Welcome to our ongoing Saturday series on some of the practicalities of serving other people with the word of God. The next couple of weeks are going to be devoted to a ministry that anyone can practice: the ministry of one-to-one Bible reading and prayer.

The following is a true story. Last Friday, two friends met to read the Bible, pray and drink coffee, like they do every week for about an hour. They go to the same church, and decided they needed some accountability in their lives as Christians. Last week, they were up to Philippians chapter 2 in their reading programme. They read the chapter out loud, then talked about its implications for their thinking and prayers. They are doing detailed Bible study in small groups, so the focus of their time was on application and encouragement. From Philippians 2, they talked for a while about Jesus' priority of service over status and their struggles to help others when there is no recognition involved. They confessed their tendency to complain and argue, and the conversation moved to wider issues of status seeking in the church. This gave them plenty to pray about, and they concluded their prayers by remembering two missionary families. Next week they will read chapter 3.

So what?

This doesn't exactly grab you as one of the great stand-out events of last Friday. Even within the Christian world, on a scale of 1 to 100, it doesn't rank more than a 0.01 in importance.

But think about the long-term effects of meeting like this. The two friends will know the Bible better, pray regularly and deepen their friendship. They will encourage each other to deal with God and his word with integrity. As they open their lives to each other before God's word, they will “spur one another on towards love and good deeds” (Heb 10:24-25). They will strengthen each other to resist sin and remain faithful to Christ.

Why do it?

At the core of all Christian ministry is Bible reading and prayer. We are united with Christ by hearing his word and responding in faith, and that is how we remain in Christ. We can never progress beyond these basics—teaching each other the word of God; calling upon each other to believe and repent; bringing our lives, our churches and the world before God in prayer.

But we can do all this in three broad contexts: large groups, small groups and one-to-one. We choose different contexts on totally pragmatic grounds. There is a certain efficiency of gathering people together, and there are various educational advantages in each context. However, all ministry is ultimately to individuals, even when we are dealing with groups. Our concern is for the salvation and growth of each one.

So what are the benefits of reading the Bible and praying one-to-one? It is:

• convenient: arranging to meet one Christian for one hour weekly is realistic, even in the busiest lives. It's easy to get started, with minimal organization required.
• personal: the discussion and prayers can address particular individual concerns. In groups, it is impossible to deal with everyone's issues and questions.
• accountable: meeting one-to-one is an ideal way of holding each other accountable to read and obey the Bible. It is hard to meet each week and pretend to be serious about submitting to Christ while playing around with secret sin. In our perversity, this is not impossible, but it's hard to sustain the performance.
• strategic: this is a basic ministry to master, and will be useful in many contexts. Wherever we go in church life, we can find a Christian with whom we can read and pray. Sometimes at work we will find a Christian who would love to meet with us. In some ministry contexts, such as the military and educational institutions, it is almost impossible to gather Christians into groups, and personal ministry is the only option. For some Christians, the only opportunity for fellowship is with individuals due to family restrictions and persecution.

Why we don't

If I had to hazard a guess as to how many Christians engage in one-to-one Bible reading and prayer, I would say less than 1%. I have no data on this; it's just a hunch. This seems strange if it is such a simple and convenient way of spurring each other on in the faith. Why don't we do it?

We are too busy in Christian service

The old cliché is true: “the good is the enemy of the best”. One reason we don't read and pray with each other is our devotion to other Christian activities.

There are limitless opportunities to serve Christ and his people, and Christ has given a diversity of gifts to edify his church. However, certain ministries, such as prophecy, have priority over others because they are more useful for edifying the church. Whatever else Paul means by prophecy, fundamentally it is speaking the word of God, and we are to “excel in gifts that build up the church” (1 Cor 14:12). Speaking the word of God to each other is the way we are strengthened, encouraged and comforted, and the way the church is built. One-to-one Bible reading and prayer is, therefore, a very high ministry priority.

Most of us have little discretionary time where we are free to choose how we use it. We have fixed priorities that absorb most of the 168 hours in the week. Sleeping, eating, travelling, working, family responsibilities, chores and ‘personal things’ take around 140 hours, if you have anything like a ‘normal’ life. The 28 hours remaining is your discretionary time—time that you can divide between leisure, study, socializing, hobbies, and so on. Christians will devote some of these 28 hours to specifically Christian activity. This will include private Bible reading, prayer and study of Christian literature, as well as service to others. When we look at it realistically, there are only around 5-10 hours per week available for Christian activity with others, and most of this time is taken up with church meetings, a Bible study group or committees. And, as the years roll on, there is even less time at our discretion, with increased family and work responsibilities.

Maybe we need to rethink our ministry responsibilities and withdraw from some tasks in church life in order to read and pray with others.

