by Shawn Hendricks, The Baptist Paper

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Churches must not forget their communities, urged Cindy Wiles as she spoke during the Tuesday morning (Nov. 11) session of BGAV's Annual Meeting.

Wiles is executive director of Restore Hope, a nonprofit that networks with churches and helps them plug into cross-cultural ministry through serving in “long-term missionary capacities.” She also serves alongside her husband, Dennis, who is senior pastor of First Baptist Church Arlington, Texas, and she assists in global missions leadership.

Before Wiles stepped on stage, hymns of praise from the Appalachian-rooted Chosen Road gospel band echoed through the auditorium. An interpretive sketch highlighted bearing “abundant fruit” and the importance of the Lord “cutting away the old thoughts and the old desires” we all struggle with.

Continuing to reference Philippians 3:14 — which Highlands Fellowship Church’s pastor Tim Brown preached from the evening before with a focus on “pressing toward the Church” — Wiles turned her attention to “pressing toward the community.”

‘Just do it’

A lifelong “SEC loyalist,” Wiles shared her love for college athletics and her appreciation of Paul’s sports analogies that urge Christ followers to press on “in hot pursuit” toward the goal of serving Christ.

Referencing the Nike trademark tagline “Just do it,” Wiles referred to Paul as a “Nike guy.”  He was always on the move, she said, visiting and encouraging fellow believers and preaching wherever he went.

Christians, she added, must adopt the same attitude in ministry.  

But she cautioned that “just doing good” is not enough. Churches must focus on “achieving Christ’s purposes” and “participating in his sufferings.”

What can one church do?

Wiles shared how FBC Arlington and one church member, Tillie Burgin, started Mission Arlington in the 80s — before her husband became the church’s pastor. Since then, the ministry has impacted apartment complexes through creating “apartment churches.” Today, apartment residents continue to be reached by this ministry with the gospel through medical clinics, food distribution, clothing ministries, dental clinics, homeless and women’s shelters, school transportation, and more. Thousands of volunteers, she noted, are helping make a difference through Christ.

“God had a plan,” she noted. “It wasn’t our plan.”

More than showing up

The key, she added, is to not get “settled in” and in a position where “we can’t see what God sees.” A church must be willing to “rethink the way we do things in our community,” she said.

“We’ve got to understand our community,” Wiles said. “We don’t just show up with all the answers, do we? We know the answer. The answer is Jesus … that’s always the right answer. But we don’t always know the ways, the means by which Christ will be made known. But God does. The important thing for us is that we’re in tune with Him — and that we’re in tune with our communities.”

To accomplish this, churches must know the needs, understand, and study the culture.

“This is really about people, knowing them, spending time with them, listening to them, inviting them in, eating a meal with them, going to their homes,” she said. “In all of this, God creates opportunity.”

She added, “The Spirit of God is already testifying in your community … our greatest strategy is to follow the Spirit of God, and to remember that you are not alone.”

Food to Faith panel

Wiles’ sermon was followed by a panel discussion on BGAV’s Food to Faith initiative, a ministry that blends Impact Missions hunger grants with the community-centered spirit of Fresh Expressions’ Dinner Church model to build relationships, share the gospel, and cultivate faith around the table.

BGAV President Shelton Miles moderated the panel consisting of panelists Shannon Kiser, senior director of Fresh Expressions; Greg LeMaster, liaison with BGAV churches for Dinner Church; and Verlon Fosner, a Seattle pastor and national pioneer in the Dinner Church Collective..

Kiser emphasized the value of moving existing food ministries into intentional Christian communities centered around a “Jesus table,” where those who might not attend a traditional church can feel welcomed and engaged.

LeMaster shared a story about a man with terminal cancer who found faith at a dinner church just before he died. The man’s wife continues to attend, LeMaster said, highlighting how the Dinner Church model can lead to profound life change.

Fosner noted the growing secularism in American culture and said Dinner Church is proving to be an effective way to reach the unchurched and meet their spiritual needs.

“It’s a recognition of doing church for people who are not like us, in a way that they need, not the way we need or maybe even the way that we like,” Fosner said, adding, “There’s something prolific about a table that the early Church understood that we are just now working hard to get back.”

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