A Brief Review Before Going On

IMG_0157Dear Friends: This week, we are taking time for a brief review of the first part of our study before beginning to look at the second part. The first part of the study was previewed this spring with two small groups. The second part is new. It is about what kind of person we must be to be a disciple, the importance of a small group that is a part of the family of God and reflects the character of the Kingdom of God, and how we can lead others in a life changing discipling relationship. Blessings to all!

Before we move forward, we need to stop and take a brief look backward. IMG_5869This summer, I had an opportunity to walk the Camino De Santiago in Spain. Every morning, my colleague and I got up with a goal in mind. We even had a map and some instructions. Yet, every day we needed to review where we were and how far we had come. At least a few times we had managed to stray from the path and needed to remind ourselves of the way to our destination. This is just such a pause.

Sometimes it helps to know both where you are headed and where you have come from to make real progress. T4T uses a wonderful graphic called, “The Four Fields Graphic” to outline the entire T4T idea. [1]

images-1There are for fields shown, and we have now covered two of them in some detail: Who is Your Mission Field? and What Do You Share? The second part of this study concentrates on the last two questions, “How do you Disciple” and bringing new disciples into an existing church (Group) and developing them as disciples in community. Finally, we need to both be leaders (disciple who can train disciples) and be aware of developing the leadership ability of those around us (How).

Our Mission Field (Who)

Each disciple of Jesus is called to disciple people somewhere, and that somewhere is wherever we are! However, it is not enough to know our geographic location. We have to know whom it is we know and are called to disciple. Some people have used a Greek term, “Oikos” (which means household”) to describe the social sources of people we might disciple. NetworkOthers call it our “social network.” In any case, all of us live within a network of human relationships in which we meet people who are open to God. Here is one way to graphically represent this aspect of discipleship:

We all have connections to a lot of people, some more important and
more fruitful than others. Therefore, within our social networks, we are especially looking for People of Peace.POP2 People of Peace are those people we think are open to the Gospel for one reason or another. One thing we need to remember: We may not know if a person is a Person of Peace. The Apostle Paul was a Person of Peace, but he was also a persecutor of the church. When I was reached by a lady at a law firm in Houston, I was not looking for God, and did not display many of the obvious characteristics of a Person of Peace. Therefore, we share wisely and loving with those we can leaving it up to God who responds.

The Gospel We Share

Once we have an awareness of whom we should share the Gospel with, we need to have in our minds two very important things:

  1. A simple statement of the Gospel; and
  2. Our own personal Statement of Faith (our Testimony).

We also need to know as many Bible stories as we can remember, just in case we are able to share a story in the course of a conversation. We also need to be mindful of times in ordinary conversations when people we know may be signaling openness to the Gospel. This is the “What.” The “What” is an understanding of the Gospel, a personal Testimony, and a little understanding of the Bible and the story of God’s Love it tells.

Many people do not think that they are competent to share the Gospel, but they are. We have learned and shared on particular way of sharing the Gospel that is used all over the world. It is embodied in a very simple graphic.
imgres

This graphic illustrates in a very easy way the human condition, the bridge that God has provided in Christ so that we may return to close intimate fellowship with God, and the goal of our faith, which is to be untied with God in Christ. We are all separated to one degree or another from God, from our true self, and from others. God, in his wisdom and love, filled with mercy and a desire to repair our relationship provided such a way in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In Jesus we see the wisdom and love of God in human form and by faith we can be filled with the Spirit of Love and Wisdom in a life changing relationship with God through Christ.

How To Disciple People

What happens once we share the Gospel with another person and they are brought near to God in Christ? Bibllical discipleshipmaking is concerned with making Great Commission disciples not just getting people to verbally accept Christ. Remember: Jesus said go make disciples (i.e. active followers of Christ, not just believers or admirers of Jesus). This means our job is not done when we have given your testimony, explained a bit about the Christian faith, and helped another person to receive Christ. In fact, in some ways, it has just begun!

When I (Chris) was a new Christian, I belonged to a small group of Christians about my age that met on Friday evenings. We had the very creative name, “The Friday Night Bible Study.” We met about 7:00 on Friday nights. It began with a time of singing and worship. Then we prayed and shared a bit. After a few minutes we broke up into small groups and discussed a Bible lesson. After a bit longer, we came together for prayer requests and a brief closing song. It was in that little group that I first learned what it meant to be a disciple of Jesus. A part of the importance of the group was the Bible study. Yet, a bigger part of the experience was watching more experienced Christians and learning something of how they lived.

If new Christians are to grow, they need a church—a worship congregation—to attend worship with weekly. However, more importantly they need a small group of people to share their Christian life with and with whom to grow in Christ. Therefore, the very first and most important things to do once a person has come to faith in Christ is to bring them into the church and connect them with a small group of disciples with whom they can share the Christian walk.

Expanding the Kingdom of God

The founding pastor of our congregation constantly remarked that the Christian faith was always only one generation from extinction. This was a reminder to our congregation that we cannot just sit on our laurels. The kingdom of God is something that should be constantly expanding. If this is to happen, Christians cannot just sit and be satisfied with our own salvation. We must be constantly expanding the Kingdom of God by bringing others into God’s kingdom of love. This means that we must continue to train others to share the gospel just as we have been trained to share the gospel.

For this to happen, we must be on the lookout for disciplers—people who are able to share their faith with others and who can form and lead discipling groups. American churches, and especially mainline churches have been slow to understand the necessity for going into the world, sharing the Good News, bringing others to faith, and then discipling them to Christian maturity. This means that we must have a way of continually sending those we have empowered into the world as Christ commanded. This requires leadership.

We live in challenging times for Christians. Our culture is not helpful in empowering us to share the Gospel in Word and Deed. Nevertheless, we are called to be faithful in our time. It may not be easy, but it is the most life transforming, life enhancing thing we experience possible–not just for ourselves but for other people as well. God bless you this coming week!!!

 Copyright 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] This graphic is from www.CoopersOnAMission.com (downloaded April 8, 2015).

Lesson 5: A Disciple has a Gospel to Share

 

IMG_0133Here is the latest installment of the lessons on evangelism and discipleship. Please comment. I am printing in an order, but in the lesson plan we are developing, this lesson may be before the lesson for last week. Kathy and I thank you for all your help”

Copyright, 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Many, perhaps even most Christians are shy about sharing their faith. This can be especially true of average Christians in older denominations. We are worried that we will say the wrong thing, annoy people, face rejection, and be unable to answer questions and the like. We don’t want to come off as a religious fanatic. These fears are completely understandable. However, we do need to think about how we will actually approach people and what we will say. In a way, we are already prepared; however, it might be a good idea if we could review what we’ve already learned. In the last chapter, we talked about telling people our personal story of faith. Telling our own story of faith is very important. People love to hear stories about how another person’s life was changed for the better.

Many Christians have difficulty sharing their own story. Even more people are not sure that they could tell another person what it means to be a Christian. This is nothing new. Christians have always struggled to tell others of the love of God we see in Jesus Christ. However, to be completely equipped as disciples to share God’s love with others we need to have two things in our minds

  1. A testimony of what God has done in our own lives.
  2. We have a simple understanding of how to explain the Gospel to another person. Here it is again

This chapter is designed to be sure you are prepared to share the gospel with others in a short way, so that they will understand what it means to be a Christians.

The New Testament is literally littered with examples of the Gospel. Peter, Paul, and the other disciples shared the Good News. Naturally, when they wrote letters or gave advice, their testimony concerning the Gospel was implicit is all they said. Sometimes, they were very clear about the content of their Gospel. In First Corinthians, Paul describes his gospel as follows:

Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born (I Corinthians 15:1-8)

In this paragraph, written relatively early in the career of the Apostle, he tells the Corinthians the essence of the Gospel. Jesus Christ died for our sins. God vindicated him in by raising him from the dead. Finally, this was no private affair, but a matter of public record.

In letter after letter, Paul shares this gospel in many forms, some longer, some shorter. Near the end of his life, Paul shared another form of his gospel with Timothy:

So never be ashamed to tell others about our Lord. And don’t be ashamed of me, either, even though I’m in prison for him. With the strength God gives you, be ready to suffer with me for the sake of the Good News. For God saved us and called us to live a holy life. He did this, not because we deserved it, but because that was his plan from before the beginning of time—to show us his grace through Christ Jesus. And now he has made all of this plain to us by the appearing of Christ Jesus, our Savior. He broke the power of death and illuminated the way to life and immortality through the Good News (2 Timothy 1:8-10, NLT).

A little later on, Paul goes tells Timothy to remember his Gospel, the gospel of Jesus Christ who was of the house of David, and therefore qualified to be the Messiah, died, and was raised from the dead (2 Timothy 2:8). In these verses, Paul speaks of the power of God shown in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

These various testimonies, and a number of others in the New Testament, give us an idea about what a good explanation of the Gospel needs to say. First, any short gospel presentation needs to center on Jesus: on his life, his death, his resurrection, and his continuing work in the people of God who believe he is the true revelation of the mercy of God. Second, a good testimony includes some notion of the human need for God—the fact that we are mortal, doomed to physical death, and often sinful, doing things we know to be wrong and to deserve punishment. Third, to be good news, a presentation of the Gospel needs to assure hearers that a wise and loving God has provided us a way to fellowship with him, forgiveness of sins, and a kind of life we can only imagine.

If I were to write out a short gospel presentation, it would go something like this:

Everyone I know, including myself, often feels alienated from God. We have done things that we know are wrong. The people I know who have tried to overcome their sinful nature by hard work have failed. Some gave up entirely, and some became hypocrites trying to appear better than they were. What we need is inner transformation. images-2God  loved us enough to send his Son, Jesus Christ, into the world to show us what a truly wholesome life would be like, to teach us God’s ways, and to die for our sins, showing us the extent of God’s amazing grace. God raised this Jesus from the dead, and then he promised to send his Holy Spirit to us when we believe, forgiving us and changing us from the inside out.

This testimony says who Jesus is, who we are, and what God has done for us in Christ. It centers expresses our need to accept Christ by faith.

For many years, Christians have used a graphic to describe the work of Christ. This little graphic is set out below. Some sophisticated Christians make fun of this graphic, but I think that it meets a need. Here is the graphic:imgres

There are other ways of thinking about what we would say to another person who is far from God and needs to become closer. This lesson helps us overcome our fears by thinking again about what we might say to a person who needs to become closer to Christ. Here are the elements of the Gospel that this lesson accentuates:

Everyone is a sinner. In the Old Testament, the word for sin connotes an arrow that has missed the mark. We can all relate to this: however good or bad we have been, all of us have fallen short of being the person we were meant to be and treating others as God wanted them treated. In this sense, we are all sinners.

Sin has a Price. Just as we are all sinners, we all know sin has a price. Our relationship with God, others, and God’s creation is broken by our sin. As a result, we suffer a kind of death. Not only are we not the people we should be, we are also incapable of becoming the people we might have been. The penalty of sin is death—death in this world and death in the world to come. Spiritually, we are all dead because of our sin and far from being the people we might have been.

God is Holy and Perfect. God, on the other hand, is not a sinner nor does God experience sin. In my mind the most beautiful statement of God’s perfection comes in James where the author says, Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first-fruits of all he created” (James 1:16-18). God is perfect, without sin, and our sin can’t be blamed on God.

There is a Chasm Between Us and God. Because we are sinners and God is perfect, there is a chasm between God and the human race—a chasm we cannot cross because the chasm represents a fundamental difference between us: we are sinners and God is perfect and therefore fundamentally separated from the darkness within us. The chasm between God and the human race is our alienation from the very source of our being, alienation described in Genesis as a hiding from God and others because of human shame.

God has Provided a Way of Reconciliation. The Good New is that in Christ God has provided a way to bring sinful people into a relationship with a sinless God. By becoming one of us in the person of Jesus Christ, God adopted our human limitations, yet lived a sinless life. By taking on our sins on the cross, God paid the eternal price for our sins and a way for us to recover our broken relationship with him. This is the Good News.

Some years ago, I was in my office on a Friday. I got a call from the front desk because a disturbed individual was there asking for help. I went up and brought the person to my office. Without going into detail, this person was in a sinful lifestyle, taking mind-altering drugs, and in a relationship of abuse. She was not highly intelligent and she had been drinking. I knew that whatever I said to her had to be simple. The only thing I knew to do was share the gospel in a short form. I took out a piece of paper, drew the little diagram above, and shared the basic elements of the gospel. My guest had been raised in a poor, minority church. She knew the basics of the story. As I shared the Gospel with her, her eyes lit up. She prayed for forgiveness. We spoke of other, more urgent things, and our congregation helped her with a physical need. In the end, this short sharing of the Gospel was exactly what this person needed.

The Power of Prayer

Many years ago, in my first church, I created a little card that described the process of leading a person to Christ. It all begins with prayer. It would be nice if it were easy to determine who is a person of peace and who is not. It would be great if it were possible to tell who will receive the Gospel with joy and who will not. Fortunately, God does know. Therefore, the best place to start with discipling people is exactly where we should start every day anyway—by praying.

One important thing about prayer is that it leads us to unlikely people. Think of the Apostle Paul. On the surface, he did not seem to be a person of peace. Here is how he describes his own conversion:

For you have heard of my previous way of life in Judaism, how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it. I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers. But when God, who set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles, my immediate response was not to consult any human being. I did not go up to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before I was, but I went into Arabia. Later I returned to Damascus (Galatians 1:13-17).

Paul was not interested in being a Christian. He was interested in being a Pharisee. He was not overtly open to the gospel. He was a persecutor. However, God warmed his heart. In Acts, we are told that the early church did not easily accept Paul. They feared him with good reason. Yet, Paul was a person of peace—a person God had prepared to respond to the Gospel. Paul’s story reminds us to keep an open heart and open mind and to look beneath the surface. His story also urges us to be patient.

Be Open To God and To Circumstances

One of the most important things we can be is open to God and to circumstances. If every interruption in our daily routine or plan for the week is seen as negative, we will miss a lot of chances to share Christ with others. Many of our best opportunities to share the Gospel with others will come when we planned to do something else! Therefore, we have to remain open to the work of God in unforeseen and sometimes bothersome circumstances.

Overcome Fears

The single most difficult thing for most people to overcome is fear. When I was in seminary, some well-intentioned professor warned us never to pray for people without asking. He was afraid that we would offend people. After more than twenty years of ministry, that event has never come up. The fact is, people are not as easily offended as we think. People in trouble almost always appreciate a prayer, even non-Christians.

This does not mean that we do not need to be sensitive to others. We do. However, most of the time our normal human sensitivity to others will be sufficient to protect us from making terrible mistakes. What is needed in offering prayer and in offering our testimony and the Gospel is good sense and discernment. If we are other-centered, trying to understand and help another person, our ordinary common sense is likely to lead us in the correct path.

Speak Plainly

Many of us think we cannot share with others because we are not eloquent. This is simply not a problem. Most of those we meet will accept, understand, and enjoy our testimony precisely because it is not eloquent, practiced, professional and the like. Plain words, plainly spoken are better than practiced speeches. This is why it is important to put your testimony and gospel presentation in your own words.

On the other end of the spectrum are people who are eloquent and even a bit learned who say too much and speak in an overly-theological language. The moment of conversion is not the time to use words like “Predestined” or “Total Depravity.” These are theological words with complex meanings. It is enough to know God is at work when we come to Him and we need God because we all do things we know we ought not be done. One very important rule is to never use a word you cannot explain to someone who knows little or nothing about the Christian faith. Finally, of course, it goes without saying that one should never use a word the speaker does not understand.

Don’t Worry About Results

Much of the time, we want people to respond immediately. Some people do and will. However, others will not. Some people like to ponder what they have heard and only react after a time of thinking. We are part of a Presbyterian weekend retreat held four times a year. At this point, we’ve seen hundreds of people go through an extremely intense weekend of spiritual growth. Some people react immediately and emotionally. Some people do not. What we’ve noticed over the years is that some of those who react immediately and emotionally return to their normal lives unchanged in just a few days. Some of those who barely reacted at all during the weekend after a few weeks are changed forever. The Holy Spirit works according to God’s timetable not ours.

