I’m Lovin’ It is the current advertising jingle for McDonald’s. In 1940 the colossal fast-food chain was founded by two brothers in their 30’s: Richard and Maurice McDonald. With big dreams of becoming millionaires by the age of 50, they opened a tiny drive-in restaurant in San Bernardino, California, where they served slow-cooked BBQ food. Eight years later they realized that a huge percentage of their sales came from burgers alone. They decided to introduce a new speedy service system that focused on lowering prices and slimming their menu down to just nine items – hamburgers, cheeseburgers, soft drinks in three flavors, milk, coffee, crisps (which were later replaced by fries) and pie…and the first fast-food restaurant was born. 

Thanks to the change, the brothers soon saw their profits double, leading them to open a handful of franchises in California and Arizona. In 1954, a milkshake mixer salesman named Ray Kroc became so impressed by the operation that he bought the rights to the brothers’ restaurants across the country. In 1955, Kroc opened his own McDonald’s in Illinois before buying the entire company from the brothers in 1961 for $2.7 million.

That success story is nothing compared to the story of the Church of Jesus Christ! With the smallest of beginnings, around 120 followers on the Day of Pentecost, the Church was born. With a broad brush the Church is well over 2 billion Christians around the world today.     

What made the difference? 

A vision for the future, a vision for eternity. They followed Jesus’ marching orders that He gave them before He left: Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you (Matthew 28:19-20). 

The mission hasn’t changed! Our mission some 2,000 years later is the same mission – to make more and more disciples.

Like an individual, every day we are becoming someone — the question is, who? Dawson Trotman, founder of The Navigators, used to say, You are going to be what you are now becoming.

The Bible speaks of this process of becoming Christlike: And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another (2 Corinthians 3:18). You become like what you focus on. Focus on Jesus and His mission and you become more and more Christlike. Gaze upon superficiality and a temporal world, and it’s equally predictable what you’ll become.

Who we become will be the cumulative result of the daily choices we make. Our choices flow out of our hearts, therefore we must take care to guard them from contamination: Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life (Proverbs 4:23). 

What’s the most effective way to contaminate a water supply? Poison it at its source. If we don’t guard our hearts from a lost world’s values, we’ll be conformed to it. It takes no more effort to be conformed to the world than it does to float downstream. To be transformed by the renewing of our minds is to swim upstream against the current. Renewing our minds requires conscious, deliberate effort. We will become the product of what you choose to delight in and meditate upon. 

Following Christ isn’t magic. It requires repeated actions on our part, which develop into habits and life disciplines. Christ-centered endurance doesn’t just happen, any more than running a marathon or climbing a mountain just happens or having a good marriage just happens.

Endurance requires a good plan with clear tangible steps that are taken one after the other. The farmer tills the soil. The weeds have to be removed. He doesn’t say, “Lord, please remove the weeds.” He prays, “Lord, give me your strength as I pull these weeds today.” An athlete doesn’t say, “Lord, go out there and win that race.” He says, “God, empower me to run hard and do my best, and if you so desire it, to win.”

The key to spirituality is the development of little habits, like Bible reading, prayer, serving and sharing your faith. In putting one foot in front of the other day after day, we become the kind of person who grows and endures rather than withers and dies. We become more like Jesus!

Ten years, twenty years, even fifty years from now, where will our church be? The decisions we as a church family make today determine what that church family will be like then. The New Testament teaches that we are to be a Christian-Counterculture. And while it’s true that you can be self-taught, it’s very rare. 

Discipling in a community is why Jesus had His disciples with Him for three and a half years. The Church today only spends a fraction of time together. With no space to gather, the fraction is a fraction of a fraction. Without space to gather at a reasonably convenient time in our time pressured world, discipleship is squeezed out more and more. 

In his book, Spiritual Disciplines of the Christian Life, Donald Whitney tells the story of six-year-old Kevin, whose parents enrolled him in music lessons. After school every afternoon, he sits dejectedly in the living room and strums a guitar while watching his buddies across the street play baseball. But one day Kevin is visited by an angel, who takes him to Carnegie Hall. Kevin witnesses onstage a great guitar player. Kevin is awed by the man’s skill and the beauty of his performance. Finally, the angel asks, “What do you think, Kevin?” His answer is, “Wow!”  

Suddenly they’re back in Kevin’s living room. The angel tells him, “The wonderful musician you saw is you in another fifteen years.” Then he adds, “But only if you practice!” Kevin is energized. Now he has a vision, a purpose for his daily disciplines. Practice can still be hard, but it’s worthwhile because he sees its purpose, he sees what it will make him into.

Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness (1 Timothy 4:7). 

And practicing, the spiritual disciplines…every part of the Christian life is easier when you do it with other Christ-followers. 

Why are we sharing our vision for the future? Why are we asking you to help us build a better place for discipleship? Because fifty years from now we want Grace Church to still be making a generational difference in this community. We’re asking you to partner with us in building a better discipleship tool! Are you in? 

Today McDonald’s is facing declining sales and losing ground. The same can be true for a local church. You’re growing or declining. By God’s grace, we want to prepare for tomorrow so that we’re still making a difference both in this world and in eternity then!