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Be Respectful
1 Peter 3:8-15
While we were working with the Atlanta Road congregation there was a
lady who attended there every service, but her husband never came with
her. She very quickly endeared herself to my family and the longer we
knew her the more she opened up. One day I asked her about her husband,
to see if I could come over and talk with him about joining us for
function we were having at the church.
She told me that it wouldn’t be any use since he hadn’t stepped foot in
the building since the funeral. Since I didn’t know about the funeral I
pressed. That afternoon she told me about her son who was killed in a
gang drive by shooting. He was not a Christian, but she wanted his
funeral in the church building so maybe someone could reach out to his
friends. But no one was prepared for what happened.
This was a black family and in their heritage, they always stopped
halfway during the funeral service for anyone who wanted to could get up
and say a few words about the deceased. The minister asked if anyone had
anything to say and an older man approached the front of the building
and began to tell everyone in the church that since this boy was not
baptized that he was going to hell and that every one of his friends
would burn with him if they didn’t repent.
That was the last day the Mr. Willie ever stepped foot into that
building, or any religious building.
Now I know that some of you are saying sure that type of thing could
happen in Atlanta. They don’t have any tact in Atlanta. So see if this
news story touches any closer home.
Orlando Bethel says he was just repeating what the Lord told him to say.
He took the microphone at the Mount Harmony Baptist Church in Town
Creek, and told about 100 mourners that the recently deceased, Lish
Devan Taylor, had gone to hell. What's more, he told them that they were
fornicators and that they were going join old Lish there when they died.
Then someone unplugged the microphone. That didn't bother Orlando
Bethel. He reached into a gym bag and pulled out a bull horn and
continued to denounce the deceased and confront the complacent. Mr.
Taylor had been eulogized fondly by other ministers who had said he'd
gone on to a better place. Orlando Bethel said they were lying.
Grief turned to anger and some of the relatives stormed the stage and
tossed Orlando out of the church building. Glynis Bethel, Orlando's
wife, said, "The unbelievers didn't like hearing the truth and they beat
up my husband."
I need for you to look with me one more time in 1 Peter 3:8 - 15.
This is the last in our series on evangelism. Today I want to talk to
you about the last part of verse 15; Always be ready to give an answer
to everyone who asks, but do this with gentleness and respect.
Gentleness and respect.
There are three schools of evangelism. First there's the one we've just
been talking about; what we could call the Orlando Bethel school of
evangelism.
Basically, it's Hard Sell Evangelism.
You do things like take over microphones at funerals and tell everyone
they are going to hell. Call them fornicators and other nasty things.
Then when they rise up and beat the daylights out of you, fall back on
the verse that says those who do the will of God will be persecuted.
You'll feel righteous, if not a little sore, but they'll still be lost.
There are lots of ways to take the Orlando Bethel approach. In college I
learned about a guy who was famous in his part of the country, for being
a successful evangelist. He'd have a Bible study with an unbeliever
where he asked lots of leading questions, the obvious answer to each of
which was, "Yes."
Then, when he had manipulated them into agreeing with everything he'd
said, he'd call for an immediate decision. If the prospect hesitated,
he'd ... and I am not making this up ... he'd pull out an unloaded gun
and point it at the person's head. He'd say, "Now this gun isn't loaded
and I'm not going to shoot you. But what if it was loaded? What if I was
going to pull the trigger? Would you be ready to go on to your eternal
destiny?"
Amazingly Ninety-nine percent of the time, he'd baptize the prospect.
But I'd be very interested to know whether those evangelism successes
were lasting decisions, or more like foxhole conversions.
I mean think about it; a guy points a gun at me and says, "You really
should be baptized." I'm going to say, "See, here is water, what doth
hinder me?" Then when he and his gun are gone, I dry off and get back to
my life. My commitment lasts as long as it takes for the water on my
skin to evaporate.
The problem with the Orlando Bethel school of evangelism, besides the
fact that it contradicts the very nature of the good news about Jesus,
is that it violates 1 Peter 3: 15. It is neither gentle nor respectful.
