October 2022 | Active Communication

Before Jesus ascended to Heaven to be with the Father, he left his disciples a huge task. He told them, “go and make disciples of all nations”. Essentially, Jesus was asking them to start a worldwide community of people joined by one simple yet profound truth, that Jesus was the risen savior, the Messiah, the son of the living God.

I can just imagine the look on the faces of those eleven guys. “Here guys, take this task and run with it. You won’t see me anymore, but I’ll be with you. I promise.” What do you mean Jesus? We need to tell the whole world about you, convince them, persuade them, teach them? We’re not even so sure about this ourselves! Can you send us a manual for this? Where do we start?

As a leader don’t you feel that way sometimes? Lord, how do I talk to kids, parents, youth, and adults about you? Jesus, how can I get those inside and outside the church to see the difference you can make in their lives and take the necessary steps towards following you?

Jesus knew that what he was asking his disciples was impossible if he didn’t show up, and it was impossible if they didn’t show up. He instructed them to wait in a room for a few days until they’d receive some sort of power. Then the day of Pentecost came, and Jesus sent them an extraordinary gift, a supernatural ability that would help them transform the world. But it wasn’t the ability to fly, or walk on water, or shoot lightning bolts out of their hands. The power of the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples in the form of flaming tongues and they received the supernatural ability to communicate in multiple languages.

And boy did they communicate! I’d say they became passionate about communicating, and their communication efforts combined with their collaboration resulted in a growing, thriving, irresistible community of believers that spread throughout the world.

What has changed from then until now?

What has changed as far as their task of building this community in the first century, and our task of continuing what they started?

They faced many obstacles: threats, skepticism, doubt, opposing views about God, witchcraft, snakes, bad weather, financial troubles, physical distance, immorality, violence, language barriers, cultural barriers, social barriers, and lack of attention (a man fell asleep, fell off his chair and died during one of Paul’s sermons!).

A lot has changed since then, but many things are the same. We’ve all been charged with the responsibility to communicate the Gospel in order to build this community of believers, but we face the same issues and barriers to communication that the early church faced. We have more means of communication than ever before, yet our communication doesn’t seem to be working as well as it should. Like most churches, we are a hard-working church, but in terms of our communication, it’s like we’re trying to chop down a tree with a dull ax.

We need to sharpen our communication ax

Every week we’re hearing stories of people encountering our church community whether in person on a Sunday, on a Friday night, or even online, and loving it. The problem is, are they becoming disciples? Are they becoming rooted in Christ? Rooted in this community? That’s one of our biggest challenges, and it actually has a lot to do with communication.

Let me explain.

For communication to take place there needs to be a sender, a recipient, and a message that is transferred. But that alone is not effective communication. The fact that you transmitted your ideas or information to another person doesn’t mean that your communication was effective.

That type of communication is a transaction but it's not relational, and it’s not effective in helping us reach our goal of building a community of people united by their faith in Christ and the love of Christ. The church is supposed to be a community where people are loved and cared for, where they are given the proper spiritual nutrition and the proper steps they need to take for growth. This can’t be accomplished by simply transferring information.

How do we sharpen this communication ax?

Our communication should create actions through interaction.

Peter preached and 3,000 were saved. Philip communicated the Gospel to the Ethiopian eunuch and he immediately got baptized. Paul wrote letters and was able to remotely encourage and build up churches in cities outside of the Jewish world.

Our communication should create actions through interaction, but in order to accomplish that, our approach to communication needs to change.

Within the context of leading people in a growing relationship with Jesus Christ, we need to practice something called Active Communication. Active communication is communication that not only provides information but leads a person towards becoming more engaged and rooted in the church community.

Here’s a simple example. Someone new might walk through our doors and ask, “Where’s the restroom?” We can passively communicate and tell them, “down the hall and to the left.”, or we can actively communicate and say, “Follow me, I’d be glad to take you there.” In those few steps toward the restroom, you might exchange names, or learn something about the person, something that could spark further conversation later on.

Active Communication understands that there’s a destination where we want to lead every person to (belonging to the community), and that there are many possible steps in-between to get them there. And every interaction we have is an opportunity to lead someone to take one of those steps.

Think of these interactions that Jesus had with people: when he told his disciples, “let the children come to me”, the woman with the issue of blood, and when Jesus invited himself to hang out with Zacchaeus. They all resulted in someone getting closer to Jesus. That is our goal, and God has given us the power to communicate in order to accomplish it.

Prepare your active communication

Active communication may not come naturally to us. To become better at it, it’s important to be prepared. Get in the habit of thinking through typical ministry scenarios that you often encounter. Think about our objective: to create a genuine community where people are cared for. Think about our mission and our core message: leading people in a growing relationship with Jesus Christ, the Son of God who died and resurrected to save us. Consider how you can implement our strategy of Active Communication to help the people you lead take a step toward following Jesus. Also, remember the end result of your communication: to benefit the listener, and build them up according to their needs.

Walk and talk yourself through different scenarios … conversations with insiders, outsiders, members of your ministry team. What is a simple step they can take towards becoming more rooted in Christ and in the community of believers? It can be signing up for an event, filling out a prayer request card, following us on social media, attending a baptism class, signing up to volunteer or joining a small group. The more you practice active communication in your thoughts, the easier it will be to execute it in live scenarios such as a phone call, a written message, in-person, or on stage.

When you walk into any church environment, in a small gathering or even in your daily life, remember that you’ve been given the responsibility to communicate the most important message in history. Accomplishing this is a huge challenge in our generation, but Jesus is still with us. He still has all authority in heaven and on earth, and we still have an extraordinary God-given power to communicate in order to lead people in a growing relationship with our risen Savior, Jesus Christ.