Keep Praying

As we work with people, it is important to continue to remind ourselves that God is in charge. We cannot bring people close to God; only God by the power of the Holy Spirit can bring people into a life-changing relationship with the Living God. We can, however, keep praying for people. Both of us have people we have been praying for a long, long time. It is discouraging to pray for a person for years without a response, but sometimes it happens. On result of believing in the Sovereignty of God is that we believe that God is in charge of who and when comes near to God. We are servants. Our job is to pray, share, and love others. We do not know what God may be doing in the life of another human being. Therefore, we must continue to pray.

A Short Method of Helping a Person Receive Christ

There is not single formula for becoming a Christian. Nevertheless, people are called upon to assist others in making a decision to become a disciple of Jesus. Here are six questions that you might ask yourself or another person if the circumstances were appropriate:

  1. Do you believe in a personal God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who created and sustains all things?
  2. Do you believe that human beings in general, and yourself in particular, are spiritually and morally flawed?
  3. Do you believe that God has acted to undo the effects of sin (spiritual and moral flaws) in your life by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus?
  4. Do you accept Jesus Christ as your savior (the one you will lean upon as having delivered you from sin) and Lord (the one you will try to follow and emulate in your daily life)?
  5. Do you commit yourself to a life of discipleship as part of a local body of believers (a church) who are trying to live on the basis of God’s love shown in Jesus Christ?
  6. Do you hope for eternal life in fellowship with God and believe in God’s ultimate victory over sin and death?

There are other ways to lead a person to Christ, but this is one way to help people feel certain that they are a Christian.

What Do I Do Next?

The next steps you take with a new Christian are very important. If a person has made a commitment to Christ, he or she is initially only a Baby Christian. New Christians need a community of believers in which they can mature and grow. In other words, a new believer needs a church and to become a member of a small Bible study or discipleship group. Therefore, there are two things that you must do immediately after a person decides to become a Christian:

  1. Bring them to church and see that they get baptized or that they confirm their baptism if they were baptized as a child.
  2. Help them become a part of the church, the body of Christ, a local fellowship of Christians.
  3. Help them become involved in a discipleship group, preferably one you lead. [1]

Remember the great Commission? Jesus said:

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:18-20).

This tells us exactly what we must do: Be sure new believers are baptized and taught the essential basics of the Christian life. In Presbyterian Churches, only the teaching elders (or ministers of word and sacrament as they are sometimes called) can administer baptism. Therefore, make an appointment to see your pastor and be sure that the person is able to be baptized or make a public statement of their new faith as soon as possible. This is important for them and for the church.

Second, it is of vital importance that they become involved in a small group (a discipleship group), preferably one you lead! If that is not possible, you need to get them into a Sunday School Class, Bible Study, or other small group. But, to reaffirm: it is best if you become their coach as they grow in Christ.

Imagine a parent who gave birth to a child, but never fed, trained, parented, or otherwise helped the child become a mature adult. We would not think that person was a very good parent. When you lead another person to faith in Christ or are instrumental in their decision to become a follower of Jesus, you become their spiritual parent. It is important, therefore, that you continue to meet with them and study the Bible and pray with them as they mature in Christ.

The Order Does Not Matter

Right here we come to a place where differing groups have different ideas about leading people to Christ. The last thing I mentioned is to bring people to a small group in which they can grow in Christ. Much of the time, this may be the first thing to do. People should be invited into our Bible Studies and fellowship groups just as soon as we think they will respond. It is a big mistake. Invite people to your home, to a Sunday School class, to a Bible study, to worship. Many, if not most people need to enter the church and begin to feel comfortable in church even before they are Christians.

[1] This is the primary reason that we have created a training guide for Presbyterians. In our way of doing church, a Teaching Elder or Minister of the Word or Sacrament or other elder authorized to baptize new believers should baptize people in a local congregation.

Lesson 4: Looking for People of Peace

Mom and Dad in BelizeThis is Lesson Four of a training manual Kathy and I are writing. We would very much enjoy any comments for improvements and corrections anyone has. We will be teaching this training program for 26 weeks this next year. Please help us by subscribing to this blog, commenting on each post, and telling your friends about it so they can join in too.

Copyright 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Looking for People of Peace

Once we know what to say,  we are ready to sow some seeds. Perhaps you have already been sharing God’s love by sharing the Good News and your personal testimony with other people. Maybe they have not responded as you wish they would. Perhaps you feel like you are just not the kind of person who can or should share their testimony with others.

Some people become discouraged when sharing their testimony. Please do not. Remember the basic principles that we shared right at the beginning:

  1. Go and tell people. Do not wait for them to come to you.
  2. Share with everyone, not just some.
  3. Concentrate on making disciples in long-term relationships, not just new members for a church.

Nevertheless, there are some sharing’s that are more likely to bear fruit than others. Jesus, as he was beginning his ministry and his training of his disciples told the following story:

images-6Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.” Then Jesus said, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.” (Mark 4:3-9).

In this parable, Jesus describes the human heart as like different kinds of soil with differing interest and capacity to absorb the Gospel and grow.

When Jesus and his disciples were alone, they asked Jesus to explain the parable, which he did saying:

The farmer sows the word. Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them. Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.” (Mark 4:14-20).

As we go out into the world, we are going to meet four basic kinds of people:

  1. People whose hearts are as hard as rock and who simply will not hear the story.
  2. People who are spiritually shallow who will follow Jesus for a while but when times are tough the will fall away.
  3. People who could be really powerful disciples but who are so immersed in the things of this word, their day-to-day activities that their faith never matures.
  4. People who have a deep spiritual capacity and who grow in Christ and become disciples who make other disciples and bear fruit for God.

Our problem is that we do not know which is which until we sow the word. Sometimes people who we think have no interest in God and in Christ at all turn out to be the best disciples. Conversely, people who we thought would be the greatest disciples turn out to be big disappointments. This is why the first principle of D4D is to “Share the good news with everyone, not just some.” When we share liberally, we do not leave anyone out.

Looking for Good, Deep Soil

Farmers are always on the lookout for good soil. For a time, we lived in a farming community. Good farmers are always on the lookout for good land to farm. This same thing is true for us. Sure we share with people who are hard-hearted, shallow, or self-involved. Nevertheless we are looking for those who will receive the Gospel with joy and share that Gospel with others enthusiastically. We are looking for deep soil that will bear a produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown” (Mark 4:20).

The Bible has a term for people like this. It calls them “People of Peace.” When Jesus sent out his disciples on a training mission, he told them to look out for persons of peace. Here is the story as Luke tells it:

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road. When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ If someone who promotes peace is there, your peace will rest on them; if not, it will return to you” (Luke 10:1-6).

POP2Who is a “Person of Peace? Luke gives us a few clues.

  1. A Person of Peace is a person we meet as we go into the world as we have been asked to do by Christ.
  2. A Person of Peace welcomes us and in welcoming us welcomes the Gospel and Christ into their lives.
  3. A person of Peace is someone who welcomes the Gospel so that the peace of Christ enters the life and relationships of that person.

David and Paul Watson describe Persons of Peace as follows in their book Contageous Disciple Making: “Persons of peace have three primary characteristics. They are open to a relationship with you. They hunger for spiritual answers to their deepest questions. And they will share whatever they lean with others.” [1] Open to you. Open to God. Open to share. These are three important things to look for in a Person of Peace.

We don’t use the phrase “Person of Peace” often in our daily lives, and we all think of peace as the absence of conflict. So we might think that a Person of Peace is simply someone who doesn’t react negatively to the Gospel. This is true, but there is a deeper characteristic of a Person of Peace. The Hebrew word for “Peace” is “Shalom.” Shalom is more than the absence of conflict. Shalom is a situation in which everything is as it should be. It is a situation of harmony and blessing. Jesus says that he brings a peace unlike the world brings (John 14:27). This is a peace created by the Spirit of God. It is a peace that transcends our physical, emotional, or mental wellbeing. A Person of Peace is a person upon whom the Spirit of God rests and in whom God has found a home. Such a person is bound to bear fruit for the Kingdom of God.

Take a few moments and think about who are the People of Peace in your life. These would be people who are not yet close to Christ, but who you think might be searching for his Shalom and ready to receive it.

 

 

[1] David L. Watson & Paul D. Watson, Contageous Disciple Making: Leading Others on a Journey of Discovery (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2014.

Copyright, 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Lesson 3: A Discipler has a Story To Tell

IMG_0089Once again, I am a bit late because of the Special 4th of July post. This is Lesson Three of the training manual Kathy and I are writing. We would very much enjoy any comments for improvements and corrections. We will be teaching this training program for 26 weeks this next year. Please help us by subscribing to this blog, reading each entry, and getting your friends to do so as well. All Blogs deal with the subject of how to live wisely a life of love for others.

Copyright 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Jesus came bearing witness to his relationship with the Father. Jesus’ disciples went into the world bearing witness to their experience of the crucified and risen Christ. The four Gospels are essentially remembrances of the story of the disciples personal relationship with Jesus. One reason we must read our Bibles, and particularly the Gospels, is that we need to remember and be able to tell the stories of Jesus. One reason that Disciplers are asked to memorize Bible stories is so that we can tell them to others. However, there is more to disciple making than telling stories from the Bible. We must be able to tell our own story of what God has meant to us.

The Apostle Paul was able to tell his story to people in order to bring them to Christ. His testimony is recorded in Acts and again in Galatians. In Acts, Paul tells his story at length to his fellow Jews. Here is the story as Paul tells it:

I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. I studied under Gamaliel and was thoroughly trained in the law of our ancestors. I was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison, as the high priest and all the Council can themselves testify. I even obtained letters from them to their associates in Damascus, and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished.
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About noon as I came near Damascus, suddenly a bright light from heaven flashed around me. I fell to the ground and heard a voice say to me, “Saul! Saul! Why do you persecute me?” “Who are you, Lord?” I asked. “I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. My companions saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me.  “What shall I do, Lord?” I asked. “Get up,” the Lord said, “and go into Damascus. There you will be told all that you have been assigned to do.” My companions led me by the hand into Damascus, because the brilliance of the light had blinded me. A man named Ananias came to see me. He was a devout observer of the law and highly respected by all the Jews living there. He stood beside me and said, “Brother Saul, receive your sight!” And at that very moment I was able to see him. Then he said: “The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and to hear words from his mouth. You will be his witness to all people of what you have seen and heard. And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.” When I returned to Jerusalem and was praying at the temple, I fell into a trance and saw the Lord speaking to me. “Quick!” he said. “Leave Jerusalem immediately, because the people here will not accept your testimony about me.” “Lord,” I replied, “these people know that I went from one synagogue to another to imprison and beat those who believe in you. And when the blood of your martyr Stephen was shed, I stood there giving my approval and guarding the clothes of those who were killing him.” Then the Lord said to me, “Go; I will send you far away to the Gentiles”
(Acts 22:1-21).

This famous testimony of Paul’s has three features that any good testimony has:

  1. It tells us what kind of a person Paul was before he became a Christian.
  2. It tells us how Paul became a Christian.
  3. It tells us what happened as a result of Paul becoming a Christian.

Before Paul became a Christian, Paul was a persecutor of Christians. He hated Christ and the Christian faith. He met Christ on the Road to Damascus on his way to persecute the Christians in that city. As a result of his conversion, Paul became a missionary to the Gentiles. All good testimonies have these three characteristics:

  1. Who I was before I came to Christ
  2. How I came to Christ
  3. What a difference it has made in my life.

IMG_0400Take a moment and write out your testimony in these three categories:

  1. Who I was before I came to Christ.
  1. How I came to Christ
  1. What a difference it has made in my life.

Dramatic and Nurtured Testimonies

Some Christians are hesitant to share their story with others because they feel it is not good enough, powerful enough, dramatic enough, or whatever. This is a big mistake. In our marriage, Chris has a dramatic testimony of how God came into his life. Kathy, on the other hand, has been a Christian almost all of her life. It is very important, therefore to remember that there are as many different testimonies as there are persons and there is more than one type of testimony.

People sometimes talk about the difference between dramatic conversions and nurtured conversions. A dramatic conversion usually occurs when someone has been far from God and is brought close to God in a single dramatic event or series of events. A nurtured conversion usually involves a parent, grandparent, or some other significant person who gradually nurtured the believer as a Christian. Once again, In Chris’ case, he was far from God, not really looking for God, when he suffered a series of failures and losses. At an important moment, a young co-worker reached out and invited him to a Bible study. Over several months the members of this Bible study nurtured him until he came to believe in Christ in a dramatic moment of commitment. Kathy grew up in a Christian family, was nurtured as a Christian by her parents, accepted Christ at an early age. She can, however, remember a time at a Christian camp when she drew near to God.

Think about your Christian walk. Then answer the following questions:

  1. What elements of nurture do you see?
  1. What elements of dramatic commitment do you see?
  1. How can you put these two elements together?

God’s Continuing Work in Your Life

People love to hear the story of who someone came to Christ. These stories are very important. However, our conversion story is not our only testimony. Since the time we came to believe in God and came close to Christ, other things have happened to us. Everyone has faced times of challenge, times of doubt, times of social pressure and the like. One of the most powerful testimonies any Christian can give to another person is to tell a story of a struggle in your life that is similar to a struggle they are having in their life. Once again, people like to hear stories of what God has been doing in the life of people they know are Christians. Once again, these stories do not have to be dramatic. In fact, sometimes they are more powerful if they are not dramatic.

For example, suppose that you were let go from a job and it took a long time to find a new one. Suppose you prayed, reached out to other Christians, and went to a Christian ministry that helps people find new jobs. Then, after several months of looking, you found a new job! That testimony would mean a lot to a person who was just laid off. Suppose you have had a struggle in your marriage or in parenting where you prayed and sensed God’s presence in solving the problem. That testimony would be powerful to someone who is struggling in his or her marriage or with a child.

We might call these kind of testimonies “Continuing Testimonies.” God continues to work in our lives day by day after we are Christians forming us into the people he wants us to be. This forming process, both pleasant and unpleasant is part of our testimony. It is also an important witness to what God can do in the life of ordinary people like us.

Think about times in your Christian walk when you felt God at work. Jot down some notes below about how you might describe it to another person:

Putting It All Together

We ask every person to prepare a three or minute testimony. If you wrote it out, that would be about one typed page, double-spaced in length. Your testimony needs to be unique to you. It needs to be your story. Of course, it needs to be factually correct. It also needs to be constructed so as to have all the elements of a good testimony:

  1. Who I was before I came to Christ
  2. How I came to Christ
  3. What a difference it has made in my life.

If it is a vignette from your past, some moment when God acted in your life in a special way, then the three elements might look like this:

  1. The problem I faced in my Christian walk.
  2. How God entered my life in my circumstances
  3. What a difference it has made in my life.

Take time now to write out   your testimony.

 

 

 

 


 

Honoring Dad: A Special 4th of July Post

IMG_0137Friday, we were in Fredericksburg, Texas to dedicate a plaque to my Dad and Granddad on the wall of the Nimitz/Pacific War Museum. Set out below is approximately what I said.

“I am a pastor, and so I get to teach Psalms periodically at our church. People who have never studied Psalms are often amazed at how many Psalms are simple retellings of the history of Israel. (See for example, Psalm 78). The Jewish people knew from bitter experience the importance of remembering the past.

In Psalm 77 the psalmist says the following:

I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago. I will consider all your works and meditate on all your mighty deeds” (Psalm 77:11-12).

One of the frequent teachings of Scripture is this: The people of God are inclined to forget the mighty acts of God and his merciful provision and thereby bring judgment upon themselves and their societies. This is a principle with secular as well as spiritual application. When a people forget what has been done for them by prior generations a curious pride and foolishness—a taking for granted of blessings—develops. The result is misery. We live in a time when rediscovering the importance of honoring the past and what has been done for us is an important priority.

There are a lot of men and women honored on these walls. FullSizeRenderWe have come to honor two of them, who happen to be Tim’s and my father and grandfather. According to family lore, Dad joined up first being about eighteen years old. My grandfather, who was too young for World War I and forty years old when the war broke out, followed later. Apparently, he did not want to stay home while his eldest son fought.

My grandfather died before Tim and I were born. We know that he served in four campaigns in the Pacific and earned a Purple Heart. He died at about 49 with shrapnel still in his body. My father did not like to talk about the war. I have only a few memories of things that he said. After the war my father met my mother and served as an FBI agent until retirement. After he retired he was a city councilman and mayor of Springfield, Missouri. He spent all his adult life serving his country and community. He did not like violence, although he had two occupations, soldier and FBI agent, where there were always the danger of violence. In the midst of this, he was a peaceful guy.

