If the Universalists are right, why bother with evangelism?

The belief that proclaiming faith in God is useless because in the end all will be welcomed into the Kingdom of God is at the heart of the Universalist approach to the Christian faith. I believe that the scope of Christ’s saving work on the cross secures salvation for all who believe, but I do not believe that we all “get in” because God is a nice guy and wouldn’t logically choose to keep anyone out.

God is a “nice guy” (in the sense that God’s heart is infinitely good and loving) and God wouldn’t choose to keep anyone out (2 Peter 3:9, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance”), but God has made the path toward salvation and eternal life abundantly clear in the scriptures:

-John 17:3, “Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.”
-Romans 10:9-10, “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.”
-Acts 4:12, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”

Believing everyone will be welcomed into heaven is really based more in wishful thinking than it is based in the teachings of scripture. We want to believe God will welcome everyone, despite their profession or rejection of God’s offer in Christ. Truth is Universalism negates the need for and impact of the cross. If the universalists are right then Jesus died for nothing; making his death of no account.

Bottom line is: you have to decide. You cannot ignore responding and not responding is a response! Unlike the Universalist approach we evangelize because we believe the story of God’s love revealed in Jesus Christ is Good News worth sharing & we likewise believe in its power to change lives. Like Paul in Romans 1:16 we affirm, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes.” Evangelism matters because Jesus death matters and sharing his love with people living apart from him matters.

The Universalists are just wrong! But they’ll get over it. I am convinced God loves them. I am convinced God understands why they believe what they believe. But I am equally convinced it grieves God’s heart because their caring heart for people does not translate into lives being received into the Kingdom.

Convinced more than ever evangelism matters,
Eli

 

Speaking Truth to Others

On Sundays I lead an adult spiritual formation experience at the church I serve. This week we were talking about how to make the gospel connect with people who are immersed in destructive lifestyles. How do we speak biblical truth to them in ways that doesn’t spiritually harm them or cause them to want to avoid us? The truth is this is a question about speaking prophetic truth to others.

Speaking truth at any level is not easy, but if God calls us to speak a word of truth to another I believe there are some guidelines and checkpoints we must walk through first. Why? Because we want to be sure we are personally divested of any desire to “fix” or “clean-up” the person we’re feeling led to speak truth to. Sometimes we’re motivated to speak truth to someone whose hurt us because we want them to “understand” what they’ve done. That motive is selfish and not aimed at their best interest, its aimed at helping ourselves feel better.

Allow me to establish an illustration that should help us frame this issue of speaking truth in a meaningful context. Let’s say you have a severely addicted brother who is rarely if ever functioning in sobriety. Your heart aches for this brother and as a committed follower of Christ you desperately want him to discover the hope and freedom that come from a transformational relationship with Christ. Your desire is good and I affirm that God put that desire in your heart.

Speaking truth into the life of a family member comes with serious risks; it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it, but it does mean we must realize the level of risk involved relationally could be costly. The implications of speaking truth to this person could reverberate through the entire family and cause people to start taking sides and add to the pain instead of having a healing effect on the situation.

Speaking truth to anyone should, I believe, go through three simple filters. First, I wouldn’t speak it if it is not God-directed. Unless the Holy Spirit impresses this on your heart in an unavoidable way (ie: you have direct clarity that God is telling you to speak this word, there is no way out of this). If God is directing you to speak truth God will simultaneously empower you with the courage and confidence necessary to do so. This may be a truth you are being called to speak once or a truth you are called to speak into this person’s life over a period of time. Regardless, it will ultimately be damaging instead of spiritually transforming if it is self-directed versus being clearly, unavoidably God-directed.

The second filter is this, the word we speak must be spoken in love. Speaking in love may be a word of tenderness and compassion or it may be very direct, firm, and decisive. Discerning the tone of the message is important. Frequently parents must speak truth to their children in ways that are direct and firm, but love is always the motive if the message of our words is for their benefit. Nuance whatever you say with a reminder to the person that it is because you love them that you are sharing what you’re sharing. Go into this experience with a deep sense of humility and ask God’s grace to infuse every word with the Spirit’s power so that it would be God’s words that emerge and that whatever you say would connect spiritually with the recipient.