We put structures before people

If we are asked about the ministries of our church, we usually answer in terms of structures and programmes: men's fellowship, Sunday School, Youth Club, women's Bible study, and so on. If our pastors ask us to be involved in ministry, they usually mean taking on a particular task to keep the programme running. These kinds of programmes are often good—some may be essential—but our thinking is back to front. The reason we run ministry activities is for people—their salvation and maturity in Christ. After a while, the programme attains a validity in itself; the means becomes the end. For example, ee run a drop-in centre because we have always run a drop-in centre.

If, instead, we start with people and ask how we can win them for Christ and establish them in the faith, we might end up spending our ministry time differently. We might cancel some programmes, and start meeting with individuals for Bible reading and prayer. Or we might build this one-to-one ministry into our existing programmes.

We seek recognition for our ministry

There is no kudos or notoriety in private meetings with individuals reading the Bible and praying. There is a type of career path in churches—from pew sitter to welcomer to assistant Bible study leader to Bible study leader to board of elders to chair of the board. Just adjust the titles for your particular church. One-to-one ministry doesn't advance our career at all.

We don't feel qualified

This is one of the advantages of one-to-one Bible reading and prayer: it is simple; everyone can do it. We are not taking over the minister's job to teach the Bible, and we don't have to have all the answers. Together, we can wrestle with understanding God's word and changing our lives. We are not setting ourselves up as the fount of all knowledge and virtue. All we need is the heart to know God better and to encourage one another.

We never thought of it

Now you have!

Read the full article online.

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Should we be extreme or should we be balanced?

You know what I mean by ‘balanced’: be generous, but not too generous; take Christ seriously, but don't be a religious fanatic; tell the truth, but not to a fault, etc. This approach is as old, at least, as the ancient Greeks. Lots of voices in our lives call out for this balance: parents, colleagues, work, talkback radio, novels and academia. But are these the voices of wisdom?

I've been reading Proverbs recently, and I just don't find the concept of ‘balance’ there. What I see instead are absolute virtues: be wise and not a fool; be diligent and not a lazy sluggard. This is set up boldly in the introductory orientation to Proverbs (chapters 1-9).

This is also completely consistent with the New Testament. There is no appeal to find a balance between the fruit of the Spirit and the acts of the sinful nature; Christians are to be entirely loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle and self-controlled (Gal 5:22-23). The greatest commandment is not a command to be balanced, but to be extreme: “[L]ove the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength” (Mark 12:30).

But what about the verses that advocate a balance in life? For instance, there is that beautiful prayer that asks God for neither riches, nor poverty, but simply our daily bread (Prov 30:8-9). However, on closer inspection, this balance of life is based on absolute issues of character. We want to honour God with every part of our bodies—by never stealing, if we have too little money, nor being too arrogant, if we have too much money.

How, then, do we sort out the voices in our head that call for balance? I think we need to think clearly. Some of these voices we need to hear, and others we must reject. There is a place for balance—not in our character, but in our actions that spring from that character.

Here's how I think it works:

1. In our character (being), we should seek virtues, not balance.
2. In our actions (doing), our character may demand that we act in a balanced way.

We should be holy, loving, wise, compassionate people. But being those sorts of people may demand a balance in the way we live and act in different ways at different times. This, however, must not be used as a cop-out for unvirtuous character.

A worked example: generosity. The balanced character approach: don't be over-generous, nor over-stingy (balanced character). Give a reasonable amount—not too little, but not too much (balanced action). The biblical approach: be completely generous (virtuous character). Give a wise amount that will enable you to be generous in the present as well as in the future (balanced action).

Another worked example: religious fanaticism (to use a word that others apply to us). The balanced character approach: don't be overly zealous as a Christian. Take it seriously, but not too seriously. There is a lot more to life. The biblical approach: be completely devoted to the Lord God with everything you have (virtuous character). But this doesn't mean that you spend every spare minute of every day doing a church activity. After all, there are many ways to honour God in our lives (balanced action).

Should we be extreme or should we be balanced? My short answer is that we should be extreme in our virtuous character, but sometimes that may force us to be balanced in our actions.

This is probably old hat to most of you, but this thought has been both refreshing and clarifying for me. I am open to criticism if you want to challenge this view, but I'd also like to hear some other worked examples of how this may work out—in parenting, in your workplace, in your relaxation and entertainment, in your evangelistic zeal, and so on.

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I am currently working on a book to help introduce a new Christian to the Christian life. And as I have been writing it, I have been wrestling with the question of what should a new Christian expect? In particular, what should they expect about the results of being godly in the world?

I must admit to struggling quite a bit with this question. On the one hand, 2 Timothy 3:12 tells me “all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted”. It's just a natural outworking of Jesus' own teaching isn't it? No-one is greater than their master, and if our master was nailed to a tree for godliness, what sort of response should we expect? Peter certainly expected that ‘alien’ living would result in being hated by the world: “[T]hey are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you” (1 Pet 4:4).