Picture1I believe my grandfather was a hero and probably knew it. My father on the other hand never thought of himself as a hero. Not long ago, on The Military History Channel there was a program concerning Iwo Jima. They returned a number of survivors to the island. When the commentator described them as hero’s to a man they declined the honor. One ex-marine put it this way, “I am not a hero. The heroes never left this island.” I think my father felt this way about his own service.

In dedicating this plaque, we honor two members of the greatest generation who in a moment of danger to our nation and its freedoms gave up the comforts of home, went to war to protect our freedoms from a threat, and then returned home to build the nation they loved. Millions of young men and women did the same thing during World War Two. They are all heroes, and they should be remembered and honored for what they accomplished.

Today, our family remembers Dad and Granddad. I hope our children and grandchildren will remember them and their sacrifice. As the psalmists knew long ago, those who forget their family or national story are doomed to lose it. Those who remember the faith and deeds of their ancestors have a better shot at maintaining the legacy of their faith and faithful deeds. Our parents and grandparents were not perfect; but we owe them a lot and should honor them.

Let us pray.”

Lesson Two: Sowers: It Begins with You

IMG_0089This is Lesson Two of a training manual Kathy and I are writing. We would very much enjoy any comments for improvements and corrections anyone has. We will be teaching this training program for 26 weeks this next year. Sorry for the delay. I experienced some technical difficulties last week and until now!!

Copyright 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Whenever a problem is solved, someone sees the problem, decides to solve it, figures out a solution, and gathers people to carry out the solution. For the gospel to spread, someone has to take responsibility to do what needs to be done. Someone has to take responsibility for sowing the seed of the Gospel in human hearts. For the kingdom of God to expand, for a church or Bible study to grow and prosper, someone has to step forward to and lead. In God’s Good News mission to the world, it is a person willing to disciple others, in this case a “Sower.”

When missionaries enter a mission field the need is vast. There is almost no one except the missionaries to meet that need. Something has to be done. The founders of the Church Growth Movement saw the need, but knew that traditional solutions would either not work or would take too long. One missionary working six days a week, twelve hours a day, can only reach so many people with the Gospel of wisdom and love a year or in a lifetime. Compared to the number of people who are far from God and who need to hear of God’s wise love, the number of people that can be reached by one or a few people in a year or even a lifetime is small. What is needed is a way for a visionary to lead a few, who lead a few, who lead a few, until the mission field is reached. Today, in the formerly Christian West, as well as in the traditionally unreached places of the world, the number of people who need to be reached are so great that a new method needs to be found. Focusing on people discipling people is that method.

Jesus: Our Guide As a Discipler

The best discipling leader who ever lived was Jesus. He was the best discipler and leader because he was totally related to God and totally committed to his disciples. In Luke, Jesus tells the following parable:

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” Then Jesus told them this parable: “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent. (Luke 15:1-7).

Jesus was was a loving shepherd. He had a heart for the world. The world needed Good News. If we have a heart for the lost, we will also be loving shepherds. What does a loving Shepherd do? He or she rescues sheep. Returning to the need for sowers, the first and most important thing Christian disciples do is share the Gospel and their faith in God. Sharing the Gospel is the first and most important step in rescuing sheep. But, it is not the only step. People have to be loved, nurtured, encouraged, and taught to be disciples. True sowers are more than just speakers of the word. They, like Jesus, become related to people for a long time as they grow and mature in Christ.

The Kind of Sowers God Needs

God needs sowers because there are a lot of people who have never heard the Gospel or if they have heard the Gospel they either never truly received it or they have drifted far away from God and from God’s people. We cannot know exactly who or where these people are. Therefore, we have to treat the world as God’s field and we have to learn to sow the Gospel wherever we are. We sow God’s word in at least two major ways:

  1. We share the Gospel in Words
  2. We share the Gospel in Deeds.

In order to effectively disciple people, we must first be disciples. In order to share the Gsopel in Word and Deed, we have to both know something to share verbally and live out our faith in deeds of love. To do this, we have to grow vertically (in relationship to God), internally (in relationship to one’s true self) and horizontally (in loving relations with others). Such persons want to experience:

Vertical Growth In Relation to God – An effective discipler is a person who cares deeply about his or her relationship with God as revealed in Jesus Christ and seeks to deepen it through prayer, active church participation, study of God’s Word, and above all humility. Such a person is positioned to reach others.

Internal: Growth: In Relation to Self The Bible tells us that Christians should grow in faith, hope and love, and in the fruits of the Spirit, joy, peace, patience, faithfulness, kindness, goodness and self-control. People who are not growing in maturity and self-confidence are prone to pride, gossip, and other forms of insecurity. Good disciplers, while not nearly perfect, exhibit maturity, self-understanding, and poise. They have or are developing well-integrated personalities. A person who has self-knowledge and who is in the process of overcoming sin and self-centeredness in his or her self is positioned to help others find God and grow in a relationship with God.

Horizontal Growth: In Service to Others – An effective discipler is a person who is growing in his or her love for others and willingness to reach out to others in word and deed. John 3:16 Jesus shares the Gospel with Nicodemus in this form: “For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son so that whosoever believes in him will never perish but have eternal life.” God loved the world. Therefore, God reached out to the world in word and in deed by the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus. He reached out in loving service to a lost world.

If we are going to sow the seeds of the Gospel in the lives of other people, the first thing we must do is be sure we are growing in relationship to God, to our true selves, and to others.

Jesus had a relationship with God, who he called “Abba” or “Father” or even “Daddy.” Nothing is more important to being a good discipler of others than having a strong personal relationship with God through Christ. Second, we must be in the process of becoming more like Christ. To do this, we have to mature in our faith and overcome the sins of pride. Finally, we will not sow until we we have the same love for others that God has for the lost world.

Entering Your Field

A sower cannot sow until the sower gets into the field. Therefore, it is important to come to an understanding of what kind of field God is calling us to enter and into which we show the Gospel. This is where we need to take a moment and think about a Greek term, “Oikos.’ The word in Greek means “Household.” In the ancient world, families included parents, grandparents, children, servants, extended family members and often others. All of these persons were a part of the household. In contemporary language we would call an “Oikos” a “Social Network.” Our mission field is not so much a place as it is the people we know and with whom we can share Christ.

In the first Century, the Gospel grew very rapidly, primarily though sharing the Gospel within households and human relationships. There were no church buildings. There were no church programs. Churches did not sponsor concerts and other community activities. The Gospel was shared person to person, primarily through households. Slaves shared the Gospel with other slaves and with their masters. Masters shared the gospel with their farm workers. Family members shared the Gospel with other family members. Friends shared the gospel with friends. Students shared the gospel with other students. In the end, almost every Christian shared the gospel with someone close to them. Many people who have studied the church today think that we need to return to this “Household to Household” method of sharing the Gospel.

Set out below is a graphic of what it means to have an “Oikos” or “Social Network” within which the Gospel can be shared.imgres-1

We all have friends, relatives, neighbors, coworkers, school friends and others we see regularly. These persons make up our social network within which we can most effectively disciple people.

It takes a while to really understand the implications of the notion of evangelizing a social network For example, most of us would not think of our hairdresser or barber, our yard men or repairmen, the people who check us out at the grocery store, the barista at Starbucks, the people at the gym or on the running trail—all the many, many people with whom we come in contact every day as part of our household, but they are. We all know a lot of people with whom we can share the gospel if only we reflect on who and how to share.

If the Christian faith is to grow in our culture and in other cultures, Christians will beed to return to the notion that the Good News is important for everyone. It contains the secret to a happy life for all people. It was never meant to be a private thing that Christians possess. Christian faith is meant to be shared with others. Sharing was never meant to be something a few talented evangelists do. It is meant to be something all Christians do to the best of their ability.

Take a moment and think about people you know with whom you can share the Gospel:

 

Family members:

 

Friends:

 

Neighbors:

 

Co-Workers:

 

Schoolmates

 

Others:

Lesson One — Needed: a Heart for the Harvest


Mom and Dad in BelizeThis is Lesson One of  the training manual Kathy and I are writing. We would very much enjoy any comments for improvements and corrections anyone has. We will be teaching this training program for 26 weeks this next year. Please help us by subscribing to this blog, commenting on each lesson, and encouraging your friends to do so as well. This blog is dedicated to helping people on the 
journey of life, living a life of wisdom and love.

Copyright 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus says, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field” (Luke 10:2). In any discipling movement, Christians are asked to hear God’s call and go into God’s field to share the gospel in word and deed. In order to do this, we must hear the voice of God calling us from our current pattern of life, including our some small portion of our  hobbies, activities, and church activities, into the world which is God’s field to share the message and reality of God’s love with those we find there. God is not asking most of us to do anything radical. Instead, he is asking us to order our lives in love and wisdom to make the world a better place by sharing his love with others.

Jesus came to announce the Good News of the Kingdom of God. He came to announce that God loves people, forgives people, and wants people to receive his Spirit so that they can live in his power. Mark begins his gospel with Jesus saying, “The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” (Mark 1:15). To be a part of God’s kingdom, the kingdom of Jesus, someone has to call people to repent, turn around, look at themselves, recognize how far they are from God, and then turn from the kingdoms of this world to his Kingdom of Wisdom and Love.

People will never repent unless they believe there is a better, healthier, more joy filled way of life available in Christ. In other words people must believe and put their trust in the gospel that Christ proclaimed: that God loves us, sent his son to die for us, wants us to be his children, part of his family, members of his kingdom (John 3:16). When we are sent into the harvest, we are sent to proclaim in word and deed the gospel of the kingdom in ways that cause those who are open to hear, believe, and enter God’s gracious kingdom of love.

Our church and other churches are filled with people who have never shared their faith with another person. Some students of discipleship estimate that many, if not most, Christians have never shared their faith with another person. This is too bad. These people are good people. They believe in Christ. They know that their life is better off because of their faith in God. However, they do not have a real heart for those who struggle with a sense of the meaninglessness of their lives. They love their neighbors, but too often miss the emptiness in their hearts and the struggle of their lives.

Romans 8 is one of the most beautiful texts in the entire Bible. Here is the part of what Paul has to say in this lovely passage:

For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory (Romans 8:14-17).

Here is the idea Paul is communicating: God by his Spirit is calling us. He has made us so that we desire to connect with an ultimate meaning and purpose. We have a longing for the Good, the True, and the Beautiful. We have a longing for God built into all of our souls. This is reflected in St. Augustine’s famous line, “our heart is restless until it finds its rest in you.” [1] God in his great mercy has made us with hearts that yearn for meaning, purpose, faith, goodness, wisdom, beauty, and love.

The World is God’s Field

images-3In Mark, Jesus tells a parable of the Kingdom of God. He says that his kingdom is like a farmer who goes out into a field that shows seed:

This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk then the head then the full grain in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe he puts the sickle to it for the harvest has come (Mark 4:26-29).

This parable is a story about the kingdom of God and about sharing the Good News. A farmer has a field. In the case of God, the whole world is God’s field. This is why John can say, “For God do loved the world that he sent his Only Begotten Son that whosoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). The world is the place where God intends to plant his kingdom and harvest a great crop of human beings filled with the fruit of the Spirit.

Each of us lives and works in some small part of God’s field. We may live in a large city or in a small town. We may live in the center of a city or in a suburban neighborhood. We may live in a wealthy nation or a poor nation. Wherever we live and work, that is our field.

Like any good farmer, God wants to see the day when his entire field is bearing a crop. Therefore, he sends a sower into his field. Jesus was the first sower of the Gospel, but others, the prophets especially, came to proclaim God’s love and God’s will to the people of Israel. In Jesus case, he came into the world to proclaim and to bring into being God’s gracious kingdom of love. Jesus was, however, not the last or final sower. He has sent us into God’s field with the same commission as he received from the Father.

Sowers in God’s Field

In John, Jesus speaks to his disciples one the night after his arrest, trial, crucifixion, death and resurrection. He records Jesus entering the room the disciples were in and then speaking to them:

Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”  When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained (John 20:19-23).

Jesus spent three years with his disciples sowing the Kingdom into their hearts. As his time on earth was ending, he would no longer be restricted by time and by space. He could be present to his disciples by the Holy Spirit he breathed upon them. What did he say? He said, “As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you” (John 20:22). Jesus had been sent to proclaim the good news of God’s forgiveness of sins. Now, Jesus is sending the disciples into the world to sow the seed of God’s kingdom just exactly as Jesus sowed the kingdom when he was physically present with his disciples. The twelve were going to disciple people, and those people were going to disciple people, and those people were going to disciple people until God’s kingdom grows throughout the whole world.

Jesus never intended building the kingdom of God to be the preserve of a few evangelists or charismatic pastors. God does not want evangelism to be accomplished just by pastors or by specially trained laypeople. The reason God chose twelve ordinary people to be his first disciples is that he intends for all of us, all Christians, to participate in building his kingdom. He wants us to do so where we live, work, play, and meet people, etc.—everywhere we go. Just as God sent Jesus to us, we are sent by Jesus into our world to share the Good News with others. God does not just work through special people to share his love. He works through every heart captured by his love.

The Seed is the Gospel

It is no good for a farmer to have a field and the ability to sow the field if there is no seed. A sower needs seed. In the same way, disciples of Jesus need seed as they go out into the part of the world that is their particular field. The seed is the gospel. Most Christians know of the Gospel, but when asked to put it into words, they do not how to communicate that Good News to others. One of the primary purposes of this study is to equip people to share the good news by developing the ability to communicate it to other people in a simple, concise, non-threatening way.

Jesus came proclaiming the gospel. In Jesus’ words, the gospel was the Good News that the long wait of Israel for the Messiah was over. In Jesus, the Kingdom of God had arrived (Matthew 4:23; Mark 1:15). In Luke, the birth of Jesus is portrayed as being announced by angels in such a way that it is clear that the birth of Jesus is the long awaited Messiah. Jesus begins his ministry proclaiming the Good News, saying:

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, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:18-20).

The Good News is that the Messiah has come to undo the effects of sin and oppression in the lives of the people of God. As God’s commissioned disciples, we are called to go into the world and continue building God’s kingdom  of wisdom and love, sharing his Gospel just as the original disciples went into the ancient world.

The first disciples, as they went out into the world to share the gospel, had to develop a way to explain to people the meaning of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. The Apostle Paul, who was perhaps the most effective of these early missionaries several times tells his disciples what the Gospel is. Near the end of his ministry, writing to Timothy, his beloved helper, he said: “Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners–of whom I am the worst” (I Timothy 1:15). Embedded in this little sentence is every element of a good testimony. The way to salvation is Jesus Christ. Christ came to save sinners. We are all sinners in need of salvation. Perhaps Paul’s longest version of the Gospel occurs in First Corinthians where he says:

Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born (I Corinthians 15:1-8).

In this passage, Paul outlines the gospel in narrative form. He begins by stating the importance of the Gospel. He then tells the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection, emphasizing that Jesus died for sinners, just like all of us.

I Corinthians was one of Paul’s earliest letters. 2 Timothy was one of the last. In 2 Timothy Paul speaks again of the Gospel:

So do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner. Rather, join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God. He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel (3 Timothy 1:8-10).

Although the context and wording is different, the Gospel is the same. God’s appointed savior Jesus the Christ came because of God’s foreknowledge and was apparent in the death and resurrection of Christ. This Gospel provides a means of salvation for everyone who believe in Christ and accept the gift of the forgiveness of sins and new life God offers them.

One thing we will do in this training is to develop the ability to make a short presentation of the Gospel. For the time being, it might be enough to take the time to write out in your own words what you think the Gospel is. Try writing it down in your own words.

[1] At. Augustine, The Confessions of St. Augustine tr. John K. Ryan (New York, NY: Image Books, 1960) Book 1, p. 43.

Introduction To Presbyterian Disciple Training

IMG_0089This is the introduction to a training manual Kathy and I are writing. We would very much enjoy any comments for improvements and corrections anyone has. We will be teaching this training program for 26 weeks this next year. This is a group project!!!

