Note: This sermon was introduced with a video clip from the video "Living Proof"
Why is it so hard for us to share our confidence in Christ with other people? It’s relatively easy for us to talk about Jesus here at church, where it’s safe. But when we’re working out at the gym or getting a cup of coffee at Starbucks, or when we’re carpooling or attending PTA meeting we suddenly find ourselves tongue-tied.
Yet sharing our confidence in Christ with other people, the fact remains that sharing Christ is one of the fundamental tasks God has called his church. Jesus’ final marching orders to his church was to share the message of Christ with all people everywhere. Our purpose statement as a church is to reach unchurched people of the Inland valley and beyond with Christ’s love and to help them grow into fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ who wholeheartedly love God and others.
So the real question is HOW can we effectively share our confidence in Christ with other people? For the follower of Jesus Christ who takes the teachings of Jesus seriously, we know God wants us to share our confidence in Christ, but how can we do it effectively.
Last Sunday we started a new series called LIVING CONFIDENTLY IN UNCERTAIN TIMES through the New Testament books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians. As we have less than 100 days left before the year 2000, we’re looking to these two New Testament letters from the apostle Paul for guidance as we walk into a future with lots of unknowns. God’s truth about confident living will bolster our ability to live lives pleasing to God as we approach this major milestone in our lives. And part of living confidently is sharing our confidence with others. Today we’re going to learn four steps we can take to effectively share our confidence in Christ with others.
I. Knowing Our Message (2:1-2).
Paul starts chapter 2 by looking back on his visit with the Thessalonian Christians. Just by way of review, just prior to arriving in the city of Thessalonica, Paul and his ministry team had been in the city of Philippi. Both of these cities are in Greece, and both were along the Roman road the via Egnatia. While in the city of Philippi Paul and Silas led a young slave woman to faith in Christ, and in the process she was delivered from demonic possession. The owners of this slave girl were upset, so they reported Paul and Silas to the Philippian police. The Roman authorities in Philippi ended up having Paul and Silas flogged, and then locked them up in a prison overnight. Eventually Paul and Silas were released, asked to leave town, and then they traveled along the via Egnatia until they got to the city of Thessalonica.
Their backs were probably still bleeding from the flogging when they arrived in the city of Thessalonica. During their time in Thessalonica another riot broke out, this time instigated by some of the religious leaders in the city. Since the mob couldn’t find Paul and Silas, they seized one of the Thessalonian Christians named Jason, and brought him before the civil authorities. Jason was forced to pay a sum of money to the authorities, guaranteeing that Paul and Silas would leave the town and stay away.1 So Paul and Silas had to slip out of town under the cloak of darkness and continue their journey along the via Egnatia, which led them to Athens and ultimately to Corinth.
Because of this humiliating entrance and shameful departure, some might think that their time in Thessalonica was a failure. The word failure here means "empty of results."2 So Paul wants to remind them that there were results, that even though there backs were still sore from the lashes they’d received in Philippi, that God gave them boldness to share Christ in Thessalonica. God gave them boldness despite their anxiety, despite the opposition they received in Thessalonica.
Paul describes his message here as God’s "gospel." The word "gospel" means "good news," and in the Bible the word gospel always refers to the message of God’s love and salvation as it’s revealed in God’s son Jesus Christ. This is God’s announcement to humanity, his love letter to every man, woman and child. Despite their anxiety, despite opposition from the religious leaders and the civil authorities, Paul and Silas had the confidence to declare God’s good news.
Here we find our first action. WE CAN EFFECTIVELY SHARE OUR CONFIDENCE IN CHRIST WITH OTHERS BY MAKING SURE WE KNOW OUR MESSAGE.
For Christians there’s no firmer basis of confidence than the message of Jesus Christ. Romans 1:16 says, "I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes." The message itself is God’s power in action, having the capability of transforming people’s lives.
Our problem is that our confidence is often misplaced when we seek to share our Christ with others. We often place our confidence in circumstances, or in a particular preacher, or in a technique. Nothing’s wrong with any of those things, but our confidence needs to be in the message, in God’s announcement of Christ.