And yet for all the ‘pessimism’ of the Scriptures (if that's the right way to express it), the Bible also speaks very positively about godliness and its effects. Titus reminds his readers on no less than three occasions in Titus 2 that godliness adorns the teaching about God our Saviour. Lives that are genuinely different to the ways of this world say something about the importance of the Lordship of Jesus. I take it that Jesus is saying something similar when he talks about not covering our light, but placing it on top of the hill to shine in Matthew 5:14-16. What does he say? “[L]et your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”

It seems to me that, once again, we find the great reality of the cross at work: it is only through suffering that glory comes. The same life that leads some to persecute us will be the very life that leads those that God has chosen to seek the truth. True love will always be met by both rejoicing and hatred; in a life this side of heaven, there can be no other way. The trick for me is to remain optimistic because of the grace and sovereignty of God, while being realistic: God promises that persecution will come.

Now if only I could find a way of helping others to be both optimistic and realistic while, at the same time, struggling to get it together in my own life! I wonder: how do you expect people to react to you being godly today?

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Don Carson. John Piper. Mark Driscoll. Tim Keller. Mark Dever. Josh Harris. CJ Mahaney. Rip. Sync. Play.

Remember when you had to read Desiring God to know what John Piper thought? Remember when you had to buy JI Packer's sermon collections on CD? Remember when you had to travel to a conference to hear John Stott speak?

How things have changed! Now every mega church has its main webpage, every famous preacher has his downloadable sermons, and every well-known Christian leader keeps a blog.

These days, if you see a slightly daggy middle-aged man walking along, ear buds in place, with a frown of concentration on his face instead of a swing in his step, he may be listening to a sermon on his portable MP3 player. And that harassed Christian mother in the playground might be keeping an eye on her children to the background sound of talks from the latest American female speaker.

Last year, my husband gave me an MP3 player for my birthday, and suddenly my mental life became filled with new voices. I've listened to John Piper expound the Psalms, Don Carson preach on spiritual warfare, and Carolyn Mahaney teach women from Titus 2.

The unique dangers of this wonderful new world of accessible sermons didn't occur to me until the day I listened to a talk on Psalms 42-43 by the minister from our previous church, Neil Chambers. I know this man—his pastor's heart, his godly integrity, his love for his people. I know his context—the sorrows and joys of his congregation, the suburb he preaches in, the outreach programmes he oversees. I know his church; I've taught children in Sunday School, I've chatted with mums about their lives, and I've sat with a depressed friend during the service.

A whole world of responsibilities and the memory of a loving community came back to me as I listened. There in the background of the soundtrack were the familiar sounds of my old church. I could hear babies crying, chairs scraping on the wooden floor, the endearing croak in my old minister's voice, and his familiar tears as he prayed for his people. I could see, in my mind's eye, the intense Australian sunlight pouring through the white Venetians, and balloons from last night's party hanging from the rafters. I could feel the uncomfortable heat from the old-fashioned wall heaters on my head, and taste the homemade biscuits left by the grabbing hands of children during morning tea.

MP3 sermons come with no strings attached. The preacher has no direct teaching authority over me. He'll never address the specific temptations of my congregation and context. The prayers at the end of his talk are for the people sitting in front of him, not for me. I won't have to set up chairs before he speaks, or cook a meal for someone listening with me. There's no need to encourage, or to be encouraged by, the people listening with me because I'll probably never see their faces.

Don't get me wrong; I love MP3 sermons. Like Christian books, they nourish, teach and challenge me. They give me the rare privilege of hearing some of the greatest preachers of our generation. They allow me to be encouraged by Bible talks even when I'm missing sermons at my own church to care for my children or to teach Sunday School. They give me a precious opportunity to be taught by godly women.

But MP3 sermons can never replace the real thing—sermons heard, week by week, from a minister I know, love and respect—a pastor whom God has placed over me—a man who understands the world we live in, who speaks to us where we're at, who encourages us to bear familiar burdens, and whose prayers are for us. A man who speaks to a place where we can't escape the needs of others.

On my MP3 player, there's a long menu of great sermons begging to be heard. But I'll also go along to our church faithfully, and listen to my minister John preach God's word to me and my local church family.

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One of my key roles as MTS Director is to encourage people to think about their life path and consider becoming a ‘fisher of people’ (Mark 1:17). Over the course of the last two years, I have come to realize that your average Christian has a very limited understanding of the different gospel ministry jobs that exist. So I did some ‘market research’ between January and June 2008. In any Christian gathering (where it was appropriate), I asked men and women this question: “I want you to picture in your mind’s eye a gospel worker—someone who is dedicated to prayerfully passing on the message of Christ to people. Picture this gospel worker/minister in your head. Have you got a person in mind? [People answer “Yes.”] Okay, tell me who they are.”