Have you ever been on a used car lot? Trista and I have and experienced
the call of the vultures. You know what I’m talking about, you get out
of your car just to browse and for the next three hours you hear the
same question, "What's it going to take to put you in this car?"
Now I know that not all dealerships are this way. There are some very
considerate, honest, no-nonsense people in the car business. But usually
you get that good cop/bad cop game where your salesman goes to the
manager to fight for your deal. For long stretches I'd be left alone
while they conferred and planned the next new way they were going to
make you feel guilty about not buying their car.
If you still don’t bite then they pass you from one person to the next
like a football. But they have already taken the keys to your car since
they are determining the trade-in value. So you are literally trapped.
And you feel that way.
You run the whole gamut of emotions; frustration, anger, guilt,
embarrassment, more anger, more fear, more guilt. And they keep on
asking, "What's it going to take to put you in this car?" Or in other
words, "What's the matter with you? People come in here every day and
drive home in a brand new car. Don't you love your children? Don't you
love your wife? Don't you believe in God? What's it going to take to put
a loser like you in this shiny new car?"
When Trista and I bought our Truck, we walked on the lot at noon and
left with the truck at 10:00 that evening. Somewhere during all of the
negotiating they were pouring on the guilt when Trista looked at the
salesman and said "You don't realize that this guilt thing isn't going
to work on me. I'm 30 years old and grew up in the Church of Christ. I
had my quota of guilt before I turned 21." They knew they had met a pro!
We've talked about this before. People might forget what you say. They
might forget what you do. They'll never forget how you make them feel.
The Orlando Bethel school of evangelism makes people feel bad about
hearing the good news. Isn't that odd; that we can tell the good news in
a bad way. But Christians do it all the time. It doesn't work. It isn't
biblical. It isn't what Jesus did or what Jesus would do.
The second school of evangelism is the Ernesto Miranda school of
evangelism. Maybe you have heard of him.
In 1963, Ernesto Miranda was arrested in Phoenix, Arizona for armed
robbery, and for kidnapping and raping an 18-year-old woman. He already
had a record for armed robbery, and a juvenile record including
attempted rape, assault, and burglary. While in police custody he signed
a written confession to the crime. After the conviction, his lawyers
appealed, on the grounds that Miranda did not know he was protected from
self-incrimination.
The case, Miranda vs Arizona, made it all the way to the Supreme Court,
where the conviction was overthrown. In a landmark ruling issued in
1966, the court established that the accused have the right to remain
silent and that prosecutors may not use statements made by defendants
while in police custody unless the police have advised them of their
rights, commonly called the Miranda Rights.
The case was later retried, Miranda was convicted on the basis of other
evidence, and served 11 years. He was paroled in 1972, and died in 1976
at the age of 34, after being stabbed in a bar fight. A suspect was
arrested but chose to exercise his right to remain silent, and was
released. Justice can be poetic can't she?
This type of Evangelism is known as the Right to Remain Silent.
I don’t know if you ever listen to Public Radio but I love Garrison
Keillor, Every Saturday he hosts A Prairie Home Companion, and is author
of numerous books.
One day a man who was a member at a Manhattan Lutheran church stepped
onto the elevator in his apartment building. Another man was already on
board and they exchanged morning greetings. The Lutheran immediately
recognized Mr. Kealor. He introduced himself, complimented Mr. Kealor's
writing and the radio program, then did something he'd never done
before. He invited Mr. Kealor to come to church with him. To his
surprise, Kealor said yes. He visited the next Sunday and a week later
joined that church.
The preacher asked him, "Garrison, you've lived a block away from our
church for a long time now. Why haven't you ever come down to visit us
before?"
Kealor said, "Well, because no one ever invited me. "
I guess they were all exercising their Miranda rights. We do have the
right to remain silent, but it may be used against us later.
The Orlando Bethel school of evangelism teaches people to share the good
news in a bad way. The Ernesto Miranda school teaches people to not
share it all. The one fails to respect people, the other fails to
respect God. Peter urged a different approach. He said to share the good
news gently and respectfully. We might call that the Jesus school of
evangelism.