It’s amazing to me the number of Christians store housing food for any y2k disruption who are ready to share their food and water with neighbors, but who don’t know the message of Christ sufficiently to share that with neighbors. If there’s a disruption from y2k the primary resource of the Christian church is God’s gospel, the good news of Jesus, that’s our power, that’s what can give people confidence in uncertain times.When we place our confidence in the message then we’re set free to share that message with others.
II. Modeling Integrity (2:2-6a).
You might have sensed from the first two verses that Paul’s a bit defensive, that it seems like he’s having to defend his integrity. I can just hear Paul’s enemies saying to the struggling Thessalonian Christians, "Where’s Paul now? He just ran off like all the other religious charlatans who come traipsing into town on the via Egnatia." You see back then traveling preachers were common. If you’ve ever been to a carnival where the carnies shout out at you as you walk by, trying to entice you to try their games, that’s similar to what the religious climate was like in first century Greece.
One historian says, "There has probably never been such a variety of religious cults and philosophic systems as in Paul’s day… ‘Holy men’ of all creeds and countries, popular philosophers, magicians, astrologers, crack-pots, and cranks; the sincere and the spurious, the righteous and the rouge, [all] jostled and clamored for the attention of the credulous and the skeptical."3 Paul’s motives and methods were being called into question, and he knew that if his enemies were successful in smearing his name, that the new found faith of the Thessalonian Christians would falter.
So Paul writes to defend himself in vv. 2 to 6a. The heart of this section is Paul’s integrity, as Paul reminds his readers of his conduct during his visit.
Let me give you the second step to sharing our confidence, then we’ll look in depth at this. WE CAN EFFECTIVELY SHARE OUR CONFIDENCE IN CHRIST WITH OTHERS BY MODELING INTEGRITY.
Paul mentions several credibility killers here that will undermine our attempts at modeling integrity when we share our confidence in Christ with other people. When in v. 3 he mentions that his appeal doesn’t spring from error he’s talking about an untrue message.4 Paul’s reminding us that the content of God’s gospel is true and accurate, that it’s not made up of myths and fairy tales. God really did send his son Jesus, Jesus really did die on the cross to pay the penalty for humanity’s sins, and Jesus really did rise from the grave. If our message is inaccurate or wrong, then even if we’re sincere it will kill our credibility. Paul’s asserting the veracity and truthfulness of the Christian gospel here, that it’s accurate and true.
Another credibility killer mentioned in v. 3 is a hidden agenda. That’s what he means by "impure motives." Eventually a hidden agenda always ends up being exposed, and when it is, it always kills credibility.Paul also mentions the "bait and switch" technique in v. 3. The word for "trick" here was originally a fishing term that described using a lure to entice fish to bite a hook. When I was in high school wandering around the Claremont Village I had an attractive college age girl as me if I was interested in taking a personality test. She was cute so I said yes, and we walked over to an office just outside the Claremont Village. Soon I realized that she wasn’t doing a personality test, but the was trying to recruit me for the Church of Scientology, and they used a personality test as a kind of "bait and switch" technique. But Christians are often guilty of this same thing, whether it’s claiming to be taking a survey, or inviting someone to an evangelistic event without telling them what it really is. Baiting and switching kills credibility.
Skipping v. 4 for the moment, in v. 5 Paul mentions insincerity as a credibility killer. A flatterer is someone who uses smooth and insincere words to gain personal advantage. This is the salesperson who compliments you on your hair style, not because they really mean it, but to make a good impression so you’ll buy their product. When we’re insincere in our attempts to share our confidence in Christ with others we come off as hypocritical and artificial, like bad salespersons.
Also in v. 5 he mentions the credibility killer of greed. This is the televangelist who pleads for money to send to the people starving from famine in Korea, but ends up using it to build a multimillion dollar home. This is anyone who uses religion as a business to line his or her pockets with lots of money.
