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November 18

The Method and the Message

I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.  ––John 17:14-15

When I was in college my friends and I were part of Campus Crusade for Christ (now CRU). We’d go on campus 2×2 and use a small booklet called “The Four Spiritual Laws” to evangelize (i.e., ambush) unsuspecting students and in the course of a 10- to 15-minute conversation, try to convince them to pray the Sinner’s Prayer.

It was terrifying to walk up to complete strangers and ask them the question, “If you died tonight, do you know for sure that you would go to heaven?” From there, we would walk them through the booklet, which was basically the Gospel message in an illustrated, compact tract. Usually we’d politely be told to go take a long walk on a short pier. One time, however, much to my great surprise, a male student said, “I’ve been praying for God to show me a sign that He’s real—and then you show up.” That young man ended up committing His life to Christ.

I once heard Christian marketing researcher and culture guru George Barna say, when it comes to reaching a specific generation for Christ, that “the methods change, but the message never does.” For example, what worked for me and my friends on the campus of UCLA a few decades ago may not necessarily work today.

As God’s men, we are to be students of the culture—wise to trends and belief systems—while remaining submitted and committed to the unchanging Message. Easy to do? No. As our CRU leader used to say, “It’s easier to be pulled down off a chair than it is to pull someone up onto one.” Translated: When we interact with the goats (people who have not yet committed their lives to Christ), it can be dangerous, risky, and messy. But over and over in the Word, Jesus tells us to be salt in an unsalty world—to be His sheep in the world but not of it.

Don’t remove yourself from the world—we aren’t called to bunker down, lock out the world, and wait for our “beam me up, Jesus” moment. Pray, study, research, and learn as much as you can about the culture God has placed you in. It’s not by accident that you are drawing breath in a certain corner of the world at this specific moment in time. Seize the opportunity to share the eternal Message with ever-changing and adapting methods. Then step out of your comfort zone and share God’s truth with someone—you may be just the person they’ve been waiting for to tell them about Jesus.

Lord, thank You that You never change, and that the beautiful news of the Gospel never changes. Use me by any means You see fit to share Your redemption story with those around me.

 

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