The third filter is obedience. Make sure that you are convinced in your spirit that to avoid speaking this word would be a direct act of disobedience to Christ. If we speak truth in obedience to Christ then we can be sure, regardless the recipient’s initial reaction, God will use those words over time to communicate his heart of love to and for that person.

Speaking truth is an act of exhortation. The OT prophets frequently spoke prophetic words of warning and impending doom to people in positions of power and authority. They were also frequently directed to speak into the life of the nation of Israel about their need to seek God and repent. Their message, though often a hard one, was always infused with the powerful reminder that if they relent or return God would turn away his wrath and restore them into a relationship with himself.

God always prefers grace over judgment; love over punishment. When we speak God-directed truth to others we are in a sense functioning in the prophetic voice. Not as fore-tellers of doom and destruction as much as we are messengers of grace, love, and God’s hope for restoration with those living far from God’s love. Love should be the motive behind all that we do and all that we say for the purpose of seeing God’s love transform hearts and lives for the sake of God’s Kingdom.

 

Something to Say

I realized that I haven’t written anything at all in 2009 at this blog. It is certainly not for having nothing to say. Sometimes I forget about this little blog, and I can’t have it thinking that I don’t care. So here goes.

The other day I was meeting with a friend/co-leader from the church I serve and we decided, randomly enough, to go have some Mexican at the little place in town. Random factual tidbit of the day-there are two kinds of foods I am always in the mood for: Mexican and Chinese. So without the slightest hint of hesitation I agreed that Mexican sounded good and off we went.

It was a normal lunch, as far as these kind of leadership check-in luncheons go. Trouble is you never know if its just lunch or if God appointed you to be in that place for an encounter with one of his hurting lambs.

This particular luncheon had a missional purpose beyond catching up on “church-stuff.” Our waitress was a nice young lady, but it was more than apparent that she was carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. She was in obvious physical pain. She was also obviously hurting emotionally. Beyond the forced smile and contrived sweetness was a depth of need that was unavoidable. And so I said, “I’ll bet you spent your life growing up in church.”

That was all it took and boom the floodgates were open, her life story spilled out, and my friend and I were in the middle of a kairotic moment of ministry. She was divorced a year ago from a mentally disturbed, violent husband who used force to control and manipulate her. Her most recent boyfriend just left her and stuck her with a bunch of credit card debt. She’s a minimum of 2+ hours from home or anyone familiar, she’s essentially homeless, takes her dog to work with her in her borrowed van, and works 3 jobs just to keep her head above water.

What we did not do: we did not pull out our copy of the Four Spiritual Laws for a speedy conversion notch on our evangelism belts, we did not brow beat her with cheesy, bumper-sticker Christian cop-outs, we did not bombard her with scriptures about how God was going to see her through this tough time (though certainly we believe he will and also believe scripture speaks to that truth). What we did do: we listened, our eyes moistened as her painful journey spilled out, and we made a simple invitation to community, “Hey, we’re having church tonight, we’d love it if you could come.” She told us about growing up in the church with a Baptist preacher for a grandpa and a faithful grandma who loved her dearly. She said, “Yeah, I really need to find a church. I miss that.”

Before we left we gave her directions and I gave her a couple numbers where I could be reached. We prayed for her and reissued our invitation to church. Then we thanked God for the opportunity to have this encounter with one of his hurting lambs.

You know what? She came that night! She said she fought through a million and one excuses for why staying home (home is with her boss and his wife) but she fought through the excuses and came. Our church loved on her and she left, I hope, having just experienced the warm love of Jesus.

My encounter with this young woman reminds me of a story of Jesus sitting near a well at about noon. Along comes a woman in the heat of the day to draw water from the well. That day a woman left healed and restored in her heart, all over a conversation about water.

If we learn to see that every place we are is ripe with God appointed opportunities for loving others and reaching out to them with God’s grace then these kinds of encounters will increasingly be the norm for us, not the exception. God’s broken lambs are all around us. They are just waiting for someone to notice, someone to care, someone to ask, and treat them like they matter. Knowing that makes us approach every situation with a sacredness, with a holiness, that permits God to work in and through our lives whenever and wherever God wishes.

So you know what else: I went to have Mexican again today!

