To Follow Jesus - Prison Fellowship

re: T. M. Moore: "...We’ve been seeking crowds, not disciples. We’ve considered every possible means of getting the most people into our buildings and keeping them there, and we’ve attracted people on the basis of mere self-interest, so that what we have are congregations ecstatic to belong to some place that, in the name of the Lord, takes their self-interest as seriously as they do. /I wonder what would happen if we ever began seeking disciples? Would the crowds turn on us with as much vehemence and vengeance as they did on Jesus? /Or might we be surprised to see some, perhaps many, step forward, like convicted Isaiahs, saying, “Here am I; send me”? My own sense is that church people are weary of status quo Christianity, whether that status quo is of the traditional church, dying on the vine, or the contemporary church that is merely contemporary and not much church. People want to be challenged to lay down their lives, to nurture passionate, exclusive love for Jesus through prayer and devotion to His Word. The world is all superficial and self-centered. Shouldn’t the church be something else? Something solid, profound, deeply mystical, altogether other-worldly, and devoted to loving God and neighbor no matter the cost?..."...