Tag Archives: gospel

Sep 13 2010

Can you help raise the dead?


What is your/my church doing in the community, or around the world, that could not be done just as well by a good civic club made up of non-Christians?

I was first challenged by such a question perhaps 30 years ago by the late Dr. J. Vernon McGee, a pastor and radio preacher. The question he asked was something like this. “What is your church doing that could not be done if God was dead?”

Wow! What a question! Questions like those make me a bit uncomfortable, how about you? I believe that for far to many churches the answer would be “Not much”.

For about 14 1/2 years I lived in a small north Texas town. There was one place in town to eat breakfast on Saturday morning, a post office, hardware store, grocery store, police office, and a couple of gas stations. It was one of those little communities where you knew the mayor and the chief of police and most everyone else on a first name basis. Our little town also had Baptist churches, a church of Christ, a Methodist church, a Catholic church, and a Pentecostal church. (There might have been others but I remember those)

We also had an American Legion Post and a VFW club. To be fair, some of the members of those churches were also active in either the VFW or the American Legion. The truth is that those beer guzzling old veterans and their wives did far more benevolent works in our community than all the churches combined. That was true for at least the first 10 years I lived there.

If someone’s house burned it was them, not the church folks who would show up to pitch in and help rebuild and give money for new appliances, furniture and bedding. Those two clubs simply put the churches to shame when it came to actually doing something tangible in the community. Thankfully, because one new pastor came to town who actually loved the people, that changed quickly, first in his church and then it spread to the others.

There is great value in giving a cup of water to a thirsty man in Jesus’ stead. We must do those sorts of things to be right and on track with God. His command is that we remember the down trodden, widows, orphans, and prisoners. Those acts of love are not options.

What then can the church do that a civic club can’t?

Christians, as God’s agents in the world, can offer dead men life!

You see, those men and women who are not Christians have one great need and that need is LIFE! A person who does not have a relationship with God through Jesus Christ does not need better morals, or even to become a regular attender at church on Sunday. No, his needs are far greater than improvement, he a problem only the gospel of Christ can solve.

Non-Christians are spiritually dead.

There is only one remedy for death and that is life. The Apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians said this of those Christians before they trusted Christ and were saved.

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins. (Ephesians 2:1)

But God, being rich in mercy,because of the great love with which he loved us,even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. (Ephesians 2:4,5)

And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him. (Colossians 2:13)

In response to the gospel God makes the dead live.

God’s greatest work is not to make bad men good enough for heaven but to make dead men live. Ephesians 2 above says “God…made us alive together with Christ“. There is no other cure for death. Just as certainly as Jesus called Lazareth from the tomb he calls ungodly men to life today. Jesus said of himself, “I am the resurrection and the life..” and “I am the way, the truth, and the life”.

Jesus himself is eternal life.

Eternal life is not something Jesus gives to repentant sinners outside of himself. There is no spiritual (eternal) life outside of Him. What He gives is Himself. He is LIFE!

And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. (1 John 5:20)

For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans 5:10)

To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. (Colossians 1:27

Feed the poor? YES! Care for the needy? YES! Visit and care for widows, orphans, and prisoners? YES! But we must also be saying to the dead in our communities “LIVE!”.

The gospel of Christ is good news because it announces that Christ has died for you, that God’s righteousness can be yours, and that your body will be changed from mortal to immortality, and you will forever be God’s own dear child. No civic club can do this work. It is reserved for those who by relationship and sonship have become ambassadors for a heavenly kingdom whose orders is to herald the good news “Jesus Saves, Jesus Saves, come and live forever with Him”.

Royce

Aug 30 2010

Social Networking for Jesus


In recent weeks I have had readers visit from about a dozen foreign countries and about 40 states. Amazingly, little ole’ me can type a post here, hit the publish icon with my mouse, and in less than 5 minutes have an email telling me someone from across the world has read my post and made a comment.

Who can imagine what the next decade, or the next 25 years will be like? I have a profile on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and some others. Some of my friends have even more. For about $39 I can do an impressive background check on almost anyone if I know their name, or telephone number, or address, and I can do it in about one minute.

I have enjoyed contacting old classmates and catching up with old friends from places I’ve lived over the last 50 years. I think last time I looked I had something over 700 friends on Facebook. I don’t know most of them but someone I know knows them so they wanted to be my friend. I have no idea why.

So I’m thinking today….just how effective is the social networking platforms for ministry, and more specifically for evangelism. One way to measure this is to compare 2010 to about 80 or 90 A.D.

