Recharge Your Relationships

I read a tragic story this week.

Man Forced To Watch Concerts With His Own Eyes

Tragedy of the greatest sort.

Recharge.

The idea is that something has to stop in your life, so you can connect to something more important. And if you connect to the right things, you will recharge your whole life. Because let's be honest, you won’t properly recharge your life on a diet of constant activity. Something has to stop. Meaning you have to take a hard look at your schedules and the activities that fill your day and choose to stop things.

Stopping is always hard. It is difficult to cut out something that is enjoyable, or good, or harmless. We all fight with just cramming a little more into our already busy lives rather than stopping something when we add something. But when I talk about recharging certain areas of our lives, I am not talking about adding more to our already crammed full lives. What I am proposing is freeing up space for something better. The challenge is to stop. Stop something good, to invest in something better. Because you won’t properly recharge your life on a diet of constant activity. 

Stop. Connect. Recharge. 

Something in your life has to stop, so you can connect, to recharge.

Robert Banks, in his book, All the Busyness of Life, notes:
"While American society is rich in goods, it is extremely time-poor. Many societies in the two-thirds world, by contrast, are poor in material possessions, by our standards, but they are rich in time. They are not driven or hurried. They live with a sense that there is adequate time to do what needs to be done today."

In other words, while we have lots of things, and many of those things are intended to help productivity and make our lives easier, we end up having very little spare time. We wind up spending our time on the wrong things, and we live lives, despite all the blessings we are surrounded with, less fulfilled than those who have way less than us.

And because we are so busy, our relationships suffer. So this week to follow up our two messages that focused on connecting with God through our prayer life and Bible study, I am proposing a third key element to connecting with God - our relationships with others. We have to stop and slow down in order to connect with others and live a recharged life with God.

The early church did this.

And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. Acts 2:42 (ESV)

Jesus taught us to live lives of loved toward each other:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.  By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:34-35 (ESV)

And Paul instructed us to also invest in others:

Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.  Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,  who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,  but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. Philippians 2:4-7 (ESV)

There are so many passages in the Bible dealing with this subject. I will read just one more. This one is from John:

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.  Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.  In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. 1 John 4:7-12 (ESV)

In order to have this life with others, we have to take something out of our lives. We have to free up space and time to live lives of love and live in healthy relationships with others. God made us to be in healthy relationships with others. Yet that isn't happening. The church is not doing a good job of modeling that. We -- those who should be examples to the world of life in Jesus -- are missing out on that for which we were made and our example is more like a light hidden, salt ruined, and a city decimated.

Let's start with talking about one of the core relationships in our society, our family. A lot of families are not ideal. But no matter what situation we find ourselves in with our family, God wants us to live a life of love in it. Many of us find ourselves on the other side of events and decisions that have taken us away from the ideal family. But don't lose hope. God starts from where you are at and works on you to be where he wants you to be. So we have to stop something we enjoy. Something that is probably good and taking our time, in order to invest that time in our families and be the family God wants us to be.

And then we connect. We connect by...

Reevaluating our family - Where should our family be heading.

Rethinking our role in the family  - What can I do to get our family there.

Reinvesting our time in our family. This is where we just be who we know we should be.

This is the recharging process. You connect to the power source by reevaluating, rethinking, and reinvesting. Then we will be recharged, living in the life God wants us to live.

We start this recharged life by first working on our relationship with God through prayer and Bible study, then it spirals into our relationship with our family. From there, it spirals even further to our relationships with co-workers, neighbors, friends, and others that we encounter throughout the day.

All too often Christians want to be friends with people just to win them to the Lord. When the person doesn't come to the Lord, the Christian then moves on to the next project to try and win them to the Lord. This is not true friendship. This is not love. This is manipulation.

Instead, I want us to rethink evangelism in three ways.

One, evangelism starts with you being right with God. The first two steps of our Recharge series are essentials to evangelism. You have to be praying and reading your Bible.  Through those processes, the Holy Spirit will transform your life.

