Global Outreach Website

Aug 06

All around the world, there are pastors and Christian leaders who are beginning to think differently about what the church could and should be in their community.  There is a growing awareness that effectiveness is not measured by what happens inside the church, but rather by the impact people in their church have in their cities and communities to see community transformation take place through the gospel. Churches are realizing that community transformation doesn’t happen through programs, events or campaigns, but it begins when the church ceases to wait for people to come to her many offerings, and instead builds bridges into the community seeking ways to serve.

An externally focused church is not satisfied with numbers, but focuses on the faith observed through the impact of her members who are being equipped to serve with their specific gifts and skills within the community. Every layperson is seen as a minister qualified to use his skills to serve those around him. The power of the gospel is the combination of both word and deed. Without the deed, the church becomes irrelevant to the community around it.

Such was our story. On Perimeter’s 25^th anniversary, Randy Pope challenged us to “become a church of influence and to turn itself inside out for the least and the lost.” For our first 25 years we had been missing the Hand as a church. We did a pretty good job of the Head and the Heart, but we were uneducated on the needs within a 12 mile in the radius of our church and were not doing a great job of caring for those with significant needs outside of our own doors. Since then God has led us to work with 25 community partners, mobilize thousands of our members for service on an ongoing basis and develop a network of over 125 churches in Atlanta that are focused on serving the city together:  www.uniteus.org

So many churches are like we were, unaware of the needs of their community. We long to see more externally focused churches who research the needs of those around them in order to be able to serve more effectively. In most communities, there are already established organizations who are seeking to serve the least and the lost. An externally focused church looks for existing opportunities to come alongside those who are already serving in the trenches. As they serve, they begin to focus on blessing the community and those who serve it as well as praying for them and their efforts.