So, I was honored and blessed to teach at Victory Assembly this past Sunday night. I took my notes and expanded on them a bit to share with whoever wants to read something long. If you prefer to watch a video recording, you can do so here:
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/13780270 This is the first time we have video recorded a service, so the quality isn't great. The sermon starts at around 9:40 into the video, and the sound is super quiet until amost 13 minutes in. You'll want to use headphones. Or just read the below. Or just shrug it off and go elsewhere on the interweb. Ok, that's all.
What brought this on? Why has this been on my heart?
This is a message that has been on my heart for a long time. It is something that has caused me to feel ashamed, angry, and inspired all at the same time. My heart for this has grown for a variety of reasons and experiences, such as: Struck by the perception of Christians I encounter in “the world.” Thinking about the unsaved, and why we don’t see more people coming to the cross. Working with unsaved people. News coverage. Blog articles, etc on the web.
It occurred to me that something is wrong. Something isn’t happening, or the wrong thing IS happening. I wanted to see what the reality is “out there.”
What is the current situation? What is the perception?
I pulled some research from the web to see what was going on out there. A couple primary sources jumped out at me:
Survey by LifeWay Research (research arm of Southern Baptist Convention): 79% of those surveyed said that Christianity today is more about organized religion than loving God and loving people. No info on the data set, demo, or date
Barna Group study in 2007 – age 16-29 non-Christians over three years. Only 3% have a favorable view of evangelicals. Top criticisms: Christians today are judgmental (87%), Too involved in politics (75%), 50% of churchgoers think Christianity is judgmental and out of touch! 91% of non-churched and 80% of churched say that Christianity is “anti-gay.” That beyond opposition to homosexuality, Christians show excessive contempt and unloving attitudes towards gays and lesbians. They have made homosexuality a bigger sin than anything else. “Christianity in today’s society no longer looks like Jesus.”
Rev. Rowten is an evangelist that came and spoke at our church a couple month’s ago. He told us this story about his mom, who was a baker back in the day. She would apparently mix up her batter, pour it into the cake pan and then test it. She tested it by taking a single finger, dipping it in the batter, and tasting it. Her assumption was that if that one little bit tasted good, then it all tasted good. It occurred to me then, and it strikes me now: that is exactly how the world at large form their opinions of Christianity. While I always tell people they shouldn’t base their view of Christianity on flawed human beings, people do. If they have an experience with someone who claims to be a Christian, then that has set an expectation in that person’s mind as to what Christianity is like. Perception is REALITY.
The main takeaway here is that the world, the nation, our very community has a warped view of Christianity. That is because the ones that seem to get the most attention are those who, although what they are saying may be true, are not communicating the truth through the love of Jesus in the right way. Sometimes they are the loudest, sometimes they aren’t. But either way, there are not enough Christians today communicating through the love of Christ in an effective way.
My goal is to look at what Christ showed us about this in Scripture, and then we’ll look at how we should then approach this.
What is Christ’s example? What does he show us?
Take a look at Matthew 9:10 – 13. Here we find Jesus is eating with sinners and tax collectors. These were the “worst of the worst” in the society at that time. This is significant! In this culture, dining together was a BIG deal. You didn’t just eat with anyone. And, Jesus was eating with the “worst of the worst.” He not only tolerated them – this is what a lot of us do. We think to ourselves that we can tolerate “those people” so long as they keep to themselves and leave us alone, but this is not what we see from Jesus. He aggressively pursued them and deliberately placed Himself with them. Why? “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.” He ate with them. Why? Because that is where they were.
Look at the woman caught in adultery in John 8. Yes, Jesus told her to go and sin no more, but before that he stepped in and saved her. Love came first. What about the woman at the well in John 4? The sheer act of talking to a Samaritan was scandalous, let alone a Samaritan woman. This is someone he should not have spoken to. For anyone else, they would have felt awkward. They would have blown her off. But He showed love to the woman by engaging her in conversation. He then proceeded to tell her about her past, in an effort to show her that He knew her – and even then, He was still there talking to her. The cool thing is that later in the chapter we see that she tells others, who later come to Jesus and believed. Jesus never scoffed at a sinner. He never looked down his nose. He went straight to the sinners of the land, despite the religious tradition of the day, and he loved. And lives were changed. In contrast to the religion custom of the time (driven by the Pharisees), He was scandalous. This was a scandalous love. REMEMBER, Christ’s sacrifice on the cross was not in response to repentance (repentance wasn’t required for love), it was born first out of the love of God for us SINNERS.