A group of rag-tag fishermen, a tax collector, a doctor, and other roustabouts started to follow Jesus of Nazareth. He performed miracles, healed the infirm, opened blinded eyes, fed multitudes with a few loaves of bread and a few fish, raised the dead, and preached. His message was against the established religion of the day and he was considered by most of the church crowd to be quite a rebel.

You know the story, Jesus was executed after being convicted in a kangaroo court, and then after being buried for 3 days he was raised from the dead. The resurrection of Jesus was common knowledge in all the near countries in a short time.

These first century evangelists were common men and women who for the most part were uneducated, had very limited training in the Scriptures, didn’t like each other, many of them were dirt poor, yet they turned the world upside down for the cause of Christ. At once after the events of that first Pentecost after Christ’s resurrection the gospel swept across the land like the wind.

No printing presses for flyers or tracts, or Bibles. No telephones, no telegraphs, none of almost everything we take for granted today, and the record shows that those first century Christians were indeed very effective. And, the record is also clear that we are not very effective. Especially in this country we are loosing ground, not holding our own. Some of the sects are recruiting members at much higher rates. Why?

One would think that with all the technology, all the education, all the wealth, we should be blazing with evangelistic zeal. We aren’t.

Maybe we are too comfortable

Cars with nav systems, huge flat screen HDTV’s, cosmetic surgeons, lake houses and club memberships are standard fare for some of us. Even the poorest of us (in the U.S.A.) are rich compared to much of the rest of the world. We are full and happy, and making plans to build bigger barns.

We have no persecution

Severe persecution marked the history of the church for the first several centuries after Christ was raised from the dead. That persecution was the very thing God used to spread the people and thus the message of the good news far and wide. Christ promised it would come, and it did to them, and it turned out to be good for the gospel cause. Maybe we haven’t done anything threatening enough to be persecuted for.

Maybe we are off message

Those earliest gospel heralds preached Jesus, his death, burial, and resurrection. It was the resurrection that stirred up the opposition the most. We preach on it a lot on Easter Sunday but not a lot otherwise. We quote scripture to each other on Facebook and try to one-up each other with pithy quotes on Twitter, but there is precious little gospel out reach on the social platforms I know about.

Maybe we are going and doing in our own power

Jesus said “I have all the power in heaven and on earth and I’ll give it to you”. You go wait until you receive that power and then go be my witnesses and I’ll be with you, you have nothing to fear.” So, this bunch of guys who ran like rabbits before Jesus was crucified, less than two months later were mighty men of God who feared nothing but God. Maybe we should wait before God in prayer until we have that same power for gospel witness.

Maybe we need a new profile

Instead of thinking I’m Bob, a teacher, father, and avid football fan who is a Christian, we should be thinking I’m a Christian who happens to be a teacher, father, and football fan. Maybe a new identity would change our sense of worth and affect our work for Jesus and the gospel. A different profile might result in new priorities.

All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:18-21)

Royce

Aug 25 2010

A new look at an old institution – the Church


Brian Mashburn’s post today reminded me of something I needed to write. Brian’s post is titled “Change how you do church or watch your church die“.

The traditional way we build churches is sort of  a competition. Group “A” will locate a town with no church like their brand in it and they will plant a church there. Then they will try to grow that church, especially numerically. In truth, the goal, even if unspoken, is to be the largest church in town one day. I think its settled that the way success is measured is by Sunday a.m. attendance isn’t it?

Consider a new way.

A congregation wants to evangelize Yourtown, USA.  Three young couples who have been discipled and are mature believes are willing to move to the town to plant a church. So they move, find housing, get jobs, put the kids in school, and start meeting in the living room of one of the couples. The group grows, and soon outgrows the living room. Here is where the story changes.

(Back to Yourtown, USA for a moment. Lets suppose this town has 8 major apartment complexes, 4 large subdivisions, and a large trailer park. There are jobs, a favorable climate, acceptable tax structure, and people are moving in.)

The traditional way, is to begin trying to find a larger space, first to rent, until they get big enough to purchase land and build a building. And many thousands have done just that. In a few years they have lets say 200 solid members.

What if when Bob and Carol’s space becomes too small, they simply start a simultaneous group over at Ted and Alice’s apartment complex, and when that space gets to small they begin another at Bill and Susan’s trailer park meeting room, etc, etc, etc.

You tell me which is more Biblical and a more effective model.

Traditional: In five years there are two hundred members, two services on Sunday and one on Wednesday night. There are Bible classes, the church is supporting foreign missions, people are happy and things are going well. People are members from all over the town, there were 7 baptisms last year and some other families joined whose jobs brought them here. The young church has a full-time preacher, a youth minister, two elders, and a huge mortgage. Pretty typical huh?

