terms and lay people often being viewed as functionary resources to get church work done. The collapse of church culture and emergence of kingdom growth as a paradigm for renewal spell end of an era of church members playing support roles. Many clergy just don't get this. They view recruitment difficulties they are experiencing as a motivational issue rather than understanding significant shift in how people are making decisions about how they will spend their lives.

I propose that we begin studying culture of people we are ministering to. North American culture is increasingly postmodern. The church in North America is thoroughly modern (i.e., out of touch with its surrounding culture). The result of modern church's form of spirituality is a North American church that is largely on a head-trip. This is at heart of why lifestyles and values of people in church mirror so closely lifestyles and values of people in larger culture. We have a rational faith. The test for orthodoxy typically focuses on doctrinal stances, not character and spiritual connectedness to Christ and others.

In keeping with modernism, Christians in North America practice their faith in a segmented approach, separated from other parts of life (business, family, and so forth). This is why we go to “church” to do our spiritual activity. This is why we don't do spiritual formation at home. That's what church is for. After all, spiritual “education” should be left to professionals who have training and credentials for it.

The end result is parents unable to talk to their kids about God, church members who take their teenagers to church (believing that this activity inoculates them against influence of a pagan culture) but don't talk about life implications of faith, couples who are embarrassed to pray together - list goes on and on. True Christianity starts in home and is built upon following three truths. First, God is no respecter of persons. Everyone in church is an integral part of Body and is no more or less important then any other. Second, every Christian home can become a center for fellowship. Neighborhood fellowships build strong communities and become centers of outreach for those who are seeking Spiritual nourishment, but do not have a church of their own to attend. Third, every Church building with a local pastor should be a training center to support home fellowships. This approach will give local pastor time to work with those who have ability to minister to small groups and at same time build unity within church.

Maurice Goulet is Author of Lord Of Darkness ~ Lord Of Light.(Unfolding The Signs Of The Times And The Hope Of A New World) Now available Online at www.CDBN.com.

God didn't send me to speak a Word to Michael on April 26, 1998 because He had nothing else to do, but He had a great love for this man. A love so great, that He led me to him totally by Spirit in order to let him know that in spite of his faults, God saw his need. His need is to be delivered from snare of world, and its devices. To deliver him from lie . What is lie? It is that which he believes is true to his nature, believing that his puny existence as what he is in flesh is all there is to life itself. Believing that if he concentrate hard enough, focus hard enough that he will stop all things he is doing that are bad or as we say sinful. Sorry to say, but it doesn’t work that way. No man is able in and of himself to stop sinning, no matter what he does. If Michael really saw truth, he wouldn't desire half of things he has now, nor would he even care to chase after things that out of his reach as of now.

He wasn't chosen by God after he became a great basketball player, or a multimillionaire. He was chosen before foundation of world, and now is appointed time of Lord that he shall be set free. The people of this world idolize this man, this body of flesh, therefore God put Michael before them as a symbol. A symbolization that no matter how deep in sin, and no matter how far one has moved away from God, He is able to bring him back. It is giving people of God hope that if God can penetrate a man so entrenched in world and lust of it, that He is still in control of this world, and never for one moment lost that control. But like world and its inhabitants today, God is shunned and denied on every level of humanity. When a man is willing to sign a document just to make money, and states a person cannot stand or endorse God, and His Son Jesus Christ shows detriment of our society. When a man cannot be a friend to a person who believes in Lord because he feels it will disrupt his career in some way is sad and grievous to say least.

When there were times that I asked to speak with him concerning what was said to him in 1998, he just shunned me. He out rightly ignored Word and its messenger time after time. He never seem to have time to hear what God wanted to say to him, and his view of messenger was tainted by sin and carnality. His own view of himself, and upkeep of his image continued to be a hindrance in his submission to Word. He had time for everything else, including "scratching an itch," and play basketball again. He had time for golf, parties, clubs, women and booze, but never time for God. Yes, he is a true example of society as a whole today. This mindset deludes itself that it can hide from others what is taking place, but heart never lies. God sees when no one else can. I know that God allowed negative things to come forth about Michael in order to get his attention. To remind him of his word that he spoke before God, and even though he felt that no one else heard it but me, God heard it, and this day God is requiring his life.

No matter how much money he accumulates, no matter where he may go in world, no matter who he may meet, he will never find fulfillment in any of it until he seeks for Lord with all his heart. The same way he has sought after everything of world, so God requires him to seek for Him this way. King Solomon fell because he ran after other gods through foreign women he married. He started out by marrying daughter of Pharaoh, an Egyptian. She and her kind didn't serve one and only true God, and therefore, Solomon was caught in a web of destruction that would eventually bring forth loss of kingdom. God made a promise to David that He would not forget him, and that he will have an heir upon throne. When God told Michael that he was Solomon and that he would finish what he didn't, He wasn't speaking in natural as if Solomon was reincarnated in Michael Jordan. He meant that wisdom, power, peace and authority that came with Solomon's rule would be evident again in a people, starting with him.

He didn’t realize cry of his heart at time, but yet I knew because Lord showed it to me on those nights that I stayed awake praying for him. He showed me times of Michael as a child, and times in college. The uncertainties of life and his career. The fear of losing everything, but yet knowing deep in his heart that he still did not possess everything. In reality it possessed him, and God came to release him from that bondage; but just as a man may walk up to an animal or even a person who has been enslaved for so long and has grown accustomed to its environment. So it is with those who God comes to set free, but never walk away from chains because it knows nothing else. When it does experience something else, even if it is only for a moment, it is frightened of what it feels because it feels foreign. It brings forth a feeling that this can’t be right, because I do not understand it. It is this feeling that we run from every time only to be running in circles. When time is right, God stops us in our tracks and shows us way to freedom, to peace.

God’s plan for Michael’s life will eventually outweigh his plans, but only when it is God’s time. We can plant and we can water, but God must give increase. As God increases, so shall he decrease, and then world shall give praise to God for what He has done. Michael may deny every word written in this article. He may even deny me, but he can never truly deny God, because to do so would be to deny himself. We are held accountable for every word that proceeds out of our mouths no matter who we are. There are many that say, “There is no god,” but God will show them not by mere words of men that are empty puffs of smoke, vapors that are here and then vanish away. He will reveal His glory and power through action, through effect. He is Cause of all things, and effects are enormous!