Two, evangelism is less about getting them to make a commitment to follow Jesus and about you showing them God's love. See, you can only control one of those two actions. You can't control whether a person makes a commitment to follow Jesus, but you can make a decision to show others God's love. So focus on the thing you can control. You and your love. And allow the Holy Spirit to work in the things you can't control.

Three, be seriously committed to your local church. 

The church plays a tremendous role in maturing disciples, helping new Christians get more Christian friendships, and encouraging each other serve God through good works. And if you're not involved, when you reach people, they won't be involved either. And the likelihood of a serious, life-changing faith sticking decreases.

The church is out of vogue these days in many circles. And many sincere people are claiming to follow Jesus outside of the church. Yet this is not what God designed us for. The writer of Hebrews wrote:

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works,  not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. Hebrews 10:24-25 (ESV).

The best way to evangelize is to actually be what you should be and to rely on the Holy Spirit to make up for your failings and to do the things that you can't do.

And then just be a great friend and blessing to the community you live in. Don't isolate yourself. Isolation is the exact opposite of evangelism. And when we isolate ourselves and still try to evangelize, we start taking the sniper approach to evangelism, launching gospel grenades at others. This would be where you just go into a conversation, drop a Jesus bomb, and think you have shared the gospel. This is not evangelism.

Be in your community, be active in your workplace, be active in your neighborhood, and be prepared to tell others why you are a Christian and why you go to church. This is evangelism. The Apostle Peter says that people will ask us for the reason we have the hope we have because we are living differently. If we don't know the answer - why we have the hope we have? Why are we following Jesus? Your story and your reasons - then we won't be able to share the gospel with words when the opportunity arises. And when we aren't living a different life in the midst of the lost, then we won't have these opportunities.

The Gospel is us living as God wants us to live. Living amongst the world but not like the world. The Gospel isn't just a witty five sentences or four steps or a five-finger message. The Gospel is a Spirit-filled life lived out with other believers among the world yet not of the world.

So we must be a blessing to the community and our friends if we want the Gospel we share to be heard.

We often look for a quick fix. One that doesn't require me being passionate for Jesus. One that doesn't require some sacrifice on my part. We want a program to implement. A phrase to use. A persuasive argument. But that isn't the way the Gospel will spread. It will spread through us living the lives we are called to live, not in isolation, but in the midst of our community. In healthy relationships with our family, with our church, and with the people around us. The Gospel will flourish in our community when we let the Gospel flourish among us.

We need to rediscover friendship in a community of isolation, fear, and selfishness.

Be a friend who tells the truth.

Be a friend who encourages and builds up.

Be a friend who guides.

Be a friend who is there through thick and thin.

Jackie Robinson was the first black person to play in the major leagues. When breaking baseball’s color barrier, he faced jeering crowds in every stadium. Opposing players would stomp on his feet and kick him.

While playing one day in his home stadium in Brooklyn, he made an error. The fans began to ridicule him. He stood at second base, humiliated, while the fans jeered. Then, shortstop Pee Wee Reese came over and stood next to him. He put his arm around Jackie Robinson and faced the crowd. The fans grew quiet. Robinson later said that arm around his shoulder saved his career. (Jackie Robinson illustration adapted from Sermon Central).

We need to be friends, even to the ones that society thinks is the least of those among us. We need to go into our friendships and ask what we can do to make our friends' lives better. If we want the gospel to be heard, then we need to live in a way worthy of someone hearing what we believe.

About 100 years ago there was a child, Walter, who loved to draw. Walter's parents did not really praise him for this. But Walter’s aunt encouraged him by buying him drawing pads and pencils. Walter also had a neighbor, “Doc” Sherwood, who encouraged his talent. The neighbor “hired” Walter to draw pictures of his horse when Walter was only 7 years old. Doc Sherwood and his wife told Walter how wonderful his drawings were. Of course, you all know what became of Walter. Walt Disney grew up to bring us Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and a host of other characters, theme parks, and lots of fun. He won 22 Oscars for his beloved Disney cartoons and movie productions, more than any single person. A little encouragement can go a long way. (Adapted from Paul and Barnabas).

