Scripture Introduction
To teach pastors to dig deeply into the Bible, seminary students take Greek Exegesis, a course connecting study of the Greek language with work in the New Testament. During the semester, we translated and analyzed ten or so passages, each one revealing different methods to get at the meaning of a text. But all of that work was preliminary to the final paper. As we learned a new skill by studying various passages, we applied that knowledge to the text our course was based on. And for us, Dr. Chamblin chose 2Corinthians 5.14-21.
Of course the whole Bible is important – all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable. But when a professor chooses a text for an entire semester of study, he wants one particularly full of theological depth and significant application to the church. To use the language of the boardroom, this passage could be placed on the cover of every Bible as the “executive summary.” I will read our text for us, then we will pray and see what God would show us about himself, and us, and evangelism.
[Read 2Corinthians 5.11-6.13. Pray.]
Introduction
So, the young boy said, “Daddy, if three frogs are sitting on a limb hanging over the creek, and one frog decides to jump, how many frogs are left on the limb?”
His dad replied, “Two.”
“No,” the son said. “Listen carefully, daddy. There are three frogs and one decides to jump. How many are left?”
Dad says, “Oh, I get it, if one decides to jump, the others would too. So there are none left.”
“No daddy—there are three left on the limb. The first frog only DECIDED to jump.”
I wonder if we frogs have DECIDED to be evangelists but still sit on the limb. When I first spoke with the pulpit committee in July of 2006, they stressed the importance of calling a pastor who would lead the church in evangelism. When Helen and the kids and I visited the congregation later that fall, we heard you say how the pastor should be committed to evangelism. When the session went on a vision and ministry retreat in March of 2007 (three months after I arrived) we agreed that local outreach and evangelism was the area of ministry where we as a church needed most to change, improve, and grow. In January of 2009, when the session met with the Presbytery to strategize about changes were needed to revitalize our church, this decision was reached: “what we are doing is basically pleasing to the Lord, so we need to focus on continuing to do it well, while working hard to improve outreach.” The session decided that I should teach a Sunday school class on evangelism in the fall of 2009, because that was the area of church ministry we most needed to focus on. And a couple of months ago, the elders asked the men of the church to a series of Saturday morning breakfast meetings to discuss ideas for outreach. We have definitely decided to jump, but are we still on the limb?
Paul jumped – in fact, he jumped in with both feet (as the idiom has it). He was known for his evangelistic zeal; he sought to proclaim the gospel to all of creation; and he commanded that his young disciple, Timothy, “endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry” (2 Timothy 4.5). When we think about Paul, two things should immediately come to mind: he was the great systematic theologian of the church, and he was passionate about evangelism. We cannot claim reformed theology and evangelistic effectiveness are incompatible.
In 2Corinthians 5, Paul defends and explains his ministry. While doing so, he also describes a job God gives his people: Ambassadors for Christ. We go into the world with the message of the King! Please notice five things about this work.
1. We May Look Foolish as Gospel Ambassadors (2Corinthians 5.11-13)
Notice that verse 11 begins with “therefore,” connecting it to the previous sentence, where God reminds us that all must appear before the judgment seat of Christ, where each will be either rewarded for our faith or punished for our sins. “Therefore,” Paul now says, “because of the future judgment, knowing that the true living God is a holy and consuming fire, fearing the Lord (with good reason lest we be given the treatment we truly deserve), I seek to persuade others to come to faith.” Paul does not play around with the possibility of evangelism, he passionately pursues this work.
And there is the problem. Look at verse 13: “for if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you.” Some said, “This guy is a nut, a certifiable fruit-cake.” They felt the Apostle was too fanatical: “We need someone with less fire and more deliberation, less emotional appeals and more logical reserve, less enthusiasm and more decency.” But Paul insists that his craziness is for God’s glory and their good, and do we not all need to be more beside ourselves in that way?
John Calvin: “This [insanity] is said by way of concession; for Paul’s glorying was sane, or it was, if we may so term it, a sober and most judicious madness; but as he appeared foolish in the eyes of many, he speaks according to their views. Now he declares two things: in the first place, that he makes no account of himself, but has this one object in view—that he may serve God and the Church; and, secondly, that he fears not the opinion of men, so that he is prepared for being reckoned either sane or insane, provided only he transacts faithfully the affairs of God and the Church…. This is a passage deserving not merely of notice, but also of constant meditation; for unless we shall have our minds thus regulated, the smallest occasions of offense will from time to time draw us off from our duty.”
