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streetpreacher
Registered Member
Date Joined Dec 2001
Total Posts : 16
| Posted 11/30/2003 7:47 PM (GMT -6) |   | I found this teaching to be very instructive on motivation in our relationship with God and others. Do we relate to people from a legal or gospel approach?
Interwoven in the teaching are the concepts of free will and God ruling based on love and influence rather than power and control (reminds me of some of Doc's stuff I've listened to recently). Very powerful truths here, not to intellectualy satisfy but to apply to your life. God really wants relationship with us. I know we often say it, but do we really grasp it? I know I don't. Not to sound too charismaniac, but our "big" heads really do get in the way at times. I trust that God will use this teaching to work in your lives the way He is working in mine.
This article was given as a teaching at a YWAM Discipleship Training School. I don't know if it was written prior to a formal lecture of if someone attempted a transcript of a lecture. Here is the website (many other articles in Word form there that can be saved including one or two by Winkie Pratney): www.technoheaven.com/dts/
6/25/01
Author: Al McBryan
Legal vs. Gospel: A look at two very different ways in which Gods seeks to reach us, touch us, influence us, or affect us.
Matthew 20:1-16 For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard. About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the market place dong nothing. He told them, “ You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went. He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, “Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?” “Because no one has hired us,” they answered. He said to them, “You also go and work in my vineyard.” When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, “Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.” The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. “These me who were hired last worked only one hour,” they said, “and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.” But he answered one of them, “Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?” So the last will be first, and the first will be last.
Jesus said that the kingdom of God is like this parable. We look at this and we almost feel like the workers had a point. We don’t think that the landowner’s answer is really a sufficient answer. Maybe it is something about grace. Maybe it is about the age that we get saved. However, both of these seem insufficient. What is God getting at here? Let’s forget about this parable for now though.
The first approach: A Legal Approach
1. It is an arm’s length relationship. You get to know someone to a certain point but not farther than that. Look at the standard greeting. This is a handshake (an arm’s length). When we really know someone, we hug him or her. This is keeping someone at a distance. We do this out of fear and insecurity etc. The reasons can vary quite a bit.
2. It tends to hold in things in check and keep them from falling apart. It keeps things from disintegrating.
It is a twin emphasis on reward and punishment. These are how we create incentives to influence people to get them to do things. The hope of reward or the fear of punishment becomes an incentive to motivate people. This is the approach that parents use a lot. It is used a lot in human relationships. We can motivate people to do things that they might otherwise not do.
This is very similar to bribery. We can be put in jail for this. What is the difference between the two? In both cases someone is being offered something to do something. In the first situation, the reward is for something good. In the second situation, the reward is for doing something bad or for someone else’s personal gain. The second one is basically being bought off.
Yet, this kind of reward and punishment is done a lot. There are two groups of people that this is the only way to influence them. First, there are children. Parents use this a lot with their children. In the early stages, children don’t have understanding about the intrinsic value of things. The only way to motivate them is the hope of reward or fear of punishment.
Deuteronomy 1:38-39 But your assistant, Joshua son of Nun, will enter it. Encourage him, because he will lead Israel to inherit it. And the little ones that you said would be taken captive, your children who do not yet know good from bad – they will enter the land.
We are talking about the innocence of the child. It is hard to appeal to them about the virtue of certain actions. We can love our kids very deeply as parents but we are basically left to reward and punishment when they are in these stages.
Isaiah 7:14-16 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel. He will eat curds and honey when he knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right. But before the boy know enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid waste.
People think that kids are born selfish. Kids are born with self-love. We are supposed to love our neighbor’s as ourselves. The bible thinks that self-love is understood and is a natural thing. We have to teach a child to not touch a hot stove. However, we don’t have to teach them to pull their hands off the stoves when they touch it. The kid doesn’t want to have pain. Self-love is an in built desire for happiness and to dread pain and misery. Sometimes we will go through pain in order for happiness afterward. None of us like to suffer for its own sake. This is something that we all have.
People that commit suicide even love themselves. They are usually going through something so horrible that they view suicide as a way of escape. They view it as a twisted form of self-love. The other reason people commit suicide is to get back at others. They want to make other people feel guilty. In the deepest part of ourselves, we all love ourselves. We all have this built in us. We may have distorted notions of what will make us happy. Everyone wants to be happy.
