10/06/26 A REFLECTION AND A DIRECTION
Here is another view I used to have concerning possible church ministry planting.
I used to think how cool it would be to buy old motels across the country (with or without restaurants) and use them for Christian ministries, such as church facilities, Christian camps, training centers and schools. The motels of the early 1900s were often small and had a warm and welcoming personality. Those locations, being near, but not in the middle of a busy area, would allow folks to focus on their relationships with God, family and other spiritual realities.
Maybe I thought about this because my dad managed a couple of motels when I was very young. The motel near Wilmington, N.C. had a restaurant. We lived in a house on the same property as the Motor Court and Restaurant, so I spent a lot of time where the people gathered. I was in the first grade, but I interacted with the restaurant workers and the travelers. When I came home from school, I would go into the restaurant and order up anything I wanted to eat or drink. My friend's group included the cafe staff and the constant flow of new acquaintances. It was a strange life, but it was an adventure for a young boy. I remember one preacher who stopped while on his travels. I was around 6 or 7 years old and had been called by God to be a preacher, so I was interested in talking to him. The thing that stood out to me was his familiarity with his Bible. It was as if you could mention any Bible reference and he could turn within a few pages of that passage immediately.
In those days it was a really nice motel in Coral Gables, Florida (near Miami). It did not have a restaurant, but we lived in the "Manager's Quarters" attached to the Motel Office. This was cool, because we would sit outside of the office with motel guests in the evenings, near the sidewalk and facing the Boulevard, enjoying the location in the 1950s Coral Gables. I remember one particular night a lady was walking her pet on a leash. The pet was either a Cheetah or a Jaguar. WOW, THAT WAS COOL FOR A 7 or 8 year old.
As a very young child, I enjoyed meeting people, sitting around listening to the travelers share their stories. This was an important part of my early exposure to cultural differences and an education in communicating with adults of various backgrounds. If my parents had been saved (converted believers and followers of Christ) then the conversations would have been much more important and meaningful.
As I said earlier, I thought that old motels would have been great places to have a local ministry and a great way to spread that ministry to other locations. Later in my ministry years I think I saw that someone had done something along these lines.
However, as the years went by, I saw that there is a price to pay when a ministry allows any human entity to take the place of Jesus as the only Head of His Church. Local ministries often surrender the Headship of their church to the State, to a Denomination, to Carnal Church Leaders, to Financial Supporters, to Local Governments, HOA's, Community Pressures, zoning codes. Sometimes the rule of the church is challenged by some of these groups, even when the pastor and congregation is determined to follow and obey God. This is a worldwide problem that we are starting to face in America.
There comes a time when worldly oppression exerts pressure and persecutes an obedient body of believers. Many of today's local churches walked into the devil's trap blindly, and they lost the ability to serve God as fully and freely as they intended. I have tried to learn how to serve God without making a contract with anyone or any institution that will try to usurp God's authority and Christ's Headship of His own church. Making great investments in properties that can become controlled by the unsaved can become a counter-productive endeavor.
State intrusion and oppression of Chrisitan lives, families, ministries will increase in our future (as we have seen it in other countries). We will not see the kingdom until the King comes back, and we cannot avoid the persecution by a darkened society, but we can be as bold as lions, as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves. We will not hide our faith in the face of the oppressor, but we do not need to hand the keys to the enemy. We need to ask God to show us the godly way to fight the good fight of faith, assault the gates of hell, without being entangled in the affairs of this life, until we are called home.
