Series: Aggressive Evangelism
Get In Their Home
Luke 10:5-7
Terisa Acevedo initially thought her year old dachshund had escaped the burning house and she spent the next week putting up signs around the neighborhood hoping someone had seen her. After a few weeks she as sadness settled in as she realized not only had the fire taken her home but also took her beloved 4 footed Lola. After almost a month she returned to the burnt house when she heard scratching behind the boarded up front door. Some friends helped her pull the boards off and through the opening jumped Lola into the arms of Terisa. It had been 27 days and the Lola was quite a bit skinner but alive and over the next week came back to full health. The vet who treated her said it was amazing that the dog survived that long, she had never seen anything like it. If Terisa had not returned to that home when she did the dog wouldn’t have been found.
Now I know you pet people like that story – the animal saved and survived, yeah okay so I guess it is a pretty good story. I think it probably is a great illustration of our modern world, people whose dreams have burned up and feel trapped and starved for life in the empty shell just waiting for some reason to go on and some hope that a door will be opened. At its core the message of Jesus Christ is this – one coming to save a world destined to be burned up. He claims that whoever gives their life to him will have streams of living water flowing in their soul, the kind of replenishing that keeps a person going when their body wants them to quit. That message is the one he came to preach and one we are told to aggressively pursue and proclaim.
We continue our study of the mission Jesus gave in Luke 10 – that mission to lay the ground work for him to appear and preach to the towns.
I. The Plan for the 72
What we choose to put in our homes says something about what we value, for the most vul
5 “When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ 6 If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you. 7 Stay in that house, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to house.
A. Jesus took advantage of the culture to have his followers introduce him.
1. Common practice of the time this was written - strangers stay in the houses of people in the towns they visited. Now in the modern day this is almost unheard of – welcoming strangers into your home who have just gotten into town is not done and considered extremely foolish.
2. Part of this instruction seems completely foreign to us because the culture is that far removed. This form of hospitality seems strange to us but was perfectly normal for that day.
*There are some things we do as Americans which would be considered extremely dangerous and foreign to a lot of people around the world. No bars on our windows would appear very foolish to many cultures because it would be an open invitation for people to rob. I will occasionally see a store that places discounted items outside the doors of their establishment with the understanding that if you want to purchase them you pick them up and carry them inside to buy them. Now many of these places do not have video cameras or someone watching the products – it seems like those things would be simple to steal, but it is understood by the majority of people that the right thing to do is to pay for them. Things that seem strange to our way of thinking can be understood as important to the function of society.
3. Because of this general functionality of the Biblical culture, this allowed a different interaction than public discussion – a longer and more private opportunity was presented because of that culture.
B. Consider the obstacles which they had to overcome in their day.
1. Lack of the freedom of public speech – During Biblical times there wasn’t this concept of free speech as we know it; dire consequences followed those who said something controversy. Speaking out against you leaders was a death sentence. Even hints of something that might be seen as anti government or anti-establishment would have been frowned upon.
*Going out into the public square to teach could be dangerous, at one point in the book of Acts a man named Stephen is called before the leaders to speak about how they didn’t listen to Jesus when he said, Acts 7:52-53 Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and murdered him— 53 you who have received the law that was put into effect through angels but have not obeyed it.” These pairs of men were not going to be welcome to speak in the normal gathering places – the synagogues so they had to go places where the give and take could be freely done. In the homes was a perfect place.
2. Limited available wealth – what the majority of people had in biblical times was far less than we do but the real critical difference was the lack of real opportunities. The women of that day didn’t go out and get jobs, and the people where kind of directed into the job their family told them to or the religious leaders told them to. And if they went into debt? They had to sell themselves into servant hood – no bankruptcy courts to keep them from a life of service paying it off. Minimal access to credit was the result.
3. Limited modes of communication – again limited, much more limited than we have today. They passed along documents but the number of people who could read and write would be limited too. Word of mouth was the best way, which means they had to be within ear shot.
*What is interesting to me is how none of these things are a hindrance to us today – speech is mostly protected, different places to work are available even in a struggling economy, and communication is at the highest point ever in history. Our landscape is different but the real point is how Jesus sent his followers out to engage the culture right at the heart of the society – their homes. The men went literally into their homes and would speak to them directly about Jesus and how he was going to come to them.