How do we do that? Well, how did Jesus do it?
The Jesus School of Evangelism
First He respected a person's right to empowering truth.
A new Christian is trying to tell people about Jesus and walks up to a
guy and says, "Have you heard the good news?" The guy says, "No, what's
the good news."
The Christian says "YOU'RE GOING TO HELL!! !" The guy says, "If that's
the good news, what's the bad news?"
Telling someone they are going to hell is not an empowering truth.
Suppose I had a cure for baldness. If I were to approach a bald man and
say, "Do you know what your problem is? You're bald!" Would that be
helpful?
No. I could even go into great detail about it. "Your bald, because you
have no hair. Your hair has fallen out. You look like a six foot tall
cue ball. You may try to fool others by covering your naked head with a
baseball cap, but you're not fooling God. He Counts the very hairs on
your head and it takes less than a minute with you."
Everything I've said to the bald guy is the truth. But it isn't
empowering truth. Jesus did it differently.
He told the truth to the woman at the well. "The man you are living with
is not your husband." But then he told her how to find living water. He
gave her what she was thirsty for.
He told the woman caught in adultery, "Neither do I condemn you. Go and
leave your life of sin."
He confronted Matthew, an unscrupulous tax collector, not with a
stinging indictment of his vacant character, but with a ringing
invitation to do something positive and powerful with his life.
Jesus didn't kick people while they were down. He picked them up. He
respected their need for empowering truth.
Secondly He respected their right to experience the love of God with no
strings attached.
Jesus told his first disciples that he would make them fishers of men. I
think we forget that back then, fishermen didn't use hooks. They used
nets. It's one thing to be snagged by a hook and jerked out of the
water. It's another to be embraced and drawn.
Jesus healed the blind not so that they would follow him, but so that
they could see. He raised the dead not so that he could impress the
crowds, but so that he could, save a life. He blessed children not as
part of grand strategy for reaching their parents, but because those
children needed a blessing. He loved with no strings.
When churches do that, it's a beautiful thing. Have you ever heard of
Marilyn Manson? He was real big at the end of the ‘90’s early part of
this decade. He is a “Death Metal” performer who was anointed a Satanic
Priest. Not the kind of guy you would want your daughter to bring home.
In 2001 Manson was scheduled to perform in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The media
was all geared up for an ugly battle between Manson fans and the
Christian opposition. They were caught off guard when scores of
Christians from churches all over Cedar Rapids converged on the
sidewalks outside the Five Seasons Center and instead of protesting
began to "show the love of God" to the Manson group and fans "in
practical ways."
One church purchased 100 pizzas and gave out slices to Manson fans
waiting in line. The group distributed 1,200 cans of cold sodas,
cookies, candy bars, homemade turkey and cheese sandwiches, as well as
boxed fruit drinks-all with no strings attached.
The media, the fans, the concert staff, the police and even Manson's
crew took notice. Glenn Kazan, a local pastor, said, "We want the kids
here to know not all Christians are judgmental or hate-mongers. Our
desire is to reach out to them with the love of Christ and to let them
know we care about them."
People need practical help whether they accept our message or not. We
show respect for them and for God when we love them with no strings
attached.
Finally He respected their right to say no.
Jesus was a carpenter by trade, but a farmer at heart. Wood could be
measured, cut and hammered into place, but hearts had to be cultivated.
When he talked about spreading his message he didn't use the metaphor of
a builder who could manipulate his materials to fit the project. He used
the metaphor of a farmer who sowed the seed and waited for it to grow.
He even said that sometimes the ground won't accept the seed. Sometimes,
people say no.
In Luke 18 Jesus is approached by a young man who has it all. Wealth,
position, power. He asks what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus
answers and the young man replies that he has met those conditions.
"What else do I need to do?" he asks. Then Jesus tells him this; "Sell
everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in
heaven. Then come, follow me."
Luke reports, "When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a
man of great wealth." We're left with the impression that the young man
walked away. And Jesus didn't run after him. He'd made his decision and
Jesus respected that. He always has. He always does. He always will. He
gives us the right to say no to him.
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