Copyright 2015, Chris and Kathy Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Jesus gave the Church a commission: “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:19-20). images-1Making disciples is the God’s supreme desire for the entire church. It involves going to where people are, bringing them into the fellowship of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them the things of God, showing them how to live a life pleasing to God.

The Greek word we translate “disciple” refers to one who learns from another person. However, Christian discipleship is not just about learning information. We believe that Jesus Christ is the “the Way, the Truth and the Life.” In other words, the key to abundant living is not an idea, but a person. Because being a disciple involves getting to know a person, we must believe in that person and spend time in the presence of that person. Jesus promised us that, “where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them” (Matt. 18:20). If we are to meet Jesus, a person must introduce us to him. If we are to understand what it is like to be a Christian, we must be mentored by someone who is further along the path of discipleship that we are. If we are to learn of Jesus, we must spend time with his people. This means that we need to be a part of a Christian fellowship that is trying to spend time with him. One way we do this is when we become part of a group of people who are seeking to follow Jesus, who is the Way.

“T4T” or “Training for Trainers” and “Discipleship Making Movements” or “DMM” are techniques that have been and are being used all over the world to disciple people, plant churches, and grow the kingdom. [1] Many of these programs have seen great success in growing the kingdom of God by bringing people into small house churches where they can be discipled as followers of Jesus. There is nothing wrong with any of these programs. Many of them are sponsored by independent churches that practice believer baptism, have weekly worship and communion services in small house groups, and conduct their business in ways that are not easy to emulate in the Presbyterian tradition. This set of lessons seeks to outline a way in which Presbyterians can participate in this movement without ceasing to be Presbyterian.

Having said this, it is important to underscore the debt Presbyterians owe to the Church Planting Movement, those who developed T4T and DMM, and the way in which they have been used by God to grow his kingdom. This booklet is not intended to denigrate what these movements have done worldwide. In fact, it is intended to honor that movement as we seek to find a way to appropriate it into the Reformed tradition. Those who envisioned and designed this program did a wonderful thing that has enriched the kingdom of God across the globe.

Finally, it is important to point out that this Presbyterian introduction is not a substitute for the voluminous literature that is already in existence. If one were to undertake to even summarize this vast literature, it would involve creating a book no one would ever be able to read! This work is just a series of chapters that deal with a discipleship in a general way, hopefully in sufficient detail that Presbyterians can become involved more easily than if the manual did not exist. We encourage pastors and congregations who are interested in T4T, DMM, and other Church Planting programs to read the primary sources as well as this work.

Jesus: The Great Example

There is one reason, more than any other why every Christian should either be involved leading people to Christ in some kind of a small discipleship group: Jesus brought people to himself and was in a small group of people he was actively discipling. Other religious figures have written books. Jesus did not. He chose twelve average human beings and lived in community with them for his entire ministry. Their memories of him are contained in our Gospels. It was their memories of Jesus and their time together that propelled them to carry the Good News on a continuing journey to every nation on the face of the earth. The way the early church grew was by reproducing what Jesus had done while he was with them. This is important to us. The best and most authentic way for the Kingdom of God to grow in our communities and around the world is by ordinary men and women bringing people to Christ, calling people together into discipling groups, training new believers, and continually reproducing this process through generations of discipling people.

According to Matthew, when Jesus ascended into heaven he left his disciples with a job to do and marching orders to do that job. Matthew ends his gospel with the following commission for his disciples (and for us):

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:18-20).

There are several features of this commission that many Christians have forgotten:

We are to go. In fact, we are all going somewhere—to work, to the office, to school, to a social club, to work out, to church, to our homes, to our family, etc. In fact we are going somewhere most of the time.

We are to share. As we are going we are to make disciples of all nations, or as it would be in the original, of all people groups. In other words, we are to share the gospel with everyone and make disciples of anyone who responds.

We are not alone. Christ has not abandoned us. He is with us by the power of the spirit.

In our congregation, we have an older retired pastor who grew up on a farm. Robert is in is 80’s. He has been a pastor and a missionary. He has worked in the area of evangelism. When he translates the Great Commission, he puts it something like this:

As Y’all are going wherever you go, be sure and share the Good News with others and make them disciples. As you do this, baptize those who come to believe. But, don’t stop there. Be sure you teach them all about me and to live the way I have taught you to live. Along the way, don’t be scared. I will be with you all the time, everywhere you go.

You actually have to know a little Greek to understand that Robert has captured the essence of what Jesus is saying. The word “Go” is a participle. It can mean, “Go!” but it also connotes “As you are going” in the imperative. Jesus does not say, “Get people to say they believe in me.” He says, “Teach them so that they can obey.” Too often evangelism programs stop at conversion. This is not what Jesus asked us to do. He asked us to make disciples.

It is very important right at the beginning to get firmly in mind the following principles of the Great Commission:

Go: Coming to church is not what the Christian life is about going into the world making disciples.

Share: Share with everyone you can, not some people you like.

Make Disciples: We are not called to make people Church members; we are called to make disciples. [2]

Jesus: Up In and Out

imgresThe essence of discipleship is having a relationship with Jesus. Discipleship involves a kind of triangular relationship. We have a vertical relationship with God that is the ground of all we say and do. That vertical relationship with God in Christ results in deep changes in our inner being as we become a part of the community of Jesus and walk with him and other believers. We become more like Christ. Finally, our vertical relationship with Christ and our inner transformation in Christ causes us to reach out to others with the love of God. We become a part of the Christian community and what God is doing in and through his people. This is important to get straight right at the beginning. God wants a personal relationship with us. God also wants a communal relationship with us through the church, the people of God, the ecclesia, those God has called to be his special witnessing people. Finally, God wants us to reach out and share what we have experienced in Jesus Christ with others.

The life of a disciple must be built around all three points in the triangle: We must be passionately in love with God and willing to follow Christ and obey God’s commands. To do this, we must be part of God’s radical community, the Church, where we can learn to live in wholeness, peace (Shalom) and love as God intended us to live bound together by the Spirit. Finally, we must reach out into our communities with the love of God so that others may experience God’s wisdom and love. [3]

We hope that you will enjoy your training to be a leader in this very important ministry in our church. This manual is for you to use now and in the future and to help you grow in your walk with Christ. We want to thank everyone who made it possible. In particular, we thank the many experts in the field of evangelism, leadership training, and small groups whose works were consulted in preparing this Guide.

[1] There are three main streams within what is sometimes called, “The Church Planting Movement.” T4T, DMM, and what is sometimes called DMS. They are similar, but have different strategies. This lesson book is not a place to talk about the differences. In this guide we draw on strategies and tactics from all three approaches.

[2] See, Steve Smith & Ying Kai, T4T: A Discipleship ReRevolution (Monument, CO: Wigtake Resources, 2011). This book is the single most important source for learning about T4T.

[3] See, Mike Breen & the 3DM Team, Building a Discipleship Culture: How to Release a Missional Movement by Disicpling People like Jesus Did (Pawleys Island, SC: 3DM Resources, 2011). Many churches and congregations use this triangle approach.

Keep the Main Thing the Main Thing

John 3 is one of the most important chapters in our Bible. Almost every child and every Christian knows John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16, KJV). images-2Yet, perhaps fewer Christians have studied the chapter in detail. The famous quote concerning God’s love for the world comes in the middle of a long conversation between Jesus and a man named Nicodemus. Nicodemus was a “ruler of the Jews”—a member of the Sanhedrin, Israel’s seventy member Jewish ruling council. He was almost certainly wealthy, well-educated, respected, and powerful. Nicodemus appears in Scripture as a just, fair, open-minded, and compassionate man.

Nicodemus also appears in John 7, where he defends Jesus against an early attempt to arrest him (John 7:45-52). Finally, John tells us that Nicodemus assisted Joseph of Arimathea in paying for and assisting in the burial of Jesus (John 19:39-40). Christian tradition holds that Nicodemus became a believer in Jesus, was baptized by Peter and John, lost his position in the Sanhedrin because of his faith in Christ, and was finally forced to flee the City of Jerusalem. [1] If this tradition is accurate, then Nicodemus was willing to give up everything—wealth, position influence, and power—in order to Keep the Main Thing the Main Thing.

Receiving Grace

I want to ponder in this blog the first seventeen verses of John. They read as follows:

Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.” Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.” “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!” Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked. “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”  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. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him (John 3:1-17).

Questions of the Night

John’s Gospel is much different than the other gospels. It is structured around certain signs and sayings. It leaves out many things the other gospels contain and contains things the other gospels do not mention. In addition, John often uses images and metaphors to convey its message. One image that constantly appears in John is a comparison of the darkness of our world and the light that is in Christ (John 1:4-5; John 3:19-21; John 812; 9:35-41).

John 3 begins with Nicodemus making a visit to Jesus by night. imgresRembrandt and other famous painters have tried to capture the scene. I have chosen an image that shows the light of a wall candle, perhaps symbolizing the Holy Spirit, illuminating the scene. A lot of ink is spilt trying to explain the reason Nicodemus came by night. Was Nicodemus afraid? Was he fearful of what his wealthy and powerful friends might think? Was he just too busy to make a daytime visit? We will never know the exact reason, but we do know that John uses this night visit to compare the darkness in which Nicodemus lives to the light of Christ.

Nicodemus is portrayed as a man with questions. He has heard of the powerful teacher and miracle worker, Jesus of Nazareth, and wants to believe that this Jesus is a man of God who can somehow illuminate and explain for him the way to God (John 3:2). Jesus seems to understand that Nicodemus is an earnest seeker who wants to know how to have a new kind of life and, perhaps, escape the legalism of the Pharisees. Jesus understands that Nicodemus is a true seeker after God, what Jesus elsewhere calls, a “Person of Peace” (Luke 10:6). Therefore, he says, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the Kingdom of God unless he is born again” (John 3:3). This begins and exchange of questions Nicodemus asks, questions that, in a different way, people continue to ask today.

First, Nicodemus asks, “How can a person be born anew when they are already old?” (John 3:4). In other words, “How can an old guy like me find a new life?” This is a question that people ask today, though in a different way. Sometimes, we do think that we are too old for God to use us or for to find a new life. Sometimes, we think that we have made too many mistakes, done to many things wrong, spent too many years away from God to find a new and better life. Sometimes, we feel too world-weary to begin again. When we feel like this, we are asking Nicodemus’ question.

Second, Nicodemus asks, “Assuming one could be born again, how would it work?” (John 3:4). “Surely a person cannot enter into his mother’s womb a second time. It cannot possibly work that way, can it?” Once again, all over the world in different ways and with different answers, people ask that question. Religions that believe in reincarnation essentially teach that our second chance comes in another life we will have in the future. Their idea is that we simply live life over and over again until we get it right. Skeptics, frankly, answer the question with the belief that it is not possible at all. There is no new life. Materialists ask the question and come up with a formula of diet, exercise, education, self-help, counseling, meditation, and the like that will permit human beings to recover our lost youth. You see, everyone and anyone who believes that they have messed up in life have wondered, “How do I start over?” When we feel like this, we are asking Nicodemus’ question.

One way or the other, all human beings ask the same questions Nicodemus asked Jesus. In moments of darkness, of despair, of failure, of longing for a new and better life, we all wish we could start over. By now, I have counseled so many people that I often cannot remember names, places, or even precise situations. Nevertheless, I do know that this question is one I’ve been asked a lot of times in different ways. There are business people who have done something foolish and asked, “How can I start over at my age?” There are husbands and wives that have failed and asked, “How can we start over given all the water under the bridge?” There are parents who have failed children and children who have failed parents who ask the question, “How can our family find renewal and new life?” Once again, Nicodemus’ questions are universal human questions we all encounter all the time when we get to know people.

Glimmers of Light

Into the spiritual darkness in which Nicodemus finds himself Jesus shines a bit of spiritual light. Of course, no one can physically start over in life. We cannot be physically born again once we have entered this world. We physically cannot start over once we have made certain decisions. We cannot avoid certain consequences of our decisions. We cannot overcome the physical limitations of our genetics and experiences. However, we can have a new life! We can be born again into God’s kingdom of Wisdom and Love. We can experience the blessedness of being a child of God. We can become a part of God’s family.

In answer to the question, “How can I be a New Person?” Jesus answers as follows:

Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, “You must be born again.” The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit” (John 3:5-8).

In other words, Jesus is saying, “You can become a new person, Nicodemus. You can find a new life. You can eliminate the darkness you feel in your soul. You can have a deep, personal relationship with God. The birth will not be physical, but spiritual. You must open your heart and ask God, who is a spirit, to come into your heart.”

God can give us a new life; however, he gives us a new life that is spiritual in nature. He may not change our circumstances. He may not change our physical condition. He is surely not going to make time go backwards. Instead he gives us his own life, which is different than physical life. It is a life of self-giving love and wisdom that never ends.

In response to this answer of Jesus, Nicodemus goes on to ask, “How can this be?” (John 3:9). In other words, the conversation moves on to the second question, “How can I have this new life?” or “How can this work?” In his response, Jesus says perhaps the most important words in the entire passage, words that most of us have never considered:

You are Israel’s teacher and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him (John 3: 10-15).

In the book of Proverbs we find the following:

I am the most ignorant of men; I do not have human understanding. I have not learned wisdom,  nor have I attained to the knowledge of the Holy One. Who has gone up to heaven and come down? Whose hands have gathered up the wind? Who has wrapped up the waters in a cloak? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is the name of his son? Surely you know! (Proverbs 30:1-4).

images-1This is one of those places where it is hard to believe those who assert that Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah, the Son of God, could possibly be correct. Nicodemus was a wise man. He was learned in the Old Testament. He was a ruler of the Jewish people, familiar with the proverbs of Israel that were used to teach those who would one day be in a leadership position. Nicodemus knew what we know as Proverbs 30. He probably had memorized it. In these verses from John, Jesus is saying, “Nicodemus, you know that the only person who could really answer your questions, the only person who has penetrated the heart of the wisdom of God, would be the Son of God. You know that the prophets looked forward to a messiah they called the Son of Man (Daniel 8:13). I am that person, and I am going to be lifted up on a cross just like Moses lifted up the snake in wilderness, so that you and everyone else will know this.” This is where we come to the text we all know. Jesus goes on to say:

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. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him (John 3:16-17, NIV).

Here is the Gospel restated: The creator of the universe, the giver of the Law to Moses, the God of the Prophets, loves the world so much he is willing to give his son for its salvation. Those who believe in the Son and who receive the gift by faith will enjoy “Eternal Life,” that is the very life of God.

What is the Main Thing in Your Heart

Jesus ends this section of teaching by comparing the Light that He is with the Darkness of the world and of the human heart (John 3:19-20). It is as if he is asking, Nicodemus, and us, “What do you love?” “What do you believe in?” “Who do you really trust?” “Do you believe, really believe that God is love?” “Do you really believe that by my Spirit you can receive eternal life?” “Do you believe the life of faith by the power of the Holy Spirit is the Main Thing?” “Are you willing to trust in me and me alone as the ultimate source of your life?”

In other words, he is asking, “What is the main thing in your heart?” God loves you. God wants you to enjoy his divine life now and in the world to come. All he asks is that you believe in his promise. As I mentioned at the beginning, we think Nicodemus chose to believe in and follow the Christ. May we do the same.

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] Ronald F. Youngblood, ed., “Nicodemus” in Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary Rev. Ed. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 1986), 895.

Come as You Are—But Don’t Stay that Way

This last Sunday was Pentecost. On Pentecost, we celebrate the birth of the Christian church. It is the day the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples in Jerusalem, the gospel was preached by Peter, and thousands were saved (Acts 2:1-41). imgresIt is also the day on which new believers began meeting together, hearing the teachings of the apostles, praying, having communion together, and experiencing the new life of the Kingdom of God (Acts 2:42-47). In the early church, Pentecost was more important than Christmas and nearly as important as Easter. Today is also a reminder that we can participate in the life of God. We do not have to stay as we are; we can be new people by the power of the Holy Spirit. We, like the early Christians, can be filled with the Spirit and changed by our faith.

Not so long ago, I met a person I knew forty-five or so years ago. When we were in High School, this person was skinny, not a good student, and not athletic. He was a party animal. He did not go straight to college, but worked for a while after graduation. I lost track of him. Not long ago, a handsome, confident, obviously kind person came up to greet me. “I hear you are a pastor,” he said. He then sat down and began to tell me about his Christian walk and introduced me to his wife. What a changed person he was! Actually, even today, if I did not know he was the person I knew in high school, I would not believe it was him!