C. And Jesus told them practical things to do.
1. He said they had something to offer - Peace to the house – This phrase “Peace be to you,” was a common form of salutation among the Jews and here it is like the initial comment Jesus advises them to use.
*My wife this week pointed out something she heard about phrases used in the south where the people try to be courteous, if someone there is just a loser or failure the talk about them and add “bless their heart,” with the intention of kind of saying the person is just too lame to even know what is right! I think about it when someone sneezes, the refrain is “God bless you,” it is now like the courteous thing to do, before it was kind of a superstitious phrase. But the literal words about God blessing someone, yeah we do want God to bless sneezers and non-sneezers right? We want blessings upon our heart and our soul too – Jesus advised them to use familiar words and then connect the dots of God’s real ability to bring peace. The offering of peace to be on the house was kind but also was kind of like an invitation. They were going to encounter some people who were really ready to hear the message who were interested and searching for truth. The ones whom Jesus compared earlier to being ripe – there are some who would because of their circumstances or age or interest would be ready to hear more about what God had to offer.
2. He reminded them they will have to keep trying. Peace not accepted would go back to them – what does this mean? It means that if someone didn’t want to hear their message, their conscience would be clear that they tried to fulfill their responsibility.
* The underlying truth was that this assignment was about the deliverance of a message not the success of their work. As the angels stated many years before when Jesus first arrived that it meant “on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.” Yet we still know wars and division and disobedience still exists on the earth no matter how much people say they want peace. How can we say that peace has come to earth with all the obvious upheaval? what he offered wasn’t a nice symbol or “love not war” slogan meant to bring people together, for true peace can never exist that way. True peace only comes through defeating of enemy forces, from annihilation of the enemy where it cannot emerge to disrupt or bring chaos into the picture.
But a growing number do not see that as the way to peace – compromise seems the best way and that kind of peace is merely a slow down of conflict.
II. A People in a Hard World.
A. Not While daily life isn’t as hard today as it seemed back in Bible times there is quite a bit of hard heartedness.
*Which is what Jesus said would happen in the world Matthew 24:12 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold,” So as communication, travel, and comfort have all gotten much better in our world today, the heart of people grows harder and becomes the biggest obstacle to hearing the truth of God.
1. Self-focused problem – biggest problems are treated with, “How can I get rid of this feeling?” instead of what is the right thing to do.
2. Lack of effort – what did Jesus say to pray for? Workers because people giving a bigger effort has always been a problem. 20% do 80% of the work – this is the story of the church through the ages! It comes from that heart hardening.
3. Lost what is important – hard hearted people give up the important stuff for the urgent stuff. They give up a lasting future for a temporary victory. They don’t know what is valuable because they have lost the way to measure it.
*So we pay millions to celebrities who do nothing and a barely living wage to soldiers. We see loads spent on political image and message but the cost ripped from paychecks and land values. We talk endlessly about the discrimination based on a preference and talk incessantly about the intolerance of people who want standards. We march for hours to support choice while tossing away the lives of the innocent all in the name of convenience. We honor God with our lips and then deny him with our lifestyle. We post our faith followed closely by a comment using profanity. Yes there is a hardness spiritually speaking which seems nearly impossible to overcome because all of us are being drawn in.
B. And that means we have to be more than just non-bad people, we have to be people who are aggressively looking to get to the heart of the matter.
1. Just as the men went into the houses of the people in town, we have to enter the area of ideas and combat the influences which are taking hold our own homes. And then we need to start concentrating on the places we can help the other people we know do the same.
2. This is the point of what is meant by the aggressiveness. We may hope that people see our faith in what we do, but since there is a hardening all around us we can’t assume that is happening any more. We must be actively seeking to put our faith to words in each event we are involved with.