Non-Traditional: In five years there are 12 cell churches. Each of them meets weekly for teaching, praying together, communion, worship, and mutual encouragement. Each member of each group lives in the apartment complex, subdivision, trailer park, etc. For instance, Ted and Alice have 9 couples in their group and are about to birth another in a nearby community where a member’s brother and his wife live. Ted and Alice and the other 8 families minister to the people who live in this complex, first, and then to others. When someone has a death in the family these Christians are there with food, a listening ear, baby sitting, money, or whatever help they can give. Ted and Alice and their group try desperately to love the people of that complex in Jesus stead. They will see people who have been loved open to the gospel and the Lord will add to his church.

Twelve small communities are being saturated with Christian love, concern, and modeling life as it should be lived to a watching world. Each of those complexes, subdivisions, and trailer parks are well aware of these good people who want nothing but to love them.

The leaders of the several groups meet once every few weeks to pray for each other and their people, to brainstorm, to plan large group community fairs, picnics, ect where the whole town (and all the groups) can be invited. Three men, who each lead a group, are elders. Any problems that cannot be sorted out by the people themselves is shared with these  three men who decide what is best and right.

Which model is better?

I contend that the very best traditional church, where most of what happens happens inside the “building” can never reach a community as well as the newer model. There is no competition between groups in the new model because when a group gets to about 9 or 10 families (or less) they have already been praying about where to begin a new church. (they are churches you know…) There is no salary to pay, there is no mortgage payment, so guess what? The people have more discretionary dollars to use to help others and support missions.

In my view the new model is an ego crusher. There is no big “I” and little “you”. There is just Christians being salt and light to the people who live near them. They are Christ’s ambassadors to the people they play ball with, bowl with, eat BBQ with, etc.

It might be a new way or the highway!

The attractional model of doing church once worked pretty well. No more in my view. If we don’t find a way, some way, to actually be involved in our neighbors lives with love, and help, and healing, and hope, we are a dying breed. There are some churches, even mega-churches, that are doing a great job of ministering to the communities they serve. They are meeting the needs of the people in tangible ways and making opportunities for gospel conversations. They are rare though, and I think becoming more rare.

I can imagine dozens of house churches all over a city sitting in living rooms, or on back porches, watching a live stream of a man of God teaching the Bible on a big screen TV patched to a computer. What does the future hold? Only God knows. I do know that where ever God’s sheep are that is where the church is, big or small, traditional or non-traditional. Jesus is still building it and until He comes for it, we get to work with him in his mission.

Agape”

Royce

Aug 8 2010

Good News…The War is Over!


A few years ago my wife and I had the pleasure of an extended vacation on the beautiful island of Guam. Guam is the home of Anderson AFB, a large Navy base, and I hear soon, a Marine outpost.

One day we took a day to drive around the island, to meet some native people, sample some native table fare, and see the breath-taking scenery that appears in every direction. As we drove though the countryside, a road side sign caught my attention.

I immediately remembered the story of Shoichi Yokoi, a Japanese soldier who lived for almost 30 years in a cave eating nuts, fruits, rats, snails, etc., and wearing clothing made from tree bark. Mr. Yokoi was imprisoned by his own fears and lack of accurate information. At the end of WWII when the U.S. forces defeated the Japanese and took control of Guam they dropped leaflets saying the hostilities had ended, the Japanese had surrendered, and every Japanese soldier was free to lay down his arms and come out of hiding, the war was over!

Mr. Yokoi believed the leaflets to be American propaganda and was convinced that every Japanese fighting man would live by the Imperial pledge “Never surrender alive”. He was convinced the war was not over, and even if it was he would not surrender. He was discovered by two farmers as he was fishing in the Talofofo River in 1972 and was soon returned to his homeland with a hero’s welcome.

Today as I listened to our preacher talk about the priority of the gospel, (“good news”) I thought of this poor man who had lived in self-imposed slavery because he had not believed the good news when he heard it. I also thought of the tens of millions who have not heard the good news about Jesus and what he has done for them.

As ambassadors of Jesus we are to announce the “good news” far and wide. You see, many people don’t know the war is over. They are not aware that they have been reconciled to God by the death of Jesus. And, most of them don’t understand that they have offended God so that until and unless they believe the good news and appropriate that reconciliation for themselves they stand condemned.

What good news it is to announce that Jesus has set the sinner free! He has borne their sins, died in their place, and offers eternal life and an eternity with Him to all who will believe.

Unfortunately, some will hear the news and refuse to believe it. Some will believe it and receive great blessing by God’s grace. Still others will believe it and yet live in fear that the war is not really over.


For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans 5:10)

19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.
20Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
(2 Corinthians 5:19-21)

Good News…The War is Over !

Agape’
Royce