By the same token, I have had the experience of seeing someone I knew in High School who left school, got hooked on alcohol or drugs, drifted into other behaviors, and looked twice their age. What we experience in our lives makes a difference. People change for the better or for worse in life. In this blog, we are talking about God’s power to change our lives for the better.

Come as You Are—But Don’t Stay that Way

Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is one of the most important letters in the New Testament. Scholars often reflect on its importance to Christian life and Christian thought. [1] In this letter, we see Christ’s sacrifice and our salvation as a part of God’s eternal plan (Ephesians 1:4-14). Because of the resurrection, Paul believes that Christians can be enlightened and empowered by the Holy Spirit—the Spirit of Pentecost—to know God and to live in the power of God’s Spirit (1:15-23). Then, in Chapter 2, Paul sets out his doctrine of Grace—the Power of God’s Spirit acting in love. Here is how he puts it:

But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:4-10).

The Nature of Grace

There is no idea of the Christian faith more important than the idea of Grace.images-1 There is certainly no idea more important to Protestants, since the idea that we are Saved by Grace through Faith in Christ Alone is central to the Reformation and to all Protestant theology and life. [2] Grace, however, is much more than an idea in theology books. It is a reality that must be experienced and lived. Our busy, work-oriented, frantic, lonely, and isolated culture needs to understand and, much more importantly, experience God’s grace. The therapy of God by the Spirit is of importance to our happiness as well as our salvation! [3]

So, what is God’s Grace? Grace is God’s self-giving love towards us offered freely and without cost. The Greek word, “Charis” is the same word from which we get the word “Gift” as in Spiritual Gifts. The definition of Grace has important implications for Christians:

  • We can’t earn Grace: It is a gift not something we earn.
  • We can’t deserve Grace: It is a gift not something we deserve.
  • We can only receive Grace as a gift. As Paul reminds us in today’s text Grace is a gift we receive by faith, so we have nothing to boast about.

Grace is the most important thing in the world. Grace is not only essential to our salvation; it is essential to a health human life. One reason our culture is characterized by fear about the future and excessive striving to secure our future is that we have forgotten how to rest in God and allow God to work in areas we cannot control and should not control. Thomas Oden puts it this way:

The Christian life comes to us on God’s initiative, not our own. We can choose by God’s grace to put ourselves in those times and places where God promises to be present. We can avail ourselves of the means of grace, but not so as to control them. They remain precisely grace—sheer gift. The teaching of grace stands as a penetrating challenge to all pretensions of self-sufficiency. [4]

We can never make any progress in the Christian life until we get straight on the fundamental principle: We cannot save ourselves. Only God can do that. What we can do is have faith in the love of God and in what Christ accomplished and revealed on the Cross. When I teach about Faith and Grace I put tell the following story. When our children were young, each Christmas Eve we would sit by the tree opening presents. Kathy would pick up a present, read a name, and hand the present to me. Then, one of our children would come up and get the gift. They had not earned the gift. They could not pay for the gift. But they did have to come up and get the gift. Faith is the means by which we receive the gift God has for us.

Grace Accepts Us Just as We Are.

I suppose every child has played in the mud, and every mother has cleaned up a filthy child (usually a little boy) who has found a pool of mud. When I was little, I was always getting filthy playing in dirt, mud, haystacks, piles of leaves, and other places from which Mom probably wished I would stay away. When our son was young, we learned that he had inherited this same quality! Did my mother reject me because I played in the mud? Did Kathy cease to love our son just because he got filthy? No!

The idea of purity is important to Jewish thought. To the Jew, the goal of human life was to become “righteous” by following the law and avoiding all forms of impurity. This explains a lot of the laws the ancient Jews were to obey. It is just contrary to this way of thinking to believe that God can accept us just as we are. God wants us to become pure and cannot accept us as we are.

Jesus changed all this. The Parable of the Prodigal Son from Luke is the best possible example. In the parable, a younger son dishonors his father and family by asking for his inheritance early. Unexpectedly, the father agrees. [5] Then, while the son defiles himself in immorality, the father patiently and lovingly waits for the child to come home. imgres-2When the son does come home, the father welcomes him with open arms, gives him fresh clothing, throws a party, and celebrates. The older brother cannot understand how a father could possibly act like this, expressing the Jewish discomfort with grace. But the father affirms that the wayward son is welcome because “Once he was lost, but now he is found. Once he was dead, but now he is alive” (Luke 15:11-32).

In this parable, Jesus reveals a God who does not reject people for failing, for doing foolish things, for behaving immorally, etc. Instead God is portrayed in the Parable of the Prodigal Son as a forgiving, loving, restoring God. This is what God showed us in Christ: God loves each one of us unconditionally, like the greatest father any of us might have or dream of having.

This has implications for Advent as a church as well as for Christians. Just as God does not reject people because of their sinfulness, brokenness, and pain, so also God’s church is called to be a place of Grace. We are called to be a place where sinners find a home where the Good News is preached and lived.

Grace Does Not Leave Us As We Are

Grace accepts us as we are, but grace does not leave us as we are. Tomorrow is Memorial Day. I will go out in the yard to do some once a summer work. In the course of a few hours, I will begin to look a lot like a dirty child. Moreover, I will begin to smell like what women sometimes call, “A Stinky Boy.” Kathy will not reject me or banish me from the house because of this. She will not stop loving me. She will, however, demand that I take a shower before dinner. When Tim and I used to get muddy playing outside, Mom did not disown us or stop loving us, but she did make us take off our clothes and bathe. Any mother of a small child who managed to get covered with cleans up her child. God, like any good mother, does not leave us as he finds us! God loves us enough to continue by grace to help us change.

John Burke, Pastor of Gateway Church in San Antonio, has writing a book called, No Perfect People Allowed: Creating a Come as You are Culture in the Church. In the book, he describes what would happen if one of us found a Rembrandt covered in mud:

“If you saw a Rembrandt covered in mud, you wouldn’t focus on the mud or treat it like mud. Your primary concern would not be the mud at all — though it would need to be removed. You’d be ecstatic to have something so valuable in your care. But if you tried to clean it yourself, you might damage it. So you would carefully bring this work of art to a master who could guide you and help you to restore it to the condition originally intended. When people begin treating one another as God’s masterpiece waiting to be revealed, God’s grace grows in their lives and cleanses them.” [6]

Each of us is like a masterpiece painted by God. Along the journey of life, we may have managed to get covered in mud, but that does stop God from loving us. God reaches out to us just as we are. However, it is not God’s plan to leave us as we are. God’s grace continues to operate in our lives after we accept Christ. This grace, sometimes called, “Sanctifying Grace” helps us become the people God desires us to be.

There is a kind of evangelical Christianity that is not just about grace, it is about what the German martyr, theologian and pastor, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, called “Cheap Grace.” dbprisonCheap Grace is not really grace at all. It is counterfeit grace—a kind of religious co-dependence. In his book, the Cost of Discipleship, Bonhoeffer decries the Church’s tendency to market Cheap Grace to people. Cheap Grace is grace without a commitment to change, grace without true repentance, grace without awareness and confession of sin, grace without the necessity of discipleship. [7] Cheap Grace is really not grace at all.

Grace Creates What We Shall Be

Bonhoeffer goes on to describe real, Costly Grace. Costly Grace is like the Pearl of Great Price Jesus describes in his parable of the same name. Jesus says that the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Discipleship is like a precious jewel hidden in a field. A reasonable person knowing of such a jewel would go, sell everything, borrow as much as possible, and purchase that pearl (Matthew 13:45-46). Real Grace is Costly Grace. It costs us everything because it is the priceless gift of God. If we have been truly saved then whatever good works we do are not just works of our human strength, but also works of God.

In the early church, there were people who accused Paul of a kind of Cheap Grace. Paul’s doctrine of salvation by grace alone through faith and not works was and is subject to misunderstanding. Some people accused Paul of “antinomianism,” or being against the Torah, the law of God. In Romans, Paul specifically defends himself against this charge, saying:

What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life (Romans 6:1-4).

Christianity does not eliminate the law or the desire of God that we live in holiness. Our problem is, as Paul knows, we cannot obey the law without a new kind of live, a divine life given to us by God (Romans 7:21-25). Our new birth in Christ is like our natural birth. No one of us had anything to do with our physical birth. We received life as a gift from our parents. Similarly, we cannot be “born again” by our own works or by any action we take. Only God can give us a new life. Nevertheless, after we are born again we can and must cooperate with God in discipleship as by grace God transforms us into the people he desires us to be. This is what is sometimes called “Cooperating Grace.” In discipleship we cooperate with God in becoming the people God calls us to be. Grace you see does not end with our salvation. It continues after our salvation as God completes the work he began in our salvation (Philippians 1:6).

Conclusion

There are a lot of folks these days trying to figure our how to live forever. What if there was a way to live forever? What if there was a way not just to live forever, but also to live forever in a state of blessedness human beings never enjoy however much money they have? What if there were a way to live not just as we now live, but as we dream of living, filled with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, self-control, hope and the like? There is. God’s Sanctifying Grace is also God’s Perfecting Grace. We will not fully experience it in this world, but we will experience it. God is in the business of making all things perfect, including us. There will be a New Heaven and a New Earth, and there will be a new you and a new me (Revelation 21:1).

Ephesians says we are saved by grace not by works, yet God has prepared works for us to do. This sounds hard until we realize that the works God has for us to do are simply the works of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, self-control, hope, and the like we will do once we are captured by his love and renewed by his grace. The works of which Paul speaks are not something unpleasant or otherworldly. Instead, the works of Grace consist in living our ordinary lives in an extraordinary, loving, grace-filled way. This is the life of discipleship.

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] See Francis W. Beare, “Epistle to the Ephesians” in The Interpreter’s Bible (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1953). I do not agree with Beare regarding authorship but it is a fine commentary.

[2] The Reformation outlined the so-called “Sola’s.” “Sola” means “Alone.” For Luther and the reformers, there were five ”Sola’s”: Sola Christus (Christ Alone), Sola Scriptura (Scripture Alone), Sola Fide (Faith Alone), and Sola Gracia (Grace Alone) and Sola Gloria (Glory of God Alone). Today, the focus is on grace.

[3] See, Thomas C. Oden, The Transforming Power of Grace (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1993. I have relied on this book to guide the theology of grace set out, and especially in crafting the definition of grace set out below.

[4] Id, at 37.

[5] See, Ken Bailey, Poet and Peasant through Peasant Eyes Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1976). Bailey points out that no first century middle eastern father would have agreed to such a request, and Jesus’ hearers would have understood something we miss—the Father’s love us extravagant, unusual, and unbelievable.

[6] John Burke, No Perfect People Allowed: Creating a Come as You are Culture in the Church (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005), 97.

[7] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship (New York, NY: Macmillan Paperbacks, 1959, 1961 reprint), 45-47.

From Family to Christian Community

Last week, this blog was on the value of family in Christian faith and life. Families are important to God and important to wise living. It is in our families that we learn and relearn the most basic skill of wise living—loving other people unconditionally. Family is essential for raising children, passing on values to another generation, and  passing faith from generation to generation. We ended last week with a warning: As important as families are, families are only a part of God’s plan. Our human families merge into God’s family, the church. Our human families fully become what God desires them to be as they become part of God’s family. Chris Portrait 008

This week at staff meeting, we talked about the church in America and the challenges we face. Tuesday afternoon, four different people sent me an article containing the results of a recent Pew Institute Poll showing that the number of people who claim to be Christians fell seven percent in only seven years, the largest decline in American history. [1] The Los Angeles Times, the BBC, the New York Times, and other major media outlets picked up the study. For a long time, religious scholars have seen a decline in church attendance. It is not surprising that after a long period of decline in attendance, we now see the results in the number of people who claim to be Christians. The Pew researched showed that the number of Americans claiming to be Christian has fallen precipitously in the past few years.

The word “Church” comes from a Greek word meaning “those who are called out”. [2] The Bible teaches that God calls people into his kingdom of wisdom and love. There is an old gospel hymn called “Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling.” This hymn captures the truth that God calls us in Christ out of the World into his Church. Once Christians are called out, we are called to assemble with other believers as a church. Therefore, the word “ekklesia,” is also a word that translates the Hebrew word for “Assembly,” as when the people of Israel assembled as a nation in the Old Testament. [3] We were called to live together as the church.

Don’t Stop Being Community

This blog’s text comes from Hebrews. Hebrews was written, as the title indicates, to a group of Jewish Christians, perhaps in Rome. [4] The King James Version assumes Paul wrote the letter; however, not very many people actually think Paul wrote it, though he might have. The best candidate is a man named “Apollos” who appears in several of Paul’s letters. Apollos was a master of Greek Rhetoric and scholar of the Old Testament, and seems a likely candidate. Hebrews is written in the best New Testament Greek by someone who knew the Old Testament backwards and forwards. This indicates Paul, Apollos, or someone very similar in background wrote the book. Here is my text for this blog as it comes from the Book of Hebrews:

Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching (Hebrews 10:19-25).

Prayer: Eternal God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: you live eternally in a fellowship of love and desire for us to live in your church as your called out people proclaiming your love to the world. Help us to value your church and to value the relationships we have here with you and others.

 Christ: The Center of Hebrews

As I mentioned above, Hebrews is one of the most elegant books in the New Testament. Whoever wrote it was a committed Christian, familiar with the Old Testament, a brilliant scholar, and a writer of great skill.  The book is organized like a sermon. As is often the case in sermons, Hebrews  alternates theological arguments and practical implications. [5] In this blog, we are talking about the practical implications. However, it helps to know what the author has said earlier about Christ.

imagesHebrews begins with the following statement of the importance of Christ:

In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs (Hebrews 1:1-4).

Here we have a clear statement of the supremacy of Christ. Christ is superior to the prophets (1:1-2).Christ is the means through which God created the universe (1:2).Christ sustains all things by the power of God (1:2). Christ reveals exactly who God is and what God is like. Christ is superior to angels (1:6-14). Christ is superior to Moses (3:1-4). Christ is the great High Priest (54:14-5:6). Christ is the perfect sacrifice for our sins (9:11-28). Christ is the way in which we can have new relationship with God, a perfect relationship with God by his new and living way (10:20). This is the main point the author of Hebrews wants to make: Christ is the center of Hebrews and the center of our faith.

Because of Christ: Our Relationship with God

We began our text with the word, “Therefore.” When an author begins a sentence with “Therefore,” he or she means to let us know that because of everything that has come before there are certain conclusions to be drawn. The author of Hebrews is no exception. Because of who Christ is and what Christ has done, Christians need to be different and live differently than other people. You see, there are implications to Christian faith. Here are a few mentioned in our text:

First of all, because of who Christ is and what Christ has done, we should draw near to God (v.22). In Jesus, it is revealed that God is not an angry judge. God is not out to get us because we are sinners. Christ reveals that God is love and loves us. We have nothing to fear. I have a friend who is a bit gruff. Most of the time people are just a little afraid of him. However, once you get to know him, you find out he is as loving and gentle as can be. God is like my friend. If you only casually know him, he can be scary. But if you really know who God is in Christ, you know he is safe.

Second, we should not be afraid. God is love. God desires to save us. God has paid the full price for our sins. Therefore, we should have faith and have full assurance that God loves us and we are free from our sins and from the guilty conscience we sometimes have from our sins. This is, I think, one of the most important things about faith: We don’t have to carry around our guilt concerning the past. We are cleansed of that guilt and shame from the past (v. 22). Many people live burdened by guilt and shame from the past. It is not necessary. God has provide a way of healing in Christ.

Finally, we should never lose hope. Because Christ is the exact representation of God, revealing God’s perfect self-giving love, we need not fear. I got a note the other day from one of our members. In the note he said, “Don’t worry. We’ve got your back.” God has our back. The just, loving, wise and all-powerful God of the heavens and the earth has our back. We have nothing to fear. Whatever may happen to us on this earth, we can be sure that the God of Hope, who raised Jesus from the dead, loves us and intends to respond to his faithfulness.

