The truth is that churches exists to meet the spiritual needs of the congregation and community – to build spiritually fit followers of Jesus who are on God’s redemptive mission, whatever industry or arena they inhabit out in the “real world.”  If you’re a layman, the church exists to serve you.  But that doesn’t mean that, aside from our tithes and volunteer hours, we don’t have anything of value to offer back.

In American today, we need more citizens who are both willing and able to pull their own weight.  We don’t need to look to the government to save us, we get to participate in the government process.  We don’t need big businesses to save the economy, we can build up the businesses we’re in or start our own.  And while our churches and para-church organizations provide us with spiritual leadership, guidance, and environments, we also have a spiritual contribution to make.

It’s time for Christian laymen to pull their own spiritual weight – and then a little extra.

We pull our spiritual weight when we accept the responsibility to read and apply the Word of God for ourselves.  (Christian laymen like Johannes Gutenberg invested their lives to give other laymen the ability to access God’s Word for themselves).  We pull our spiritual weight when we raise families that know God’s ways and follow them – something no one else can do for us.  We pull our spiritual weight when we contribute in our local church and take the initiative to walk alongside those who are younger in their faith – instead of just passing them off to the full-time staff.  We pull our spiritual weight when we are a light for Christ in our personal and professional communities, communities that church staff doesn’t have the same access to.  And we pull our spiritual weight when we contribute our testimonies and insights for the encouragement and inspiration of others as well – not to replace those of our church leaders, but to complement them.

That is the purpose of this blog: to provide spiritual encouragement and inspire others to share as well.  We’ve all got something that only we can contribute, whether we get paid to be a Christian or not.

Will you join me?

If you’re a Christian layman, like I am, you may feel that you have something to add to the discussion on church, life, and following Jesus even though you didn’t go to seminary and don’t work for a church.  I feel the same way!  I go to an unbelievable church, National Community Church in Washington, DC with unbelievable leaders.  But regular people with regular jobs and lives, people like you and me, can still take the initiative to pull our own spiritual weight – and then a little extra – for the benefit of those around us.  That’s what spiritual leadership is all about.  You’ll hear more about this in the Christian Layman’s Manifesto.

I’ll be posting a couple of times a month.  If you haven’t already done so, I encourage you to subscribe via email or RSS.  That way my posts will be automatically delivered to your inbox.  I’ll also be sending notices out from my Twitter account.

It means a lot to engage with my readers via the comments section below each post, so let me know what you think, especially if you found something of value.  Feel free to share my posts, or to share your posts – or others – with me.  And please do feel free to contact me and let me know what topics would be most helpful for you to read about.

There’s so much work to do.  Let’s do it together!

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, speaker, and thought leader. To learn more about his services, visit NathanMagnuson.com/consulting or follow him on Twitter.