So, what should we do? What does Christ’s example show us about how we should live?
First things first, we must KNOW SCRIPTURE, and not just tradition. We cannot solely rely on what we hear in church from our pastors, or what our parents tell us. Why do I say this? Take a look at this information below:
Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life put together a 32 question quiz, and polled more than 3,400 Americans. This quiz was about religion at large, with a big focus on Biblical knowledge. Most Americans scored 50% or less on Bible knowledge. Bible belt folk did not score high – they were at the bottom! Highest scoring were Atheists! Those who said they believe the Bible is the literal word of God did slightly worse than average! So we believe it, but we don’t know it? No wonder the message is missing the mark!
When we approach those outside of the church, we need to do so as Christ did, NOT as the Pharisees. The Hebrew form of “Pharisees” means “separatists” or “the separated ones.” Sound like anyone you know? Most of us have heard the term “Be in the world, not of it.” First, as an FYI, this actual phrase is not in Scripture, but is a paraphrase “mashup” of a few different verses that basically talk about how we are not of this world, and we should not be conformed by the world, etc. Many of us believe this to mean that we must DISTANCE ourselves. We see the opposite in Jesus. He did not condone, but he also never shied away. He was there. He was in the places that the Pharisees didn’t go near. He talked to people that the religious sect excluded and shunned.
When I was in college at Central Bible College in Springfield, MO, I worked as a server at a local Applebee’s. It came time for a holiday party or annual part of some kind, and it was being held in a bar. I wrestled with whether or not I should go. I had heard all my life that a good Christian boy should never step foot into a bar for any reason whatsoever. So, I went to my Grandfather, who I respect greatly for his heart for the Lord and his wisdom. I don’t remember his exact words to me, but the basic jist was that you have to be around dark to be a light. He reminded me that Jesus went to those people where they were. So I went, and hopefully I was a witness for Christ at that party.
The Pharisees looked down on others, and questioned Jesus when he ate with sinners. Someone questioned me about going to that holiday party. Matthew 23:13 says "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in." Can our actions actually work against us being used by God to add to the kingdom of heaven? YES! And, unfortunately, a lot of the “Christians” these days in many churches seem more like Pharisees than Jesus to me. We are far too interested in keeping to ourselves and “protecting” ourselves from whatever evil lurks about beyond the walls of our local church.
We, as the people of Chris, need to focus more on the “who” and less on the “what.” Let me illustrate this for you. Let’s look at the issue of homosexuality, which is arguably a hot button item, but this was specifically mentioned in the Barna survey, so why not address it? The “what” in this case is homosexuality, and the “who” is the person. The actual individual being, with feelings, and whom God loves desperately. Politics was also mentioned in the Barna survey, and let’s face it – these two topics are incredibly linked in today’s political atmosphere.
Now first of all, we can and should be active in our democratic system. It is one of the great things about our country, and we should be a part of it. This is not to take away from that. Here is what I am seeing: the church is incredibly mobilized in the political arena to fight gay marriage. You see it in the news, on the web, on the streets, etc. It is a massive, almost militant effort, for the most part (not everyone, of course). You know what I don’t see? I don’t see a bunch of churches actually reaching out to and ministering to the LGBT community. We need to realize that getting laws passed does absolutely nothing when it comes to the hearts of men. If a law banning gay marriage was passed, what would happen? Nothing. Whether it’s a law or not, individuals are still gay. Passing a law won’t change hearts. So why the focus? I’m not saying you shouldn’t vote a certain way based on your core beliefs and values, but I feel like the “church” as a whole has put WAY too much emphasis on attacking this, and so very, very little energy into reaching out to and building relationships with this group of people. When we look at Jesus’ example in Scripture, he focused his efforts on bringing about the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth, not fighting against or trying to change the government at the time. This despite an incredibly corrupt and immoral government at the time. The problem comes when we spend more time being vocal about politics than we do about showing the love of Christ. What are you more known for?
Look at Matthew 5:46 and 47 (pieces somewhat mashed up here): “If you love those who love you . . . greet your brethren only, what reward have you . . . what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” Christ likens us to tax collectors (which is bad), if we do not love others, outside the walls of this church. This is a serious matter. We cannot simply hide away inside our church walls. We have to get outside of ourselves and reach out to people the way Christ did.