 

Cast Your Vote, But Seek God’s Kingdom First

The central priority of those proclaiming Jesus Christ ought to be the Kingdom of God. Jesus focuses much of his earthly teaching ministry on this topic. The Christian’s first allegiance is not to a particular political party (hence Christians should be political without being partisan). Our first allegiance is to the Kingdom of God, to live and think and act in ways that seek to establish God’s Kingdom here and now. Jesus taught his disciples, via the Lord’s prayer, to petition God so that His Kingdom and will might be established, “on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10b).

As a pastor, people frequently want me to speak from Sinai on topics like politics. The reality is, I don’t know which candidate fits within the will of God for this era of human history. I believe both candidates have strengths and weaknesses. I believe both have potentially good and helpful ideas that will aid the common good, but I also believe both have ideas that could be detrimental to our economy and way of life. Recently, my thinking about this election has had less to do with who God thinks is right for the position of President of the United States and more to do with how I might best live as a person committed to God’s Kingdom first.

That would be my primary concern if I were a citizen of any other country and should be equally so as a citizen of the United States. I believe I am at peace in my conscience with who I will be casting my vote for and I do so realizing this person is not the answer to the challenges this country faces. I am committed to doing what I can do to make my home, my community, and my world the best they can be but I do so not as a Republican or a Democrat but as a committed follower of Jesus Christ who sees the world not through partisan lenses but through the lens of God’s love for the broken, lost, and hurting among us in need of a hope that lasts longer than the last election stump speech full of promises that a candidate might or might not be able to deliver on.

Lord Jesus, you are the creative influence through which God made everything that is. During your earthly ministry you taught us to be hungry to see the Kingdom of God established in human hearts now so that life here might more closely resemble the life we will know with you and the Father in eternity. We lift up our brothers and sisters as we collectively seek to elect a new President/leader for our nation. Let us not be so caught up in the things of this life that we lose perspective about the real importance of this election. If we live as members of your Kingdom first then the results of this election will do little to sway us one way or the other about the way in which we are called to live our lives. Help us to accept the result of this election as your will for us now and to focus our energies, passions, gifts, and graces on living for you now and welcoming the greatest number possible into your eternal Kingdom of joy, hope, life, and peace. You are the hope that will never fail us. We ask all these things in your Son’s strong name, Amen.

 

Living Beyond the Walls

Churches that effectively reach their communities for Jesus Christ have learned the importance of living beyond the walls of their churches. Inside they enjoy the safety and comfort of knowing and being known in relationship with people they have grown close to and easily relate to. Outside awaits a world of unpredictability; full of unknowns and full of hurting people whose lives are often a mess. It is much easier to remain safely cloistered inside the walls without considering the needs of the outside world but living this way means they have chosen to ignore the clear call of Jesus to go out into the messy, real world of pain, brokenness, and alienation and bring the message of God’s unfailing love and unending grace.

Why do we stay locked away in our church buildings, seemingly content to let the world around us die without knowing the hope, freedom, and joy of life with Christ? Mostly because of fear. Fear will cause us to avoid living missionally. The trade off is a life on the edge of our seats following Jesus into the places he calls us to go that are not easily navigable by our standard set of presumptions and methodologies about evangelism. That’s the rub. Following Jesus is a much more difficult, time consuming, and life-emptying path. And so many churches are content to stay busy with planning dinners and fellowship experiences for the insiders while failing to live the mission of Christ with passion and effectiveness.

I pastor a local church that is beginning to transition into living missionally and believe me it is painful to confront old methods and old ways of thinking with the clear teaching of Jesus. People don’t like feeling uncomfortable. They don’t like changing their approach, even though they know what they’ve done forever is no longer working. They don’t like confronting the cultural realities of an ever changing world where the rules change constantly. This, however, is the environment in which we live and if we hope to be effective reaching people to day we must accept this truth and joyfully embrace the call of God to become the gospel to the world.

My hope for you and for your churches is that the mission of Christ will so invade your hearts and your thinking and attitudes about evangelism that you will passionately seek new ways of sharing the love of Jesus in your communities and in the world. We cannot sit on our hands and wonder why our churches aren’t being effective, aren’t growing, and aren’t having the results we once did. I am committed with every ounce of my energy, with every gift I’ve been given, and with every second of life I’m blessed with to living out that mission with creativity and passion. I am available to consult with churches and individuals who share that passion and hope for the church and I would delight to hear about what God is doing in your communities through the active ministry of your congregations in the world.