All but a handful mentioned the senior minister at their local suburban church. I would have put 10-12 groups of keen Christians through this exercise over a six-month period so that the tally equalled about 100 people. I did it in churches and at training days and MTS Challenge conferences. 95% of the keen Christians I surveyed immediately thought of the local suburban senior pastor when encouraged to picture in their mind’s eye a ‘gospel worker’.

I thought to myself, “We need to widen people’s horizons. We need to communicate the variety and diversity of gospel jobs that exist”. So a small group of MTS friends got together with a whiteboard and marker, and brainstormed. Our aim? To create a tool—a list of “101 gospel jobs”. The result? See below. We came up with more than 101 gospel jobs in an hour. You’ll probably be able to come up with 101 more. I hope you do!

We used this list at our MTS Challenge conferences to encourage people to ‘think outside the square’ —to ponder their gifts, their passions, and the list and the possibilities. In the workshop where the list was revealed, we had really vigorous discussions about the plethora of ways God can use his people to pass on the gospel and grow people in Christ.

At MTS, we want to affirm that ‘gospel ministry’ is different to ‘creation ministry’. Gospel ministry involves “preaching the Word (not just from the pulpit) prayerfully to people”. So if we take the example of job #2, we need to remember that an Ephesians 6:4 father is very different to the father who does not honour Jesus as saviour and Lord. Godly dads do heaps of gospel work!

We hope you find the list encouraging. We hope it broadens believers’ minds and opens up a whole heap of possibilities. The list is the result of a one-hour whiteboard splat; it isn’t perfect, but we hope it will spur on Christians everywhere to be great commisionaries for Jesus (Matt 28:16-20)! We hope Christians will look at their gifts, identify an area of interest and ponder anew the possibilities open to them to proclaim Christ and live like him.

101 gospel jobs (+7)

1. Mother
2. Father
3. Church-based Children’s Ministry
4. Church-based Youth Ministry
5. Church Pastor/Senior Pastor
6. Executive (admin) Pastor
7. Apprentice Training Pastor
8. Associate/Assistant Pastor
9. Music/Worship Ministry
10. Women’s Pastor
11. Pastoral Worker
12. Women’s Ministry Trainer
13. School Chaplain
14. Primary School Scripture Teacher
15. High School Scripture Teacher
16. Scripture Coordinator
17. Christian Studies Teacher (Christian School)
18. Christian School Leadership
19. Boarding House ‘Master‘ or Pastor
20. University student Ministry Team member (e.g. with AFES)
21. University student Ministry Campus Director (e.g. with AFES)
22. International Student Ministry (ministry to students who come to study from overseas)
23. University Postgraduate/Staff Ministry
24. University College Chaplaincy
25. University College Admin/leadership
26. Theological Education
27. Itinerant Ministry
28. Evangelist
29. Evangelism Trainer
30. Apologist (e.g. Centre for Public Christianity)
31. Hive off Church Planter (i.e. leave an existing congregation with 20 members to plant a new one)
32. Pioneer Church Planter
33. Prison Chaplaincy
34. Prison/Detention Centre Bible Ministry
35. Hospital Chaplaincy
36. Refugee Ministry
37. Youth Outreach Ministry (e.g. RICE)
38. Women’s/Youth Refuge ministry
39. Gospel Foster Caring (e.g. Anglicare)
40. Seniors Pastor
41. Aged Care/Nursing Home Chaplain
42. Sports Chaplain (e.g. to the NSW Cricket Team)
43. Truckies Chaplain
44. Industry Chaplain
45. Police/Emergency Services Chaplain
46. Defence Force Chaplain
47. Defence Network Ministry (e.g. Fighting Words)
48. City Business Network Ministry (e.g. ECOM)
49. Christian Resources Writing (e.g. CEP)
50. Christian Book Writing (e.g. Matthias Media)
51. Christian Book Editing/Publishing
52. Christian Advertising/Posters (e.g. FEVA and Outreach Media)
53. Website and Graphic design
54. Web-based Ministry (e.g. christianity.net.au)
55. Ministry Training Consultant (e.g. MTS)
56. Leadership Development/Training Consultant
57. Radio Ministry (e.g. Kel Richards)
58. TV Ministry (e.g. Audio Advice)
59. Songwriter (e.g. Nathan Tasker)
60. Cult Rescue Ministry
61. Retreat based Ministry/Training (e.g. Cornerstone)
62. Camping Ministries (e.g. Youthworks)
63. Outdoor Adventure Ministry (e.g. Youthworks)
64. Conference/House party ministries
65. Bible Translators (e.g. Wycliffe)
66. Bible Distribution (e.g. Gideons and Bible League)
67. Mentoring and Pastoring Pastors (e.g. John Mark Ministry)
68. Episcopal Ministry (Bishops)
69. Archdeacons Ministry
70. Denominational Ministries (various)
71. Parent Education Ministries (e.g. Focus on the Family)
72. Marriage Education Ministries (e.g. Prepare)
73. TAFE Ministry
74. Parliamentary Chaplaincy/network ministry
75. Lobbying Ministries (e.g. Australian Christian Lobby)
76. Welfare Ministry Evangelism
77. Abuse Recovery Chaplain
78. Christian Bookstore Manager
79. Cross-Cultural Evangelist
80. Children’s Evangelist/Entertainer
81. Puppet Ministry
82. Convention Ministry (e.g. KCC)
83. Mission—Church Pastor (NB Mission = homeland and overseas)
84. Mission—Theological Education
85. Mission—Student Ministry
86. Mission—Leadership Training and Development
87. Mission—Evangelist
88. Medical/Welfare Missionaries
89. Mission Hospital/Welfare Admin
90. Mission School Teacher
91. Mission Society Leadership
92. Mission Support (e.g. CMS)
93. Fundraiser/Deputationist (e.g. Dunham and Co)
94. Part-time Pastoral Work
95. Self-funded Pastoral Work
96. Ministry Apprentice Training Pastor
97. Christian Comedian
98. Film Ministry (e.g. Ignite)
99. Mobile Ministry Maintenance
100. Retreat-Based Evangelism Ministry (e.g. L’Abri-type—Schaeffer)
101. Journalist (e.g. Southern Cross)
102. Mega Church Pastor
103. University Student Ministry Evangelist
104. University Student Ministry Trainer (in Two ways to live, Growth Groups, Missions, etc.)
105. Movement Leader (e.g. Mike Lynch, Vision 100)
106. Muslim Ministry Facilitator (Evangelism Ministry)
107. Muslim Ministry Evangelist
108. Women’s Muslim Ministry Evangelist