That last sentence applies well, doesn’t it? If we jump into the creek of evangelism, some will think us mad. And unless we are prepared, their criticism will draw us off from our duty. But God is our judge, and the church is the beneficiary, so we must employ every means to persuade others.
2. We Must Be Controlled By the Love of Christ to be Gospel Ambassadors (2Corinthians 5.14-17)
Why do it Paul? Why suffer reproach and criticism? Why work so hard in such terrible conditions? Why bother with evangelism when it causes such problems? Paul’s answer: “Jesus loves me, this I know.”
The love of Jesus saved Paul from sin and judgment, and now Jesus’ love will not let him go. Christ died for all, that those who live might be rescued from selfishness. Self-absorption provides no joy; true happiness comes from service. And what greater service could there be than proclaiming the gospel to every creature under heaven?
To be sure, Paul loved people, and that will come in a few minutes. But it is significant that he begins with the vertical – his love for Jesus and Jesus’ love for him: the love of Christ controls us.
The sin which wraps its treacherous tentacles around the human heart can twist and corrupt love for people into hurtful and harmful behavior. The only one who can teach us to love others without harm is Jesus. His love was perfectly other-oriented; ours never is. So Paul does not begin ministry with love for people, because then he would be tempted to do what he thought best for them or, worse, what they thought best. Instead, he grounds evangelism in his relationship with God. Evangelistic zeal must be controlled our love for Jesus which comes from his love for us.
3. We Must Be Directed by God to be Gospel Ambassadors (2Corinthians 5.18-6.2)
Verse 18: “All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.”
Verse 20: “Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us….”
Notice that God does two things. First, he reconciles. We made ourselves his enemies by our sin; he restores friendship by his sacrifice – the giving up of his son to the cross of judgment. God is the first cause of salvation – he made Christ Jesus, who knew no sin, to be sin, so that we who know only sin, can be righteous. And having done this first, great work though the life and death of Son, God does another, a second work – he sends messengers to proclaim the day and way of salvation. God appeals to people though the evangelist.
New Testament professor Murray Harris gives a helpful (if somewhat technical explanation): “As proclaimers of the gospel of peace (the good tidings about reconciliation), the apostles were acting on Christ’s behalf as messengers and representatives duly appointed by him. Not only so, it was as if God were issuing a personal and direct invitation through them to their hearers…. This appeal issued in Christ’s name, this message of reconciliation, is the God-designed link between the objective work of reconciliation and its subjective appropriation by the sinner.”
That is a fancy way of saying this: evangelism is God’s way of getting people saved, and God aims to push us off the limb into that creek.
4. We Must Serve and Suffer to be Gospel Ambassadors (2Corinthians 6.3-10)
Paul begins this section of his apology by noting that he puts no obstacle in anyone’s way. That does not mean that he acts like a salesmen of cheap religious baubles or a peddler of God’s word for a profit. He does not manipulate people by catering to their base instincts or desires. But neither does he toss boulders in their paths that could make them stumble. Only the gospel should offend the non-Christian, not our preferences. Paul tells the truth, graciously and compassionately, with zeal and fervor. He serves God as a faithful evangelist, and he willingly suffers for the cause of Christ (which every evangelist must do).
Since Paul does not cater to people’s opinions, he can freely proclaim Christ. But, because the world cannot love the message of Jesus, the ministry brings with it suffering. The gospel insists that we are “sinners in the sight of God justly deserving his displeasure, and without hope, except through his sovereign mercy” (PCA membership vow), and people do not like that message. When we go out as evangelists, we go under the command of God, and we go willing to suffer hardship.
5. We Must Love People to be Gospel Ambassadors (2Corinthians 6.11-13)
The Bible insists that love speaks the truth – carefully, yes; gently, compassionately, wisely, with concern for how it will be heard, and how to do it well. Yes, all of those are part of the answer – part of the delivery system for truth. When we really care about people then we will speak the truth, which means that we are willing to risk everything, including the relationship, in order to point them to Jesus.
Paul did just so. He spoke freely, with deep affection. In return, some were offended and shut their hearts toward Paul. They did not like it when Paul said to those in church: some of you need to be reconciled to God through faith in Jesus!