Hope is not a feeling or a kind of unrealistic optimism. John Polkinghorne notes that faith creates a kind of hope that is not a feeling, not mere optimism, but an acceptance of the world and its possibilities and impossibilities joined with confidence in the fundamental goodness of God. [6] Later he puts it this way:

Hope lies in the divine chesed, God’s steadfast love, and not in some unchanging realm of ideas or an intrinsic immortality of the human soul. Christian trust in the divine faithfulness is reinforced by the knowledge that God is the One who raised Jesus from the dead. Only such a God could be the ground for the hope against hope that transcends the limits of natural expectations. [7]

In Hebrews one finds a list of the great hero’s of the Old Testament. Some of them received the promises of God in their lifetime; others did not (11:13). Those saints who did not, died looking forward to fulfillment of promises they did not receive. They died looking forward to “a better country” (11:16). Christian hope, therefore, looks forward to the future in confidence, not because it is assured of success in this world, but because the God who is faithful will eventually grant justice in this world or in a better world to come.

Because of Christ: Our Relationship with One Another

Those readers who have been on a Great Banquet during which I was the Head Spiritual Director know that I quote Hebrews 10:25 at almost every closing. “Do not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing” (my paraphrase). Christians were never meant to live out the Christian life in isolation.family-worship-backgrounds1 We may be alone for a time, but we were not meant to live out our Christian life alone. Community is the normal state for Christians. Aloneness is something we endure. “Church”—“Community”—is our natural state. We were meant for one another.

Christians were meant to live in community, and the community we were meant to live in is the family of God, or the community of God, or what we call “the Church.” Just as God lives in a community, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, so also God has created the church as a visible reminder of what God is like. God intends for us to be a part of His community of love and live in that community. He never meant it to be made up of people who are passing through relationships with a congregation or one another. He meant it to be made up of people who are in a committed relationship with one another.

My parents belonged to what was known as the “Builder’s Class” of their church. The class was very close. We had picnics, holiday celebrations, like the 4th of July, parties, and the like. That class still exists, though it is quite small. It began somewhere around 1960 or about 55 years ago. At some point during my childhood, one of the members left his wife and family. My Dad, who was an FBI agent, found out where the man was, drove 250 miles, and talked the man into returning to his family. Without their close community and fellowship, it would not have been possible for Dad to do this; however, the man knew Dad cared enough to take a day off, drive 250 miles, and sit down to talk.

In Hebrews 10: 24-25, the author asks us to consider how we can spur one another to good deeds and that we encourage one another. Obviously, there is no encouraging one another without community. The idea of supporting and encouraging one another is the most common idea in the entire New Testament. A prominent Church consultant and author published some fifty-nine such texts in the New Testament. [8] Here are just a few:

  • “Be at peace with each other” (Mark 9:50).
  • “Love one another…” (John 13:34; John 13:35; John 15:12; John 15:17; I John 3:11; I John 3: 2; Romans 13:83; I John 4:7; I John 4:11; I John 4:12; II John 5; I Thessalonians 4:9’ I Thessalonians 3:12; I Peter 3:8; I Peter 4:8).
  • “Be devoted to one another” (Romans 12:10).
  • “Honor one another…” (Romans 12:10).
  • “Live in harmony with one another…” (Romans 12:16; I Peter 3:8).
  • “Accept one another…” (Romans 15:7).
  • “Instruct one another…” (Romans 15:14; Colossians 3:16)
  • “Greet one another with a holy kiss…” (Romans 16:16; I Corinthians 16:20; II Corinthians 13:12; I Peter 5:14)
  • “Have equal concern for one another” (I Corinthians 12:25)
  • Serve one another…” (Galatians 5:13).
  • “Carry one another’s burdens…” (Galatians 6:2).
  • “Be patient and bear with one another…” (Ephesians 4:2; Colossians 3:13).
  • “Be kind and compassionate to one another…” (Ephesians 4:32).
  • “Forgive one another…” (Ephesians 4:32; Colossians 3:13).
  • “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ” (Ephesians 5:21).
  • “In humility consider others better than yourselves.” (Philippians 2:3)
  • “Admonish one another” (Colossians 3:16).
  • “Encourage one another…”(I Thessalonians 4:18; I Thessalonians 5:11; Hebrews 10:25; Hebrews 3:13).
  • “Build up one another…” (I Thessalonians 5:11).
  • “Spur one another on toward love and good deeds” (Hebrews 10:24).
  • “Do not slander one another.” (James 4:11).
  • “Don’t grumble against one another…” (James 5:9).
  • “Confess your sins to one another…” (James 5:16).
  • “Pray for one another.” (James 5:16)
  • “Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling” (I Peter 4:9).
  • “Use whatever gift you have received to serve one another…” (I Peter 4:10).
  • “…Clothe yourselves with humility toward one another…”(I Peter 5:5).

It is obvious from this list that God want us to live in a community of love with each other, not jumping around looking for the perfect church, but living in a community of love with each other. There will be failures, uncomfortable moments, sin, and the like. There is in every human community. On the other hand, there will be times when the Kingdom of God shines through our human brokenness and we glimpse a bit of what heaven is like. We glimpse the Kingdom that is coming in the midst of the world as it is.

What We Are

I began with the observation that the Greek word for “Church” means “those who have been called out by God.” The church is not made up of especially smart, strong, capable, spiritually mature, loving, wise, or caring people. The church is made up of ordinary people whom God has called to declare his praises to the world and show something of his wisdom, love, character, and perfect will in our world (I Peter 2:9). In this world, no congregation will ever be a perfect church. All churches are made up of ordinary, fallen, imperfect people. Therefore, there can be no perfect church. Nevertheless, we are here to represent God to the world as best we can.

This Sunday is Graduation Sunday in our congregation. I want to close this blog with an encouragement to our graduates and the graduates of each and every church. Many graduates will go off to college or begin careers. Some will join campus ministries. Let me encourage you to also become part of a local church wherever you go, hopefully a church where you will be part of an ordinary congregation filled with ordinary people. Find a church where everyone is not your age, your income level, your race, having your interests. Don’t just be friends with the college students. Find someone who is fifty years older than you are to befriend. Find a normal church and continue to love people as God has called you to love. God wants us to be in a community of love not just when we are young, or when we have children, or when we need community, but always. If you are leaving home this year, go do just that.

Amen

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] See, “America’s Religious Landscape is Changing” www.pewforum.org (downloaded May 14, 2015).

[2] The Greek word is “ekklesia.” This word literally translates “those called out from.” The idea is that Christians have been called out from the world into God’s family, the church.

[3] Gerharad Kittle & Gerhard Friedrich, “Kaleo” in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament Geoffrey Bromiley ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Erdmanns, 1985), 394-402.

[4] William Barclay, “The Letter to the Hebrews” in The Daily Bible Study Series Rev. Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1976). I am indebted to Barclay for much of the historical background of this book. See also, John Calvin, “Commentary on Hebrews” in Calvin’s Commentaries Vol. 22 (Grand Rapids, MI Baker Books, 1993).

[5] There are three main ideas of the book that we must get in our mind to understand what is being said in Chapters 10-13: (1) the supremacy of Christ, the priesthood of Christ, and the perfect sacrifice of Christ.

[6] John Polkinghorne, The God of Hope and the End of the World (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2002), 48-49.

[7] Id, at 95.

[8] Carl F. George, Prepare Your Church for the Future (Tarrytown, NY: Revell, 1991), 129-131. I have not included the entire list here, but eliminated similar and negative “one anothers”. Others have made similar lists of varying sizes. I have shortened George’s for this blog.

Generations of Grace

Every year near Fathers Day, we are reminded that Mothers Day is one of the highest attended Sunday’s of the year. When we lived in Brownsville, I learned that the day before Mothers Day is also the busiest day of the year for florists. A member who was a florist had to employ a number of additional helpers to meet the demand of Mothers Day.

Let’s face it. Mothers are important. IMG_0035When Kathy would go out of town when the children were young they always looked forward to her return. The food and cleanliness of the house made a big improvement within minutes of her return! Mothers are also important for Christian faith. I have heard a lot of testimonies over the last 35 years. The most common testimony is of how a mother or grandmother was essential in bringing a child to faith in Christ. Many of these testimonies were by young men who strayed from the Christian faith only to be rescued by the prayers and sacrifice of a mother or grandmother.

Two weeks ago when looking at the importance of Scripture for the wise and loving life, we looked at II Timothy. Timothy is one of the most important people in the New Testament. Timothy’s mother, Eunice, was central to his Christian faith. Paul discipled Timothy, but it was Eunice who brought him to Christian faith. Most Christians know the story of St. Augustine, who was not a Christian until very shortly before his mother’s death. [1] Monica prayed and prayed for young Augustine. Finally, after much wandering, Augustine embraced his mother’s faith in one of the most dramatic and important conversions in all of Christian history.

If Christian faith is going to be passed from generation to generation, then it will be because mothers, fathers, parents, grandparents, and others take responsibility to disciple children seriously. Churches are important in this process, but family is more important—and mothers may be the most important people of all!

A Warning from History

It may seem odd to read from the book of Judges on and near Mothers Day. However, mothers are part of families, and this is a blog on passing along faith in families. Therefore, it is appropriate to ask the question, “What happens if faith is not passed along?” “What happens if our children and grandchildren forget our faith or the faith of their parents and grandparents?” Judges tells just such a story. Our text comes from Judges 2, and I am going to be readying verse 7 and verses 10-13:

The people served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Joshua and of the elders who outlived him and who had seen all the great things the Lord had done for Israel. … After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. They forsook the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They aroused the Lord’s anger because they forsook him and served Baal and the Ashtoreths. In his anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who plundered them (Judges 2:7, 10-14).

Most Christians seldom read the book of Judges. It is the seventh book in our Bible and tells the story of Israel between the death of Joshua, who led the people into the Promised Land, until the time of Samuel, the last judge. As Judges begins, a godly, wise, and effective leader has led the people of Israel into the Promised Land. Joshua was Moses’ assistant, a great general, and a godly person. Now, Joshua is passing away.

So long as Joshua was alive, the people of Israel followed the LORD. Joshua and the generation Joshua led into the Promised Land remembered their captivity in Egypt. They remembered that God had released them from captivity, led them in the desert, and miraculously delivered them to the Promised Land. However, after Joshua and the members of his generation died, the newer generations did not remember what God had done. They lost their memory of slavery in Egypt, of their suffering, of God’s miraculous deliverance by the leadership of Moses, the long wandering in the wilderness, and their conquest of the Promised Land. They lost their memory, and as they lost their memory of what God had done, they lost their faith. Soon they were worshiping false gods, living immorally, and acting violently. It was not long before they began to lose their blessings as well.

How long did it take? It took less time than the United States has existed as a nation. We need to take a warning from Israel’s history. There is every reason to believe that our nation and our families are forgetting God, forgetting our history, forgetting those who came here seeking religious freedom, forgetting their struggle for liberty.

Increasingly, young people are abandoning the church and the values of our nation. Increasingly, we see signs of religious persecution as elites who have no respect for religion, and even think it dangerous and deliberately suppress and often distort religion’s importance in our history. As individuals, as families, as communities, and as a nation we need to take the threat of losing our blessings seriously. Our nation was formed on the basis of religious freedom and self-discipline. It cannot survive without it.

Our founding pastor used to like to say; “The Church is only a generation away from extinction in every generation.” This is true. If those who went before us had not been faithful in their day, we who are Christians would not be here today. If we do not find ways to be faithful now, in our day and time, then the blessings of the wisdom and love that can only come from God will not be with our children. Worse, the sufferings that come with moral and spiritual failure will be theirs. We see every indication that this is happening in our time, in our nation. The increase in violence, selfish self-seeking, the increase in divorce, increasing incidence of instability, a loss of good jobs, and the loss of respect for human life—all these things coincide with our culture’s drift away from its spiritual, moral, and legal heritage.

Grace from God

Romans 8 is one of the most beautiful texts in the entire Bible. Here is the part of what Paul has to say in this lovely passage:

For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory (Romans 8:14-17).

Here is the idea Paul is communicating: God is calling us by his Spirit. He has made us so that we desire to connect with an ultimate meaning and purpose. We have a longing for the Good, the True, and the Beautiful. We have a longing for God built into all of our souls. This is reflected in St. Augustine’s famous line, “our heart is restless until it finds its rest in you.” [2] God in his great mercy has made us with hearts that yearn for meaning, purpose, faith, goodness, wisdom, beauty, and love.

God’s Spirit cries out in each one of us. When we respond and cry out, “Abba Father” or “Father God” we bring ourselves into alignment with the God of Wisdom and Love. When we do that, we are brought into God’s family. From this point, whatever our former condition, the power of God’s wisdom and love is unleashed in our lives to change us, reform us, renew, us, and permit us to live wise and morally, emotionally, and spiritually healthy lives. This can also mean a healing of our human family.Chris Portrait 008 I personally know this to be true in my life. My conversion to Christ coincided with a healing in my family. God’s grace is not just for our salvation when we die, it is for our healing and salvation and for the healing and salvation of our families, our communities, our church, our nation, our world, as impossible as that seems.

The first and most important things we can do to have a godly family is to open our hearts to God’s grace, invite God in, and allow God to change us. We won’t make a lot of progress on our own. We need God to help us.

Godly Families

Once we have God in the right place, we come to the place where we can get our human families in order as well. There is an old, old adage that a good marriage has three parties, a husband, a wife, and God.imgresThere are times when any family will come apart unless both parties are committed to something more important than their own self-interest. A reason divorce has become prevalent in our culture, even among Christians, is that we often do not remember that there is more at stake in a marriage than our own needs and satisfactions. We forget that God has an eternal purpose in our marriages and families. While God does want us to be happy and fulfilled, God has eternal reasons for the family as a place where children are loved, understood, and nurtured. The family is also a place where the elderly grow old in the care of their children and are respected for their experience and wisdom. This does not always work out; it never works out perfectly. Nevertheless, it is a goal we seek by God’s grace.

When we bring God into our family, it is important to really and truly make God a part of our family. A strength of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church is our emphasis on family and on the role of mothers and fathers in the spiritual nurture of children. In a few weeks, we will have Vacation Bible School. All summer long we will have youth and children’s programs. Next fall, we will have EPIC (our midweek children’s program designed after what is called, “LOGOS”). We always have Sunday School. Our church is committed to helping parents in raising Christian children. Yet, the primary place our children learn Christian faith and discipleship is in the home.

A lot of mothers and fathers try to have family devotionals, try to say grace, try to have spiritual conversations with their children, and feel like failures. I urge us not to think this way. Often, we do not see immediate results in discipling children. Sometimes the results of our nurture are long years in revealing themselves. The example of Augustine’s mother, Monica, should always be with us in difficult times.

The Ultimate Family

I wish there were some way to say what I need to say now simply. This is the hardest part of this blog to understand, but it is important. In life there are things that are good in themselves, but they can become harmful when they become ultimate things. Love of country is a good thing—but as we saw in Nazi Germany and in Russian Communism, when love of country is not subject to love of God it can become something terrible. Love of family is the same way. From time to time we see inward-looking families who have no time for others, they are completely absorbed in themselves. Such families are rarely healthy. For a human family to find its place of greatest peace, it must find its true meaning and purpose as a part of the human family and God’s family. Families are part of God’s plan for the wise life, but the family is not God’s entire plan for human happiness.

Over the years, we have been on a few mission trips with our family and other families. Truthfully, I wish we had done more of these. I have really good memories of a few mission trips to Mexico and seeing Hilary, Trammell, Clara or Melanie on the roof of a house being built—and Kathy standing grinning or playing the guitar for a Bible School. On at least one occasion, a couple from Advent came with us and we stayed in the same motel in Mexico. It was a wonderful experience. Serving others, reaching out as a family to help others, getting out of our own selves long enough to see the needs of others is a wonderful and necessary thing.

A couple of weeks ago, the staff attended what is called the “Kainos Conference” in Memphis. It is a special conference that focuses on multi-racial ministry. “Kainos” means “fresh” or “new” in Greek. The idea is that God is doing a new, fresh thing in American churches, as our nation becomes increasingly multi-cultural. Several speakers encouraged us to make friends across cultural and racial barriers. They mentioned that people are uncomfortable with people who are different.

During the talk, one speaker quoted from Revelation a passage wherein we learn that, at the end of human history, we will all be together in heaven—people from every tribe, language group, and nation—all praising God together (Revelation 5:9-10). Then he said, “We are going to be together in heaven; we might as well be together on earth.” It is very true.

