WestonWilliams.com

Today I introduced the new sermon series, “Help! I Need Somebody!”  This is a series about life’s great questions as asked by the Beatles and answered in Jesus Christ.

Paul’s sermon in Athens as found in Acts 17 is really the inspiration behind the Beatles series.  We see in this passage Paul quotes from the popular poets of the Greek culture.  These are the cultural movers and shakers of their day and Paul engages them at the intersection of their culture and faith.  Paul here is examining the Athenian culture and is finding points of contact between their world and the truth of God.  He finds several points, primarily  their spirituality as expressed in their idols and poetry.  He compliments them for seeking spiritual truth and starts a spiritual conversation at this place.

It is our desire to explore these points of contact of culture and faith as found in the Beatles.  We won’t be able to get to them all.  There are some questions expressed by the Beatles that are answered in Jesus Christ and a few of these we want to examine.  I’ve had several questions about this series from some of our church goers.  One question that some had about a series like this was, “Can we do a Metallica series next?” I’ll think about it.  Second question is, “Is this okay?” The answer is, “Yes.”  Paul (the Apostle, not McCartney) quotes these secular poets of their day in a very secular society.  These poets were no more “Christian” than the Beatles.  They viewed Christians and Jews as atheists, because they didn’t believe in their  many gods.  During this time atheism was a capital crime.

Finally this series is definitively Christian because we’re not looking to these outside sources for answers, we look to them to voice our questions. In a very real sense we see that these voices of the poets, singers and artists of the world almost act as a prophetic voice about society.  Jesus has something to say to them and we want to hear it.  Join us as we explore God’s answers to life’s questions on Sundays.

The term “puritanical” today means overly zealous, legalistic, prudish.  But, the puritan understanding of evangelism was beautiful.  They wanted above all else a devout community that shined it’s light.  John Winthrop was the first Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and outlines their understanding or their mission statement in a work titled, “A Model of Christian Charity,” likely preached in part aboard the ship Arbella that took them to the new world.

“Now the only way to avoid this shipwreck, and to provide for our posterity, is to follow the counsel of Micah, to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. For this end, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities. We must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality. We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body. So shall we keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.”

Nothing about evangelism yet, but we see that their understanding of evangelism started with a church practicing Christian love.  Last week we talked about the church and our relationship with the church.  We talked about the defining characteristics of the church and defining characteristics of it.  When the church is the church the world takes notice.

1. My life is obvious. (5:14)

• We try to disguise this, but as soon as someone knows you’re a Christian they start making assumptions – about your values, preferences, conduct, etc.
• Transformed lives are different from the world.
  • 2 Corinthians 5:17, “So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”
  • Jesus says it best in Matthew 5:14, “You are the light of the world, a city on a hill cannot be hid.”  If you’ve ever gone driving at night you know this is true, cities can not be hid, the light shines and is shone all over.  We are those lights, together we make up a city on a hill shining light to the world.  We call this our witness.
  • John Winthrop understood this and sought to be different by being separate, forming a new witnessing fellowship by forming a pure church.  He continues in his thesis, “We shall find that the God of Israel is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies; when He shall make us a praise and glory that men shall say of succeeding plantations, “may the Lord make it like that of New England.” For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world. We shall open the mouths of enemies to speak evil of the ways of God, and all professors for God’s sake. We shall shame the faces of many of God’s worthy servants, and cause their prayers to be turned into curses upon us till we be consumed out of the good land whither we are going.”
• Transformed lives by nature bring hope or despair to others.
  • When you fly into LA during the day you are overwhelmed by the smog, the brown cloud this serves as a lens for viewing the entire city.  When you fly into LA at night its completely different, lights everywhere and they all shine beautifully.  Regardless, it’s the same city.  As Christians we are the same on the inside, the question is how are we revealing Christ to the world?
  • Philippians 1:27, “Only, live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that, whether I come and see you or am absent and hear about you, I will know that you are standing firm in one spirit, striving side by side with one mind for the faith of the gospel.”
  • John Winthrop understood this and wanted to bring hope when he said, “May the Lord make it like in New England.”  May that be our heartfelt prayer, that we would be a model community that churches pray, “May the Lord make it like at BGCC.”
  • Yet the puritans in their heavy handedness and lack of grace drove many including Roger Williams away, to form their own community in Rhode Island. You see a believer’s life will bring either hope or despair.  For 2,000 years Christianity has claimed to have the best answers to life’s toughest questions, but when Christians go out and live lives with stupid choices the world stops, looks, shakes it’s head and says, “Apparently this is it, there is nothing better.”  What hope do our lives’ bring when they look no different?

