Bible Talks - Family Church (9:45am)
Responding to the Proclamation
Sunday, 17 April 2005
Feedback:
Share using:
Tweet
Post this to:
Facebook · Delicious · Google · Twitter · Email
(suggest another share link)
When I was a teenager at high school, I was a member of a youth fellowship at our local church. I would attend every Friday night when we would play games and have a short devotional before supper. On Sunday evenings we would all go to church together and once a month on Sunday afternoon there would be a fellowship tea, usually with a guest speaker. Every so often we would have a Saturday outing and once a year there would be the fellowship house party, again with a guest speaker. But the one fellowship activity I did not join in was the Wednesday evening bible study. As well as these activities at our local church I was an occasional visitor at the ISCF group at school.
I used to enjoy all these activities, my mates were there, there were girls there (remember this was in the days of segregated high schools) but there was one thing I really didn’t like, one thing I resented and that was when they talked about things like repentance, asking God for forgiveness of my sins, and most of all conversion, being born again. It wasn’t until I was 18, in my first year at university, that I came to know Jesus as my Lord and Saviour and my attitude to such things changed.
My two brothers belonged to the same fellowship group, enjoyed the same activities, heard the same talks, listened to the same sermons, but their attitude didn’t change. They never accepted Jesus as Lord.
In the early chapters of Luke’s gospel we read of John the Baptist preparing the way for Jesus by preaching a baptism of repentance in preparation for the forgiveness of sins that would come through the Messiah. Some people responded, but others resented the implications of what he was saying.
You see, like myself before I became a Christian, like my brothers still today, and like so many other people when they hear the gospel proclaimed there is a resentment of the implication that we are not good people. People hear the call to repentance as a criticism of their superficial moral behaviour rather than as an offer to deal with the deep down problem common to all mankind, their alienation from God.
Whenever the gospel is proclaimed there is this polarization of people’s attitudes. Some hear it as this criticism of their behaviour and resent it, while others see it as the solution to their problems and eagerly embrace it.
The problem is that most people are not aware of their true position. Life in this world, “under the shadow of death”, is a precarious existence. There is a general recognition of this precariousness but people seek security and stability in the things of this world rather than in their heavenly Father’s everlasting arms. The stuff we own, be it house, car, money in the bank, shares, superannuation give us a false sense of safety. But we find ourselves worrying every time the Reserve Bank Governors increase the interest rate, or the share prices on Wall Street start to slide or there’s a down-turn in the real estate market. Why do you think that these items are reported daily in the TV news? People want to know how secure they are, or aren’t, as the case may be; should I panic or am I OK for now?
Alternately, or perhaps even in parallel, with this security based on worldly possessions, there is a sense of security that people try to get by comparing themselves with others around them. “I’m OK because it’s the good people who go to heaven and I’m better than .......... and at least as good as........ And you again look at all those terrible people you see on the TV news and think “I’m OK. I’m definitely a lot better than that person.” And you are but that’s not the problem.
The repentance and forgiveness that John the Baptist and Jesus were talking about comes from a change in thinking, seeing things from a different, godly, perspective. A shift from a focus on the things of this world to a focus on and a valuing of the things of God’s new world, God’s kingdom which was brought in by Jesus and will one day be fully realized with Jesus’ return. This re-evaluation of life leads to radical changes not just in the externals of moral behaviour but to who we are and what we believe deep down. Jesus calls it being born again. It is as though we become totally new people because our whole orientation has done a radical shift, a 180 degree turn from following our way to following God’s way.
In that reading from Luke 10 we see Jesus sending out 72 of his followers to the towns he was about to visit. “Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand” was the basic message. The Lord of the harvest is coming so be ready. What we see is Jesus warning his followers that they are not going to be welcomed with open arms in every case. Yes there will be those who welcome them and to such people assure them that God’s peace rests upon them. But there will be others, even whole towns of others, who will not welcome the message. You still tell them that the Kingdom of God is near but you warn them of the judgment that is to come.
Today, we must expect the same response to the proclamation of the good news of Jesus Christ, as those early disciples received while Jesus was still amongst them. 6“He who listens to you listens to me; he who rejects you rejects me; but he who rejects me rejects him who sent me.”
In an earlier sermon from this series we saw that the message that we proclaim doesn’t belong to us. It belongs to the Lord. Verse 6 of Luke 10 tells us even more clearly, the message may be delivered through us but if it is rejected it’s not just us they are rejecting. It’s not even just Jesus they are rejecting. It is God himself who is being rejected.
Repent and believe the gospel is a call to people to do a complete, radical, rethink of their attitudes not just towards morality - What sort of life should I live, but a rethink of their whole attitude towards God and Jesus – what is it that gives me my meaning, my security, my safety, my life.
Whenever the Gospel is properly proclaimed, both sides of the proclamation are clearly presented. The Good News is true, accurate, news. It contains the wonderful news of God’s rescue plan for mankind through the forgiveness that comes through faith in Jesus Christ, but it also contains the declaration of God’s wrath on the unrepentant sinner. The person who hardens their heart when they hear the gospel, rather than opening it to God.
Of course we Christians would prefer not to speak about hell and punishment. We prefer to spare people’s feelings and only speak about the good stuff. Who among us longs to discuss the most confrontational doctrine imaginable. But Jesus spoke about it, and to present the whole Gospel so must we. In that passage from Luke 10 Jesus says about the town that rejects his disciples, “I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town.” Then he goes on to pronounce judgment on the towns of Korazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum, all of which do not exist today except as places of archeological interest.
A famous American evangelist of the late 19th early 20th centuries by the name of Billy Sunday used to say ,”If there was more hell preached in our churches, there’d be less hell practised in our streets!” Another saying that I was unable to find the source of is that “a preacher’s job is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable”.
If we are genuinely concerned to save the lost in our community then we need to do a number of things:
1. Be convinced ourselves that they really are lost and in need of saving. Wishy, washy liberal ideas that everyone will go to heaven, or people are all deep down fundamentally good are contrary to what Jesus says and contrary to why Jesus went to the cross.
2. Be unashamed and undaunted in proclaiming the full gospel of God’s gift of forgiveness and salvation for the repentant and of God’s wrath on those who reject his offer.
3. Be prepared to cop the flack, the opposition, the rejection and even the persecution as we uncompromisingly do this. We are to be as Jesus told those 72 disciples when faced with rejection, still tell them about the Kingdom of God and then declare his wrath.
When we proclaim the Good News of forgiveness and salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, sadly, all too often we are met with indifference, rejection, hardness of heart, more often than we are met with reception and joy. Jesus warned his disciples about it and it still happens today. The big danger is that because of our fear of rejection, particularly by those dear to us, we fail to speak out like we should.
Chuck Colson, the founder of the Prison Fellowship Ministries in the USA after spending time in prison himself following the Watergate affair tells a story of a man who tried to save the city of Sodom from destruction. The city’s inhabitants ignored him and asked mockingly “Why are you bothering us like this? We’re not going to change.” The man replied, “Maybe I can’t change you but if I yell and scream and holler enough maybe you won’t change me.”
The big danger in the indifference of people to the proclamation of the gospel to our community is that we’ll just give up.
Let us pray.