My mother is gone now.new phone day 053 One promise I hold dear is that I will see Mom and Dad again in heaven. Our family is not over. Our family remains important to God, and he will restore it. In the end, I will meet people in my family, like my grandfather, I never even knew. Furthermore, in heaven, all the dysfunctions and problems of our family will be healed and we will be bound together in a perfect love we never achieved on earth. Finally, as important as my family will be to me in heaven, there will be another family there, the family of God, the Ultimate Family, of which my own family—and yours—is just a part.

Amen

[1] See, At. Augustine, The Confessions of St. Augustine tr. John K. Ryan (New York, NY: Image Books, 1960).

[2] Confessions of St. Augustine, Book 1, p. 43.

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

Praying in the Future

Our theme in today’s blog is prayer. imgresPrayer is a key to Christian discipleship, Christian growth, Christian community, and Christian life. As such it is something Christians should value. On my bookshelf, there are a number of books on prayer. I’ve read a number of them. However, prayer is like playing an instrument or any sport. The question is not, “How many books have your read?” The question is, “How much have you practiced?” Prayer is not primarily a matter of knowledge. It is a matter of practice. The best thing to do to learn to pray is pray.

Each weekend in the bulletin there is a prayer list. The last thing we do in every staff meeting is to prepare that prayer list for the congregation. In addition, at 9:30 each Tuesday, a group of staff members meet and pray. Some years ago, when we were changing denominations, we began having prayer vigils on the First Friday of the month. Every first Friday, for the past four years there has been a prayer guide outside the chapel and services at 7:00, 12:00 noon, and 6:00 in the evening. Our prayer day isn’t always well attended, but during this time, we pray for the needs of our church, community, and world. The Session prays for the needs of our church at every meeting, sometimes for a long time.

This is a Great Banquet Weekend. The other day, I woke up early, and Kathy was gone. Well, not really gone. She was downstairs praying for me, for the coming Great Banquet, for our children, and for other prayer requests. This weekend, there have been people praying for the Great Banquet all weekend long. Yesterday, our Men’s Saturday reunion group did what we spend the first Saturday of each month doing: we spent a half a day praying, meditating, and seeking to to grow closer to God.

Paul’s Good Advice.

Our text for this blog comes from Paul’s letter to the Philippians. Although a part of the text has to do with a problem in Philippi, the fact is that Philippians is a happy letter. The Philippian church was a strong church and supported Paul through thick and thin. It was also a generous church, giving to the needs of the church in Jerusalem in a time of need. [1] Like all churches, the Philippian church was not perfect. After Paul left, there were false teachers and other issues. As we begin our text, it is obvious that two people, Euodius and Syntyche, are quarreling. Paul’s admonition to rejoice, pray, and dwell on true and good things arises out of his response to this problem. Here is the Word of God as it comes from Philippians:

Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, dear friends! I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yes, and I ask you, my true companion, help these women since they have contended at my side in the cause of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life. Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you (Philippians 4:1-9).

Prayer: God of Joy and Peace: Come to us in these words so that we can learn how it by prayer and purity we can enjoy the fullness of joy you have for each one of us. In Jesus Name, Amen.

Our Fallen Condition.

This is a blog about praying, but it needs to begin with our human condition. The problems between the two people in Philippi reminds us that human beings are not by nature in God’s will. We are all naturally self-centered, self-interested, short-sighted, desiring secondary pleasures and unimportant things, inclined to worry and be anxious, sometimes jealous of those who have more than we do, and prone to divide into factions. Each of us may not have all of these inclinations, but we all have some of them. We all have these problems because none of us by nature has the spiritual connection with God that enables us to avoid them. The story of Genesis and the fall is the story of our human condition and its consequences in real life. Since the fall, human beings have had a problem staying connected with God.

I know all my readers know that Kathy and I would never, ever quarrel, and I am sure that none of you who are married ever quarrel, but I have observed in my adult life that when human beings quarrel with another person, we cease to communicate, and when we cease to communicate our problem seldom gets better. In fact, I have noticed over the years that quarrels themselves are often a failure of loving communication in the first place! People who are fighting do not communicate well.

Our relationship with God is no different. Our human tendency is to push God into a corner of our lives, perhaps Sunday morning or a few minutes each day if we remember. The result is that we don’t have the relationship and constant communication we need with God to experience the joy and peace God desires for us to have.

The Solution.

The first step in getting out of ourselves and and our own desires and into God and the desires that God has for us, then, is to rejoice and be thankful for the gift of life and for what God has done for us. It is interesting that, right after Paul comments on the quarrel in the Philippian church, he speaks the following words: “Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, Rejoice!” (v. 4). A life of prayer begins with rejoicing in faith. Our rejoicing will not always be without pain or fatigue or anxiety. Yet, we know there is a God who cares and so we pray to Him.

Second, Paul goes tells the Philippians to be gentle and not to worry, but in everything with prayers and petitions to let God know what we need (v.5). It is as if Paul is saying, once you have your attitude right about God and have begun to praise God and rejoice your salvation by faith, then start talking. Let God know what you need and how much you need it. Just let God know what is on your heart—everything that is on your heart (v.6). Once again, the point is not that we will never be anxious. The point is to turn our anxiety over to God.

Third, Paul says that we should be thoughtful and think about things that are true, roble, right, pure, lovely and admirable (v.8). In other words, we can’t be filled with the Spirit if we don’t think about things that will fill us with the Spirit of God—the True, the Good and the Beautiful. Thinking about true, good and lovely things centers us on the One who is True, Good, and Beautiful.

Finally, Paul says that the Philippians need to think about what they have seen Paul do, how he lived, the results the Gospel had in his life, and put the Gospel into practice (v. 9). It is only as we rejoice, pray, and become wise, and put into practice the grace we have received that God’s peace will come into our hearts (v. 7, 9). Just like study needs to lead to action, prayer needs to lead to action. We need to put our prayers into practice.

Our congregation is generous when it comes to missions. We give to the EPC World Outreach. We support several missionaries whose names appear in the Prayer List in our bulletin. We support what is called, “The Presbyterian Outreach Foundation,” which supports missions in our former denomination, the EPC, and other denominations. One of the members of that board, who lives in the Southeast, is a real prayer warrior. Every so often, I go into my office and he has a prayer message on my phone. Occasionally, he calls and prays. He did this just this week! Sometimes, I get emails with a word of wisdom and a prayer contained within them. I’ve watched my friend for some time now. He is not a pastor. He is in business. He serves on a financial-related committee of the Outreach Foundation. He is unfailingly cheerful and gentle. He is always obviously prayerful. His prayers are powerful and touching. His comments are unfailingly wise and thoughtful. And, in his personal and professional life he puts into practice what it is he believes and prays for. He does not just pray; he leads a prayerful life.

An Approach.

In this Blog, I don’t want to talk about a method of prayer. Most Christians know about the “ACTS method” of Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication, and about other prayer methods. Instead, I want to talk about an approach to prayer that can help each of us develop a deeper prayer life. This week, in the Bulletin and on Facebook, the meditation was as follows:

In prayer, three things happen: We come in touch with God and God’s will, we come in touch with how our will and God’s will can become one, and we come into unity with our brothers and sisters in Christ. When our will and God’s will become one, the power of God’s wisdom and love becomes unleashed in our personal lives. When God’s will and the will of a community of believers become one, the power of God’s wisdom and love becomes unleashed in the world.

The first step in developing a prayer life is alignment. If all we do is ask for things, eventually our prayer life burns out. None of us gets all of our prayers answered, and all of us will have times when we ask God for things we cannot and should not have. As we listen to God and align our prayers with God’s will, we slowly begin asking and praying within the will of God. When that happens our prayer life becomes more powerful. The prayer group our Saturday Men’s Reunion Group attends is primarily a listening prayer experience.

Second, one reason we come together and pray as a group on Sunday mornings, in worship, in small groups, and in classes is that, as the members of our Session, Church, classes, and small groups pray together, their wills and prayers begin to align with God’s will.

Think of alignment as something like a laser. imagesLasers are essentially light beams that have become “aligned,” or in scientific terms, “coherent”—that is to say all the beams of light are going in the same direction. The light beam of a laser is powerful because it is aligned and coherent. As we pray and listen to God, our wills and God’s will become aligned. We stop asking for things that are not in God’s will. We do ask for things that are in God’s will. As a group prays and listens to God its prayers become aligned, that is to say the entire group is praying in unity within God’s will. When that happens, the power of God is unleashed in churches, families and communities. This is one reason spouses should pray together: It creates unity and alignment.

Finally, we should pray constantly. We all need to have quiet times. We all need special times of prayers at home and church. At the same time, we should all try to develop the habit of constant prayer—a kind of prayer without ceasing. Paul says we should pray in everything, and that means about everything and all the time. When we are worried, tired, stressed, short, jealous, angry, etc. we need to pray. When life is not going our way, we need to pray. If we listen to God, we will certainly find many, many prayers to lift up to God.

As I mentioned a moment ago, the Men’s Saturday Reunion Group at our church meets once a month at a local Episcopal Church for an extended time of prayer. For a good amount of the time, we are silently listening for God. If we are to become aligned with God and God’s will, we have to develop the habit of listening to God and allowing God to form us and speak to us in the silence of our hearts. It is hard for those of us who are active and used to being busy. It is not easy for me. Alignment and constancy in prayer are not natural. They are a gift that God gives to those who wait and desire to be one with God in important matters of the spirit.

Conclusion.

Most Christians know that, on the night before he was crucified, Jesus went to pray in the Garden of Gethsemane. He prayed to be relieved of the duty God had placed upon him. However, he ended the prayer, “Not my will, but your will be done” (Matthew 26:39). In other words, Jesus’ human will had become aligned with God’s will, so that now he had the strength to endure what was about to happen.

Not all of our prayers will be in easy times. Not all will have pleasant results. Our prayer, in the end, is for our human will to embrace God’s will so we may be filled with his power whatever the circumstances. Paul’s advice to lift everything up to God with Thanksgiving is as good a piece of advice today as it was in the First Century.

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] The scholarly sources for this sermon are William Barclay, “The Letters to the Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians” in The Daily Bible Study Series Rev. Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster 1975) and Richard R. Melick, Jr., Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon” in The New American Commentary vol. 32, (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1991).

A Story to Live By

Kathy and I have been thinking a lot about maps recently. The other day, I was trying to figure out how to get from Fithian, Illinois to San Antonio, Texas through Abilene, Kansas. For the life of me, I could not close my eyes and remember where in the world Abilene, Kansas could be! I had to look it up on a map.

I have a friend who used to have a huge wall map of the world sitting in his breakfast area. world-mapI have been thinking a lot about that map because we’ve been thinking about framing a map of the world for one of our Sunday School Class rooms. Two weeks ago, I was in a mission meeting listening to a report about world missions. I was amazed at how many places there were in the world that I could not close my eyes and imagine where they are!

Without some idea of where you are and where it is you are going, it is really hard to plan a trip. The same thing is true of life. Unless we have some idea of where we are and of where we intend to go in life, we have a lot of trouble getting anywhere. One problem in our world is that a lot of the old road maps for life have changed, and people have a hard idea formulating any idea of who they are, what they were created to be, what changes are needed to be who they were intended to be, and how to get there.

Many people in our culture have a sense of rootlessness. That is to say, they live day in and day out acting on the impulses of the moment. They do not feel particularly connected to the past of their families, communities, our nation, or our culture. They are making up life as they go along. The result is often misery.

The Importance of Scripture.

Our text is from Second Timothy. This is one of Paul’s last letters, if not his last letter. He wrote it from captivity, probably in Rome (2 Tim. 1:8). The letter is to Timothy, his “son in Christ,” protégé, and assistant (See, 1:2). imagesIn it, Paul gives Timothy the best advice he can, knowing that it may be the last advice he can give to him. Here is a part of what he says:

You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, persecutions, sufferings—what kinds of things happened to me in Antioch, Iconium and Lystra, the persecutions I endured. Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evildoers and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:10-17).

Prayer: Word of God: This morning we come to a teaching that is at the center of our faith—the authority of your Word and its importance in our lives. Come by the power of your Holy Spirit that we might hunger for the wisdom only you can give. In Your Name we pray, Amen.

A Story that Leads to Christ

Last week in this blog, we visited about worship and about the Jewish temple. This week, we are visiting about another aspect of Jewish culture that is just as important to Christianity and to us—the fact that Jews and Christians are both “People of the Book.” When the Jews were taken into captivity for the second time, this time in Babylon, the temple was destroyed. In any case, it would have been a trip of hundreds of miles to visit Jerusalem, a trip no captive slave could possibly take. Therefore, the Jewish people had to maintain their heritage without the aid of temple worship. It is at this time that the Jews began to create synagogues, diligently study scripture, and compile commentaries on their Scripture. Their worship, which could not include Temple sacrifices, became centered on Scripture.

When we teach one year through the Bible studies, one thing that amazes first time readers is the extent to which the first five books of the Old Testament, what the Jews call the “Torah” or “Law,” aren’t law at all. They are the story of the history of the Jewish people up until their entry into the Promised Land. The story Scripture tells continues right up until the people return from captivity. All this time, the prophets were writing and so were the wise men. By the time it was all over, the Jews had a scripture almost identical to our Old Testament containing their national story, their hymns and songs, their wisdom teachings, and the words of those who warned them against disobedience to God. In those writings was embedded the idea of a Messiah, a Savior who would come to free them from captivity and bring them into a time of renewal.

When the early Christians read the Old Testament, they immediately began to see in the story of the Old Testament and in all of its teachings a foreshadowing of Christ. They saw Jesus as the one who would crush the serpent’s head (Gen. 3:15). They saw in Jesus the Suffering Servant of Isaiah (Isaiah 53). The life, death and resurrection of Jesus made sense of the human condition and of God’s intention for human life. The same thing is true today. The Bible, the written Word of God, has a purpose, and its first purpose is to lead us to Christ, to the Word of God in human form. We do not primarily read our Bibles for head knowledge, but to have a heart relationship with God. The first and most important role of Scripture is to lead us to God and to Christ.

A Story that Leads to Self-Understanding.

We find in the story the Bible tells a way of making sense of our personal story, the story of our family and friends, and the story of our world. It is a story of a people created in God’s image, but fallen and prone to err. It is the story of God’s love for every human being. It is the story of God sending his Son to free us from the past, and give us new life. It is a story that can, as Paul says, make us “wise unto salvation” (2 Tim. 3:15). The power of the Bible is such that it can lead us to God and lead us to behave and be changed into more Godly people.

Paul goes on to say that the Scriptures are useful for teaching and for rebuke (2 Tim. 3:16). In other words, an important purpose of reading the Bible is to allow us and cause us to come to a better self-understanding. The Bible leads us to Christ, but it also exposes our need for Christ by exposing who we really are. And, of course, when it does this we learn that we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory God intended for us (Romans 3:23).

When I was younger I taught marksmanship and archery for a while. In teaching archery, I learned an important fact. Bent arrows do not fly straight. Each early summer when the counselors got to camp, we would look at last year’s arrows, some of which had gotten damp and warped. (This is before composite and aluminum arrows.) We threw them away because no one could shoot a crooked arrow straight.

This is theologically interesting.imgres One Old Testament word for sin connotes an arrow that has gone astray and missed the mark. [1] It is as if our lives are like arrows fired by our parents and God. Unfortunately, we are crooked arrows. We are all a bit selfish and self-centered. We are all a bit bent morally and spiritually.

A Word that Leads to Correction and New Life

Worse yet (and to change metaphors), all of us have bad sights. We all aim our lives more or less away from God’s perfect intention for us that we live lives of wisdom and love. The result is that we all like sheep, go astray (Isaiah 53:6). Therefore, we all need a bit of rebuking and correcting. In a word, we need to get back on the straight road.

I am not a very good shot, and I don’t know a lot about guns. Recently I have been trying to learn to shoot. When you purchase a new weapon, you have to see if the sights are correct. If the sites are not correct, you won’t hit the target. You also have to learn to aim the weapon properly. If you do not aim at the target, you won’t hit it. Getting your sights right and getting your aim corrected are really important if you want to learn to shoot well.