Ephesians 2:17 He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. This peace Jesus was offering was not about elimination of war but a spiritual reassurance – lasting, final, uncompromised and conquering peace. It wasn’t a let’s stop fighting peace with an ambiguous length of time, it was a “enemies have been vanquished” peace. Fewer and fewer people though understand that concept or even believe that is how peace comes. A result in the completed work of Jesus would be the offer of complete and lasting peace between God and man – this was a continuation of that event, as they came into the house an offer of peace was presented and an invitation to find more.
3. This is the strength of our faith and message! Jesus defeated the mystery of what happens after death and for every person who accepts his lordship of their life receives that reassurance – that peace. As the saying go, that is where the truth hits home.
*Not culturally common to be door to door evangelism. It works occasionally but most people do not seem to respond to that type of thing.
There is still a place for that but it really is the rare person who does it well. If you have the desire to go and knock on doors and ask people to church, then do it! Don’t wait for instructions or permission, go ahead. Most people that isn’t how it is going to be done. What we need to do is start thinking about are some of the places where people might be more open to hearing about Christ today. That part in verse 2 is very important: Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. So let’s start from the ground floor here. I suggest we do something as a group – if you have phone or a PDA with a calendar, I am going to suggest setting an alarm or reminder to pray about this – that God would send workers to the harvest. I am going to suggest maybe at this time each day – 11:30 put a regular alarm or write it in your personal calendar where you are asking God to send workers to the harvest – it is really the first thing Jesus mentions here. And I want us this morning to do a personal thought process about being aggressive in our evangelism by asking a different question: Where do you feel the most comfortable and feel confident to talk openly?
III. A Plan for Modern Life
A. Our task is to take the principles of Jesus and apply them to the modern life.
1. And while our culture is different from the people in the Luke 10 passage, the principles of passing the message is the same.
2. As I said last week we are to be God’s ambassadors to the world by being nearby but the next step of our message is to show how the truth of Christ is made for implementation in our homes as well as public lives.
3. Let’s stick to the principles first of all. We don’t stay in strangers homes and going door to door is not as effective as it used to be. there are limits on the places we can really present the clear message – time is limited as well.
B. This is one thing we can never forget – very important. Culture changes but the needs and desires of people never really do.
This is the key to our evangelism:
1. Every person longs for peace. Because when you have peace you don’t have to worry or protect or war. The world won’t stop doing this, Jesus said in John 16:33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace.” When you have Christ the biggest question – dying has an answer. That peace underlies everything else. If you forget that you find yourself troubled once again. Reaching people happens when you tell them you have peace and they can have it too.
2. Every person wants to know they have a real Purpose – that their work, their efforts, their struggles weren’t just lousy luck and pointless moments. Jesus reinforced that by saying the “worker deserves his wages,” those pairs were going to work at some places and not find success. Their efforts pleased God – that is where they were a success. It is discouraging to not see things happen as you want, God’s message is that being his man or woman to the world is success.
1 Corinthians 15:58 Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
58With all this going for us, my dear, dear friends, stand your ground. And don't hold back. Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for him is a waste of time or effort. The message of God is that your life isn’t a waste of time – be confident about that truth no matter what it might seem like right now.
3. Every person wants Permanence – Everyone wants to be part of something that will last, that won’t be washed away or crumbled. It is an inner desire to have something real for a lifetime – one of the best descriptions is the word home. Having a home, a spot where you can call your own.
*And sure there is a desire to have things fresh and new and exciting to look forward to, but to really enjoy them there has to be a foundation of something steady. Something which can be returned to that gives us relief or reassurance or renewal. As we read through the book of Numbers in our year through the Bible as a church, the kingdom of Israel reaches the brink of the promised land – the wonderful place given to Abraham which God told them they were going to posses. The people were afraid to go fight for it – except for Joshua and Caleb, they wanted to go. It must have been hard for the two as God dragged the Israelites around the desert for 40 years letting the entire generation who feared die off. But they kept on because they knew God’ would keep his promise, they would be in the promise land and it would be theirs. Jesus Christ promised something more than a promised land, he said “I go to prepare a place for you,” and it wouldn’t take a war to keep it; it is to be our place forever – a permanent home. The real point is not to stick us somewhere but to let us know that we are being given ownership of heaven. There is plenty of room for all who would come, they only have to claim it. This is what we can do to love God, to go and let them know this truth.
