Evangelism 1
Notes
Transcript
Our mission statement
1. People of the Gospel...
The first part of our mission is about preparation and equipping. We believe every believer has been given a gift by God (equipped) in order to share the Good News in his or her unique way. FBC desires to prepare every believer that has a passion for the lost by teaching and encouraging them to pray, study the Bible, and church fellowship. We are not trying to gain members. We are trying to encourage you to do what the Lord has called you to do!
In order to fulfill our mission, we need to know what the gospel is…
Let’s look at the life of Jesus and then we will jump to Paul
Last week we looked at 5 things that Jesus came to do.
18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free,
So, Jesus came to proclaim good news to the poor. What was this good news?
In Matthew we read
23 Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people.
Likewise, when Jesus send out the 12 disciples he says:
7 As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’
So, we know that the good news has to do with the kingdom of heaven coming near, but before we get too far down this trail, we need to jump a bit further back in Matthew:
17 From that time on Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
And, even before we look at Jesus, we can go a bit further back to John the baptist
1 In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea 2 and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
So, as we went backwards, if we go further, we have John the baptist, who is the crazy guy in the wilderness suddenly appear and preaching the message
“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand”
As Jesus comes, He preaches the same exact message that John was preaching.
So, the gospel begins quite clearly with the word “repent”
How many of you have seen this guy?
Often times when people hear of evangelism, this is what there mind goes to
Some guys standing on the corner with a sign like this…
I’m curious, how many people this guy has led to Jesus?
Now, God can work in all things to bring people to Him, so possibly some, but probably not an effective way of evangelism!
Why?
Well, a couple things:
I wonder how many people that did not grow up in church know what the word “repent” means? Not a word used very often outside of christianese
It’s an incomplete message
So, let’s break it down
What does repent mean?
It is the greek word “metanoa” which literally means to change your mind
But, it actually means a little bit more than that
So, in our western minds, we are so literal that we may not understand the word in the eastern context
If I am doing something that is harmful for me, or others and it is revealed to me, by the HS, reading the Word, a friend in the church, and maybe I go and research it and realize, yeah, it’s hurting me, but I decide to keep doing it, have I repented?
Well, quite literally, one could say yeah I recognized now that it is bad for me or others, but I haven’t stopped doing what I am doing
See, in the eastern understanding, which would be the context of John the baptist and Jesus, repentance hasn’t been fully realized until it results in a change of direction
So, the first part would be recognizing and changing my mind about what I am doing and then step 2 would be to stop doing it.
You could say that I have repented when I stopped doing the harmful thing
Interestingly, the Jewish understanding of metanoa actually goes a bit even further
Repentance doesn’t mean simply changing your mind and your direction, but turning back to God specifically
You see this in Jewish literature
So, it means to change your mind, your direction and come back to God
And, so, specifically what is Jesus saying to repent from?
It is unbelief in Him as the Messiah!
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
And Jesus explains what happens to those who don’t believe in Him.
In Matthew 25, Jesus is talking about his return and the sheep and goats. The sheep are on His right who have heard His voice, believed in Him, and served others as if they were serving Him and the King will say to them:
34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.
Then the goats on the left did not respond to Him, believe in Him and serve others as if they are serving Him and the King will say to them:
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
So repentance is to turn from our way of thinking, which is sinful and selfish, deserving eternal death, which is separation from God, and turn back to God for eternal life!
Here in a few messages, we will talk about comments and things that people make, and so I won’t chase that rabbit too far today, but one of the question is:
Why would a good and loving God send someone to hell?
You see, the premise of the question is flawed. People are already separated from God by their sin and on their way to hell.
The better question is why would a good and loving God not make a way for people to be in relationship with Him?
And the obvious answer is: a good and loving God would make a way!
And so, He did! Through Jesus Christ!
What repentance is: is recognizing that we are separated and lost and need to come back home!
So, we turn from our unbelief and turn back to God!
My problem with the sign guy is if we don’t know this is what repentance means, what are we to do with his sign?
The horders out there would take this sign to mean something totally different than probably what this guy is intending
So, my first issue with the sign is most unchurched probably don’t know what repent means and secondly, it is an incomplete message
Without Jewish/christian understanding to turn back to God, what are we repenting of or to?
As John the baptist and Jesus preached, repent, but also the kingdom of heaven is at hand!
In other words, God has come near!
He is here!
As Jesus went around preaching, healing, and casting out demons it was a demonstration of the kingdom coming
38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.
And in Matthew 12 after Jesus casts out a demon the Pharisees needed and explanation for how He did it and they said
24 But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, “It is only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that this fellow drives out demons.” 25 Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand.
26 If Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then can his kingdom stand? 27 And if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your people drive them out? So then, they will be your judges. 28 But if it is by the Spirit of God that I drive out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.
So, Jesus demonstrates the power of the kingdom as He does His work and as He preaches
At the end of the sermon on the mount in:
28 When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, 29 because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law.
So, there was something powerful about Jesus’ teaching
So, the gospel according to what Jesus taught, was to repent and turn back to God and that His kingdom has come!
Jesus then spends a lot of time talking about the kingdom of heaven and what it is like
31 He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field.
33 He told them still another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds of flour until it worked all through the dough.”
44 “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
45 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls.
47 “Once again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish.
1 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard.
So, Jesus says to repent, turn back to God as the kingdom has come and He demonstrates the power of the kingdom and then explains what this kingdom is like
This is the gospel according to Jesus! The gospel that He sent His disciples out to preach!
Next week we are going to start looking at the gospel that the apostles, mostly Paul preached and I think we will see some similarities
But for now, maybe you have heard something today that resonated with you.
Maybe it’s the first time you are hearing that God loves you and wants what’s best for you!
That in His kingdom, there is freedom, healing, restoration, etc.
Maybe you realize that the path that you are on is of destruction and separation from the giver of life
And maybe you want to be connected with God, and free from the bondage of sin
It is a pretty simple ting, though not always easy, you believe in Him, you make Him Lord of your life
Maybe this morning, you have done that, but want to see the power of God in some are of your life
We would love to pray with you this morning!