Every day, I read the Bible. It is a rare week when I do not feel myself condemned by some portion of Scripture I am reading. I don’t always like this aspect of reading the Bible, but I do think it is good for me because it leads to correction. You can only read so long about the need for wise speech before you begin to speak more wisely. You can only read so often about the importance of hard work before you begin to work harder. You can only read so often about saving money before you start saving money. You can only read so long about loving others before you begin to love others.

Those in Memphis who have been in Disciple Bible studies, and more recently in the new discipling study Kathy and I are leading, know that God has been working on my heart concerning discipling people and changing the emphasis of our Bible studies. We do not primarily read our Bibles to gain new information. We read them to correct our vision and attain a new kind of life characterized by wisdom and love—God’s wisdom and love. What is important is not so much how much Bible do I know, but how much Bible am I putting to work in my life. The big question is, “Am I being corrected and living a new, different, healthier, less self-centered, less selfish, less broken, less sinful life?”

A Word that Leads to Good Works.

I have been working our way through one single sentence of Paul. Paul says that “All Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, for rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (I Tim. 3:16-17). Those two little words, “so that” mean that God inspired Scripture, he allows it to teach us, rebuke is, correct us, and train us for a purpose. This purpose is that we are properly equipped for every good work.

This summer, I plan on doing some hiking. My plan was to put on my old running shoes and hike. The person with whom I am going hiking pointed out to me that this was a bad idea. Running shoes lack lateral support and are built for short exercise periods, not hours and hours of walking day after day. He told me I needed new equipment if I want to hike with him. The fact is most work requires some kind of equipment. One important purpose of the Bible is to equip us for the work and life God has for us.

In Ephesians, Paul says the following:

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:8-9).

We are not saved by our works, that is, by doing good things; however, we were saved for good works. God has a plan to undo all the sin and all the violence and all the greed and all the misplaced passion in the world. He has the idea that people need to be respected, loved, saved from darkness, allowed to lived better lives, converted from sin, taught to live joyfully and healthily.

God saved us all right. But, let’s think back a bit: someone communicated God’s love to us. Someone shared the Gospel. Someone treated us with dignity. Someone helped us up when we were down. Someone shared an insight that helped us solve a problem. Someone invited us to church, or youth group, our Bible study, or an AA group. Someone did something when God saved us.

There is a movie I like called Pay It Forward. [2] It is the story of a young man named Trevor who has a terrible life. His mother and father are both dysfunctional. One day in class his teacher challenges them to do something to change the world. A few days later, Trevor decides to do something big for three people who really need it, with the understanding that each will pay it forward with three good deeds of their own. In Trevor’s vision, the whole world will be changed for the better as people pay good deeds forward.

It so happens and Trevor and God have the same idea. God saved us from our brokenness, and in response, he desires us to pay it forward.

Amen

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] One of the many words for sin connotes missing the mark, as if an arrow missed its intended target. This is not the only connotation, for there are many Hebrew words used to connote sin. If the target of life is to live wisely in community with others, then sin is anything we do to miss this target of life.

[2] Leslie Dixon wr., based on the novel by Catherine Ryan Hyde, Pay it Forward dir. by Mimi Leder, starring Keven Spacey, Helen Hunt, Haley Joel Osment (Warner Brothers Pictures, October 20, 2000).

A Life of Constant Worship

For a long, long time, I’ve wanted to preach a sermon on worship, which I have done for the past two weeks at Advent Presbyterian Church at each pf our campuses. In this Blog, I want to center on why worship is essential to the wise life. All over America churches are struggling with worship attendance. There are a lot of reasons for this, but at the center of the problem is the notion that worship is something optional. If there is a God, it cannot be optional, because when we cease worshiping, we eventually cease recognizing that there is a wisdom greater than ours. Soon, as Paul puts it in Romans, “thinking ourselves wise, we become fools” (Romans 1:22).

I remember a day when I was in college sitting on the grass on the commons at Trinity University. imgresA group of freshmen were watching an anti-war demonstration and talking. Our conversation drifted to the subject of chapel and church attendance. A friend of mine from Oklahoma said, “I just don’t need to go to church. I can worship God anywhere.” We all agreed. Within about a year, we were all in various stages of losing our Christian faith—and none of us were behaving well at all. It was only a number of years later, after some suffering, that I realized how important worship and the Christian community are.

Worship is important to wise living; but to understand how and why, it is necessary to have a clear understanding of what worship is and is not. Two weeks ago, was Palm Sunday. We thought and meditated about the cross. Last week was Easter. We thought and meditated about the resurrection. We spoke about how the lives of the apostles and disciples of Jesus were changed by those twin events. In the cross, we see the Amazing Love of God, a love so great it would give anything, even life itself, for the Beloved. In the resurrection, we see the victory of God’s Amazing Love over death.

images-2All love evokes a response. Christians have always seen worship not as a duty, but a response to God’s Amazing Love. True worship is a response to God’s love. As we respond to God’s love in worship, we ground ourselves in the source of all true wisdom and all self-giving love–a wisdom greater than natural wisdom and a love greater than natural love.

A Life of Christ-Formed Worship.

To guide our meditation, I have chosen a passage from First Peter. First Peter is one of what are called “the Catholic Epistles.” [1] The Apostle Peter wrote it to congregations in Asia Minor, probably from Rome, near the end of his life (I Peter 1:1). In this letter, Peter gives mature advice to congregations he helped plant and over which he had authority concerning essential parts of the Christian life. In this particular passage, he talks about the Christian life, but what he says is entirely relevant to the subject of worship:

As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him—you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For in Scripture it says: “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.”

Now to you who believe, this stone is precious. But to those who do not believe,

“The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone,” and, “A stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the message—which is also what they were destined for. But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy (I Peter 4:4-10).

Place Centered Worship.

In this is a passage, it is evident that the writer was a Jew. Peter begins by speaking of Jesus as a “living stone” (I Peter 2:4). He speaks of Christians being built into a spiritual house (2:5). He speaks of a precious stone being laid in Zion (2:6). He speaks of Christians as a “royal priesthood” (2:9). In all of this, Peter is recalling Israel and its history.

In the ancient world temples were built of stone. Mt. Zion was the place where the Temple of the Jews was built. The Temple was manned by priesthood, a special group of people called out of ordinary living to serve the God of Israel at the Temple in Jerusalem.

When Moses led the people out of captivity, he instituted a form of what we might call “Place-Centered Worship.” (Exodus 25-40) Worship was to be in the Tabernacle, a tent designed to be the place where the God of Israel was present in a special way. Aaron and the Levites were called out of the tribes of Israel and given special responsibility to supervise the worship of the Jewish people. The Tabernacle traveled with the Jews, and they believed that God was present there in a special way.

4.The_16Once Solomon became king, he built a Temple in Jerusalem. The Temple was the successor to the Tabernacle. No longer did the God of Israel travel around present in a special tent. Now, God was especially present in his Temple on Mt. Zion, in Jerusalem. Therefore, Jews who wanted to worship their God or make a sacrifice to their God needed to travel to Jerusalem, the place God chose for his dwelling (See, Deuteronomy 12:5).

When the Jews returned from captivity in Babylon, they rebuilt the temple and reinstituted the form of worship they had before they left (See, Haggai, Zechariah, etc.). Right up to the time of Jesus, Israel had a place centered form of worship, and the place was the Temple.

Most churches are proud of their buildings. Over the past thirty-seven years, the people of our church have built a number of times. We are proud of the sanctuaries and facilities we have built in Cordova and Arlington. Nevertheless, we cannot come to believe our buildings are necessary for worship. People gather all over the world, sometimes in tents or under trees to worship God. Too often in the West, we have allowed ourselves to be excessively committed to a “Place Centered” kind of worship.

The Church is not the building. It is the people. We all love our worship services, whether contemporary or traditional. However, we cannot mistake a worship service or particular liturgy or style of music for true worship. True worship goes beyond a building. True worship is about God and about the human and divine spirit. It is about coming together to worship the Living God of Wisdom, Power, and Love.

Christ-Centered Worship.

Recently, a number of us have been memorizing a story from the book of John. In John 4, Jesus met a woman at a well in Samaria. Jesus was tired and thirsty, so he asked the woman to draw water for him (John 4:7). This was unusual for a couple of reasons. First, the woman was a woman, and Jewish rabbi’s seldom talked directly to women to whom they were not married. Second, she was a Samaritan, and the Jews did not like Samaritans, whom they felt were half-breeds who worshiped falsely on Mt. Gerizim not in Jerusalem where they were supposed to worship (4. 22). Finally, this woman was an immoral woman, and rabbis were never to even be seen with such a person, much less speak to them.jesuswell

Jesus and the woman got into a talk about water. Jesus asked her to fetch him a cup of physical water, and then began to talk about a kind of living water that, once you drank it, you would never be thirsty again (4:10; 13-14). The woman was amazed at this, again for several reasons. First of all, the well at which Jesus and the woman were having the conversation was one of the most famous wells in all of Jewish history. It was called Jacob’s well (4:12). Second, this woman, like all ancient women, spent hours each day going to and from the well getting water. (This is still the case in much of the world today.) Therefore, this woman is interested in this living water for purely selfish reasons.

“What is this Living Water?” The Living Water is the Holy Spirit—Jesus’ continuing presence and power with us today. Jesus promised this woman a spiritual water to wash away her sin and guilt. He promised her a living water that will allow her to live a completely new kind of life free from the problems and sin of her past. Jesus was also promising her a new kind of worship.

As Jesus and the woman began to talk about worship, the woman pointed out that both the Samaritans and the Jews had a place-centered kind of worship. For the Samaritans it was centered on Mt. Gerizim. For the Jews it was centered on Mt. Zion. She expected that Jesus would defend the Jewish position that all true worship has to take place in Jerusalem, on Mt. Zion, in the Temple. Surprisingly, he did not. Instead he said:

“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth” (John 4:21-24).

By this teaching, Jesus is alerting the woman that in him, something new is coming in the area of worship. A particular place is not going to be as important as it will be that worship be spiritual. In First Peter, Peter is talking about a post-place centered worship. He is saying that, in Jesus God was building a spiritual temple that we can be a part of as we are built up into the community of faith and become God’s priests, or sharers of grace. As we open our hearts to God, our hearts become a place of worship. God is saying the same thing to us today. God intends our worship to be a true spiritual worship that lasts all week long.

A Community of Constant Christ-Centered Worship

10922771_10206566193938639_4671154989334180850_nOne of the fundamental differences between the way ancient people saw the world and the way we see the world has to do with the role of community. Every “you” in our text is in the plural. All the verbs are in the plural. In our way of speaking it would be “all of you together are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God” (I Peter 2:9 (GCS paraphrase). In the ancient world, only a few chosen people were priests who interceded for the people to God. Now, we are all priests together. We are all called to worship together, declaring the praises of God as a community. We are all called to sacrifice together for the salvation and healing of the world. We are all called to live lives of worship (Romans 12:1-2).

One implication of this is that we need to meet together once a week to worship. We need to be together! In fact, that is what the early church did and what Christians have always done since the earliest times.  Jews met on Saturday to worship. Christians met on Sunday. They met to sing songs together. They met to pray together. They met to listen together to the word of God being read. They met to hear the encouragement of the apostles, sometimes, as in First Peter, that encouragement was in the form of a letter read in the service. They met to baptize new believers and to have a meal and communion together. [2] Ever since the beginning of the Christian movement, Christians have taken time to worship the Living God together weekly, singing, praying, hearing the word of God read and expounded, and having Communion.

Sunday, however, was only the beginning of the week. The people of God went from their weekly worship services out into the world where they continued to worship God in spirit and in truth by their daily lives. That is why Peter goes on to urge his readers to live lives worthy of the One who was raised from the dead and who had brought them into his Kingdom of Love (I Peter 2:11-12). This is why Paul urges the early Christians to offer their bodies as “living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God” as true, spiritual worship (Romans 12:1). [3]

We know that in the early church people shared their faith fearlessly. They lived in households where entire groups of people were converted, sometimes all at once. They shared their lives and belongings in ways that caused people to take note (Acts 2:42-47). They were unafraid to live differently than those around them. [4] The weekly worship was lived out in day-to day living. Just as God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, lives in a communion of love, Christians are meant to live and worship in community. A God who exists in community needs to be worshiped in a community that tries to emulate the wisdom and love of the divine community in their worship and life.

In large part, the goal of the Reformers, and especially of Calvin, was to reinstate a humble, spiritual form of worship that was consistent with the intentions of Christ, the practice of the early church, and Holy Scripture, especially the worship we see in the book of Acts. The focus of their efforts was to be sure that worship was spiritual, Christ-centered, and scriptural. [5]

The Church today needs to recover the notion that we are not individuals who privately have been called into a new kind of relationship with God. We are part of a family of people who have been called to live each day in constant worship to “glorify God and enjoy him forever,” as the catechism puts it.  In order to be empowered and encouraged to live the Christian life week in and week out, we need to meet together once a week and worship in community.

A Call to Life Changing Worship.

I began this blog with an illustration of the beginning of what I would call the Post-Modern Christian perspective on worship attendance. My experience in college was just the beginning of the decline in worship we have seen in America. Worship has become increasingly unimportant to Christians in our excessively individualistic culture. In recent years, attendance has fallen in almost all denominations and in almost all churches within those denominations. This phenomenon has impacted Presbyterian churches, Baptist churches, Assemblies of God churches, and independent churches—all kinds of churches. The problem did not begin yesterday. In fact, the seeds of our crisis were sown years ago as the church, and especially the evangelical churches, increasingly adopted the personalistic, entertainment oriented nature of the surrounding culture.

In addition, Americans, even American Christians, have developed what I would call a “personal self-fulfillment search” focus on life, which has impacted churches and church attendance. Too often we seek a particular music, preacher, worship style, etc. that we find personally moving. As a pastor, I cannot complain too loudly about this, but I think it is mistaken. It is mistaken because we are called into communities of people who are bound together by both a relationship with God and with each other, not just here once a week, but in all of life. God did not mean our worship to be like going to a rock concert, but like going to a family reunion.family-worship-backgrounds1

It is easier to complain than it is to see the way forward. The church I serve, for example, has two different worship services to meet the felt needs of two different kinds of worship preferences. Churches that cater to a younger audience surround us in our community. These congregations have a still different worship format. Each week in all these places, people worship God “in spirit and in truth.” Nevertheless, taken together, we are not reaching the vast numbers of people who never or only very seldom come to worship. Just in our area of Memphis, Tennessee, there are as many as 30,000 people who never attend worship.

Surely part of the solution is to concentrate on a kind of discipleship that encourages new believers to understand the importance of true discipleship, true life in community, and true worship. Salvation is a great thing. However, as Paul says, it has to be worked out in “fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:2). Those who have a godly “fear” (Deep Respect) for God will not only understand the duty of corporate and personal worship, but will seek it with hearts aflame. Our first duty, then, is to make such disciples.

I began with an observation that living a wise, loving,  joyful, spirit-filled life is impossible without worship. Indeed, this is so. It is simply impossible to live a life in community with the Eternal God without living that life in community with others. It is simply impossible to continue to live a life infused with the Spirit of God without remaining connected to that Spirit day in and day out. For Christians, Sunday is that day we set apart for a special worship time together as a community. We believe that worship is essential to being continually connected to the source of the true wisdom, true power, and true suffering love we need to live out the example of Christ in our day to day lives. There is no substitute for true worship.

[1] See, William Barclay, “The Letters of James and Peter” in The Daily Bible Study Series rev. ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1976), 137 ff.

[2] See, “The First Apology of Justin Martyr” in Cyril. C. Richardson, ed. Early Christian Fathers (New York, NY: Collier Books, 1970), 282-288.

[3] This is another place where the Jewishness of the Paul and the early church comes through. In the Temple, there were animal sacrifices of blood. In Jesus, this system was completed and ended. Now, the true form of sacrifice is spiritual. There are intimations of this in the Old Testament. For example, In Micah 6:8 the prophet says, “Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of olive oil? Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” This is an expression of the inadequacy of the external religion of temple sacrifice.

[4] This is not the place for me to dwell on this issue, but in my view the biggest issue for the contemporary church in America is the unwillingness of Christians to be different and live differently than the surrounding culture.

[5] There is a vast volume of literature on this. See, Robert E. Webber, Worship Old and New (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1982), 73-84.

Copyright 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

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