Materials
The Gospel Of Life: Evangelism Defined
By R. Todd Bouldin
I.
INTRODUCTION
A. "What are words which describe what you believe the gospel is?" List these on the board.
Peace, Freedom, Hope, Joy, Victory, Truth, Salvation, Redemption, Forgiveness, Power, Good News
B. Turn to your neighbor and discuss which one of these you identify with the most that best explains your understanding of the gospel or your own experience of the gospel.
C. I wish to begin tonight by reading from Luke 4:18-19. Listen as Jesus describes his ministry. Listen for its concreteness - As depth, its vastness.
And then again from Romans 10:13 and 15: For whoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And how shall they believe upon him of whom they have not heard? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of great things!”
Over the next two weeks, I wish to provide an alternative view of evangelism from what you have been hearing, in some respects. But my intent is not to cause a stir or to counter Larry West as much as to critically think about evangelism together arid hopefully come away with an enlightened understanding, new skills, and encouraged hearts. This week, we will discuss the message of evangelism. Next week, we will turn to the proclamation aspects of evangelism. I will contend in both lessons that our evangelism should be shaped, not by shifting cultural trends or careless acts born of frustration, but shaped and determined by two things:
1. The message of the Gospel
2. The ministry of Jesus Christ
II. THE CONTEXT FOR EVANGELISM: THE KINGDOM OF GOD
A. Tonight, and with the risk of being too heady and not practical enough, I want to look at the message of evangelism. What exactly is the Gospel? How might we teach it to people of the 21st century in a way that reaches them but does not lose its power or compromise its truth? It is my contention tonight that the message should shape the medium-that because of the nature of the Gospel itself, there are some methods of proclaiming it that are appropriate and some that are not. So, it is critical that we first understand what we are striving to communicate to the world before we set out on the task.
Next week, I want us to look at the proclamation of the message we discover this week and discover methods of communicating the Gospel which build on its message. I am giving you two articles which you might read in preparation for next week, but I particularly wish to urge you to return again to the woman at the well in John 4.
B. If I was to ask you what the Gospel is, most of you would probably say that it is the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Some would say it is what one must do to enter the church. These all are at least partially true, but I do believe there is more. I want to take us on a journey through Scripture tonight to provide us with a wider context for viewing our evangelism.
C. If we are to understand what role the gospel and our proclamation of it has in the world, we must begin by grasping what God's larger purposes are in history and in creation. Doesn't it make sense that our evangelism must be related to where God is taking all history and every person?
Therefore, I wish to begin at the beginning with Genesis 1:1, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth... Then God said, Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness. . . So God created humankind in his image, in the image of Cod he created them, male and female he created them.” "God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good."
First, it is important to note the love with which God made creation, and his attention to its every detail and need. Further, God observed his creation, made from complete nothingness and darkness and a void, and he claimed it was good. This included the human being that Cod made as the princes and princesses of creation. This point cannot be overemphasized: that God made the human being and regarded his or her essential nature as good. Everything was perfect and right about these humans, and they lived in a creation untainted by destruction, immorality, war, hatred, and death. That is until they succumb to temptation, choosing death and bondage of the soul to the perfection of God's kingdom.
From this point on, suffering and death become the fundamental human reality.
But this did not thwart God's purposes to put things back as they were, to bring his creatures back home to the freedom and life found in relationship with Him. This rebellion by his own creatures did not shatter the Creator's intention to make his creation good again. So, Cod created a salvation community, the nation of Israel, through which his message of redemption would come to all nations.
Notice, how despite the human rebellion against God, he never ceases to view his creatures as good: The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all He has made. All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and all your faithful shall bless you. They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom, and tell of your power, to make known to all people your mighty deeds and the glorious splendor of your kingdom. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout all generations. Psalm 145:5-13.
Two points:
1. Evangelism views people in the context of creation, not fundamentally as "lost" but as loved.
When we speak of evangelism, we often talk about those outside the church as "the lost." There -is nothing scripturally wrong with this image. For instance, Jesus describes unbelievers in Luke 1 5 as lost coins, lost sheep, and and like a lost son. In Luke 14:10, Jesus says that the disciples are to "seek and save those things which are lost." It is helpful to note here that Jesus is describing the unbeliever's state of mind, heart and soul as lost. He primarily does not use the word as a noun itself.
However, we use these words as our primary description of unbelievers. Again, it is technically not unscriptural perhaps. But I fear that we have come to view those outside the kingdom of God fundamentally this way, causing us to see God's human creation more as they are in their sin rather than as God sees them: the object of his love and souls that are waiting to be restored to their rightful place in God's creation, to the state of perfection and freedom and immortality that they had before they rebelled. This does make a difference, for one tends to be condescending and cause Christians to view non-Christians as somehow less than them or the objects of God's Judgment or scorn. Such teaching will emphasize "getting right with God" rather than coming home to the place of God's restoration and forgiveness, finding the wholeness, healing, and salvation of the heart of our Creator for which the human heart longs.