 

Frustration Leads to Opportunity

I pastor an existing congregation with a long history in our community (175 years this year). There are many good things about this church and its people, but there are some things that stick out about us that could keep me busy for the next 30 years. When I arrived here it became obvious to me that many in our congregation took church attendance seriously but were not as serious about their discipleship and cultivating an intimate relationship with Christ. Additionally, I observed that our entire congregation was pretty much the same down the line: white, a good mix of working class folk and professional/degreed folk, homeowners, grandparents, community minded, etc. But what I have not observed is a missional spirit by and large. These are good people but many of them have never had one faith sharing experience in their lives. They seem altogether content to fill pews and go about their lives until the next time they come to “refuel.”

We have begun to connect with some people who are very different from us, at least culturally speaking. Even though these folks are of the same ethnicity their experiences in life are vastly different and I am discovering that the folks in our congregation have a difficult time understanding how to connect with them. I preach and teach about becoming the kind of faith community where anyone can find community and the warm welcome of Christ’s love, but not all are willing to embrace that vision of Church. I have literally watched some of the “old-timers” make a physical loop around some of the new families to avoid contact with them.

Obviously, this kind of behavior/attitude grieves and frustrates me deeply. I think things should be further along after all the teaching, preaching, and casting of new vision we’ve done. However, many still are not getting it. But this frustration is at the same time an opportunity to continue learning how to equip this comfortable, complacent, preference-based congregation how to love, live, and act more like Christ. The call to living missionally as individuals and churches is unfortunately a radical message in churches today, but the journey toward becoming missional is so worth it. Nothing is more exciting than seeing the people of God really start living from the perspective of the mission of Christ.

My heart is that we increasingly become a church community that sounds, looks, acts, talks, thinks, and connects like Jesus. The road is long and bumpy, but I am certain as God’s Holy Spirit guides us we will get there and we will have new stories of faith to rejoice in as we see God’s hand at work among us and through us in the world.

 

The Transformed Life

The goal of the Christian faith is not “hell” avoidance. It is learning to live an authentically transformed life in Christ. God transforms the believer’s heart by way of the Holy Spirit’s work of renewal in the heart of the repentant person. We so easily and so frequently forget what it’s all about. Click to listen to a sermon that challenges us to live excellent lives of faith by embracing the transforming power and presence of Christ. We cannot really begin to be effective witnesses for the gospel if our lives are not evidencing the transforming power of Christ within.

 

The Posture of Love: Advocacy & Activism in the Way of Jesus

This Sunday I preached a sermon about a Christian approach to advocacy and activism. The text for the message was John 8:1-11. To listen follow this link. I reference an interview with Kay Warren about her passion for battling the global HIV/AIDS crisis. For copyright purposes I do not include that interview in the online podcast. If you’d like to listen to it follow this link.

 

Missional Urgency

There used to be a sense of urgency that drove the missional purpose of Christ. In today’s world, relational ministry takes time and earning the right to people’s trust through unconditional acts of love and genuine compassion help open the door to faith sharing. But we seem to have lost our sense of the message of the Good News being something we urgently want the world to hear and experience.

Even when methods and techniques change, as they should in order to best meet the culture where it lives, we must be guided by a sense of urgency in being and sharing the gospel with the world. I was reading yesterday that globally 1.8 billion people still have never heard about or encountered Jesus Christ (source: http://www.ggministry.org/page.asp?sec=4&page=334). Imagine that! With that statistic in mind, the Greatest Commandment and the Great Commission have never seemed more relevant. But without an urgent desire to share the Good News of God’s love for humanity in Jesus Christ that number will likely increase.

I was reading in the book of Titus today and Paul instructs his apprentice to take his ministry of teaching and preaching seriously. He says in Titus 2:7 that Titus should approach his teaching ministry with: 1.) Integrity; 2.) gravity. He should teach the truth of Christ with integrity (so that he would be set apart from the false teachers) and with gravity (he should rightly appreciate the seriousness and urgency of the gospel he has been charged to preach).

Today, it seems, the Church fails to teach and preach the gospel with urgency. We say we believe Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, but we often function instead as practical agnostics; embracing a secret commitment to universalism (ie: wishful thinking theology that minimalizes the urgent need to share the Good News with others in favor of a theology that embraces an “all roads lead to God” approach. Christians are Jesus people and we believe God saves the world and all humanity through the cross of Christ). If you don’t want to be a Christian, fine and good, but being a Christ follower means believing evangelizing the world is essential to living out the missional purpose of Christ in the world.

