Blog Title

This is a bible study that I wrote for our Adult Bible Fellowship (Sunday School) classes at FBCE. It is intended as an intro into our four week study/campaign focusing on Bill Hybel’s Just Walk Across the Room. It’s my first foray into the task of authoring curriculum. I’m rather proud of the result as our Minister of Discipleship made a few content additions and style changes, but basically left my original in tact. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

(more…)

Although it is biblical, I’m thinking the whole “Free gift from God thing” isn’t really working as an evangelism strategy these days. Let me tell you why before you chop my head off.

(more…)

I find it fun to go through times like I am currently. I’ve been pretty frustrated with a lot of things, and stressed with the amount of things in which I am involved. So, when I get on a soapbox like I have been lately with evangelism, it’s gratifying to have it affirmed by the things around me.

(more…)

A recent Bible Study led to a discussion on asking for signs from God. How do we know it’s a sign from God? What do we say to those who need to “see to believe?” It turned into a discussion about “the lost” and “the non-believers” and how we as Christians prove God’s existence to “them”.

Only recently have I felt our church making an effort to tear down that invisible wall around our group of believers and really make our community more than an afterthought. Evangelism tends to be something we make about “us and them” and appears in events like we’re doing this weekend which, while effective, is just an event.

We as Christians continue on with our defensive bubble, asking those around us to come in and hear what we have to say, or with this idea that we have something to prove. We make Christianity more about religion than about relationships.

Christianity is not exclusive. It isn’t something we do. It is something we are. I believe the self-inflicted bubble has contributed more to the angst against believers than anything else. Where is the humility in being set apart? We take that so literally that we seclude ourselves. Or, in a thinly veiled attempt at evangelism, we try to convince this “them” that we have something “they” should want. It is not our job to prove anything. It is our job to serve those in need. It is our job to serve those not in need. The Holy Spirit does the tugging.

Please, do not take this to mean that I’m against sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ or that I’m encouraging a strictly passive approach to sharing (or not sharing) the Gospel. I believe wholeheartedly in the Great Commission. I just feel like we tend to look at it more as a job or an obligation than a heartfelt desire to expand the Kingdom. We put such emphasis on telling people about Jesus, that we completely skip over the first step of building a relationship and meeting the needs of people.

If we truly want to make a difference, there is no convincing to be done. There is only serving.

I have a post regarding relevance in Christianity in the works, but felt I needed to get something off my chest. In any industry, one must first define it’s market and meet the needs of that market the best that they can. It is common practice to shoot for an 80% success rate when discussing groups of people. If you can reach 80% of the people 20% of the time, you’re succeeding.

The same holds true in ministry as well. Too many times churches set lofty goals to reach their entire community for Christ, and they attempt to do so in only one or two ways. A block party here, a Christmas pageant there, etc. While these are great in Theory (I’ve always wanted to live there), there is no possible way to succeed with these goals in mind. While you may say “wait, dude, anything is possible with God, right?” I’ll respond with yes, but God also does things differently for different groups of people. The Corinthians, the Thessalonians, the Romans, all received very different messages that were relevant to their specific needs.

What we as A Church – a single group of God-fearing Christians – must do is to break the masses up into smaller groups of people and reach them in ways that are relevant to them. Church A then ministers to one group while Church B ministers to another. Why work against each other and expect Church A to be everything to everyone. It won’t work. If you encounter someone at Church A not being reached, let them know about Church B, or even better, Church C that just started around the corner.

We do this so well with international missions, breaking people groups up and providing materials in their language, storyboards, and dramatic presentations, how come we forget that there are multiple groups of people right outside our doors? Just because we all live in the same community doesn’t mean we all worship the same way.

If Church A happens to have two services, and is still missing their target(s – there could be more than one), maybe a third service, or modifying one of the existing two is in order. It isn’t about a single style of worship or about the music, it is how best to relate the message in away that is relevant to their target audience.

There has been an uprising of community churches with multiple campuses or satellites. This is not only to cover a larger geographic area (churches are all about numbers, you know), but is also to be more relevant to different groups of people in the community.

In a perfect world, we wouldn’t have to be relevant in our presentation, because the distractions wouldn’t exist. Our vision of God would be clear and the desire to know Him would be inherent in all of us (it truly is, but we don’t realize it) from the start. Therefore we would already be at the point of “What can I do for Him” rather than the selfish, human “what can He do for me?”

The problem here is that the people we’re trying to bring into the church and minister to are not able to grasp a concept of “what can I do for Him.” That takes time. We must first be patient and understand that before they can get there, they need to understand “What can He do for me?”

Speak their language. Be relevant. Be passionate. Don’t be afraid to point someone in a different direction (not the same as turning them away) that speaks to them. Work together. If you want to be more things to more people, realize that it’s going to take time & effort and can’t be accomplished in one or two ways.