I once heard about a church in Massachusetts who ask a common question when they interview potential ministers for their church. They ask the candidate to go over and look out the window and describe a person walking on the street below. If the candidate replies, “I see a lost person," that candidate is rejected. If the candidate replies, “I see a person created in the image of God" that candidate is called to ministry. Why?
It makes a difference in how we will minister and how we will proclaim the Gospel to "the lost" because God's heart looks on his creation as they once were and as he desires them to be again, not as they are. Listen to what Paul tells the Corinthians, "For the love of Christ urges us on, because we are convinced that one died for all, therefore all have died ... From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view." II Corinthians 5:14-16. How are you seeing people?
2. The rule of God in creation and every heart is the context of evangelism.
Notice how the writer of Psalm 145 is so inclusive and universal in what he believes God is doing in the world: "all" will worship him in the Kingdom of God. God is Creator and King. His intention in creation was for his whole creation, including every person, to "worship and enjoy him forever" as Augustine said. This is what Gad intends for every person-to live in His Kingdom, the place where he is Ruler over all things and every heart.
If we are to discern the primary message of the gospel, it may be helpful to look at Jesus. His overwhelming message was the coming of the kingdom of God, both in the present and in the future. The witness of the four gospels is that the long-expected wait for the transforming Kingdom of God is over: the kingdom has come in history in the person of Jesus Christ. Mark begins his gospel in Mark 1:15, stating that Jesus came proclaiming "the good news of God" (the gospel), which is, Mark goes on to clarify, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news." This message resounds over and over throughout the gospel of Luke, beginning with the passage I read tonight at the beginning of class where Jesus inaugurates his ministry with words from the Old Testament that described the coming kingdom. When Jesus was asked in Luke 17:20-21 when the Kingdom of God was coming, he said, "The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed ... For in fact, the kingdom of God is among you."
Again, note in Luke 16:16, where Jesus contrasts the old law with the good news of the gospel. What is this gospel? Jesus says it is the Kingdom of God. Jesus also told many parables of the Kingdom, which you can find in Matthew 13, Mark 4, and Luke 15. This good news is that the saving power of God's rule is now operative and present in history.
Paradoxically, the kingdom though is still yet to come. Jesus over and over proclaims the Kingdom to have come in him, but also to be a future event where the whole cosmos will be returned to its rightful Creator and owner, and all will bow down to the one King. Thus, Jesus taught his disciples to pray, "Thy kingdom come." Matt. 6:9-13. The coming of the Kingdom will bring a great day of judgment of human acts, so therefore, "all who say to me `Lord, Lord' will not enter the kingdom of heaven."
Matthew 7:21; Matthew 25:31-46.
Finally, the Kingdom now present will come to its full glory and fruition in the age to come. Matthew 13:31-32. In a beautiful and powerful scene of this final and complete glory of the Kingdom, we are given a glimpse of the throne room in Revelations 4 where God reigns as Sovereign over all, and all worship him as we read in Psalm 145. At this point, the Kingdom will come in all its fullness. And then God will proclaim, "It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and end."
Therefore, in summary, what God has done and is doing and is about to do in history (our lives) is a foretaste of what he will do at the end of history when he will completely reign over all. Thus, God's Kingdom has come in the past; it is here in the present; it will come in the future.
Why is this important? There are several reasons:
1. Evangelism in the New Testament, and today, was rooted in the church's experience of the transforming Kingdom of God in their midst.
This experience of God's rule and the upside down nature of the Kingdom gave the Christians the psychological strength and motivation for evangelism that we often find lacking. It is important to note that this motivation is quite different from those that often spur us to concern for evangelism: a carefully designed evangelistic program, acts to assuage the guilt we feel when we read the Great Commission, the desire to have a growing church like the one down the road. This evangelism is spurred on by the conviction that the most fundamental act of history is occurring and will occur-that we are announcing the meaning and transformation of all history, that we speak the good news that life makes sense and has ultimate purpose in the person of Jesus, and we announce that we know the end game: that all creatures will bow in worship to the one that made and loves them. Thus, what God made as good will then be good again and all will be perfect in the Kingdom of God.
2. Our evangelism is a proclamation to the world of the good news that history has a Creator: that history has a purpose, that it is guided now by a loving creator, and that it will end with the fulfillment of God's purpose: the worship of God.
This is freeing news: that we humans are not left to fate, to our own foibles and failures, to our frailty and humanity, to our inability to control things. No, One stands ruling over everything who is also the beginning and end, the Alpha and the Omega. So, you can see that the gospel is freeing in this way because it provides a definitive answer to the most essential of human questions: How did I get here, why am I here, and where are we going?
