November 24, 2009
Baggage
There is an interesting cost to evangelism. Bringing others into the church means we also have to be on guard against the secular baggage that comes with them. Even our elders and deacons can sometimes get a little paranoid as they try to protect the flock from false teachers and leaders. I recently read an article about atheist groups on college campuses that are running into a similar problem. Victor Stenger, an adjunct professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado said, "The trouble is, any time you start working with other groups, religion starts coming in. People bring up Jesus…” I find it strangely satisfying to know that atheists have to work at trying to keep the Lord out of their gatherings.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Gail;
-----This cost to evangelism of which you speak is a difficult price to pay, but it will be paid. The church is a very special group of people because it involves people gathering around the truth about God, as well as God gathering amongst them about their security. It, then, necessarily involves two dynamics: the nature of human group behavior, and the nature of God’s movement within His people. The one is very error prone; the other is faultless, yet not forcible. God knows His purposes and principles for the church beyond any misunderstanding. But man does not even possess a mind capable of complete or perfectly accurate understanding. And since God is not forcible, the doctrinal, philosophical, and behavioral cleanliness of the church is at the mercy of man’s incomplete capability. Yet, God loves His children to the point of jealousy (Ex 34:14); He does not want them stolen away by deceitful philosophies. So He warns the church not to associate with anyone who calls himself a brother, “...if he is guilty of immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or robber...” (I Cor 5:11), to avoid those holding the form of religion and denying its power (II Tim 3:5), to have nothing to do with the factious (Titus 3:10), and to not recognize anyone who does not acknowledge the commands of God given by His prophets and apostles (I Cor 14:38). This is all well and good for protecting the boundaries and principles of the church, especially since it is given by God, but it is the currency in which the cost to evangelism must be paid.
-----Man is more cognizant of boundaries than is God. God is more cognizant of behavior than is man. Man will allow the unbeliever to cross a boundary into the church, but he will do little more than subtly challenge his ungodliness in order to favor an opportunity to evangelize. This does nothing more than barter the cost by relinquishing evangelism itself. For evangelism is more than just saying the words, “God loves you, and Jesus saves you.” Evangelism challenges the acceptability of ungodliness, calling for the decision of actual repentance and the acceptance of a new ideology (Rom 12:2). Evangelism must add this to the call to come to Christ, because Christ Himself is about the new life. Therefore cutting the message anywhere short of openly challenging the ungodliness of the visiting unbeliever barters evangelism, rather than costs evangelism. But when the ungodliness is challenged, and the unbeliever accepts the challenge, evangelism profits. Conversely, when the unbeliever is challenged and does reject the challenge, the cost to evangelism must be paid in the currency of separation to avoid the actual barter of the message.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
P.S.
-----The difficulties being felt by the atheist groups experiencing the interjection of the message of Jesus Christ is a product of the more effective evangelism. What is definitely bartered when the Christian’s worship gatherings are made a place of evangelism is the worship. That is not a good thing to barter away. Worship is as important as is evangelism. But if worship has not a place in the worship service, then where is its place? Yet the contemporary philosophy is so intent on making the worship service the place of evangelism that they must alter the church’s terminology to avoid exposing the conundrum: worship cannot abide the company of rejection (which the casual seeker is doing until he repents.) That is why contemporary churches are so attentive to praise services, celebration services, or anything other than worship services. They have bartered worship to have only praise and celebration, for these much less connote submission, subservience, and relationship - poisons to the chronic seeker in the midst. Praise and celebration are unthreatening expressions of joy and admiration, which the seeker also feels. So the answer to the conundrum is to evangelize in the seeker’s group, and to worship in the believer’s group.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
Post a Comment