2. My witness is necessary (5:15-16)

• The world has no hope outside of Christ.
  • John 14:6, “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
  • I think that we have lost our sense of urgency in our sensitive and tolerant culture.  We have thought that Christianity is a way of life instead of the way to life.
  • William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, “‘Not called!’ did you say?  ’Not heard the call,’ I think you should say. Put your ear down to the Bible, and hear Him bid you go and pull sinners out of the fire of sin. Put your ear down to the burdened, agonized heart of humanity, and listen to its pitiful wail for help. Go stand by the gates of hell, and hear the damned entreat you to go to their father’s house and bid their brothers and sisters and servants and masters not to come there. Then look Christ in the face — whose mercy you have professed to obey — and tell Him whether you will join heart and soul and body and circumstances in the march to publish His mercy to the world.”
• God’s witness outside of “me” is ineffective to save! (Romans 1:19-20)
  • Creation shows God’s presence, not his plan.  Creation serves to start a conversation, not end it.  Creation is there proclaiming God’s existence, but not the way to God.
  • God must use “Me” to reach his people!
    • Romans 10:14, “But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him?”
    • We believe, I believe in lifestyle evangelism, but there comes a time for words.  So few people live so intentionally that others will ask questions, it’s not apparent by the way you pour coffee or make copies that you’re a Christian.
    • We keep the world at arm’s length and think to ourselves that if I live a good enough life then those who come in contact with me will catch salvation.  Salvation is not a cold!
    • How can we live a lifestyle of evangelism if we have not invited others into relationship with us?  So much of what causes questions are the internal struggles.  How do you have hope after loss?  How do you treat people?
  • People must go through “Me” to reach God!
    • This is the flip side of the priestly equation we live in, if God must use me to get to the world, then the world must use me to get to God.  While God can certainly meet someone in any way he would like, there is no occurrence of someone entering into a saving relationship with Jesus outside of another Christian.
    • Even Paul who is knocked off his horse by Jesus himself is told to go to Ananias to receive the full truth about God. (Acts 9)

As we progress through exploring our mission we’ll be looking at evangelism this Sunday. We started by exploring our responsibilities of fellowship in the church and this Sunday we’ll be looking at the church’s responsibility of evangelism to the world.  There is a purpose to our order because if the church acts like the church, then the world takes notice. John Winthrop was a great thinker in the puritanical movement and while the puritans can hardly be held up as a model of practice their thought at its inception was beautiful.  Wintrhop’s essay below is thought to have been preached at least in part aboard the Arbella the ship which brought the puritans to America.  Before they stepped foot in the new world they understood their grand experiment in being the church and a witness in the world.  While the whole essay is worth reading I’ve included an excerpt below (a sneak peek from Sunday).

Now the only way to avoid this shipwreck, and to provide for our posterity, is to follow the counsel of Micah, to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. For this end, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities. We must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality. We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body. So shall we keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as His own people, and will command a blessing upon us in all our ways, so that we shall see much more of His wisdom, power, goodness and truth, than formerly we have been acquainted with. We shall find that the God of Israel is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies; when He shall make us a praise and glory that men shall say of succeeding plantations, “may the Lord make it like that of New England.”

- From “A Model Of Christian Charity,” by John Winthrop (1630)  (Full text available here)

Recently it was reported that the Southern Baptist Convention reported a decline in baptism for this year to the lowest since 1987 and that their membership had dipped by about 40,000 in 2007. This news is a bit of surprise for America’s largest protestant denomination. More surprising, however, was SBC PResident Frank Page’s remarks, “”Our culture is increasingly antagonistic and sometimes adverse to a conversation about a faith in Christ. Sometimes that’s our fault because we have not always presented a winsome Christian life that would engender trust and a desire on the part of many people to engage in a conversation on the Gospel.” Interesting “sometimes that’s our fault” but most of the time it’s someone else’s?

Is Frank Page stating that the reason people aren’t coming to Christ is because they don’t want to? Hasn’t that always been the problem? Wasn’t Jesus crucified because his culture was “antagonistic and adverse to a conversation about a faith in Christ?” Weren’t the disciples martyred because their culture was “antagonistic and adverse to a conversation about a faith in Christ?” What culture hasn’t been “antagonistic and adverse to a conversation about a faith in Christ?”

The problem is not that people are “antagonistic and adverse to a conversation about a faith in Christ” it’s that they’re particularly “antagonistic and adverse to our portrayal of faith in Christ.” We have recreated Christ in our image and it’s not pretty. We have made an idol and called it contemporary Christianity. What we need a is a restoring of the right image of Christ so that people would deal with Christ, not our distortions of it.

Page gets at this when he says, “We have not always presented a winsome Christian life that would engender trust and a desire on the part of many people.” True, but not enough, it’s not the lifestyle choice of Christianity that brings salvation or is desirous. It is Christ who brings salvation and is desirous, not the lifestyle choice – we’ve gotten it wrong!

On a more encouraging note this same article in the Lexington Herald-Leader acknowledges that independent and community churches are growing. Is it because these churches are less steeped in excessive dogma? Is it because they have less trappings surrounding their image of Christ? I don’t know, but I’m glad that I’m a part of one and that we have the ability to be a body of believers – attempting to be the Body of Christ and nothing else.