The list is endless!

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In the 1950s and 1960s, John Stott, amongst others, raised the bar in evangelical preaching. Stott, in his preaching and in his commentaries, showed three generations of preachers how to expound a biblical text. He unfolded the text, showed what was there, connected it with life, and did it all with passion and a clear, memorable structure. Those who heard Stott and the very best of those who preached like him, knew that they had been addressed by God. They knew why this part of the Bible mattered, why God wanted us to have it, and the difference it makes to life as a disciple of Christ. Whether they were being challenged or comforted, they were gripped by the teaching of Scripture and excited about studying the Bible. This style of preaching nourished faith, revitalized churches and taught people how to read the Bible for themselves.

But nothing good seems to last forever, and expository preaching of this kind has been dealt some body blows in the last few years.

At one end of the spectrum, some practitioners have fallen into dull, lifeless analyses of Bible passages with little sense of their connection to life and little obvious passion and commitment to these words as life-giving and life-transforming. The message they preach terminates on the words of the text, rather than pointing us to the living God who addresses the world we live in and who has something life-changing to say.

At the other end, and perhaps in reaction to what they have seen as growing dullness in many pulpits, others have returned to the launching pad sermon. Nothing they say is untrue, generally. It might be even be genuinely helpful. But the sermon’s relation to the biblical text is impressionistic. The Bible passage suggests a theme, which is handled with a string of anecdotes—some funny, some profoundly moving. People who listen hear the gospel—no question about it. But the message could have been preached from any text, and we aren’t learning how to read the Bible for ourselves anywhere near as much.

Of course, other factors play a role as well, such as the massive internet presence of some very powerful preachers who do not follow the expository model. They are often great communicators and insightful critics of contemporary society, and they are absolutely orthodox in their theological commitments, but the Bible, while open, slides quietly into the background. Add to this the way the basic foundations of confidence in the Bible have been shaken both inside and outside the churches, and can we expect people to listen to what this book has to say anymore? In some quarters, a fascination with technique, which is evident in so many other areas of life, has distracted preachers as well. And perhaps most subtly and yet most insidiously, the desire to be (or to be seen to be) a great preacher can so easily eclipse the desire to preach a great God.

The best preaching I hear is biblical, profoundly theological and thoroughly engaging. It is suffused with a sense of urgency and importance—not the self-importance of the preacher, but the importance of the living God and the word he wants us to hear. The worst preaching I hear might as well be the rehearsal of tomorrow’s shopping list—almost as coherent and every bit as memorable.

Of course, good expository preaching doesn’t have to sound like it comes from the 1950s. It doesn’t have to bore the socks off all who try to listen to it. It can cut through the confusion of our present circumstances and, at the same time, teach us how to read the Bible responsibly for ourselves. And it builds deep Christian faith, rather than itching ears. We will suffer and our churches will suffer if it is lost to us.

We need a serious conversation about what preaching really is, why good sermons succeed and bad sermons fail. And perhaps—just perhaps—we need to learn again that the way we preach and what we preach are inseparably connected. So if we do really believe in a God who is not only living, but present, as we preach, what difference will that make?

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Welcome again to our Saturday series on how to be a factotum—a servant. Last week we introduced the idea of ‘consumer oriented evangelism’. This week, we start to see some practical outworkings of thinking about our evangelism in terms of the people we are trying to reach for Jesus. The first part of the article challenges us to be compelling Christians and the second half talks about learning to think like the people we are trying to reach.

