Considering What They Would Do

In the midst of his discussion in Evangelism for the Rest of Us, Mike Bechtle asks what they would do.

You might think he’s speaking about the people with whom you are sharing the gospel. Or other people, like those extroverts, who use other methods.

He’s really thinking about Jesus and Satan. In two separate chapters he addresses each respectively.

The first of the two chapters focuses on how Jesus interacted with people. There are some speculative questions, just to prompt thoughts. I have no idea if Jesus would go on TV, and don’t actually find it to be a helpful question (Bechtle isn’t focusing on that so this is not a criticism of him).

He does go to the fact that Jesus “came eating and drinking”, essentially doing things that the religious people of His day looked down upon. If Jesus showed up on TV, it wouldn’t be TBN. It might be CNN to talk to Larry King.

Bechtle has 2 assumptions: Jesus wants to impact people eternally, and He’ll use appropriate methods to do that.

What do we see Him doing?

1. Jesus went about His daily life and ministered to the people He met. While on a mission, Jesus wasn’t necessarily like a missionary. But for 3 years Jesus was an itinerant rabbi. He focused on His disciples. But there were times when He traveled the countryside speaking to crowds. Most of the time was ordinary. He encountered people in every day life, like the woman at the well, and talked with them.
2. He met people where they were and moved them closer to God. He went to them. He didn’t set up an office, or booth like Lucy the 5-cent psychiatrist. He found them. “Jesus’s goal was the same- to love people and move them a step closer to knowing God.”
3. He prayed for God to work through Him. We see Jesus taking time to pray. Fully human, Jesus relied upon the Holy Spirit in His ministry just as you and I are supposed to. As “the perfect man” He was perfectly dependent upon the Father expressed in prayer.

“His philosophy of evangelism seemed to be, ‘Love people and talk to them.'”

Bechtle then applies this to us in the 21st century.

1. Minister to the people you encounter while going about your daily life. Perhaps you need to pray to see the ministry opportunities available to you every day. The person in the cubicle next to you that is going through a rough patch. Your neighbor with ordinary problems. Jesus simply lived in proximity to people. So do you. See those ordinary encounters or interactions as appointments. Maybe you simplify your life. Live closer to work or church so you have more time. You don’t need to meet every need you come across (we are often driven by what the media thinks is important). But be open-hearted toward those in your path.
2. Meet people where they are and help move them closer to God. Yes, that is odd terminology if we want to be overly theological. Yes, you are either in Adam or in Christ. We are talking about the process of evangelism. Engage them on one pertinent issue that comes up. Not every conversation turns into the 4 Spiritual Laws. You may just listen to them to better understand them, but willingly engage people.

He spends time talking about listening. We aren’t listening to challenge them, but to love them (which may include challenging their thinking at times). Listening builds trust as well as understanding. It is interesting to ask people about their jobs, most of the time. But you learn things about people, ideas, areas of knowledge. Listen to love.

¹⁹ Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; ²⁰ for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. James 1

Bechtle then turns the table, so to speak. He talks about what Satan does in order to keep us from bearing witness or being effective in bearing witness.

…¹¹ so that we would not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs. 2 Corinthians 2

… ²⁷ and give no opportunity to the devil.  Ephesians 4

¹ Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. Ephesians 6

⁸ Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 1 Peter 5

If we pay attention to the NT, we see that Paul wants us to aware of Satan’s strategies. If we are aware of them we won’t be surprised or ambushed.

1. He wants to keep us distracted. Whether it is focused on method, our sin, entertainment … Anything but bearing witness. It is easy to distract most of us.
2. He wants to keep us divided. He wants us fighting about methods instead of actually doing evangelism. He wants us to bicker over just about anything: the color of the carpet, instruments and style of music in worship, how to administer communion, etc. He stirs up pride and envy.
3. He wants to keep us deceived. While we have the mind of Christ, our justified minds are still being sanctified or renewed. There are lies we can believe that keep us from evangelizing others. It could be hyper-Calvinism. It could be racism (see Jonah). There are lots of ways he can deceive us so we don’t bear witness. One Bechtle mentions is focusing on Satan’s power instead of God’s infinitely greater power.
4. He wants us to be discouraged. He does this with unrealistic expectations. Reminding us of our sins and mistakes so we feel like failures.

In keeping with this overall strategies, Bechtle offers 10 ways Satan schemes to disrupt our efforts.

1. He tempts us to sin. Whether or not we actually sin, the reality of our corruption is exposed and we can be paralyzed by guilt and shame. We need to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, the Author and Perfector of our faith.
2. He works against and outwits us. He knows our weaknesses and patterns. We need to be aware too, so we’ll know the places he’ll strike.
3. He appeals to our pride. This the “mother of all sins”. One manifestation is seeking to be liked and respected. Our pride will take offense at any slight and detour evangelism. We should be humbling ourselves under God’s mighty hand, remembering that He opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.
4. He lies. It is his native tongue. We need to know the truth better so we can spot the lies.
5. He works on our hearts, manipulating our emotions and passions. Scripture reminds us to guard our hearts lest it be tainted by bitterness.
6. He convinces us to be friends with the world. This means we’ll minimize sin and participate in sin w/out a thought. We are to be friends with God who loved us and gave Himself for us. The world doesn’t love us and give itself for us, but kills us if we oppose it.
7. He engages in battle against us. Put on that armor: truth, faith, peace, righteousness, salvation, the Word & Spirit and get to fighting.
8. He pretends to be an angel of light. This is part of the deception. He can distract us with “good causes” that are keeping us from the main fight. The gospel does have social implications, but if we make them the main issue we’ve lost.
9. He’s vigilant. Be watchful too!
10. He interferes with our ministry. He’s like the heel in wrestling who cheats whenever the ref isn’t looking. Expect it at every turn. Don’t give up but keep trying.