It always happens that way when we plead with folks to be reconciled. The Bible tells us that an unbeliever is in rebellion against God; their sin has made the Lord their enemy. That is a hard message to convey. Only deep love coming from a heart wide open can make the evangelist speak freely about such things. These truths are too hard for us apart from a huge heart of love.
But when we consider that all must appear before the judgment seat of Christ and receive what is his or her due, the love we have for people will (with Paul) propel us into the ministry of evangelism.
6. Conclusion
Would you please consider four applications?
6.1. Reformed theology and evangelistic effectiveness are not incompatible
God saved me in a Presbyterian church where the pastor was once professor of systematic theology at Reformed Seminary. The church hosted conferences on reformed theology. Since then, we have been part of seven different Presbyterian churches. In every single one, people have asked the same question we have wondered about: should we let others do evangelism while we focus on discipling? Five reasons that will not work:
• It goes against human nature: those who are led to Christ in a church are usually loyal for the long-term. Yes, people do change churches, but the majority stay as long as they can in the church where they were converted.
• It goes against evangelist desire. When a person becomes a Christian through a church’s ministry, they immediately think of friends to invite to find the same Jesus. Leaving a church that effectively evangelizes, for one which does not, goes against hope for my friends.
• There is a strong temptation to pride. When we suppose that our work is to fix people who got converted in churches of inferior theological quality, we come across as insufferably arrogant.
• Those who practice evangelism are changed by work on the front lines. Jesus always sent his disciples to do the work of evangelism – they led people to Christ, but they were also changed by the work. We need to be different in the way that only evangelism will make us.
• The Bible requires that we be evangelists. The great commission demands it, and the Biblical examples support it. Please consider (and I say this with a heart wide open in love for you) that when we suppose that our theology is not compatible with evangelism, we may be making an excuse rather than a understanding a fact.
Paul was the great systematic theologian of the church and passionate about evangelism. God wants us to be also.
6.2. Churches and Christians that are not intentional about evangelism are not involved at all
Evangelism is the front-lines of the war on the dominion of Satan. As such, it will be opposed in every way – suffering, shame, insult, criticism. It was true when John Calvin said it 400 years ago just as it is true today: “unless we shall have our minds thus regulated, the smallest occasions of offense will from time to time draw us off from our duty.”
This work will never be our default, nor will we ever do it as the normal course of life. It is simply too hard and brings too much opposition. Staying on the limb is safer! If we are not intentional we will not be involved.
6.3. Every aspect of church life should have an evangelistic aspect and flavor
When Bill Hybels started Willow Creek in 1975, he wanted a church where those who were not followers of Christ could meet him. Imitators soon followed, and the seeker church movement was created. Some of the excesses of that idea led other churches to work on a new slogan: church is for Christians. Soon the Christian landscape appeared divided between “seeker-driven” churches and “seeker-insensitive.”
If we let all of our fears and preconceptions go, and look at the Bible, it seems that God does not make such distinctions. This letter, written to a church, covers a wide range of topics: 1) the comfort God gives when Christians suffer, 2) why his travel plans changed, 3) the importance of restoring penitent sinners, 4) the victory of Jesus, and the promise of heaven (among other things). Clearly these are matters of special interest to Christians. But note well: Paul also presents a gospel call: “I implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.” Paul clearly assumes there are those in the congregation who are not yet Christians, who need to place their faith in Jesus.
Yes, church is for Christians; and church is for those who do not yet know Jesus and follow him as disciples. Everything we do should be for Christians and covenant families, and everything we do should be for those whom God might bring into the household of faith.
6.4. We must give up some preferences to remove obstacles from the way of salvation
I believe that God wants each of us to invite friends to church, expecting them to experience God’s presence and power here, combined with Biblical truth, in such a way that they might be reconciled to God.
So I would like each of you to ask, “What needs to be different here so that I can bring people to church with hope and joy and confidence that they can meet Jesus and come to faith?”
Here in 2Corinthians 6.3, Paul reminds us that he puts no obstacle in anyone’s way. In 1Corinthians 9 he says, “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them…. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.”
I’m not asking that we compromise truth or faithfulness. I am saying that complaints about compromise can be excuses for not changing. I’m not going to tell you what we will do. You tell me and the elders – what needs to happen here so that you can bring non-Christian friends here to meet Jesus? Let’s answer that for the sake of the gospel, so that we too can share with them in its blessings. Amen.