The compelling Jesus

Jesus himself captivates. His humanity is impressive and demands scrutiny. He never changed his mind, made a mistake, backed down or apologised. He had extraordinary self-assurance. Those who met him were never the same. He always divided his audience. And beyond his humanity he claimed to be God and manipulated the created order as if he was.

Sometimes our gospelling is reduced to presenting a theological catechism and a totally impersonal Jesus. We start with creation, sin and judgement, and Jesus fits in as a piece in a theological jigsaw. We certainly need to communicate the theology, but gospelling is announcing a Person. Jesus is compelling and challenging and interesting and exciting. We need to work out how to communicate that. Maybe we should start by showing how Jesus is compelling to us. What would it mean to be a compelling Christian?

The compelling Christian

Distinct

If you were imprisoned for being Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you? Our distinctive Christian lifestyle is a bait to non-Christians. We have just as many problems as them, but fewer ulcers. We enjoy relationships more, including marriage because we know how to forgive rather than seek revenge. Take, for example, my friend in Adelaide, who, when rammed by another motorist, got caught up talking about Christ and forgot about the damages cost! We are not racist, sexist, ageist, homophobic or elitist. We work hard; we use ‘honest scales’. People are more important to us than organisations and bureaucracy. The only thing that bothers us about being poor is being a burden to others. If this sounds like Alice in Wonderland, think about it—it shouldn’t.

Honest

Christians sin and do evil like others, except we know how to deal with it. We know the One we have offended, we know his forgiveness even for the most gross evils, and we know to stop. We don’t have to cover up the past or present. People think we are claiming to be perfect, so we cower in embarrassed silence in the face of our hypocrisy. In reality, our openness in admitting to our sin, and how we deal with it, is gospel bait. Facing sin has its advantages.

Real

“Does it work for you?” People are pragmatists— they want what works and makes a difference. They want to know how following Jesus works for you. How were you convinced it is true? What difference does it make today?

Think like a fish

There is only one rule for fishing: you have to think like a fish. Where do they swim? What time of day do they come out? What do they eat? Do they suck or bite? Do they swim with the line or fight?... We get so filled up with what we want to say that it just pours out all over the place and leaves quite a mess. Instead, listen, chat for hours and days. Think carefully about the person with whom you are talking.

• Who is this person and makes them tick?
• What are their beliefs and values?
• What influences have shaped them?
• What motivates them?
• What persuades them something is true: logic, people or experience?
• What is their religious background?
• What do they know about Christianity?
• What is their attitude to Christianity?
• What are the big implications for them if they follow Jesus?

Best Bait

Doing Consumer Friendly Evangelism is like finding the best bait for that particular type of fish. If they never take worms, it is useless to thread the hook with one. If they love worms, why would you use anything else?

The gospel of Jesus addresses the whole of life. God’s Word shines into every crevice of our lives, illuminating the prevailing darkness. There will be certain aspects of an individual’s life to which the gospel is especially pertinent. These are the best bait.

The gospel addresses our many roles and situations. It addresses us as fathers, mothers, children, wives, husbands, citizens, employers, employees, orphans, divorcees, widows, power brokers, victims, manic and depressive. It addresses our many and varied concerns: fear of death, boredom, suffering, anxiety concerning the future, needing a cause worth dying for, dealing with guilt, raising kids.

In Christ are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. His Word is sweet like the honeycomb. Search for the best bait—look for a person’s tender spots: where will they be impressed by the wisdom of God and soothed by his comfort?

Fishing co-ops

The best fishing is with mates, dragging each other out of bed at 5am, giving advice on the best bait, tackle and spots, swapping tall tales of tiny catches. It’s the same with evangelism. Why not form an evangelism co-op? Here are a few ideas to get you started:

• Find 3-6 others who could join you in evangelising a particular group. Some examples: work colleagues reaching your office or factory; your co-op joining a sporting club; three couples evangelising your school community; four of you living in the same street or block of units.
• Meet regularly for prayer, Bible study and friendship
• Start praying for everyone in the group you are reaching.
• Think about the people you want to evangelise using the questions in “Think like a fish”.
• Work out how you can make a positive contribution in the lives of your target group. e.g., meeting practical needs, organising social events, remembering birthdays. Become the social centres of the group rather than the social misfits.
• Aim to get into meaningful conversation about things other than the gospel with each person. Jumping from light banter about the Melbourne Cup into evangelistic conversations is quite a social hurdle! (The Melbourne cup is a horse race in Australia—it’s called the race that stops the nation)
• Work at naturally letting individuals know you are Christians.
• Invite the group to a dinner party at one of your homes— purely social, no evangelism.
• Work out ways of introducing the gospel with each person in private conversation.
• At some stage invite the group to your church or a dialogue meeting or something that puts Christianity squarely on the agenda. Working in a team like this will keep you going when the results are slow in coming. It also allows people to see how Christians relate, and to discover that you are not a ‘freak’.