“Resisting the devil means learning how our enemy works and taking offensive and defensive measures to render him ineffective.”

Not the best chapters in this book. But there were a few things worth considering. He could have recommended a book like Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices.

As you go, make use of every opportunity knowing that the enemy will oppose you at every turn.

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Considering Sex & Money: Mostly Sex

Our world is insane about many things. Sin will do that, produce a form of insanity. But when it comes to Sex & Money, our world is really crazy. Paul Tripp’s newest book is about these “pleasures that leave you empty and the grace that satisfies.”

He confesses that this was a very difficult book for him to write, precisely because of what it revealed about his own heart. Really, that is what most of this book is about: the heart. The manifestations of a heart gone astray he’s focused on are sex and money. This is not an easy book to read for the very same reasons- the waywardness of your own heart will be revealed.

“I am sad to think that when it comes to sex and money, we still buy into the legalism that says if we can organize people’s lives, give them the right set of rules, and attach them to efficient systems of accountability, we can deliver people from their sex-and-money insanity. … Few areas of the human struggle reveal more powerfully the sad sinfulness of sin than the sex-and-money evils that are done thousands of times every day.”

He begins the book with a series of scenarios that illustrate our insanity when it comes to sex and money.

• A fifteen year-old self-appointed expert on oral sex.
• An 8 year-old boy who is addicted to internet pornography.
• A married man who masturbates daily.
• Teachers having sex with under age students (nearly nightly on the news these days).
• Unemployed high school students bombarded with offers for credit cards.
• The average amount of consumer debt people carry creating an “anxiety-producing dance debt.”
• Governments worldwide are deep in debt, near bankruptcy. And their citizens are rioting because they don’t get enough benefits.

And we could go on. You could go on. I know of pastors arrested in “massage parlors”. I know people arrested in the sting operations designed to get men trying to have sex with minors. And these are only what comes out in public. What of the sex and money sins that are still hidden?

“Both offer you an inner sense of well-being while having no capacity whatsoever to satisfy your heart.”

But there is a deeper theological orientation that Tripp wants us to consider: both creation and redemption. He made us sexual beings. He placed us in a world where sex and money issues are unavoidable and significant part of our ordinary experience. You should get the feeling that you are living in your own version of Deuteronomy 8: test, humbled and too often found wanting. Yet…

“The gospel graces us with everything we need to celebrate and participate in both areas of life in a way that honors God and fully enjoys the good things he’s given us to enjoy.”

Tripp moves into the dangerous dichotomy, expanding on the fact that God is Creator. One of the teachings that has done us much harm is that some of life is sacred and some is secular. The fact of creation shows, as Paul says in Colossians 1, that everything was made by God and for God. It is all intended to bring Him glory, and us good. it is all under His rule. A gospel-centered approach starts here because sex and money aren’t the real problem. We are.

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Considering Grant Jeffrey & Friends

I’ve got too much time on my hands.  That isn’t a very good thing sometimes.

Only $0.01 at Amazon!

I noticed a title on the bookshelf here at the in-laws (they sort of just collect interesting looking books, they probably haven’t read this).  It was The Millennium Meltdown: Year 2000 Computer Crisis by Grant Jeffrey.  Selling Y2K fear was big business in the late ’90’s.  I know I told my congregation to be prepared, just in case.  Just trying to be wise.  So no big deal that NOTHING happened.

But when you write a book about it, tying it into a secret agenda for world government (yes, that’s a chapter title) you are seriously committed to the idea.  And when it doesn’t happen, you lose some serious credibility- or at least you should.

  Grant Jeffrey is one of the many dispensational doom & gloom salesmen who see each world crisis as proof that the Great Tribulation is about to begin ( he has about 10 titles in this genre).  Despite the fact that he is batting .000 (and so are the rest of these guys) …

1. How do they have the chutzpah to continue to write books as if they have any intellectual, biblical legs to stand upon?
2. Why do people continue to buy those same books as if they had any intellectual, biblical legs to stand upon?

I have a number of conflicting emotions as I see both how self-deceived you must be to continue to write this books without ever asking, “Am I misunderstanding the Bible?” and questioning the system of thought that keeps bringing you to these conclusions that don’t match the facts of history.  I also have a number of conflicting emotions when I see how gullible and naive people can be to keep buying this stuff even though these men (and women) have been 100% consistently wrong (just for fun read the customer reviews on Amazon).

I fear for the American Church, it as if large chunks of the church want to be deceived.  Or perhaps I’m deceived and the Y2K mess really happened, there is a cashless society operated by the one world government and the war on terror, or oil, or sand, is triggering the advent of Antichrist and the rapture which they have predicted about 50 times by now.  Or that God actually does want me to be wealthier than I can imagine, perfectly healthy and trouncing the devil with every step and I’m not living my best life so far because I don’t have enough faith or think positively enough and I just really need to will my migraines and back pain away.

I need to head to the tiny beach nearby with my MP3 player of sermons so I’ll stop thinking of these things.

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