Then in the first part of v. 6 Paul talks about the credibility killer of saying what people want to hear. He says that he wasn’t looking for praise from people because he didn’t alter his message according to the opinion polls of Thessalonica, but instead he stuck with what God wanted him to say. When we allow public opinion to determine our message that undermines our credibility.
So these are things that kill our credibility, but tucked in-between of these credibility killers in v. 4 Paul describes how to model integrity. The word "approved" here was sometimes used to describe someone who was declared fit to run for public office.
Just as a new supreme court justice nominee has to go through confirmation hearings, God thoroughly tests those who he calls to share their confidence, and God confirms their integrity.5 This is a proven track record of integrity, a character that’s free from the credibility killers we just talked about.
Here we learn that God actually has faith in you and I when he entrusts us with his message. The word for "entrust" here is the same word translated "have faith" and "believe" throughout the rest of the New Testament. God has faith in us, he believes in us when he trusts his message to us. Here we find a deep sense of accountability to God for how we share and what we share with other people.
Now it’s really important for me to mention here that modeling integrity does not mean being perfect. Many Christians, in a desire to avoid the credibility killers we already mentioned, put on a facade around non-Christians. That facade makes us look like our families are perfect, that we never worry about finances, we never struggle with sexual temptation, we never have doubts about our faith, and so forth. We end up looking like Ken and Barbie to our unchurched friends, and instead of modeling integrity we come off as phony, shallow and plastic.
One of my first experiences sharing my confidence in Christ came when I worked at a State Hospital back in 1983. I was the only Christian on the unit I worked on, and the environment was hostile to my faith. There was a particular janitor I was sharing with, and one day he saw me lose my temper and yell at one of the clients I was working with. I felt horrible, as if all my efforts at sharing my confidence in Christ went down the drain in that moment of weakness. So I went to him and apologized, I told him I was wrong in what I’d done, and shared with him how concerned I was that my own failure would effect his attitude toward Christ. From that point on he became extremely open to the message of Christ. I realized at that point that modeling integrity is not the same thing as acting perfect, that integrity means that there’s continuity between who I appear to be and who I really am, imperfections and all. We’ll be effective if we learn to model integrity to those around us.
III. Gentle Respect (2:6b-9).
At this point Paul moves from his own internal motives to how he interacted with the Thessalonian Christians. Paul’s love for the Thessalonians oozes through the page here, as we’re struck with nurturing words like gentle, caring, loved, delighted, shared, dear, and so on. Remember that Paul’s talking about his relationship with the Thessalonians in their conversion, that even before they turned to Christ that he’d fallen in love with them as people.Paul was willing to give up his right to financial support. We know from the rest of the New Testament that Paul was a leather worker who made tents, and apparently he worked in this capacity even during his short stay in Thessalonica. Even though as an apostle he had a right to financial support, he gladly gave up that right out of love for the people he was seeking to share his confidence in Christ with.
To Paul the Thessalonians were not just an evangelism project, but they were people, people he’d grown to deeply appreciate and care for. In fact v. 8 is my life verse when it comes to sharing my confidence in Christ with my unchurched friends. Not only do I want to share God’s message, but I want to share my life with them. The word for life here is the word usually translated "soul" in the New Testament, and it’s an all encompassing word that describes our emotions, our hopes and dreams, our failures, our doubts and struggles, our goals, our problems.
This is describing a relationship of transparency and authenticity with those around us.
Here we learn a third step. WE CAN EFFECTIVELY SHARE OUR CONFIDENCE IN CHRIST WITH OTHERS BY TREATING OUR UNCHURCHED FRIENDS WITH GENTLE RESPECT.