To be selfish is to see the good of others but yet choose your own. In the early stages of childhood, children only see themselves. Thus, it is hard for them to be selfless. Little kids don’t think in terms of “yours” and “mine.” They think that everything is theirs. Little kids can be naked and be unashamed. You can laugh at kids and they don’t feel anything. However, there is a point where you can’t do this anymore. They start to become aware of others. The second commandment awakens; “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
It is easiest to love ourselves. We are most aware of ourselves. We can be angry with ourselves but still love ourselves. However, we don’t cut ourselves off. Maybe we should get angry with our neighbors the way we get angry with ourselves. It is not wrong to be angry. It is what we do with that anger that counts. However, we never get bitter with ourselves. God feels angry at times but never gets bitter. God doesn’t get pleasure in the death of the wicked. Do we really believe this? He gets angry but still cares. This isn’t that hard to understand if we view this in relation to ourselves.
Little children that die before the age of accountability are probably not held responsible for sin. The one who knows what he should do and doesn’t do it, sins. Children don’t understand at an early age. They don’t have the capacity to understand their morality.
The other group of people that this approach works with is selfish people. This is because it plays right into what their motivation is. They want to know what is in it for them. The problem is that we can use it with selfish people but never change what is inside them. If someone is doing something good just because they get a reward, they may never be changed. Look at the movie “Les Miserable”. When we do something nice, people are looking for our angle. Why are we doing nice things? If the only reason that someone doesn’t do something bad is because of fear of punishment they may not be virtuous. All we can say is that something bad didn’t happen.
God uses this approach and uses it a lot. Whenever this approach is used, it only modifies human behavior. It doesn’t change the person inside. The tragedy is that many people have come to see this as the Gospel. However, it is so far from the Gospel that it’s ridiculous. A lot of non-Christians think that we aren’t different from them. They think that we do nice things just to get to heaven. They think that we are just as selfish as they are. This makes them feel less selfish. If people see the gospel as this, no real change will ever be made.
It is not enough to know that someone is doing something nice. We want to know why. We need to know the motives. Legal’s great weakness is that we can motivate action but never win someone. Winning is much deeper than this. As long as we see the Gospel as a reward and punishment, we will not get close to God. It makes a world of difference to understand why someone is doing something. If God weren’t humble, he would hardly have us for the reasons that most of us come to him. When we first come to God, it is often for just legal reasons. It is not bad but it isn’t intimate. It’s how kids start off in life. It’s one thing if that is the way it starts but it is another way if it stays that way.
People primarily see the bible as legal. They don’t see what goes beyond that. Let’s look how deep this can actually go. This is probably one of the arguments that Satan makes to God.
Job 1:1-12 In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil. He had seven sons and three daughters, and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East. His sons used to take turns holding feast in their homes, and they would invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. When a period of feasting had run its course, Job would send and have them purified. Early in the morning he would sacrifice a burnt offering for each of them, thinking, “Perhaps my children have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.” This was Job’s regular custom. One day the angels came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them. The Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?” Satan answered the Lord, “From roaming through the earth and going back and forth in it.” Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.” “Does Job fear God for nothing?” Satan replied. “Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he had? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. But stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.” Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.
Satan thinks that Job is only upright because of God’s blessing. Satan tells God that his kingdom is no greater than his. Will Job still love him if Job was poor? Satan is saying that Job is just as selfish as the next guy.
The battle between Satan and God is not power versus power. Any teaching on spiritual warfare that leaves us afraid of Satan is unbiblical. If it were power versus power, there would only be two punches. The battle is philosophical and moral. A tyrant can use power to scare people and motive them. A tyrant would never win anyone though. God could do this if he wanted to. However, some things are not won by being powerful. What creates intimacy is not power. What is God going to say to respond this?
Proverbs 26:4-5 Do not answer a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him. Answer a fool, as his folly deserves, lest he be wise in his own eyes.
Sometimes when we try to answer a fool, we look no different than a fool. However, if we don’t answer, they may think we are afraid. This verse tells us that sometimes we should answer and sometimes we shouldn’t. Sometimes the issue is important enough that it is not okay. How do we really know what Job is like? Is Satan right or is God right? Have we ever not been able to get close to someone because of the motives we think that they have. People can justify their own self-centeredness if they can show that everyone else is the same way. This is what Satan is doing.
A lot of Job’s friends thought that Job had sinned and that’s why the things were happening. The irony, though, is that they are happening because everything was right with Job. In some respects, what God did in Job is out of character for God (don’t take this literally). What God proceeded to do in relation to both Satan and Job was something that he did not want to do. God was in a dilemma. He either would answer or wouldn’t.
