All of these posts are a part of the 40 days portion of the 40/10 Initiative. The 40 days are preparing ourselves for the great celebration of Easter. The 10 days that follow will be about letting those around us know about the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Read these following words from Tom Mercer, pastor of the 11,000 member High Desert Church as you think about who you can share Jesus with:
"Jesus commissioned us to reach the lost, and He both modeled and taught a strategic formula that would facilitate that great endeavor. Throughout the New Testament, when God's Spirit changed a life, a world-changer was born. Whether it was a demon-possessed man, a swindler named Zacchaeus, a royal official with a dying son, a tax collector named Matthew, a Centurion named Cornelius, a businesswoman named Lydia, or a recently unemployed Philippian jailor, they all were sent back home to their oikos. Oikos, the Greek word for "extended family," encompasses our relational worlds—anywhere from eight to fifteen people, on the average, whom God has supernaturally and strategically placed in our spheres of influence. And, if those relationships frame our primary evangelistic targets, then that reality must frame our primary ministry strategies for the church.
Our mission is simple—not easy, but simple. Christians who believe that it's their job to witness to everybody usually don't witness to anybody. But when believers, representing any generation or culture, come to understand their specific evangelistic assignment, oikos becomes the great equalizer in any church—the simplest, yet most important common denominator in any ministry. It doesn't matter how good-looking or unattractive you think you might be. It doesn't matter how tall you are or how short you are. It doesn't matter if you have money or if you're flat broke. Your ethnicity, theological background, language, and age don't matter either. We all have eight to fifteen people whom God has supernaturally and strategically placed in our extended families, our relational worlds. We are all Christ's partners in world-change.
Oikos is not an evangelism program. It is essentially a worldview, a paradigm through which a Christ-follower evaluates life, its purpose and events. Not only is the oikos formula not new to the Church, it's not new to yours. The overwhelming majority of the people in any local church came to Christ through an oikos relationship. I've asked the question of countless groups through the years, across America and in other cultures: "If you were to isolate the primary vehicle that God used to draw you to Himself, how many would say that it was someone in your oikos?" Virtually everyone raises a hand—and most of the ones who don't raise a hand didn't understand the question!"
(If you didn't understand these paragraphs, I encourage you to re-read them and ask the Holy Spirit to open your mind.)
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