The way a lot of Christians treat unchurched people it’s a wonder that anyone comes to trust Christ at all. Instead of gentle respect, our lives often exude cruel contempt. If they light a cigarette we scowl, if they order a beer we smile with smug arrogance. We often act as if we expect unchurched people to embrace a Christian world view and biblical value system before they come to know Christ personally. We’re offended when sinners sin.It was a transforming experience for me when I noticed how Jesus acted around people we’d consider sinners. Have you ever noticed that Jesus seemed to genuinely like hanging out with people of questionable reputation? Jesus consistently demonstrated gentleness and love with the people who knew they were messed up, and that he saved his sternest words for religious people?
I thought about this a few weeks ago when I was talking to one of my unchurched friends. It was just a casual conversation, at first, until she confided in me that she was gay. I was on the verge of walking out when she shared that, so instead I sat down and we talked for 30 minutes. On the one hand I didn’t want her to think that I thought homosexuality was no big deal, after all the Bible’s pretty clear in identifying homosexual behavior as sinful. But I also wanted here to know that I still cared about here, that I wasn’t shocked or horrified, that I didn’t view her any differently. I pray that I did what Paul describes here, that I treated her with gentle respect as I tried to answer her questions about the Bible and the Christian faith.
Just treating unchurched people with gentle respect would revolutionize our effectiveness in our community.
IV. Inviting To Respond (2:10-12).
In vv. 10 to 12 Paul sums up his time spent with the Thessalonians. Paul shifts from the image of a mother nurturing an infant to a father instructing his children. Back then the mother was primarily responsible for nurture, and the dad was responsible to instruct his kids in faith, morals, and ethics. So this shift would make sense to his readers.
In v. 12 Paul uses three verbs to describe how he urged his friends to respond to Jesus. Notice none of these are words of coercion or manipulation, but they’re words that presuppose the caring relationship described in the previous 9 verses.
The word "encouraging" has the idea of coming alongside a person and helping them take the next step. The word "comforting" mean to console someone who is losing heart and feels like giving up.6 Finally the word "urging" means "to emphatically state an opinion or a desire." 7
In these three verbs we find a final step we can take. WE CAN EFFECTIVELY SHARE OUR CONFIDENCE IN CHRIST WITH OTHERS BY INVITING OUR UNCHURCHED FRIENDS TO RESPOND.
Without a personal relationship with the person this feels artificial and comes off as a sale’s pitch. But when we’ve gone through the previous three steps this feels like the most natural thing in the world, like reaching out to someone in danger and offering to pull them to safety. I’ve found that if I just love my unchurched friends and share the message of Christ as God opens the doors, it’s just a matter of time until they’re ready to respond.
When my unchurched friend John relapsed after 3 years of sobriety he called me, and it was the most natural thing in the world to invite him to respond to Christ. When a married couple Chris and I were sharing our lives with started going through problems, I invited him to respond and Chris invited the wife to respond, and it seemed the most natural thing in the world. There comes a time to invite, not just to invite people to church, but to invite them to trust Christ, to live for Jesus, to become disciples of Jesus who seek to live lives worthy of God’s calling.
Conclusion
Now at this point let me give you some practical help in growing in this area. I’ve found the books Gentle Persuasion and Lifestyle Evangelism, both by Joseph Aldrich, to be very helpful in living out these principles. It’s not an exaggeration to say that these two books revolutionized my approach to sharing my confidence in Christ with other people, and I heartily recommend them to you.Living confidently in uncertain times means a willingness to share our confidence in Christ with others.
I’m convinced that people are becoming more and more open to hearing about Jesus as we live in a transition before the new millennium. But we’ll only share effectively if we know our message, model integrity, treat the unchurched with gentle respect, and invite them to respond to Christ.
Notes
1. This is the probable meaning of Acts 17:9; see John Stott, The Message of Acts (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1990), p. 273.
2. J. P. Louw and E. Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament Based on Semantic Domains (New York: United Bible Societies, 1989), CD rom version, 89.53.
3. Leon Morris, The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians. (NICNT. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), p. 58.
4. The word is plane, and it means a "misleading belief, deceptive belief, error, mistaken view" (Louw and Nida 31.10).
5. Morris, p. 63.
6. Louw and Nida 25.143.
7. Louw and Nida 33.319.