Job 1:12 The Lord said to Satan, “Very well, then, everything he has is in your hands, but on the man himself do not lay a finger.” Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.
After this everything falls apart. Job doesn’t know why this is happening but is still praising God. This is not the reaction that Satan was thinking Job would have.
Job 2:1-3 On another day the angels came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them to present himself before him. And the Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?” Satan answered the Lord, “From roaming through the earth and going back and forth in it.” Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and suns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though you incited me against him to ruin him without any reason.”
Job’s friends were sure the Job was doing something wrong. Job was frustrated because he couldn’t find anything wrong with himself. However, God said that it happened without a cause. There is another place in the bible where Satan demands to sift somebody. He demanded to sift Peter. Peter denied Jesus three times before the cock crowed. Jesus said that Satan had demanded this test. Jesus said that he prayed that Peter would turn back to him after he fails.
People that are evil tend to accuse others. This shifts the focus off that person. Satan is an accuser of the brethren. He accuses them day and night before the Lord. We overcome his accusations by the blood of the lamb, the word of the testimony, and not loving our own lives even to death. One of the things about the atonement of Christ is to bring about the forgiveness of sin and to deflect accusation in the way in which God’s deals out mercy. Satan accuses people before the Lord who are wrong and who God does not judge accordingly.
Love tends to believe the best. Evil tend to gravitate toward cynicism. If our own heart is rotten, we think that others’ hearts are rotten. If our own heart is good, we will be optimistic toward others and will be amazed when others are evil. People who are good may tend to be naïve. Satan’s own heart is rotten and will accuse everyone as being as rotten as he is.
God doesn’t want to rule simply because he is the most powerful. He wants to rule because he is righteous. God could rule by might but doesn’t want to do this way. Tyrants control by power. However, they cannot win anyone. Satan is extremely wicked. A good description would be the evil emperor in Star Wars. In the movie Obi Won and Yoda are training a Jedi Knight. What concerns both of them is that they may lose Luke to the dark side. Yoda doesn’t want Luke to be consumed by anger when he meets his father and in turn be as evil as his father. Luke wounds his dad and the emperor tells Luke to kill his dad. This is where Luke faces his hatred. For the first time the emperor is exposed for who he is. Then the emperor tries to kill Luke. So Vader gets saved and kills the emperor.
The parallel can be made to the story of Job. Job is different than what Satan has accused him of being. This is where his argument goes to pieces. God didn’t let this happen to just anybody. He let it happen to Job because he had a great amount of trust in Job. Every time that someone lives for purposes other than what Satan accuses, Satan’s accusation falls apart.
When Job didn’t sin, Satan upped the ante. Then God let Satan go after Job himself. Job felt so awful that he wished that he would never have been born. However, he didn’t sin. His friends stayed with him for a week and didn’t say anything. When we have the feeling that we don’t know what to say, we should probably be doing exactly that.
Job 32:3 He was also angry with the three friends, because they had found no way to refute Job, and yet had condemned him.
How often does the church do this? The church often condemns and gives no reason for condemnation.
How else could God prove to Satan that Satan was wrong? The only alternative to answering Satan was to let him think he was right. In the end, Satan will not have a valid argument on his judgment day.
The legal approach can motivate people but it doesn’t have the power to change people’s lives. As long as this is conveyed as the primary message of the gospel, people will not turn their lives toward God.
It would be a huge mistake to represent this approach as the gospel.
The second approach: The Gospel Approach
This approach results in intimacy. Intimacy is a good word. It means to become close to someone. Intimacy is something that we all long for but at the same time is something that we all fear. It involves closeness and trust but also includes vulnerability. There is a tremendous potential for hurt when we become intimate with someone. People who have been hurt a lot tend to stay shallow in relationships.
Faith is the vehicle by which we get close to anyone or anything. If we love something enough, it will reveal its secrets to us. Faith and love are what link us to someone.
There are two dangers in life. The first is to be gullible or believing to easily. This is not a good thing. When a prophet prophesies, it is good to test it. The second danger is to become cynical. This means to not believe in anything. This cuts us off from being intimate ever again. However, there is a risk in intimacy.
A second characteristic of this approach is that it touches our hearts. It is one thing to hear a message and a whole different thing to get the heart of it.
What is the essence of the gospel? The gospel wants to bring us to a place of love and trust which is rooted in a revelation of value. It is to be won by God through a revelation of his value. We will all change once we know the value of knowing Christ Jesus. God becomes very real in our lives when legal starts give way to Gospel. We have to become personally attracted to God.
