When you say ‘church,’ most people have a picture in their head of what church is. That picture is really a snapshot of a moment of time in the life of a particular body of Believers in a particular culture. ’What is Church?’ is a difficult question because church is organic…what it looks like and does in its infancy may be quite different from what it looks like and does when that body is over a century old. An acorn and an oak tree look quite different, but at the genetic level they are the same. They also have the same purpose – grow and produce more acorns which become oak trees. When we discuss church, we need to discuss where a particular body is in development as much as we need to discuss what we mean when we say ‘Church.’
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One Response to Is Gospel Planting About Acorns or Oak Trees?
Ben Taylor
Replied on: August 31, 2011, 6:53 am
I love it. We got into this gospel planting/disciple making work because God spoke to us about an acorn and an oak tree. A friend had a prophetic word for us – stop looking at the size of the field and plant the acorn that God has given you. This friend said that all the DNA needed to produce a great Oak tree was in the little acorn but we needed to plant! So many parables in this picture and links with what Jesus said about working small to achieve big (Mustard sees, Discipling the faithful few in order to reach the nations) This is a very timely reminder Paul so thankyou. I have been wrestling with God about how we move forward from where we are at so that we will get to what God has shown us. You’ve reminded us that we keep planting the acorn and the DNA that God has given us. Thanks mate.