Sam Youngblood is one of my Patreon Community members who helps to research various topics on the Biblical Literacy Team. This is also part of a new interview series where I interview various members who are in the Patreon Community.

Churches are faced with a constant need to understand the cultural demands around them. Sometimes churches can borrow from the culture in ways that create an unhealthy environment. Of course this is in effort to reach the world for Christ. Sam outlines three keys in conceptualizing church growth.

There are 3 primary ways that churches can emphasize church growth:

1) …by an exaltation of “The Great Commission”

-“The Great Commission” is used for rhetorical power

-That title is a new invention

-Matthew 28:18-20 points to a wider mission (“I have been given all authority…teaching them to obey”)

2)…by missing the big picture of God’s mission

-Old Testament portraits of God’s aims are wider

-Focus on “souls” rather than humans and creation

-Eschatology as an influence on the “then” and the “now”

-What kind of fruit do disciples bear?

3)…by misunderstanding church history

-Paul’s failure to thrust evangelism as the central task of churches

-How the early church following the apostles regarded Matt. 28:18-20 and their growth

-Supposedly almost 2000 years of no movement of true disciples until now

-Impulse of Christ, or Constantine?