Surprising the World

What do you think of when you hear the word evangelism?

Some people get nervous because they think that the pastor is going to ask them to tell someone about their faith.

Some people think of the tele-evangelists on the Christian stations. You know those people with perfect in place big hair.

Some people get the image of people going door to door spreading the gospel message.

One question I want to ask you is: Should faith-sharing really be anxiety producing?

For the next few weeks I want to give you some insight into ways that you can share your faith without having an anxious feeling.

I truly believe that all of us are not gifted evangelists that can give a gospel presentation and thousands get saved. But I do believe that God has given each of us abilities to use to win the world for Jesus. We just have to find what works for each of us. All of us are different. All of us have different abilities. All of us have talents that God has given us and we have to use what God has given us to reach those around us.

This series is called Surprise the World. I want to give you ways that you can surprise your world.

If you have your Bible with you, go with me to the book of Colossians chapter 4. I want to begin reading at verse 2.

Colossians 4:2–6 NIV

2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. 4 Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. 5 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.

As we read this passage, did you notice that Paul gives instructions pointing out two types of people. The first group of people are the evangelists like Paul and Christian Workers that he had around him. The other group of people that Paul refers to is the everyday believers that were there in Colosse. He tells the everyday believer to devote themselves to prayer and he asks them to pray for Paul and his companions that God may open a door for them.

Paul understands that there are two types of people that God uses. There are those that are Pastors, Teachers, Evangelists and so on and there are those that are everyday believers that God has gifted with other abilities. Today I want to focus on the second group. I want to look at many of you. Probably most of you would say that you are an everyday believer. You don’t plan on preaching behind a pulpit. You don’t plan on going from church to church and preaching the gospel message. But God has called you here at Cliff Terrace to help build this church to be the church that God has called us to be. If that is you, then that is who I want to talk to for the next several weeks.

In this passage of scripture, Paul is giving you instructions and he gives you two things that you should do.

1. Devote Yourselves to Prayer

If you look up the phrase “Devote Yourselves” in the Greek it is the word proskartereo which means “continue steadily” or persevere. Implying strong determination and passion for prayer.

Then there is another phrase in this same verse, “being watchful.” That phrase in the Greek is the word gregoreo which means being spiritually awake or alert.

Prayer was an important part of the life of a New Testament believer.

Acts 2:42 NIV

42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

This was a part of their DNA as believers, as the church.

In order for you to devote yourself to serious prayer, you must be alert to the many things that would distract you from God’s purpose.

There are many things in this world that can distract us from being what God wants us to be.

How many of you have tried to pray and then all these distractions came your way? That’s what the enemy wants to do. The enemy wants to put distractions in our way to keep us from going to God for the answers. That’s why Paul is telling the everyday Christian of his day in Colosse to devote themselves to prayer and be watchful. Don’t get distracted, don’t fall asleep, don’t let your mind wonder.

How do we keep from getting distracted? The answer is this: Practice. Haven’t you ever heard the saying, “Practice makes perfect.”

You see, preachers like me and Pastor Bill and Pastor Duke and Pastor Mailey and all the other teachers and evangelists that we have in this church and outside this church need the everyday Christians to pray for us. Like Paul said in verse 3, “Pray for us that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ.” And verse 4, “pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should.”

Those of you that God hasn’t called to be teachers or evangelists or preachers should be on your knees in prayer for those that are called by God to teach and preach and be evangelists.

And that is not all you are to do.

2. Be Wise in the Way You Act Toward Outsiders

What does that mean?

Look at the rest of verse 5 and 6. It says, “Make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”

The everyday Christian is one who is a good interesting conversationalist. Then, interesting conversation leads to relationship, and within that relationship questions of lifestyle come up. Do you see where I am going with this.

Your Christian life isn’t only lived in the prayer closet. At some point you have to get out of the closet and start living the life that God wants you to live. This passage shows us that God is concerned both about your personal prayer life and your interaction with the world. He cares about our prayer closet and the public street, and he wants us to care about bother as well.

You can’t spend all your time in the closet praying, that is the asking and receiving phase of the Christian life. At some point you have to go and make the most of every opportunity, that is the going phase of the Christian life.

1 Peter 3:15–16 NIV

15 But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, 16 keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.

As you develop relationships with your neighbors and you become neighborly and you have these interesting conversations, people are going to start to question why you do what you do. They are going to want to know why you act differently than the unbeliever. And you are going to need to be able to answer them. While the evangelists are making the most of every opportunity, the primary contribution the rest of us make to the work of evangelism is to answer questions. Our job is to surprise the world. It is only when people are surprised or intrigued that they start to ask questions.