Being a friend is about us putting into a relationship, not about getting something out of it. Stop trying to get something out of every relationship. Instead, focus on putting something into it. And then you will find that you are getting more out of it than ever before.

This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.  You are my friends if you do what I command you.  No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.  These things I command you, so that you will love one another. John 15:12-17 (ESV)

Developing the community God wants isn't about a genius developing a great concept to create community. There has been community happening for thousands of years. And we seem to have forgotten how to experience it.

Developing the community God wants us to have isn't about a stroke of luck. It's about us actually striving and struggling. Breaking through the difficult moments and seeing the beauty God has intended for us.

We have to practice community until we have it. Through God's strength our church can be a real, authentic community in a society of isolation. We can be an example of the kingdom of God, an example of the gospel life.

We have to allow God to build us into a church where real relationships flourish, where people are encouraged to pursue their dreams, where people are given a hand up when they are down, and where we see the glory of God here on earth as we will in heaven.

If a church is unhealthy, it's not the programs. It's never the programs. It's the church is filled with people who don't have a right relationship with God and/or a right relationships with people. They are just going through the motions. That is not the plan God has for us. He wants us to have life and have it abundantly, not just in some far off heavenly future; he wants us to have it now. Here among the dirt. Here among the pain. Here among the suffering. Here among love. Being real. Being genuine. Being sacrificial. 

If we master these things - having a healthy family life and a healthy life with others - we will have a healthy church life.

Let me reread that passage from Hebrews:

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works,  not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. Hebrews 10:24-25 (ESV)

The one thing that we can't do on our own is encourage one another. We can't be the church while living in isolation.That is why we aren't supposed to stop gathering together. And it says here that we are to encourage one another in love and good works.

So many people are turned off by the church because of the people, people like you and me. Either they think that we are judgmental or hypocritical. But imagine a place where you could be honest about your struggles and where others were too? Imagine a place where people accepted you for who you were, but they also challenged you to get better? That is church.

Authenticity. Transparency. Being real. Those are difficult concepts in a small town.

Small towns disappointingly master at only knowing each other superficially. Yet being just that is the witness our town needs. Real, authentic, and transparent radical followers of Jesus. Not isolated or holed up. But living within the community. Living together as brothers and sisters in Jesus. Living the life God wants us to live. That is the church. That is the church Antwerp needs. That is the church the world needs.

But this just won't happen by accident. You have to take something out of your life to add something into your life.

So we must change. We must stop things that are keeping us from prayer, Bible Study, from gathering together, and loving those around us in our family and wherever else we may find ourselves. Those are the most important things in your life. And when you connect to them, you will be recharged into who God made you to be.

If we just focus on prayer, we won't be grounded. If we just focus on the Bible, we will become legalistic. If we just focus on relationships, we will become a social club. But if we do all three, we will be the church used by God to change lives. To bring His will here on earth as it is in heaven. And that is really what we all want in the depth of our soul. God's will here on earth as it in heaven. That's our prayer. And we must change to make it our reality.

Hands and Feet

We are to be Jesus’ hands and feet. That takes a different tone on Good Friday.

Your faith in Jesus was made real to you by others. The only way that the people in your neighborhood are going to have a faith made real in their life is because you choose or someone else chooses to be that other to them. We need to be that person in their life who is proclaiming a different way to live. We must surrender ourselves and become that other to others that someone once was to you. We must become Jesus’ hands and feet.

Just over a month ago, I was in Liberia on a short-term mission trip. Our neighborhoods are not going to be the recipient of missionaries. When was the last time you saw a church started in your neighborhood by missionaries? When was the last time you saw a missionary meeting the needs of your neighbors and sharing the Gospel? Probably never.

Unless we realize that we are missionaries.

The reason that God has put us where we are is to be the missionaries to our neighbors, our co-workers, and our friends. The reason God has placed our churches where they are is to further His Kingdom in our neighborhoods. We are to be Jesus’ hands and feet right where we are.

This short clip illustrates it well:

When we send a missionary overseas, we expect them to share the gospel. But we also expect them to live sacrificially and meet the needs of their neighborhood. Over there, among the “lost,” we expect them to live like the guy who jumped in front of the oncoming Subway train to save a stranger. To be Jesus' hands and feet, we must be willing to die.

