The Syrian Problem or God's Providence? (part 2)

Since my last post, terror has struck in a way that is only brought on by absolute evil. As I read articles, Facebook posts, tweets, and talk to others, I am finding that fear has clouded our decision making. As a Christian, the Bible should be what we base our lives on. Although, I am finding many Christians being overcome with fear and making statements, decisions, and accusations that don't really line up with the overarching thrust of the gospel. Before I share any more about the Syrian people and God's desire to deliver them from their bondage, let me encourage you. 

I will not fear.What can man do to me? - Psalm 118:6

 
The Lord is on my side;
Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. - 1 John 4:18


For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline. -2 Timothy 1:7

So be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid and do not panic before them. For the Lord your God will personally go ahead of you. He will neither fail you nor abandon you.” - Deuteronomy 31:6


In a desperate time where evil people need punished, don't forget the gospel. Let Christ's perfect love expel your fear so you can develop a God honoring understanding of world events. 

In light of the recent events, I am not going to share about the Syrian people this week. I want you to know that Syrian refugees are trying to escape the persecution and evil that is being perpetrated by these radical Islamist. Are most of the refugees Muslim? Yes, probably about 90%. Is Muslim a religion of peace? No. But...

Does God deserve their worship? Yes. Are they worshiping God now? No. Their Allah, is no God. He desires and deserves the worship of all peoples. Now the question is... Does God desire them to repent and believe in the gospel?

He was patient with me, I bet he was with you too. 

All this seems so counter cultural, like this thought process is upside down from the way the world thinks. Yes it is, and I am weird. But I have found the unexhaustable riches of Christ. I'm deeply in love with Him and I desire to be just like him. So call me weird. I'm secure in the one has this whole life thing rigged. 

I am praying that we all come to a better understanding of how to respond and live when evil happens. 

The Syrian Problem or God's Providence?

Over the next several weeks, I want to look at the people of Syria who have left their country seeking safety and asylum. There are many people who don't want any part of these people because they are primarily Muslim. The thing I hope you see over the next couple posts is that God loves these people and He desires and deserves their worship. Syria has been a difficult country to minister in. Although now, would you believe that God is using the evil found of the terrorist groups destroying this country to bring these people to evangelical Christians in a safer western context for His glory? I think so.

Syria is in midst of a civil war. Millions of Syrians have left and continue to leave the country. Syrian refugees have fled primarily to Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey. Syrians have also fled to European countries such as Germany, Sweden, and France. President Barack Obama has told his administration to take in at least 10,000 Syrian refugees over the next year.[1] The primary reason for the mass exodus is the savage behavior of Islamic terrorist groups. Much of the Syrian people are devout Muslims. The brutal and unruly behavior of their brethren can serve as a primer for these displaced refugees to seek truth that does not seek to destroy, but rather restore.

            The need for church planting efforts within this people group is great. It appears that God is ordaining the terrible circumstances of the Syrian people to start a church planting movement that will penetrate the darkness, oppression, and spiritual poverty of the Syrian people. Syria is comprised of less than ten percent Christian. The civil unrest in the country has relocated millions of Syrians to many areas that are much more open to the gospel. It is imperative that the church be intentional to engage these refugees in their need and be an active demonstration of the gospel.

The posts that follow set out to thoroughly define the worldview of Syrians. To thoroughly define their worldview we will explore aspects of their family structure, social structure, religious structure, and economic structure. Then, apply biblical and anthropological principles to develop a strategy to reach, mature, and mobilize Syrians for the glory of God.

What are your thoughts? Not sure about some Muslims coming into the country? Just remember, at one time we were blinded of the truths of the gospel. We were enemies of God, but by His Grace through faith in Jesus we are redeemed, He calls us as His own. God desires the nations. God desires all to repent. He will make His name holy in all peoples. I just want to be part of it. I look forward to sharing with you more about the Syrian people and a strategy for reaching them with the gospel. 

Would you go ahead and be praying for that? This week would you pray specifically for God to open the eyes and hearts of the Syrian people?

