Barneyisfat: On Evangelism

Have you ever heard someone try to tell a joke and fail terribly? This happens a lot when someone wants to tell about some funny situation in their life – and they tell the crowd … and when no one laughs … and there’s that awkward silence … they always say, “Well, I guess you had to be there.”

I can’t tell you how many times I tried to tell people about some crazy joke that my sister and I have … but all of these stories always end with awkward silence and the words “I guess you had to be there.” Because my sister and I basically have our own language.

But have you ever heard someone tell a joke perfectly? Have you ever been brought into the joke and laughed so hard you cried?

The difference is knowing what to tell and what not to tell – and how to tell it, and how to make it funny. It’s not so easy to tell a funny story.

If someone is good at telling a joke, you don’t have to “be there.” They can tell the story perfectly, as though you were there with them.

It’s the same with the people who create advertisements. Advertisers often have a hard job. They often have to explain the whole premise of a tv show in just one picture. Or they have to explain a difficult concept AND why their product is the best solution – all in one picture or just 30 seconds of ad time.

The ones who fail are the ones who try to explain everything, the ones who succeed are the ones who “show them” who make people understand.

Jesus cares about communicating the message – the message is the Good News of the Kingdom of God.

Everywhere that Jesus goes, he seems to draw a crowd. He heals people, he teaches, he performs some other miracles and the people, they just come to Jesus. It seems like everyone wants to come and see this miracle worker. Jesus doesn’t seem to have any problem gathering a crowd.

In our scripture reading, Jesus sends out the twelve to go to other villages and cities to share the Good News. And right before these verses, Jesus brings a girl back from the dead. It seems like if you raise a girl from the dead on Tuesday, you’re not going to have a hard time drawing a crown on Wednesday, right? I mean, I think that resurrection would probably bring some people out to see Jesus.

But Jesus gets done bringing this girl back from the dead, and then turns to the 12 and says, “Well, friends, I’m going to send you out ahead of me. To places I haven’t been, to places that I might visit – and you will go there and tell them about me.”

I don’t know if you’ve ever been around a famous person. Or even an important person. The ways that our stomachs get tangled up in knots and we don’t say the right thing, but we want to stay close. And I imagine that these twelve, after watching this amazing miracle – that they all probably wanted to hold on to Jesus’ robe and wait for the blessing to flow. I’m sure that they didn’t want to go and leave him at this time.

But Jesus sends the twelve out, and gives them instructions on what they should do.

For Jesus, the quest of gathering a greater number of believers was never primary. In the scripture we see a great crowd following Jesus and he turns around, tells them some horrific or challenging part of Christianity, and cuts the number of followers down. We never see Jesus begging people to come and be his followers. If the goal was to get more people, well, He’s God – he could just kill everyone right now and we’ll all be on our knees before God ... because once we are standing before God there is no way we can hold our own way as higher and better than God’s. We will all just worship God.

Jesus wasn’t ever trying to gather some huge group of people – he wasn’t trying to make a huge music festival or conference or to build a bigger building. Jesus was sending out the Good News that the Kingdom of God is here right now – with us.

Do you think that Jesus needs us? God commands all of the angels in heaven, and, really - if God's main goal was to get everyone to believe in Him, I think a few dozen flaming angels or rock monsters would go a lot further than a dozen fishermen and tax cheats.

Jesus doesn’t need us, but Jesus chooses to use us. He leaves this in our hands, he trusts us with this great responsibility. He leaves this joy for us. Our salvation might get us into heaven when we die, but through our life in Christ, we build a little bit of heaven here on earth. This is what we pray over and over again – thy will be done one earth as it is in heaven – we pray this every day, and Jesus gives us the chance to live that every day. We share our faith, because we build a little bit of heaven on earth when we do that. We connect a human being with the Glory of God and we fill this world with just a little bit more light.

Evangelism. Boo!

When we talk about Evangelism, we get a little scared. I even feel a little bit uncomfortable about preaching about Evangelism because it's not something I really believe in. I know this is a strange thing to hear, but give me a minute to explain. I have taken classes on Evangelism - on how to talk to people and by the end of the conversation that person has decided to follow Jesus. I've taken at least three classes, I've read books, and I've even taught other people how to do this. But the whole time, I felt a little bit uncomfortable. One day, I realized that I felt like I was selling used cars. I felt like I had to give some sales pitch. To make a really great advertisement that explained everything.