Our neighbors, our worklplaces, our families, and our churches can be better. They have to be better. But it must start with us. We are to be Jesus’ hands and feet bringing His will into reality.

Who reading this wants to commit their life to being a missionary to their neighbor or to their workplace? If you claim to be a Christian, then you have already made a commitment to such crazy endeavors. You have already said that you want to be his sacrificial hands and feet.

Our churches are filled with people who live as if making more disciples can't happen. Our churches have some people who won’t allow changes to facilitate that happening. Don’t be one of those people. Actually, ignore those people. The mission that Jesus has placed us on. The mission of being the lifeline to our community is way too important to get it cluttered with doing church rather than being church.

Unfortunately, at times…
…we care more about buildings than we do making disciples.
…we care more about music than we do about living a life of worship.
…we care more about programs than we do reaching out.
…we care more about our own selfish needs than we do about living the calling that God has placed on us.
…we care more about receiving blessings from God than we do about about being His hands and feet.

And because of those bad priorities, we get bad results. In the town I minister in, less than 20% of the people went to church on March 25. That is compared to a national average of 35%. Maybe your neighborhood is doing better than that, but none of our neighborhoods are exactly where God wants them to be. They can always use more people moving and acting like Jesus' feet and hands.

If we actually believe that our neighborhood could be what God intended it to be and began working toward it, that which many view as impossible would become reality. It’s not going to come easily; it’s going to take us being His hands and feet, going where others say those hands and feet shouldn't go.

Dr. Dionysius Lardner, who was a prominent scientist and economist in the early 1800s, is famous for being wrong. He couldn't see the new ordinary. Once he argued, “Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia.” Today, people will regularly travel at 268 mph on the Shanghai Maglev Train. There are no known reports of passengers dying of asphyxia. At that speed, if a similar high-speed rail were in place here, we would be able to get to Chicago from Ft. Wayne in around thirty-six minutes. Or for you Yankee fans, from Ft. Wayne to New York in two hours and twenty-four minutes. 268 mph is a speed that is way beyond what Dr. Lardner thought would kill humans is now routinely in use every day in China. Things thought impossible can become reality.

Wilbur Wright, in a speech to the Aero Club in France on November 5, 1908, said, “I confess that in 1901, I said to my brother Orville that man would not fly for fifty years.” Two years later, the two Wright brothers were flying their first airplane at Kitty Hawk. The impossible became reality.

All around us, what was once thought impossible is reality.

Unfortunately, spiritually speaking, the impossible, when it comes to church, has not become reality in our neighborhoods. Paul wrote, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Phil 4:13 ESV). Yet we languish as if there is no way we can live a selfless life following Jesus here on earth. We subsist, enslaved to the same old sins that others have overcome. We spiritually endure life without experiencing the power of God.

Soren Kierkegaard, a Danish Christian, wrote a parable entitled Tame Geese: A Revivalistic Meditation. It is the story of a community of talking geese who would gather together on Sundays for their religious services. “The essential content of the sermon was: what a lofty destiny the geese had, what a high goal the Creator (and every time this word was mentioned the geese curtsied and the ganders bowed the head) had set before the geese; by the aid of wings they could fly away to distant regions, blessed climes, where properly they were at home, for here they were only strangers.” The geese were made to fly, yet after hearing the goose-changing message, the geese would all get out of their seats and waddle home. Kierkegaard concluded the story with the phrase, “Man also has wings, he has an imagination.” Yet we continue to waddle.

Let’s stop waddling. Let’s start flying. It’s amazing what these hands and feet can do.

This is part of a series that I wrote showing the mission trip I took to Liberia.

I divided the subjects into individual pages, for ease of use.

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Economy

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Wilfred

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - A Few Notable Places

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Food

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Heart of Grace Elementary School

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - The Children

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Water

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Monrovia Hope Center

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Marshall Hope Center

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Leadership Training Institute

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Gifts

2012 - Liberian Mission Trip - Our Brothers and Sisters

Here are a few articles that I wrote upon my return:
One Drop

You Shall Love Your Neighbor As...

