Living with a nag
Few things are more unpleasant than living with someone who nags you all the time. I’m not referring to my lovely wife, who rarely nags (and rarely reads my blog). I’m talking about Microsoft Office.
I’m using a new version of Office to finish my sermon. I didn’t buy it - yet. It’s a test-drive version…full-featured (except I just discovered it won’t print!) and free for thirty days. It’s a superior product (though maybe a bit bloated) to others that I’m testing and I am familiar with it, having used other versions of Office for years. MS has lowered the price too, so I really should be leaning toward buying it. There’s just one problem…
Every time I save my work (and I save often - I figure that Jesus saves, and so should I) and I mean EVERY time…it tells me that this is a test-drive and that I have 29 days left, and my choices are to buy now, learn more, or be reminded later…not very much later.
This nagging is quickly filling me with a loathing for the product. A reminder now and then is good…it’ll keep me from forgetting when the test-drive ends. But the nagging! It’s killing our relationship, me and Microsoft’s.
If I had time to think on it, there’s probably a good lesson there about marriage…or parenting…or sharing our faith. But I can’t think on that now. I’ve got to save my work. Just a sec…UGGHHHHH!!!
An unreasonable faith
It is quite a contrast reading Paul’s Hattaway’s Back to Jerusalem alongside of I Sold My Soul on eBay. In the latter, atheist Hemant Mehta searches for a reasonable expression of Christianity, and he does so in an interesting and humorous way. But Back to Jerusalem reminds us that sometimes faith requires people to live way beyond reason, to pay a price that makes sense only in light of eternity.
Back to Jerusalem tells the stories of several leaders in the underground Chinese church, heart-wrenching stories full of persecution and imprisonment. One woman, after being jailed for some time, was told she was going to be released. They took her to a place where she could see her children (and they could see her) and then told her: “All you have to do is renounce Christ.” She refused and went back to prison for 20 years, losing the chance to be a mother. Such a faith makes sense only in light of Jesus Christ and eternity.
These underground believers have a plan for completing the Great Commission. They intend to take the gospel back to Jerusalem by heading west, evangelizing India and the Muslim world along the way. Two things they have going for them: They’ve been made tough by persecution; and they aren’t American.
If their goals sound unreasonable, so is their faith. I’m looking for them to succeed.
PS - Thanks to Joanie for bringing this book to my attention. :)
Sermon: Grander vision living
Simple steps pointing people to faith.
4. Grander vision living (4 of 4)
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Evangelism, internet and otherwise
I appreciate the comments on my previous post. I think we all agree on the need to proclaim repentance as part of evangelism. Both John the Baptist and Jesus began their preaching by saying “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is near” (Matthew 3:2, 4:17). In Acts, Peter called for repentance in his first two major sermons (Acts 2:38, 3:19).
Even The Four Spiritual Laws, the Gospel presentation which begins with “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life” (Law #1) goes on to say that “Man is sinful and separated from God” (Law #2), and that “Jesus Christ is God’s ONLY provision for man’s sin” (Law #3).
But the fact that I’m a sinner isn’t part of the Good News, is it? Rather, it is the bad news that I need to hear before I can understand the Gospel as GOOD News. In our “I’m-OK, You’re-OK” culture, this bad news needs to be emphasized because people don’t want to accept their depravity before God. But it isn’t the whole truth about us, of course. Instead, the Bible holds in tension two facts about us. We are created in God’s image, and we are sinful; God loves us but cannot tolerate sin in his presence; or (as Shane Claiborne puts it) we are beautiful and we are wretched.
This Sunday, I’ll be using Bill Hybels’ illustration of the cross as the bridge between us and God. A gap separates us from God, and no amount of effort on our part can possibly bridge the gap. But what we are powerless to do, God DID.
What about talking to people about what God can DO for us? Is this a capitulation to our self-centered culture? I can only answer that Jesus did this. Extravagantly. “No one who has left home or brothers or sisters…will fail to receive a hundred times as much…” (Mark 10:29-31). “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28-30). “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it” (Matthew 16:25).
Internet evangelism day?
According to this web site, April 29 is Internet Evangelism Day. I remember hearing about this in years past and thinking “We ought to get involved in that”. But now I’m not so sure. I have to admit that I’m pretty skeptical about the potential of the web for evangelism. As I’ve said in my recent preaching, sharing Jesus is so relational and (if Jesus Himself is any indication) so incarnational, that the web with its “virtual communities” doesn’t seem like the place to do it. And the web site listed above isn’t all that helpful, with its many nested menus that seem to promise great ideas after the next click…
Maybe I’m thinking about this all wrong. I love using the web, and I’m certainly not shy about posting all my vain ramblings about faith. Do any of you have good ideas about how the web can be used for evangelism?