But, friends, Jesus isn’t some used car. He’s not a vacuum cleaner or a new type of soap. Jesus isn’t a commodity to be bought and Jesus is certainly not a commodity to be sold. We’re not in the sales business. We’re in the people business.

Let's look at the word's of Jesus here. Jesus sends these twelve men out and he asks them to proclaim, cast out demons, heal the sick, and cure disease. Jesus doesn't ask these men to answer all of their questions, he doesn't ask the twelve to bring back new disciples, he doesn't ask the twelve to feed the people or give them money.

Jesus asks the 12 to receive the hospitality of strangers, to share the Good News with them, and then to return.

Well - perhaps you are thinking, "we don't cast out so many demons, and we've never healed the sick or cured diseases."

Friends, this is a lie from the Devil. We are so tempted to believe the devil's lie that we are powerless. I watched with my own two eyes as you all have cast out the demons of wickedness, evil, corruption, and bribery. I have seen you heal the lonely and sad, and I have seen you cure the disease of depression. The devil wants us to believe that we don't have any of the power of the original disciples, but we do. We cast out demons all the time, we heal all the time. Every time you bright young people have a conversation with someone who doesn't deserve your time, you are healing them. Every time you stand up against a bully, jerk, or politician you are casting demons out of the darkness and into the light. We do these things. I've seen you do these things. And as soon as we believe in the power that God has given us for these things, we will do a lot more of it.

But it is the proclamation part that we get caught on. Because we believe the devil's lie that we are not demon caster-out-ers and we are not healers - we believe that we shouldn't proclaim the Good News either.

Here is the devil's favorite trick. He uses our desire to win to shame us. He uses our desires to get things done, to have a result, to be right, and to be approved of. We have come to believe that "proclaiming the Good News" means arguing with an atheist until he is crushed under our massive amount of faith and commits to following Jesus for the rest of his life. And this is so far from what is means to proclaim the Good News.

What does it mean "to proclaim"? It means to say out loud. Every time we tell a friend "God loves you and so do I" we are proclaiming the Good News of the Kingdom.

"God has given you so many talents." "With God's help I'm going to make it through this difficult situation." "I really messed up and I sure am glad that God forgives."

Every time you say any of these things, you are sharing your faith. Every time you tell someone about Pilgrims and worship and reading the Bible and prayer and what these things mean to you - you are sharing your faith. "Oh, today while reading the Bible I found the most beautiful verse, can I read it to you? Can I post it as a Facebook status without sounding obnoxious?

Jesus specifically tells the twelve not to take their baggage with them.

We have all these ideas about evangelism and sharing our faith and Jehovah's witnesses standing with books and Mormon's in their suits and all of these things, they destroy our evangelism. Because Jesus doesn't ask us to do any of these things. He doesn't ask us to keep a tally, to keep score of how many souls we've saved, to argue and convince people of our own rightness.

Jesus doesn't need you. But Jesus chooses to use you and me. He chooses to use really imperfect, impractical human beings to spread the Good News throughout all the earth. God promises that if we aren't willing to share the Good News, He will make the rocks sing out the Good News - but nowhere in the New Testament does anyone come to faith except through the work of a human being sent by God. These twelve ordinary men went from town to town - and they didn't even take an extra pair of underwear - and they ate what was given to them, and they shared about their faith - and then they left.

And history tells us that these 12 men took this crazy story of the rabbi/carpenter who died on a cross and rose from the dead and they told that same story over and over again and today people all over the world sing and dance in the joy of this Good News.

Jesus doesn’t need us. Jesus didn’t need to send these twelve men out. Jesus could have done it better by himself. He could have had the rocks sing. But Jesus choose these twelve men and gave their lives an extra sense of meaning and purpose.

And Jesus uses us. We are God’s advertisement to the world.

And sometimes we’re not such great or clever advertisements, but we are the advertisements that God chooses to use.