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I listened to a fascinating sermon recently on Jonah chapter 2. The preacher taught us about God and his awesome sovereignty, and about Jesus and how the patterns and promises of Jonah looked forward to him. But he also preached about Jonah himself. He talked about what it meant to be chastised by the Lord—to be brought low. He talked about Jonah's experience of God's judgement and discipline, and what we might learn from that as we experience God's chastisement ourselves.

It was a very encouraging and challenging message, but what struck me in particular was that while the preacher succeeded in locating Jonah in its biblical theological context, and avoided turning Jonah into a kind of morality tale, he nevertheless drew example and encouragement from Jonah's response to God. I don't always hear the Old Testament preached like this.

It highlighted for me a danger for us in preaching ‘biblically theologically’. We certainly need to show how the Old Testament points forward to Jesus, and we must not treat Old Testament stories as context-less tales of moral example. But we also need a biblical theology of response (if I can put it that way). We need to show our hearers from Old Testament passages what it means to respond to God in repentance and faith because that is part of why the Old Testament was written: “Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come” (1 Cor 10:11).

To just preach God and his promises fulfilled in Christ without also calling for and explaining repentance and faith is to leave out half the message.

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As a new missionary visiting a church recently, this was a question asked by one keen enquirer. He explained that he was a new Christian, he had just joined this church and he knew that it was a church that supported mission, prayed for people overseas and encouraged local mission. But he was a little embarrassed to ask what mission actually was.

So what's the answer?

Fortunately I had recently read an article by Keith Ferdinando¹ so I was able to share a few possible definitions and some of the issues that arise with each one.

Ferdinando's suggestion is that, as a word, ‘mission’ has suffered from the disease of linguistic entropy. It has come to mean what its user wants it to mean, resulting in the potentially dangerous position of “if everything is mission, nothing is mission” (this was a phrase coined by Stephen Neill in 1958).

The potential meaninglessness of the word aside, Ferdinando identifies four contemporary understandings of mission, forming a set of concentric circles of reducing diameter.

1. The Missio Dei

This is the view that sees everything God does in the world as his mission, and that we are coworkers with him in that mission, whether we do that as part of his people or not. In fact, using this definition, people who do not know or acknowledge God can be his missionaries, carrying out his will even though they are not aware of it.

One possible expression of this view is that it is God's mission that justice, human dignity and reconciliation be furthered in this world, and therefore anyone who pursues those categories is involved in mission.

The problem with this view is that it requires a fundamental shift in the definition of salvation, with its primary concern being for the reconstruction of society rather than to redeem sinners.

2. The cultural mandate

This is the view that mission is all that the church does in the world (as opposed to all that God does in the world in view 1.) Thus, mission is the activity performed by all Christians in whatever area of life they are involved in—education, industry, relationships, commerce, sport, and so on. Ferdinando sees the roots of this view in the attempt to discount the dualistic vision of ‘secular’ and ‘spiritual’ categories, but rather see the Christian life as lived in all spheres.

The effect of this definition is to equate mission with the Christian life, thus resulting in a loss of distinction and precision when it comes to talking about mission.

3. Social action

Although it has a broad range of possible meanings, ‘social action’ can be described as activity that leads to the alleviation of human suffering and the elimination of injustice, exploitation and deprivation.

There is no question that this is a good and desirable thing, but the question is to what extent is this activity an integral part of mission? Publications from the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization and the emerging missionary force of the two-thirds world have forced the Christian community to think hard about the place of social action in mission, the question of ‘holistic mission’ and the relative priority of social action, along with other factors such as proclamation and training.

One possible danger of social action is that it can be Christians doing what the world sees that Christians should be doing. That is, a little bit of religion is good for everyone as long as it teaches people to be good and helps them in their troubles. But once people get a bit serious or start talking about propositions of truth, then we are stepping over the line of acceptability.

4. Making disciples of all nations

If one end of the ‘mission spectrum’ is social action, the other end is often (and sometimes unfairly) seen as evangelism. However, Ferdinando suggests that perhaps ‘making disciples’ is a better term for what is happening in mission as it represents what we see the apostles doing as they went out in Acts. They made disciples by bringing people to faith through proclamation and encouraging their spiritual growth in the areas of their relationship with God and with others. Critically, this often brought about the consequence of social action (such as caring for widows and orphans), but that was the consequence of discipling, rather than the substance of the mission.

He also points out (using William Carey as a case study) that the history of mission shows that it is often gospel preaching and effective discipleship that leads to social change.

Does it actually matter?

But does all this matter? On one hand, it doesn't matter how we define mission just as long as we are clear in our definition so others know what they are being asked to support or pray for, and why.