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[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/world/middleeast/obama-directs-administration-to-accept-10000-syrian-refugees.html?_r=0

Six Traits of a Biblical Friendship

Six Traits of a Biblical Friendship

From creation we were woven with a desire for true deep meaningful relationships.

These friendships are imperative to the church. It is through friendship that we bring people to Christ. Surveys show that 70-90% of new Christians are brought to faith through influences of close friends. It’s in small groups where these biblical friendships are manifested. Through these biblical friendships we live our lives together and grow each other’s faith through encouragement, accountability, and correction. It is through these friendships that we work together to serve our communities.

God thinks our friendships are important.

More specific than a basic friendship I tried to define this idea of a biblical friendship; this is what I come up with.

A Christ centered mutual commitment with another believer to love one another with radical vulnerability and transparency.

God dedicated over three chapters of the bible to one particular friendship. 1 Samuel 18-20.  I would consider this friendship between Jonathan and David a great example of a biblical friendship.

 6 Traits of a Biblical Friendship

1.      A biblical friendship is based on humility.

 After David had finished talking with Saul, he met Jonathan, the king’s son. There was an immediate bond between them, for Jonathan loved David. ² From that day on Saul kept David with him and wouldn’t let him return home. ³ And Jonathan made a solemn pact with David, because he loved him as he loved himself.⁴ Jonathan sealed the pact by taking off his robe and giving it to David, together with his tunic, sword, bow, and belt. – 1 Samuel 18:1-4

Remember Jonathan is the King’s son, the crowned prince. He is next in line to be king, He is royalty, but He humbles himself by stripping off his royal robes and tunic and giving them to David.

2.      Biblical friendships are based on vulnerability.

Jonathan became very vulnerable when he gave David his sword and bow. David could have killed Jonathan at that point. In the world’s eyes they were competing for the same thrown. They should have been enemies. Samuel had anointed David, King, but Jonathan was next in line to be king in most people’s eyes.

3.      Biblical friendships are based on transparency.

 Saul now urged his servants and his son Jonathan to assassinate David. But Jonathan, because of his strong affection for David, ² told him what his father was planning. “Tomorrow morning,” he warned him, “you must find a hiding place out in the fields. ³ I’ll ask my father to go out there with me, and I’ll talk to him about you. Then I’ll tell you everything I can find out.” – 1 Samuel 19:1-3

This would have been considered high treason.

There were no secrets between these friends. Jonathan vows to tell David everything. He hides nothing.

If we go back to the story of creation and go back to the garden, prior to sin entering the picture Adam and Eve were naked. They didn’t hide anything. What was the first thing they did after they sinned? They immediately hid and covered themselves. We do the same thing. We try to hide our sins. We go hide.

Through the fall we inherited a fear of friendship.

Humility, Vulnerability, and transparency is hard to demonstrate as a fallen creation.

But we have to be vulnerable and transparent for a friend to hold us accountable. Accountability is taught in the New Testament, especially in Paul’s letters.

4.      A biblical friend holds us accountable

Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. - Galatians 6:1

Do you have someone who you are vulnerable and transparent to? Do they hold you accountable? If not, I encourage you to seek someone out to hold you accountable. If you already have a friendship that is built on transparency, give that person permission to hold you accountable. Give them permission to ask you hard questions. Give them permission to call you out, when you are being stupid. Sometimes we as humans will keep quiet to avoid conflict. If you give someone permission, you ask them, to hold you accountable it will help you in your job, your marriage, and your walk with Christ.

5.  A biblical friend advocates on our behalf

Have you forgotten about the time he risked his life to kill the Philistine giant and how the Lord brought a great victory to all Israel as a result? You were certainly happy about it then. Why should you murder an innocent man like David? There is no reason for it at all!”

- 1 Samuel 19:5

They have your back - a biblical friend will stick up for you when needed. Have you had the opportunity to stick up for a friend recently? Did you? Gossip is a huge problem in our culture; we have the tendency to further spread the gossip sometimes when we just remain quiet.

