An Interview with Centurions Director Martha Anderson

Recently, Jimmy Davis, pastor and graduate of the 2006 Centurions Program, interviewed Martha Anderson, national director of BreakPoint’s Centurions Program, to help pastors and church leaders learn more about the Centurions movement.

Jimmy Davis: Martha, what is the Centurions Program?

Martha Anderson: The Centurions Program is a distance learning and networking experience that equips Christians to think “Christianly” in order to apply biblical truth to all of life by engaging and shaping culture out of a biblical framework.

Around 100 men and women are selected each year to participate in the program and are trained through an intense combination of rigorous reading assignments, teleconferences, three weekend residencies here in Virginia, worldview devotionals, weekly newsletters, monthly meetings with accountability and prayer partners, and a thriving online forum that supports a free-flowing exchange of ideas and experiences.

Program participants who complete the first year of intensive training and meet the requirements for certification are commissioned and sent out to their churches, communities, and cultural spheres of endeavor to put their training into action by teaching others and living out their faith.

Jimmy: I found it to be an effective worldview training experience.

Martha: But as you know, Jimmy, the Centurions Program is more than a training experience. It has become a growing movement of Christians (not just pastors) from around the country who have been equipped to understand their faith not just as a personal relationship with Jesus or as a religious system, but as a framework for understanding and viewing all of life. Program participants sharpen their biblical knowledge, critical thinking skills, and communication skills so that they can engage and educate others articulately, knowledgeably, and appealingly. And with guidance from faculty, staff and other participants, they will begin to form a strategy to teach others to do the same.

Jimmy: Many of our readers are pastors and other church leaders. How would completing the Centurions Program enhance a pastor’s personal and ministry growth?

Martha: From what Centurion pastors like you tell me, the program equips them for ministry and service in ways a seminary education never did, not just in terms of the actual content presented, but in the way we encourage program participants to view discipleship, ministry, service, and teaching. Our dean, T. M. Moore, reminds us from the beginning of the program that “we are not teaching biblical worldview; we are teaching people,” and that “the goal of our instruction is love.”

The goal of our program, therefore, is not to dump a bunch of content into someone’s brain so they can then spew it back out to others and sound really smart. Our aim is to see people lovingly transformed from the inside out, to so inculcate them in biblical truth, and in how and why those truths matter in daily living, that it seeps into their mind, heart, and soul and transforms the way they think, feel, and behave.

If a pastor can grasp this for his own life and then begin to live it, preach and teach it, and shepherd and disciple others in this way, think of what that would mean for the Church today. It would radically transform families, workplaces, communities and schools as Christians begin to be the Church, to think and act “Christianly.”

Jimmy: You seem to be quite passionate about this, Martha. Besides the fact that this is your job, why are you so enthusiastic about the Centurion’s Program?

Martha: Because I can’t help but wonder: Without an understanding of what a biblical worldview is and why it matters; without a greater knowledge of our role and purpose as Christ’s agents on earth; and without the resulting desire to live accordingly; are we somehow missing out on “real Christianity”?

I was a Christian for 35 years, thoroughly grounded in Scripture, highly involved in church and para-church ministry, a student in numerous Bible studies and discipleship programs, and yet the choices and decisions I made in daily life, the way I viewed and treated people and used my time, money, and body, reflected more of the world’s values and perspectives than God’s. Why? I think it was because I looked at faith mostly from the perspective of my personal relationship with Jesus—church as a place to socialize, be fed and serve; prayer as a conversation with (or mostly monologue to) God to thank Him, intercede for others, and ask Him to meet my needs; and ministry as a service to God and others.

But none of it was placed into the context of God’s eternal perspective, or in Kingdom terms, or in light of Church history and my place and purpose in it. I bought into much of the “therapeutic, moralistic deism” that is so pervasive in our culture. As a result, I think I had a very narrow, limited, and ultimately self-centered faith—an incomplete understanding of how Christianity is more than a relationship with Jesus, more than a philosophical system or framework. It’s both and more. And by gaining a deeper understanding of who God is, what His plan for all of creation and eternity is, how we fit into it, and how His truth ultimately conforms to reality and the other “isms” of the world do not, we become more loving people, more powerful witness, more faithful disciples.

