Photo by CHEC Pro
This week I had the opportunity to meet up with various people. It is always good to connect with people on a regular basis. One in meeting in particular was notably a blessing to me. I met up with a pastor of an international church here in Jakarta. In fact, I have met up with him a few times over the last year in my visits Indonesia.
There is something refreshing about being around people who have a Kingdom mindset. I use this term, “Kingdom mindset” to describe someone who understands some basic principles:
2) They understand that having a magnanimous heart for seeing other churches succeed is a big win for God and the whole team.
3) They understand that other churches are on the same team all trying to fight the same enemy.
4) They understand that being more concerned about God’s reputation is far more important than protecting their own reputation.
5) They understand that when God blesses them it is so that they can be a blessing to others.
6) They understand that it doesn’t matter who receives the credit, just as long as one more person enters into heaven.
Whenever I meet people who are antithetical to the above principles, I usually want to end the meeting quickly. There is a major difference in being the presence of a big-hearted person and a small-hearted person. The small-hearted person sucks the life out of you (it gets harder to breathe the more they talk), while a big-hearted person pumps energy into you.
It was sad to hear that in Indonesia there aren’t too many churches that have this kind of Kingdom-minded attitude towards one another. In reality, a lot of churches are all doing their own thing and trying their best to protect what they have currently.
But there is hope because God left a remnant of people in Jakarta who have this mindset; and they want to work together to bring the Gospel to the whole nation.
As soon as a person comes to the realization that they can make a bigger splash for God’s Kingdom if many people are all jumping in the pool at the same time, they will stop trying to build their own kingdom (small “k”) and start building God’s Kingdom (big “K”).
I am looking forward to an informal meeting that some of these Kingdom-minded pastors have set up. It is going to be exciting to see all the great things that God is going to do as we join our hearts together.