When people were looking for the Messiah, they were looking for a king that would institute law from the top down. However, God took us by surprise. Of all the religions of the world, there is only one with God as a servant: Christianity. God surprised us by being a servant and laid down his life on the cross. Through this, heaven wins its way into our hearts. Jesus says that if he would be lifted up, he would win all hearts toward him.
God has found a way to break through the resistance built up in us about what we think he is like. When we see Jesus, we see what God is like. The world cannot be saved by power. The world has to freely choose God.
The bible talks about the fear of the Lord and it being the beginning of wisdom. However, whenever God appeared to man he told them not to fear. This tells us there are two types of fear. We will all fear something. The more we understand the Fear of the Lord; the less we will fear anything else. Have we ever walked close to the edge of a cliff and felt like we didn’t want to get much closer? Fear in the good sense and fear in the bad sense can often feel very much the same. Who or what impresses us? David saw Goliath in relation to God. Others saw Goliath in terms of themselves. The bible actually tells us that the Fear of the Lord helps us sleep better. The more we have an awe of God; the less we will be afraid of what others think of us.
How does God win us to himself? He does it through a revelation. On the one hand, love is a command. However, if the only reason we are doing it is because we are commanded to do it, we wonder if we even really understand it. We really want people to like us because they want to and not because they have to. God wants us to be attracted to him and not subjected to him. He doesn’t want servants. He wants friends. God wants to lead us into more than legal could ever achieve.
John 15:14-15 You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.
The only way we can come to a healthy place is to understand that God really does care. Look at the developing child case.
Luke 15:1-2 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear him. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
The Godliest person that ever walked the world was accused of walking too close to sinners. Isn’t this ironic. In his defense, Jesus tells three parables. The first parable is the parable of the lost sheep. The second is the parable of the lost coin. The third is the parable of the lost son. These parables all show why Jesus hung out with sinners (Luke Chapter 15).
The father is happy that the prodigal son came home. He told the son that stayed home that he wanted to throw him a party but that he never let him get close to him. God loves righteousness. However, God doesn’t love us for righteousness. He wants to be intimate with us. There are two ways to avoid God. One is to be the prodigal son. The other is to be religious.
Luke 7:36-50 Now one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, so he went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. When a woman who had lived a sinful life in that town learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, she brought an alabaster jar of perfume, and as she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is – that she is a sinner.” Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.” “Tell me, teacher,” he said. “Two men owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?” Simon replied, “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled.” “You have judged correctly,” Jesus said. Then he turned toward the woman ad said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven – for she loved much. But he who has been forgive little loves little.” Then Jesus said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” The other guests began to say among themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
He asked Simon if he saw this woman. Simon is thinking that yeah he sees her as a sinner. All her sins were forgiven because she loved much. However, those who love little will only be forgiven little. What will lead us to love much is to realize that our good deeds don’t matter. God loved us just the same before we were saved. It matters why we think God loves us. God loves all of us unconditionally. He does not love us because of what we do.
Most of us think that Christianity is the forgiveness of sins. It is also God winning us back to love. Our problem is that we fixate on the sin part. Part of what it means to be saved is to be returned to love.
In our desire to seek righteousness we can lose our compassion. Love has a longing for righteousness and an ease for compassion. It is two fold. We need both. It is extremely tempting to head toward either ditch in our Christian faith. The great danger in becoming righteous is becoming self-righteous. Jesus desires compassion more than sacrifice. We tend to sacrifice to try to get God to love us. However, God wants us to do good only to do good. He will love us no matter what. God wants us to be attracted to him like the woman in the parable above. Does our church attract sinners today like Jesus did or do we attract the self-righteous?
We can’t choose the gospel. The gospel grips us when we have a revelation. There is the story about the lady who put perfume on Jesus before he went to the cross. The disciples put her down because they thought it was a waste. However, Jesus said that this woman would be honored wherever the gospel was preached. This is probably because it shows the essence of the gospel. It shows the love of God and the response that it should invoke.
“We are all bastards but God loves us anyway.” Spiritually we are all illegitimate children. The closer we can get to being righteous and having compassion, the better we can understand the heart of God.
When God look at anyone, he looks like a Father does towards a child. This is why Jesus asked the Pharisee to look at the woman. God can get angry but at the same time has compassion for us. He doesn’t get bitter. He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked. Think of the courtroom scene with those that are angry and the family members of the accused that have sympathy. Man and woman are made in the image of God.