Sunrise in the Clouds over Europe

Who Will Be God's Ambassadors?

FAQ on Liberia trip from questions asked at an Indiana Tech Sociology class

Hands and Feet

The Fads of Evangelism and the Way of the Heart

A friend sent me the following link:

Evangelism's Fads and Fixtures

It's a good article that has a list of ten things that were formerly fads in Christianity but have now become dangerous fixtures.

1. Making Converts
2. The Sinner's Prayer
3. "Do You Know Jesus as..." 
4. Tribulationism
5. Testimonies
6. The Altar Call
7. Witnessing
8. Protestant Prayers
9. The Church Growth movement
10. Chick Tracts

My friend asked, "Do you think he's being Pharisaical or right on target?  If the later, how might we correct people in love and start more beneficial trends, especially in older, more established churches?"

Pharisaical implies having extra laws that keep us away from God.  The Pharisees in Jesus' day were worried about appearances while ignoring the greater matters of the heart.  They had created a system of laws that were supposed to make one right with God if they were adhered to.  The problem is that Pharisseism is not just a thing of the past.  It is alive and killing today.  The author of this piece attempts to tear down some of the Pharisaical practices we have developed over the years. 

I'm not the expert on correcting older, more established churches as the church, despite being older and corrected, I minister at became a third of its size during the corrections (although we are now back to the old number and still growing).  We still have a long way to go to be a community of real, authentic relationships with one another, have a passion for Jesus and his works, and to always love those around us in practical ways. 

Making Converts and Testimonies
 

His view on "making converts" and "testimonies" are just arguments over semantics.  We are to go and make disciples, nor is it wrong for a church to know an individual's story as a Christian before hiring them.  He is right that much of Christianity has morphed into making converts to make more converts - almost as if the purpose of being a Christian is to make other Christians.  When do we ever experience the Christian life in community?  When do we ever go out of our way to love others?  Where is the passion to follow Jesus no matter what the cost?  When is God's will brought about into this world because of the lives of those surrendered to Him?  Those need to be the focus.  Just changing the word from "convert" to "disciple" will not cause that to happen.  Those are just words.  We could "make disciples" and never expect them to live a life of total surrender.  

The Sinner's Prayer

The Christian Church does not use the sinner's prayer.  We think that makes us right.  Instead, we use baptism in a similar vein as other churches use the sinner's prayer being just as guilty in trying to have a quick, cheap grace conversion experience.  People in Christian Churches typically teach that if you get baptized, you are saved.  Really?  I understand that 1 Peter 3:21 states, "Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you."  It is part of salvation; I am not denying that.  But Peter goes on to say, "Not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him" [1 Peter 3:21-22 (ESV)].  We treat baptism like other churches treat the sinner's prayer.  In the process we have people who have "fire insurance" policies because they have been dunked under water with the right words said over them during a religious ritual, but they are not people with a good conscience before God who live their lives as His hand and feet in their workplaces, homes, schools, and communities.  God desires people who have given them their whole heart, not people who have just been baptized or say a sinner's prayer. 

Do You Know Jesus As...

We want a quick fix evangelistic method rather than living a life of total surrender where we live in such a way that the lives around us are transformed by the Holy Spirit through people seeing God through our works.  "In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 5:16 ESV). 

Tribulationism

The only message I have shared on the end times is one that hearkens back to Martin Luther believing that he was in the end times.  We Are In The End Times - Or So They Would Have Me Believe. We need to live every day as if it were our last.  What relationships need mended?  What changes need to be made in our life to be more of who God wants us to be?  We should never put those off to tomorrow.  Keeping the end times in focus should help us to live more faithfully today.

Unfortunately, the end times too often becomes a distraction that pulls people away from Christian living.  Amos 5:18-24 is pretty relevant here.  He wrote that we should not desire the coming of the Lord for that day is not a good day, nor should we become dependent on rituals, worship through song, or church gatherings for our relationship with God.  Anything that distracts us from our true calling, expecially pseudo-religious babble, needs to be excised from our body.  