We ought to be passionately focused on living out the mission of Christ: making (& maturing) disciples (followers) of Christ; baptizing new disciples (welcoming them into significant Christian community and reminding them what Christ has done for them); teaching them how to obey (follow) the teachings and commands of Christ.

Essential to being a Christian is believing that the Good News of the gospel is Good News for everyone (Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, Hindu, Pagan, etc). If we fail to embrace this core belief we will likely fail to live out the missional purpose of Christ with passion and urgency. I am reminded of Paul’s words to the church in Colasse, “We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ” (NIV).

 

Bibles and Superman Capes

Recently I was in an apartment complex neighborhood in our community. A ministry colleague and I were delivering “Family Night Idea Kits” to the moms and children in the complex as a simple way of connecting with them relationally and to let them know there are churches in our community who care with no expectation of anything in return. Follow this link to learn more about “Family Night Idea Kits.”

Since we began before Thanksgiving we’ve had the opportunity to connect with about 30 families through the baskets. It has been amazing to see how God uses them to break down walls and open doors. We’ve been invited into most of the homes and while inside we simply try to get to know the families a little. We ask them how they are managing in life, to tell us about some of the challenges they are facing, and we usually ask if it would be okay if we prayed with and for them.

There has been an overwhelming receptivity to our visits and to our invitations to prayer. In one case we were on the porch with a young mom. She and her husband both work full-time, they have three school-aged kids, and he is going to college on the side. I asked her how things were going in their home and she literally started weeping and said, “Things are falling apart.”

We talked some more about what was going on, asked her if we could pray and she said yes. We wrapped our arms around her and just pointed her to Jesus and prayed that he would reveal himself to their family in real and powerful ways; providing for their needs; assisting them in finding a Christian community to connect with for care, spiritual nurture, and worship and teaching.

A few weeks later we were just wrapping up delivering the kits to another apartment complex neighborhood when we saw Logan. Logan is a severly ADHD seven year old. He was running around on the porch in front of their home wearing a Superman Cape. I knew he had to be cool if he had the guts to wear a Superman outfit in the middle of the day (I also knew that outfit said something profound about his little heart).

Logan’s mom was on the phone when we arrived at her doorstep. We hadn’t even spoken to her yet and she waved us inside her home. When she finished her call we told her who we were and why we were visiting in her neighborhood. She was thankful for our visit. We found out she was going through a painful divorce and was trying to make ends meet raising her two kids.

Logan and his sister noticed the basket right away. We tried to explain what the baskets were about, but their excitment about the shiny colorful gifts distracted their attention. The little girl wanted some of the yummy candy, but Logan had his eye on something else. He quickly grabbed the Bible out of the basket and yelled, “I’ve always wanted one of these!” I will never forget those words, never…Oh, how I wish everyone I met and reached out to felt the same way Logan did about the Word of God. Somehow in his innocence he got it far more than those who had superior knowledge of and experience with the Word. He knew there was something powerful and special about that Book.

Logan turned to an obscure passage in Deuteronomy. I remember thinking, “Lord, couldn’t he have turned to like the Gospel of John or something in the New Testament, why Deuteronomy.” I prayed silently to the Lord asking him to guide me to some words that would speak to Logan in that passage and I found a few lines at the end that applied. He listened intently and seemed to acknowledge that he liked the words I read to him.

Before we left we prayed with the whole family. What an exciting and profound moment that was. What it taught me is that we are the ones with hang-ups about outreach. We think people are more ready to reject the love of Christ than to open themselves to it. We think we have to be careful not to offend people with our faith. We assume hostility from those we reach out to.

What this experience and so many others have taught me is that the world is just waiting for some Good News, waiting to hear someone say I love you and so does the God who made you, waiting to see and experience a love that transcends their failed and painful experiences with human love. We gotta get over thinking that people aren’t open to Jesus. His love has the power to break through strongholds and his Word has the power to make Supermen out of little boys running around in capes, pretending to be heroes.

Praise be to God for his amazing, grace-filled love that has the power to set captives free and heal broken hearts. What can be better than serving God empowered by his Holy Spirit through loving acts of kindness and compassion toward others.