However, on the other hand, it does matter, because mission is a key activity of the church. It’s not a matter of choice whether a church should be ‘missional’ or not; it’s an imperative. So we need to make sure that we work out what ‘mission’ actually is.

¹ Keith Ferdinando, ‘Mission: A problem of definition’, Themelios, Vol 33 Issue 1, May 2008, pp. 46-59.

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Church as we know it can sometimes be a bit weird and jarring. A few weeks ago at church, we heard an encouraging sermon on the second commandment (Exod 20:4-6). We heard that God cannot and must not be represented by or worshipped through images because images can only ever distort and misrepresent God. Yet the sermon was preached in a 150-year-old Cathedral building containing a plethora of accumulated religious imagery. As we listened to the sermon with our ears, our eyes were easily drawn towards a wooden statue of St Michael the archangel holding a gilded Bible, numerous large stained-glass windows depicting Jesus, a banner sewn with Mary and the baby Jesus, various crosses, and other striking images. Understandably, a few questions were raised after the sermon about the seeming disparity between what was heard and what was seen by the congregation.

The second commandment does not seem to be a blanket ban on the use of any concrete image in the spiritual life of God's people. Just five chapters after he utters the second commandment, God himself commands that golden statues of angels be made to cover the ark (Exod 25:18-22). A little later, he commands that a fiery serpent be made so that people who were afflicted with a plague of snakes could look at it and live (Num 21:8-9). In the New Testament, water baptism and, perhaps, the Lord's Supper also appear to involve a kind of imagery.

So what do we make of the second commandment? I offer here four principles about how we can honour the intention of the second commandment when it comes to our use (or abandonment) of images in Christian gatherings, and in Christian worship and obedience more generally. These aren't intended to be comprehensive, but they may serve as a starting point for discussion.

The first principle is that God's word must always be given pride of place in our worship, no matter where and when. God is known through what he says, not through any pictures we may make of him (e.g. Deut 4:9-19). It follows that, as we speak and obey his word, God will make himself known to us in his glory and splendour. The clear proclamation of God's word, by itself, will go a long way towards relativizing the importance of images, and will remove many of the problems that we might otherwise encounter when God's word is not spoken clearly. Who, having tasted the pure delight of knowing God truly through his word, would desire to go back to a bland and futile attempt to apprehend his glory through mere images?

The second principle in evaluating the use of images in our Christian lives is to consider their purpose. Why is an image being used? The cherubim in Exodus 25:18-22, for example, seem to have been used to show that God's glory in the tabernacle and ark was essentially hidden. They actually discourage, rather than encourage, worship of God through created things. In our own lives, we should be discerning about the purpose of any particular image in the Christian life. For example, if we use children's Bibles or drawings for the illiterate that depict Jesus, why are we doing it? Are the images there in order to represent God for the purpose of worshipping him through the image? This would be wrong. Or are the images there to illustrate the reality that Jesus was a human (because he is drawn just like the other human beings in the story)? Or is it just a quick illustration to guide the readers towards focusing on God's word—such as the images from Two Ways to Live that I often use to explain the gospel? Then it could be all right. One way to determine what the purpose of something is to ask what would be lost if we took it away. The more upset somebody is at the idea that a picture could be removed, the more likely it is that the image is being used for an idolatrous purpose.

The third principle is related to the second: it concerns the context of the image. The bronze snake that God commanded Moses to make, for example, later had to be destroyed because it had become an idol to which the people of Israel were making offerings (2 Kgs 18:4). An image that was necessary in one context became unacceptable in another. The same is true today: we may accept the argument, for example, that in medieval times, stained-glass windows were good and right because they used a common pictorial symbolic language to depict events in the life of Jesus. But even if we do accept this argument, all we have gained is interesting knowledge about medieval history. The question that matters is what do the stained-glass windows achieve in our context? Are they merely there for educational purposes? Or are people using them as a way of gaining access to God somehow? Has there been that (some say, inevitable) ‘leakage’ where a simple image ends up actually representing God to the hearts and minds of God's people?

The final principle follows from all the above. It is the principle of love. Those who are Christians—who are gripped by the gospel of God's love to us in Jesus' death—will want to do everything for the sake of others, not just ourselves. This applies to what we do with images. We could use Romans 14, for example, to argue that those who tend towards an auditory learning style (that's you, if you like to learn through listening and discussing) should take into account people like me who learn a lot better with diagrams and pictures. However, 1 Corinthians 8-10 pushes us towards another important application of the principle of love in Christian fellowship. There, we learn that love is expressed when we curtail our own freedoms in order to help a Christian brother or sister by removing any temptations towards idolatry. So from 1 Corinthians 8-10, the onus of love may well be on us visual learners to strip away and remove images from our lives and fellowship. Even though the images may hold no temptation for us (we're merely using them for an entirely innocent purpose), we may decide to get rid of them for the sake of our brother who struggles against the tendency to turn those images into idolatrous worship of God.

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