If no one ever asks us any questions about our lives, then we are doing it wrong. If our lives look pretty much like any other respectable law-abiding citizen, what’s so intriguing about that?

Michael Frost says it this way.

“Gifted evangelistic leaders should be training their congregations to speak about Jesus conversationally when questioned about how they deal with suffering, or why they spend their vacation serving the poor, or why they’ve opened their home to refugees, or why they’re fasting during Lent, or why they’ve made career choices that allow them to contribute to the greater social good.”

My question to you today is how questionable is your life? Does it look just like your neighbors’ lives? Is there anything intriguing or surprising about it at all? It not, then I as your leader haven’t done a good job in helping you.

So, how can you be wise in the way you act toward outsiders and How can you be more questionable?

We will look at several ways, but today I want to begin with one. Blessing Others.

Blessing Others

For years, if you have been in the church at all, you have heard the word “bless” many times. You have probably heard it in public settings outside the church as well. Like, when someone sneezes, someone might say, “bless you.” In church, you will hear people say things like, “I’m blessed” or “God is blessing me.” So, we hear the word bless or versions of the word bless often. But, have you ever considered what it really means?

Way back in Old English, it comes from the term, “to add strength to another’s arm.” So, to bless another is to build them up, to fill them with the encouragement for them to increase in strength and prosperity.

When we bless others we surprise them. If I didn’t owe you anything and I walked up to you and gave you a $20 bill you would probably ask, “what’s this for?” Then I would tell you, “No particular reason.” And you would be surprised. Because I gave you something for no reason and I might could help you with either gas or groceries.

Many of you are generous at different times to me and my family. You give me gifts for no particular reason, you bless us and we are grateful. So, what are some ways that we can bless our unbelieving friends and neighbors and fellow believers. Let me give you three. I am sure there are others, but let me give you at least three.

1. Words of Affirmation

This is the simplest way to bless someone. Send them a note, write them an email, text them. However, you do it, the point is to send words of blessing to people that you may or may not know well. You are being a blessing with your words.

“I can live for two months on a good compliment.” - Mark Twain

“A word of encouragement is like oxygen tot he soul.” - Michael Frost

We have enough negative words in this world towards one another. It is time that we give people, especially unbelievers, words of affirmation.

A second way that you can bless unbelievers is...

2. Acts of Kindness

Bless others by doing them a favor or providing some kind of practical support. Some examples could be mowing an elderly person’s lawn, babysit an exhausted couple’s kids, help a neighbor move, trims someones hedges, bring your neighbors trash cans off the street for them, and so on. You are talented enough to think of so. The sky is the limited.

And the third thing is...

3. Gifts

Who doesn’t love a gift on a day that isn’t a holiday or your birthday. I’m talking about totally random gift-giving. Nothing blesses someone more than an unexpected gift.

My wife is great at this. She will find something random and buy it for someone because it reminded her of them.

It doesn’t have to be an expensive gift. It is something small that reminds you of them. It shows that you are thinking of that person.

Some of you might of thought of the idea of providing someones meal. That is definitely a blessing, but we will talk about that next week.

Closing

So, here is what I want you to do this week. I challenge you to make a plan to bless three people each week. Of those three people, at least one has to be not a member of this church. At least one has to be a member of the church; and the third can be from either category.

I think all of us can do just that. Here in a minute I want you to pray for God to reveal those three people to you. I want you to bless them with a word of affirmation, an act of kindness or a gift. Pray and God to reveal them to you and what method you are going to use.

I believe that when we do this, people will be intrigued by our motivations. And that’s when we get to speak about Jesus, the one who taught us to bless others.

Dave Ferguson wrote a book called, Discover Your Mission Now. In this book he recounts reading a doctoral thesis entitled “Blessers versus Converters.” The researcher looked at two teams of short-term missionaries that visited Thailand with distinctly different missional strategies.

The team referred to as the “blessers” went with the intention of simply blessing people. They saw their mission as being, to bless whoever came their way in whatever practical ways they could. On the other hand, the “converters” went with the sole intention of converting people and evangelizing everyone they encountered. The researchers found that the “blessers” also had almost 50 times as many conversions than the “converters!”

When we live unexpected lives, which clearly includes the blessing of strangers, we find ourselves being questioned by others. Then, we have the best opportunity for sharing the hope of Christ within us.

Today, I want to spend some time on our knees, if you are able to get down here, praying for God to give you 3 people to bless this week. I believe that God is going to do some amazing things in our church through the people that attend our church.

Come and let’s pray.