Altar Call

The altar call was one of the first things we removed at our church when we started changing.  I still struggle with whether it would be beneficial to bring the altar call ("invitation time" in our churches) back, but we have had more people baptized since its removal.  But again, as stated previously, our goal is not to get people baptized, the goal is people living a life of total surrender to God's will in community with on another while carrying out the loving work of Jesus in the world they live in. 

Witnessing

Cold turkey door-to-door evangelism is ineffective.  Actually it's more than ineffective; it's detrimental to the cause of Christ.  People don't want strangers knocking at their doors.  It might have worked in the seventies.  I am not talking about then.  But a method of witnessing that will never grow out of style is to love our neighbors and look for opportunities to help meet their needs. 

The author of Total Church shares a story of an incident at his church.

“Matt rang to ask what he should do.  His friend George has asked him to go street preaching.  Matt wasn’t interested but didn’t know how to respond.  So the three of us got together.  As the conversation began, it was clear that George thought we were selling out in some way.  But as we talked about sharing our lives with unbelievers, about evangelism that was 24/7, about opening our homes, George’s tone changed.  At the end of our conversation he admitted, “I’m not sure if I’m up for that kind of commitment.”

Door-to-door evangelism is a distraction for many people who practice it.  They think they are doing the cause of Christ because they are doing something that requires boldness and takes them outside of their comfort zone.  Boldness should not be confused with doing the work of the Lord.  Many of the things we do requires that we be bold, but that does not mean if something requires boldness, we are doing the work of the Lord.  In James 1:26, James talks about how we can deceive our heart by talking too much.  The context shows that if we talk about love, we can deceive ourselves into feeling like we are loving others while not doing a thing.  What we really need to do is love others; it does not change anything if we just talk about it.  Witnessing door-to-door, street evangelism, or writing on the internet are placebos that make us think that we are doing the work of the Lord,.  We are surrounded by people who need to see the Lord by us living the life He would have us live. 

Protestant Prayers, Church Growth Movement, and Chick Tracts

On the issue of Protestant prayers, I love the Northumbria Community prayers.  They're bookmarked on the side of this page near the top.  I find that needing to be creative in prayer stifles me from actually just praying.

"The Church Growth Movement" is such a loaded subject that I will not delve into a discussion on it.  I don't even know what aspects of the movement the author was attacking as fads that have become a fixture.

And Chick tracts are the furthest thing removed from being a fixture.  I have never encountered someone using them.  

Conclusion

Any practice that makes us feel like we are doing what God wants us to do while we can still live our selfish life is a distraction from the real call of God on our lives.  There are many fences that keep us from God that need to be torn down in order for the Church to be a people who God is encountered through.  Changing the face of Christianity in this culture starts with each one of us living a life of total surrender to the cause of Christ.  It's difficult to do in a society that screams, "Balance!" at us all of the time, but Jesus desired total surrender that leads to radical living.  May we never shy away from destroying Pharisaical fences.  And may we never hesitate to do the will of God no matter how crazy it might make us look.

The Key to Evangelism and Our Lack of Excitement in Christ

The key to evangelism is to be excited about Jesus and what He is doing. This will lead to us naturally telling others about Jesus in our conversations. If we are not excited, we will be totally ineffective. Excitement might not look the same in each of us; some of us are more exuberant while others are more reserved.  Despite the differences in personalities, excitement cannot help but spring out of our lives. Excitement is contagious. Our love for Jesus should be filled with excitement, overflowing and contagious, not just for what he has done, but what He is currently doing.

Have you ever been in a church service where they want you to cheer for Jesus like you would cheer at a sporting event? With the same excitement and fervor? It’s a little awkward. We are being asked to celebrate an event in the past. I’m an Ohio State fan, and if you told me the story of how they won the National Championship in 2002 by Maurice Clarrett running for a 5-yard touchdown in the second overtime - a great story mind you - I’m not going to cheer. I would appreciate the good memory and experience a moment of pride in being an Ohio State fan, but that is about it. But if you were with me watching that game on January 3, 2003, when Clarrett entered the endzone, I was uncontrollably jumping, cheering, and probably trying to clap all at the same uncoordinated time. I didn’t care how foolish I was, I was celebrating; I was excited.