People need to understand that we are made in the image of God and that we sin. If all we see is that we sin, then we may not understand. We need to know he loves us because we are made in his image. God has a Father Heart toward every person on this planet. Think about how Timothy McVeigh’s father feels. He loves but yet he is angry. Do we think God feels the same way?
Think back to Luke 15:31. “We had to be merry and rejoice for this son of mine was lost and is found, was dead and alive again.” However the actual verse says, “this brother of yours.” The problem with the Pharisees is that they can’t figure out why Jesus hangs out with sinners. This is why the father says “this brother of yours” instead of “this son of mine.” This is so subtle but yet so major.
The Christian life is not self-denial but rather love. Many people think that these are synonymous but they really aren’t. Christian life is much more than not being selfish. We have to have love. It doesn’t matter what gifts we have; if we don’t have love than we don’t have anything.
1 Corinthians 13:1-3 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
God desires compassion more than sacrifice. Love is the heart of the message. Do we understand this? This is what the world needs to hear and to see.
1 Timothy 1:5-7 The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Some have wandered away from these and turned to meaningless talk. They want to be teachers of the law, but they do not know what they are talking about or what they so confidently affirm.
For the most part the Ten Commandments are written in the negative. Legal is always written this way. We can look at the same law and see it legally or in the gospel form. Do we wonder why Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love one another?
The transformation from legal to gospel doesn’t happen in a day. It is more of a gradual process. How do we preach gospel instead of legal? We need to put the focus on God and why he is worth knowing. God is valuable. Some of the focus needs to be on the intrinsic evil in sin. The more people see sin then they will begin to hate sin.
Powerful repentance involves seeing, hating, and forsaking sin. It’s hard to forsake what you don’t hate, and it’s hard to hate when you don’t see. As long as people don’t understand what is wrong with sin, they won’t get it. We have to paint the picture of the destructiveness of sin. Bad preaching often tries to get people to hate things that they don’t see as being destructive. Good preaching shows the destructiveness.
Hebrews 5:12-14 In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But sold food is for the mature who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.
God wants to help us develop sensitivity towards good and evil. This is similar to how a child learns to walk. We need to develop our level of sensitivity.
Now, let’s look back to the parable that we started off with (Matthew 20).
The first clue is that Jesus concludes that the last will be first and the first will be last. We need to look back at Matthew 19:30. This is how he also started the parable. The chapter break here doesn’t help us. We need to look at what just precedes the parable in order to understand the parable. This is actually a pretty reliable way of understanding parables. So, start reading this at Matthew 19:16.
How do we witness to nice people with no felt needs? There is a problem with saying that if you don’t believe in Jesus; you’re going to hell. People will get the message, but the nice people will kind of feel damned. This makes them defensive. A person has to feel lost to get saved. It is hard for the words above to mean much if a person is not feeling convicted. This is what you tell a convicted person.
Too much conversion is shallow because we don’t understand the dynamics of conversion. Conversion must be preceded by conviction. We are only changed when our heart is gripped. This is true for everyone. People need to be attracted to God.
Acts 26:18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.
This is a key verse in evangelism. We need to open their eyes. Why? They can’t turn unless their eyes are open. It’s only after the turning that forgiveness can take place. However, we often want people to skip right to the forgiveness part when we are converting them. The prodigal son came home when he came to his senses. Sometimes in evangelism a challenge isn’t appropriate. Maybe we just need to help them turn to their senses. Conversion is when we start to open our hearts. How much will we get if we harvest before we should? We shouldn’t feel bad if our evangelism is planting and watering with no harvesting.
How do you witness to nice people? We have to find a way to get them to feel as though they are not as nice as they think. This can be difficult. Most people think that being nice is following the golden rule. This is doing unto others as you would have them to unto you. When people say this, don’t argue with them. We should agree with them. We should say that they are hitting on the second most important thing in life. Then we should ask them the following: “Could you call yourself a good person if you knew that someone existed who knew everything there was to know and was genuinely committed to the greatest good and yet you wanted nothing to do with what he might have to say?”
Imagine a world in which two things were true of everyone. Their first is that everyone genuinely sought to love their neighbor as themselves. The second is that everyone had access to someone who knew everything there is to know and is genuinely committed to the greatest good. Do you know what this is? This is actually getting saved. Do we love God?