3. The message of the Kingdom puts evangelism within its proper place in the church. The kingdom of God is the context of evangelism, and thus evangelism is not the end all and be all of the church. Everything does not revolve around it, but this elevated position belongs to the Kingdom of God and its presence through the Lordship of Christ in every sphere of the church's life. Evangelism is important only as the Kingdom is important. To make evangelism the first concern of the church is to give it an unwarranted, unscriptural and exaggerated place that place belongs to the worship of God. (I Corinthians 14:24)
4. The message of the Kingdom is that the end of our salvation is the kingdom of God, the rule of God over everything, and not “heaven” understood as pearly gates and golden streets.
This is how God's creation will become whole again. The Kingdom includes heaven, but the simple message of "going to heaven" if you accept Jesus misses the essential point: God wants you as his created to return to your essential nature, to become what your creator desires you to be, to know intimately the one who made you, to worship the King and Creator of all. That is heaven, my friends: not walking on streets of gold, which I assume is a metaphor for eternal beauty, but enjoying forever an eternal peace and relationship with God, with everything made right again.
Listen to Colossians 1:15-20.
And to Paul's letter to the Corinthians: "Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the father, and after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.... but when all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to the one who put all things in subjection under him, so that God may be all in all." I Corinthians 15:24-28.
III. THE GOSPEL OF TRUTH: THE CONVICTION
Another description of the gospel that shapes how we communicate it is the gospel as Truth. John says in John 1:14 that Jesus came among us "full of grace and truth." In John 8:32, Jesus promises, "The truth will set you free." Jesus makes this concept of truth clearer in John 14:6 when he says, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Thus, the Gospels clearly witness that seekers of Truth will find it in the person of Jesus. That also is what the writer of Ephesians says in Ephesians 4:21, that "truth is in Jesus."
There are three implications of the Gospel as the Truth that matter for evangelism:
1. Telling the gospel of Jesus Christ as the Truth implies that there are some things which are not the Truth.
Most notably, Scripture is clear, even though we do not like it, that those who do not teach Jesus do not teach the Truth because he personifies and is Truth. This does not mean that there may not be elements of the truth in their message, but it cannot be the full Truth because it is not concerning Jesus. I also think it is important for those of us in the church to realize also that not everything we think, or even every verse of Scripture, is THE TRUTH. This is not to say that it isn't true. For instance, the biblical doctrine of baptism is true and vital for those who wish to enter the Kingdom. However, baptism is not THE TRUTH. The New Testament always talks about THE TRUTH as the person of Jesus Christ. This realization will guide us as we decide where the emphasis should be in our evangelism and teaching.
2. Second, the message of Jesus as the Truth will give our evangelism great boldness and conviction.
Shaped more by our culture where tolerance is king than by the Gospel where Jesus is King, Christians have become ashamed of a message which says essentially: "There are some things that are true and others that are not. What I am telling you is the Truth." Such an exclusivist message is not popular, but it never has been.
It is important to note here, though, that zealous Christians often are to blame for the way American cultural elites and our neighbors have come to view our claims: we have spread this message, not with conviction, but with self-righteousness and arrogance. There is a difference, and God help us to know it.
3. Third, the message of Jesus as the Truth is not tested within church abstractions but within life situations.
Credit to Dale Pauls for the following from his bulletin article, “The Person Across the Desk From Me:”
One question haunts me about evangelism: Why don't I have anything to say to the person across the desk from me about the thing that matters most to me? If this is true of the whole church, it is no wonder that we are dying. I don't believe it is because we are lazy, or because we are indifferent, or that we are not smart enough. Nor do I believe that the world, and even unbelievers in America, are\not interested in hearing what we have to say.
I believe it is because we do not know how to proclaim the Gospel apart from lifeless abstractions. We have a difficult time relating it to life if the person is not comfortable with our biblical in house language. That is perhaps why, even when we evangelize that we gravitate toward sharing the gospel with a Baptist or a Catholic rather than an unbeliever-they know our code. We have the Gospel reduced to quick syllogisms, formulas, and a memorized verse scheme. Missing is any sense of drama, mystery, human quests and seeking, and grace. If the Gospel is the Truth, and it is, it is the Truth for all of life (and after life). Therefore, we Christians must get down and dirty with our evangelism-it must not dwell in cold, universal truths alone that know nothing of life's complexities, mysteries, or turns. Jesus spoke the Gospel, and the Truth, to people where the Gospel intersected the life situation, whether that situation was wealth or poverty, addiction or hopelessness, sickness or pain, joy or sorrow.