Why do we lack excitement for Jesus like we do for sporting events? That’s the questions speakers try to remedy when they want us to cheer for what Jesus has done. But I think they are missing the point. All too often, we leave the work of Jesus in the past and expect excitement to come as a result of past facts rather than present blessings. He died on the cross, established the kingdom, and showed us how to live – all awesome stories. More than just awesome, they are life changing, but we don’t celebrate with exuberance events in the past.

What needs to happen for us to become excited is to allow the Spirit to work in the present. When we do that, our excitement will be natural, spontaneous, and unstoppable. If we suffer from a lack of excitement and claim to be followers of Jesus, it is because we have left Jesus in the past, whether as a historical redeemer some 2000 years ago or in the past of our life where we experienced his forgiveness for the first time or his miraculous provision in some way; if we lack excitement, we are not currently experiencing Him because experience inevitably breeds excitement.

God is the God of the present, just as much as he is the God of the past, and he honors our seeking him. We will continually encounter Him if we seek Him with all of our heart, soul, body, and mind – with our whole being. To experience Him, we have to live a life of risk and live dangerously. We need to tackle those issues we have doubts with and seek answers from God. We need to step out where we are uncomfortable and rely on His sustenance. We need to be willing to look like a fool for Christ. We need to experience God for ourselves, in the present, wherever we are. This builds excitement like nothing else. This will result in us being great evangelists of His message along with the added benefit of living life more fully.

Would You Like to Hear More? - A Relational Approach to Evangelism

When it comes to evangelism, Christians struggle with two major issues, both stemming from pride.  We have  a tendency to think we are always right, especially in spiritual matters, and we are not willing to humbly discuss what we believe.   Instead, we jam our beliefs down people's throats.  We're too in the face of others about our faith all of the time.  I understand that we deeply care about people getting right with the Lord, but the way we behave in going about convincing people that the Lord loves them and has a plan for their lives is completely the wrong approach.  Our actions often do more harm for God's cause than good.

Last week, I was at the park with a friend and our kids.  A woman was there, and we struck up a conversation.  I don't introduce myself as a pastor.  As a matter of fact, I try to keep that a secret.  When people find out that I am a pastor, they usually begin to act differently around me.  My friend shared that I was a pastor.  She replied, "You aren't going to be preachy now, are you?"  I jokingly retorted, "I save that for Sunday."

It saddens me that the reputation of Jesus' people, especially pastors in His Church, is that we are preachy.  We have done something wrong in living out the message of love, non-judgment, and grace that Jesus taught when someone's response when they heard that I am a pastor is that they want to make sure I am not going to preach at them.

It is a struggle to balance our witness for Jesus while respecting people's personal space, their convictions, and their lives.

I recently heard the story of a man who was an aspiring musician in the early 90s Seattle grunge scene.  You know the scene that gave us Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, and others.  Well, this guy would always go to parties, drinking, doing drugs, and the like.  But there was always this other guy there, and he would just be drinking a Coke.  Eventually, the aspiring musician decided to ask the guy why he came to all of the parties if all he did was drink Coke.

He walked over to the guy and asked, "Darrell, why are you here?  You don't drink like the rest of us.  You don't sleep around.  You are not partying like the rest of us.  What are you doing here?"

Then he replied, "Do you really want to know?" 

"I wouldn't have asked if I didn't want to know," was the response of the aspiring musician.

"Well, you see, I am a Christ follower.  I follow Jesus.  And I believe that if Jesus was around today, he would want to be here, with you guys, hanging out.  Would you like to hear more?"

The aspiring artist said that he would like to hear more about this Jesus who Darrell was talking about.  From that time on, the aspiring artist wrestled with following Jesus, and eventually surrendered his life to Him.  A little non-intrusive evangelism can go a long way.

Peter wrote:

"In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect" (1 Peter 3:5).

Would you like to hear more?