There are three basic responses. The first is that they don’t believe there is such a person. This has to do with the existence of God. If this is the response, this is where we need to start. We have to provide evidence for God. The second response is that they don’t think that God is good. A lot of people struggle with this, and they may even blame God. It is the goodness of God that leads people to repentance. The third way out of the question is to say that we are all zombies in Christ. Anyone in authority needs to understand the delicate relationship that exists between form and freedom in the exercise of that authority. This is such an important concept when thinking about authority. Form is the structures, laws, and principles etc. Freedom has to do with the latitude and mobility within the form. It is the range of the form. Anyone who has authority has either too much form and too little freedom or too little form and too much freedom.
When we bring a child into this world, we get to do a God-like thing. We have authority over this child. How does this feel? Bad leadership creates rebellion. We have authority structures all around us. We can’t get away from it. There is no one in the world that understands the relationship between form and freedom like God does when God exercises his authority. God is not a dictator. There are laws that enslave and laws that liberate.
There are times in our life when God won’t speak to us no matter how much we pray or intercede. Why is this? We should hunger to hear the voice of God but God won’t always to tell us what to do. Maybe he wants us to decide between a number of good decisions. We can seek God but he will not always dictate to us. Maybe he wants us to do good without being told to do it. God doesn’t want to stifle us.
Sometimes the littlest thing will make all the difference in our life. Most often these things become the biggest thing in our life.
The first thing that Adam did was to name the animals. How did Adam do this? Adam had not sinned yet at this point. God could have dictated this to Adam. However, God brought the animals to Adam to see what Adam would name them. Do we see that Adam had freedom within the form? God wants the best for us. Sometimes he will want us to seek him out. He wants to speak to us. But yet he may not always tell us what to do. We need to trust him that he will be specific where he needs to be specific. We have to be aware that we may become frozen in decision making if we don’t hear God’s voice. This is why we should want to become closer to God. God doesn’t want to lord himself over us. He wants to give us choices too. How amazing is this? Sometimes it doesn’t matter where or when but rather who we are. We don’t have to live in a paranoid state.
1 Peter 5:1-4 To the elders among you, I appeal as a fellow elder, a witness of Christ’s sufferings and one who also will share in the glory to be revealed: Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, serving as overseers – not because you must, but because you are willing, as God want you to be; not greedy for money, but eager to serve;
God enjoys when people volunteer rather than being directed to do something.
The heart of God: If there were a God more qualified than him, he would want us to look to him. God’s right to rule comes from his wisdom and goodness. There is no one more qualified than he is. Nice people need to see that they need to give themselves to the one who is truly perfect. The test of being a good person is whether or not we have opened ourselves up to the one who know right. Have they come to him?
John 3:16-21 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. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.”
Now, back to Matthew 19 again.
Jesus didn’t tell everyone to sell all of his or her possessions in order to get saved. Salvation is personal. God will often touch the god of our lives. For each one of us this might be very different. We can have riches but yet not have riches be our god. Jesus said that it’s harder for a rich man to be saved than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. The bible says blessed are the poor in spirit. One fate befalls us all. This is the truth. It’s not bad to be rich and it’s not good to be poor. The disciples want to know who can be saved then. Jesus replies that this is possible with God. Peter is thinking that they actually did what Jesus is talking about. Peter want to knows what there will be for them because they have followed. This is what elicits that parable. With this in mind what is the point of the parable.
The clue is that the only ones that were uptight about what they got paid are those who were hired first. Let’s look at how they were hired. The first workers agreed (settle) for a denarius. All of the others agreed to work for whatever the landowner wanted to give them. We often want a contract when we are not so sure we can trust. This is what the first workers were doing. It is not wrong to have or want a contract. The contract sets the tone of the relationship. If we need to have a contract, God will be faithful to the contract. However, if we trust God, watch out. This is why the landowner asks if their envy comes from his generosity. Legal is not entirely bad. It is just not close.
Most of us came in legal. However, God wants to break through this. That is what this parable is about. The second set of workers had the breakthrough. Sometimes it is what we think about God that keeps us from getting close to him.
We move toward the gospel approach when we discover things about God that attract us to him. People have ideas about God that keep them from getting to know him. Part of Jesus coming to earth was to show us that God really isn’t what we had thought he was.
Today Lucifer is probably surveying the church just as Bonaparte did China. One can almost behold the fear in his eyes as he thinks of the Church's unmeasured potential and growls, "Let the Church sleep! If she wakes, she will shake the world." Is not the Church the sleeping giant of today?.... - Leonard Ravenhill | | Back to Top | | |
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