We need to have a constant mindset that we are ALL sinners, and have fallen short – because it’s true! Grace is not only for us, it is for all people. We are no better than anyone else, yet the church seems to vilify some more than others. Why? Doesn’t Scripture say that God is no respecter of persons? Isn’t His love for ALL? What does Acts 10:34, 35 say? “Then Peter opened his mouth and said: “In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality. 35 But in every nation whoever fears Him and works righteousness is accepted by Him.” No partiality. No preference. EVERY NATION, not just some, not just the ones we like. Every nation. Or, in our terms, every person, no matter who they are, how they dress, or where they are from. Then why do we, as the body of Christ, shy away from and vilify certain groups of people?
I want to share an example of how Christ’s heart is played out at one particular church. Rachel and I were a part of Trinity Family Church in Gardner a while back. Part of the core value of this church was a ministry they began called Love Wins. It started with the ladies of the church going to local strip clubs and hanging out with the strippers. They would take cookies, gifts and other such items to the girls and simply love on them. This effort ultimately led to a new relationship like none I’ve heard of before. People from the club came to church. The owner of the club and other workers there helped our church do service projects for a local charity. Awesome! Then they branched out more and formed a ministry to reach out to the LGBT community. The goal was not to go and yell at them, picket them, put them down, shout at them, or anything like we normally see out there. The goal was to simply build relationships. Those who were called to do so would go to gay bars and talk to people, help clean up after gay pride parades, etc. All in the name of building relationships so they could earn the right to speak to individuals about Christ.
Lastly, we looked at a video from a couple years ago put on the web by Penn Gillette of the Penn & Teller duo. A link to the video is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhG-tkQ_Q2w First of all, Penn is a hardcore, very vocal atheist. He has badtalked religion like crazy, the Bible, etc. However, you can tell as you watch this video that he was impacted by what happened in this story. Please note how he specifically talks about how this guy was polite, and sane. I am also intrigued by his comment that one experience with a good Christian isn’t going to change his atheist views. And I thought to myself, has he really only had one positive experience with a Christian? What if he had more? I know this, Penn is someone that most Christians wouldn’t go near if they indeed knew who he is. He is large in stature, famous, wealthy, incredibly intelligent, brash, and a very vocal atheist. I’d be intimidated! But this guy did it. Jesus would have done it. This video shows us two points: It is possible to reach out to someone most wouldn’t, and it can be done the right way. He didn’t confess Christ right then, but you can see it impacted him, and a seed was planted. That is all God asks us to do.
Remember, perception is reality. The wrong message is being conveyed and received. If we’re not careful, we can and will continue to lose our influence. We need to reach out to the lost. EVERYONE deserves to hear about this. We cannot keep this to ourselves. We need to do it the right way. Times have changed. We can no longer stand on the street corner and shout “Repent!” To do this, we must build relationships - earn the right to speak into people’s lives. SHOW LOVE. Remember, Christ calls us to create disciples, not just converts. “Disciple” in Hebrew is Talmid, which means ‘student’ or one who learns and imitates another. That takes an investment on our part. It’s not a quick “get em and leave em” kind of thing. It’s a relationship. It’s a journey.
It’s important for us to live the love of Christ because we are to be living examples just as Christ was a living example for us. How often do we really, and I mean REALLY, reflect Christ? Ask yourselves these questions: Do people in your life (neighbors, work, etc) know you are a follower of Christ? What kind of example have you set? Have you loved on people, on ALL types of people? If someone around you were to be quizzed on what Christianity is, would they base their answer on experiences with others, or with you? Would they have a favorable view of Jesus and/or Christianity based on experiences with you? Based on your example, would they say that Christians are judgmental? That Christians are more about religion and tradition than Christ’s love? Or would they say that they see genuine, unassuming, unconditional love?
All comes down to this: Does the world see the REAL Jesus though us?
All of this isn’t for the sake of improving the image or reputation of Christians in the world, but rather that we should love because Christ first loved us, despite ourselves. As a church we should reflect on these things and change ourselves because it’s Jesus’ will for us to be like Him. Does Scripture tell us to be like him? You bet. Ephesians 5:1-2 “Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. And; WALK IN LOVE, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us . . .” Does the world see the REAL Jesus though us?
