1. They will be saved

They will come and hear the true Gospel. Hopefully they will be convicted in their unconverted state, and turn to Christ. In our church, we have had some of the nicest, well-washed, homeschooler, family-integrated families come to our church and be saved. They looked so good on the outside, but were dead on the inside. They didn’t even realize it when they came. They realized they were never saved in the first place. They are like millions of evangelicals today. There is a vast ocean of the unconverted who are in churches today. This has happened as a result of false gospels and a revivalistic evangelistic technique that reduces salvation to praying a prayer, walking an aisle, or embracing principles. After hearing the preaching and relating to true believers, they realize that they were only involved in a lifestyle.

2. They will be driven away

There are many nomads in conservative Christianity. Some of them have never loved the church, its ordinances, its gatherings, and the authority it brings into their lives. the just like to hang on the periphery of true Christianity. This is mostly because they are unconverted. I am not speaking of people who leave a church for legitimate reasons. I am referring to people who cannot tolerate normal biblically ordered church life with it’s commitments, relationships, authority, discipline, and rhythms that characterize a true church. It is too constraining for them. But, when they come to your church, they will hear the preaching and they will begin to see what it means to be a true church. They will receive the counsels of the elders of the church, and they will see that they really don’t like the church all that much. Eventually, they will leave. They will most likely depart and find another church where they can hang on the periphery. They may love their new church because they can remain anonymous. And, because they don’t want anything to pinch their style they will most likely leave. There are many who need to be driven away in order to show who they really are – not part of the Church of Jesus Christ.

3. They will be enfolded.

Some of these people will come to your church and rise up to be blessed members. They are true Christians and they need to be part of a church. They need to learn how to be totally enfolded into the life of a local church. They need to make the church the center of all of their lives. As they will grow there will most likely be transitions in their thinking. They are being sanctified. They need your church. It will change their lives. Plus, you need them as well. Their prayers, gifts, and service will become part of the discipleship journey of your whole church. Ephesians 4:11-16 declares the beauty of this:

"And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head--Christ--from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love."

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