When we then are able to speak'\the Gospel to people in real life situations, it will then become apparent to us that we are speaking the Truth. We will not only know that the Bible says it is true (the abstract truth), but we will know why it is True. If we are only comfortable speaking to each other, in classes, lectureships, and worship, I question whether we really believe our unwilling to test our ideas among those who do not believe in the marketplace of ideas.
Learn to see the world, as Jesus sees it, and you will never, run out of things to talk about to the person across the desk from you. You will never be bored. Why? Because Jesus is the Truth for every situation, and you will begin to know the power of the Gospel as you prayerfully begin speaking the Truth to that particular heart and circumstance.
An agnostic friend of mine in D.C., a co-worker, came to me one day to get my advice about a situation concerning his friend. His friend promised him several times that he would come to see him and spend time with him one evening. Brent looked forward to the evening, as he had not seen his friend in some time. However, when the night arrived, his friend failed to show at his apartment. He waited all night, no call, no knock on the door, no excuses. He just never showed up. Brent was hurt, and angry. He slept little that night, feeling betrayed by his friend. He came to me the next morning and asked if he could talk. I said, "Sure." He began to tell me the story, then he asked me what I would do.
I told him that I too would be angry and hurt. This is a normal human reaction. However, I told him that I would attempt to forgive my friend, to try to understand him, and to welcome him back again. Brent said that he didn't think that was possible for him, that it was not within him to do that. I agreed. He asked me how I could possibly find it within myself to forgive my friend. I told him that I couldn't find it within myself. "So, what do you mean then?" I told him that it was not naturally within me, but that I felt empowered by the grace that I had found for my own failings in Jesus. When I feel forgiven, I then can forgive others. For the first time, I realized the Truth of forgiveness, and he began to wonder about its power as the Gospel became Truth to him, not when spoken as an abstract truth apart from life, but when spoken to him as the Truth about and within life.
IV. THE GOSPEL OF FREEDOM: THE MESSAGE
The third image which the Gospel provokes that I wish to discuss this evening is the Gospel as Freedom.
For most of us, death is pretty scary. Therefore, we try to deny it. A book that is one of the most influential psychological and sociological books of this century speaks of this fear. It is called "The Denial of Death" by Ernst Becker. Becker argues that we deny death in order to deal with our fear of it, and therefore live lives with a characteristic ultimate falseness about them. Much that we do in life, he says, is controlled by our fear of death. In fact, this fear of death is at the root of our addictions to sex, money, consumerism, and alcohol or drugs. We fear that in the end there may be nothing, so we do things to push away this fear of lostness in the cosmos. Whatever it is, it makes us feel like something for a while. She wants me, they pay me, they make me feel good. And we become bought and enslaved, owned by our fear of death.
The Gospel tells us a different story about life. The Hebrew writer says, "He himself shared the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death." Hebrews 2:14-15.
Therefore, we don't have to be afraid anymore. We do not have to run from life, or from death. Why? Because Jesus has atoned for us. We fear death because we fear that we will meet a wrathful God there. But the Hebrew writer says, "No, not in Jesus. You have a great high priest." This High Priest is not sanctimonious, or intimidating or scary. He is understanding, sympathetic, and approachable ... like us in every way (Hebrew 2:17). The hanging, bleeding Savior must love us.
Therefore, we come to see the real Truth about human life through the lenses of the Gospel, and it is truly Good News: At the heart of the universe stands a cross, and there we find that there really is love and not condemnation or accusation. The Dark Force has been defeated. This is the real story of our Life in the universe.
As Dale Pauls wrote in a recent bulletin article from Stamford Church of Christ:
The fear begins to subside. Visualize the love, the warmth seeping back into your heart, the inner glow that begins when you know that you are deeply, truly, unconditionally loved. Feel the pleasure spreading through your body, the icy dread melting away. Feel the life returning to your soul, your spirit coming alive. God makes you alive with Christ. Death will be your finest hour.
This is the message of evangelism, my friends. There is no more need for lust, anger, and fear because God can shatter all our fears and make us new. Therefore, human beings, in Jesus Christ, are not resigned to living their whole lives in fear of death but can get on with healing, saving, and transforming the world around them. This is the Truth which can set us free.
I wish to end this evening with my favorite verse of any Christian hymn, and one that has been recognized as probably the most powerful verse ever written in Christian hymnody. Yet, we rarely sing this verse ironically. But I believe it says exactly what I have tried to communicate this evening about the fullness of the Gospel we are privileged to proclaim. The verse is the third stanza of "Rescue the Perishing" by Fanny J. Crosby:
Down in the human heart,
Crushed by the Tempter
Feelings lie buried that grace can restore.
Touched by a loving hand, wakened by kindness.
Chords that were broken will vibrate once more.
Rescue the perishing, care for the dying,
Jesus is merciful, Jesus will save.
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