Bob Norsworthy #2

Repurposing Companies.

One of the biggest lessons that I've learned about Transformation: The heart of transformation is alignment. Alignment with the things of God.

We teach business leaders that their company can have a transformative power just as much as an individual life can. Corporations have a life as well. When corporations are aligned they can have a winsome transformative power.

How can we bring that transformation to impact society? This can happen when a critical mass of leaders are aligned with the truth of God's word.

This is not common in most places around the world.

Transformation can happen in a minute: Can a nation be born in a day? Isaiah 66:8

The answer is yes. A life can be transformed in a moment.

But transformation is also a long term process when we are talking about an entire sphere of society.

Worldviews have changed nations: Marxism, Christianity, Secularism

Ideas permeate the arts, media, government.

Matthew 11:12 The kingdom of God is taken by force

Quote from Jay Lorenzen's Blog: http://onmovements.com/?p=91

Movement Building and Training

I ran across the following quote from Bill Allison of Cadre Ministries.

On September 11, 2001, a small band of extremely well-trained men changed the world as we know it. These men were not just well taught. These were not your run-of-the-mill religious folk. No these men really were “fully devoted disciples” of their religious sect. They did not just know about their beliefs—they did not just know about how to execute their evil mission. They were intentionally, proactively, and systematically trained to carry out their mission with precise detail and timing. These men were scrupulously trained physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. In the end, it was not their superior intelligence, abilities, weaponry, or money that equipped them to take the world’s most powerful nation by surprise. It was their masterful training—as evil as that training was. It was their fastidious training that enabled them to disregard the strongest of human drives—self-preservation—so they could die for their evil cause. And though they were small in number—just nineteen of them—they changed our world forever. These men were a true “cadre”—for evil—and should be a constant and painful reminder that—for good or evil…Training makes all the difference! — Bill Allison of Cadre Ministries

People live and breath in the market place. This is the primary place

Society Wide Transformation

Work is a pre-fall calling

• God worked
• Adam and Eve worked pre-fall
• Abraham , the father of the faith, did good business
• Most of the prophets had self-funding ministries

• The New Testament
• Was founded in the marketplace
• Spread along known trade routes and in major commercial cities
• Spoke to practical matters of everyday life
• Was not dichotomized in its thinking
• The Nestorians followed suite
• Ministered along the Silk Road
• Held high positions in business and
• Many were effective marketplace ministers
• William Carey, Founder of modern missions
• Late 17th Century
• Wrote a handbook on missions
• Founded the London Missionary Society
• First missionary to India
• Radical impact on that nation
• Who influence Carey?
• A thread from John Huss in the 1500's
• Through the French Huguenots
• To Moravia
• The lands of a wealthy young man in Germany
• Count Von Zinzendorf
• Painting: This he did for you what will you do for him
• Radical Transformation August 13 1727
• Squabbling Christians - United communities
• Disagreement - Brotherly agreement
• Inward focus - outward focus
• Religiousness - 24 hour prayer chain that was unbroken for over 100 years
• How to live in community - How to reach and transform the nations.
• Applied pragmatist thinking to the Herrnhutt community
• Prayer triplets and accountability groups
• Business as mission
• Looking for God to bring transformation
• A slave from St. Thomas
• Pleaded for believer to com to St. Thomas
• Inspired Zinzendorf
• Many nations followed
• Greenland
• Suriname
• US
• And south Africa
• They viewed business as ministry
• The missions trading company founded on Jan 9th 1859
• "Commercial activity… is an effective helpmate in order to prepare the way for Christianity. The useful activity of labor will be a strong influence in preparing to win people over to the truth of the gospel, especially prepared by the new ethical standards presented herein"
• Lessons from the Moravians
• Every missionary is a business person

• Many today are talking about transforming societies
• "Societal transformation is high on God's agenda and the catalytic force to bring it about will be Christians ministering in the marketplace": C. Peter Wagner

 

• Once anointed, we are to use our job as a ministry vehicle to transform the marketplace so that the gospel will be preached to and heard by every creature in our sphere of influence Ed Silvoso, Anointed for Business
• Graham, Barna, etc.
• Carey and friends believed societies could be changed
• Carey faced tremendous opposition
• Charles Grand: business person and author of… "Observations on the State of Society
• Carey had a long-term systematic approach
• No quick fix
• Grounded
• Realistic
• The bigger challenge: Worldview
• More than a missionary, qualified in many other fields

• God is beginning to break down the false identities to a triad: Pastors, Para-church, business people. We need to be strategic about synergy of all of them.
  
• If Carey could see the Marketplace now…
• People who want to mix God and business are rebels on several fronts. They reject the centuries-old American conviction that spirituality is a private matter. They challenge religious thinkers who disdain business as an inherently impure pursuit. They disagree with business people who say that religion is unavoidably divisive -Fortune magazine
• Business Week Magazine, Nov 1999: Today, a spiritual revival is sweeping across corporate America…
• Will we rise to the challenge to…
• Renew our own thinking?
• Think bigger than our small span of influence
• Attempt great things for God. Expect great things from God - William Carey