So though as Christians we recite the Apostles Creed, pray (and earnestly mean) the prayer of repentance and salvation, and proclaim Jesus as our Savior and God as our Father, and read the Bible and memorize Scripture and pray and try to obey the Ten Commandments, often we don’t stop and think through the full measure and scope of the biblical narrative—of the implications of Creation, the Fall, Redemption, and Restoration for how we live today and look toward the future. We think in terms of “God and me” here and now, and not with a Kingdom perspective. A biblical worldview puts that narrative into perspective, and helps us to see our role and purpose in advancing the Kingdom in relationship to God and others. And that perspective can turn the world upside down.

The Centurions Program helps equip Christians to understand the “why” behind what we believe—to look at how the Bible answers the key questions of the meaning and purpose of life, our relationship with God and with others, and as a result to get a greater vision for how we are to be God’s ambassadors in our everyday life. In other words, it helps Christians get a fully orbed view of what it means to be a disciple of Christ, and to then connect the dots between what we say we believe and why, and how to apply those principles to daily decisions and actions. And a biblical worldview equips us to fulfill both the Great Commission and the Cultural Commission—to make disciples, and to take all of creation under the dominion of God.

Jimmy: Only about 20 percent of the people in my Centurions class were full-time pastors, the rest were business men and women, educators, artists, stay-at-home moms, and others. Many were folks like you, lay leaders who had a desire to serve more effectively. Others were people who may not have had leadership roles in the church but wanted to grow in their own understanding of the biblical worldview. Let's talk about how this program would encourage and equip those two groups of people. First, how would church lay leaders (elders, deacons, Sunday school teachers, small group leaders, youth workers, choir members, etc.) benefit from this program?

Martha: The benefits in terms of the transformed life of the individual are the same no matter what one’s role is in the church. I think it’s imperative, though, that leaders in the church grasp a biblical perspective on issues like leadership, service, ministry, discipleship, caring for the poor and the widow, and raising and teaching children, so that they can be more effective leaders. Decisions about what and how to teach Christian education for adults and children; what the purpose of “youth group” really is; gaining a deeper understanding of God’s perspective on the arts and music and how to incorporate them into the life of the church; how to love and care for those in the congregation who are suffering, or lonely, or struggling with unconfessed or besetting sins; or finding ways to be salt and light in one’s community—all of these areas have the potential for change once someone begins to develop a biblical life and worldview.

Jimmy: How would the second group, the “average Joe-or-Jane-in-the-pew” benefit from this course of study?

Martha: The lay person will benefit in from the program in sometimes unexpected ways. It’s interesting. We find that a number of people initially apply for the program for the opportunity to spend time with Chuck Colson, or for the chance to learn from our various teachers like T. M. Moore, Ken Boa, and others.

But what Centurions consistently name as the key benefits, after going through their first year of training, is the confidence they gained to winsomely engage people from diverse backgrounds and faiths, and the network of like-minded people they begin to collaborate and share resources with.

For instance, many of them have been wrestling with issues related to the integration of faith with life and work and don’t know others who are asking the same questions. They know there seems to be no coherence between what say they believe and how they live, but don’t know why or how to change it. Through the online forum and weekend residencies, they meet other Christians who are approaching life and faith in similar ways, who share similar vision and mission for how to apply their faith in their families and churches and jobs and communities.

I think the greatest benefit though, is the confidence that program participants gain in their ability to understand and articulate their beliefs or faith so that they can winsomely and genuinely engage other people in conversations about faith. They begin to have real compassion and love for people who may be coming from very different places in their understanding of faith. For instance, many Christians are in a profession or environment where they have a lot of interaction with people from other cultures or faiths, but they feel completely inadequate to have faith conversations with them—or maybe even to have any conversations with them—and may avoid developing relationships with others.

Jimmy: Martha, thanks for taking the time to give us this inside look at the Centurions movement. Would you give us a brief summary of what the Centurions Program offers pastors and their people?

Martha: The Centurions Program gives participants:

• a confident understanding of orthodox Christianity.
• conversational tools for engaging friends, co-workers, and complete strangers about spiritual beliefs in a winsome and loving way.
• a community of like-minded believers to learning, loving and living out faith together.
• a road map for living out an authentic faith in a relativistic, postmodern world.
• opportunities to influence and transform the Church, communities, and culture

Worldview Church » September 2008

Jimmy Davis is associate editor of Worldview Church and pastor of Riverside Church in Knoxville, Tenn.