6.      A biblical friend makes sacrifices on our behalf

³⁰ Saul boiled with rage at Jonathan. “You stupid son of a whore!”^[a] he swore at him. “Do you think I don’t know that you want him to be king in your place, shaming yourself and your mother? ³¹ As long as that son of Jesse is alive, you’ll never be king. Now go and get him so I can kill him!”

³² “But why should he be put to death?” Jonathan asked his father. “What has he done?” ³³ Then Saul hurled his spear at Jonathan, intending to kill him. So at last Jonathan realized that his father was really determined to kill David.

³⁴ Jonathan left the table in fierce anger and refused to eat on that second day of the festival, for he was crushed by his father’s shameful behavior toward David. - 1 Samuel 20:30-34

Jonathan is forsaken by his father. His own father tries to kill him. This is all for the sake of his friend David.

Would you sacrifice for a friend? How much would you sacrifice for a friend?

¹³ There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. - John 15:13

Would you die for a friend? Would you loss possessions for a friend? Would you leave the comfort of your home for a friend?

These are questions we have to consider.

Jonathan and David give a beautiful picture of what a biblical friendship looks like, but Jesus fulfills it. Jesus showed us in an infinitely greater degree what a biblical friendship is and means.

Jesus humbled himself by giving us his royal robes. He came down from heaven to this earth. He put himself below us. He came to serve not to be served.

Jesus was vulnerable when the spirit led him to the desert to be tempted for 40 days and 40 nights.

Jesus was transparent.

¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command. ¹⁵ I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. - John 15:14-15

That is what transparency is about.

Jesus was forsaken by his father.

 And at three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” (which means“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”) - Mark 15:34

 Jesus advocates for us to the father.

My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous. ² He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world. - 1 John 2:1-2

Jesus sacrificed for us.

It was a perfect sacrifice by a perfect person to perfect some very imperfect people. By that single offering, he did everything that needed to be done for everyone who takes part in the purifying process. The Holy Spirit confirms this. 

- Hebrews 10:14-15 (MSG)

I hope that you see the importance friendships and relationships play in church. We pride ourselves in not being a religion, but a relationship. We need to display the love of Christ through our relationships. We need to love non-believers enough to share the good news of Christ Jesus. We need to love our close friends enough to hold them accountable. We need to strive to implement these 6 traits into our close friendships.

Who in your life can you begin to build this type of friendship with? If you already have one, how can you strengthen that friendship?

Church - What I need from you for Sunday.

Easter presents a huge opportunity to have guest worship with us. Some will be first time guest, others attend only a couple times a year, some will have a church background, for others this may be their first time to step foot in a church. We should do our best to make them feel as comfortable as possible.

Church a couple things I expect from you:

1. Pray Big. Don't limit God in your prayers. Pray that God moves beyond our imagination. Today as I have been in prayer, I have been in tears. Remind yourself of the Cross and empty tomb. I mean really remember it. Remember the day you experienced grace for the first time. Let that love motivate you.

2. Invite. Invite. Invite. Invite your neighbors, your friends, your family, your co-workers. Start with the people you know. If you invite 3 people statistics say 1 will come.

3. Pray. Pray. Pray... It really does begin and end with prayer. The Spirit of God really seems to respond when you pray. Pray I proclaim God's word and truth in a way that all can understand. Pray that our worship over flows into our witness. Pray for the Spirit to be preparing hearts at this moment. Pray for the spirit to move powerfully Easter morning. 

3. You are all greeters. Go out of your way to make people know they are welcome. Please make people feel welcome. Let them see the genuine love of Christ through you. If you have a personal friend you have invited. Feel free to introduce them to David or I. Introduce them to others. People desire relationships. 

4. Smile. Smile Smile. Look happy to be there. :) 

5. Sing Loud. Show the guests that you really love this guy we worship. Let's lift of the name of Jesus!

6. Be selfless. Be a servant. Help us canvas the neighborhood. Help us set up. Help us clean. Help us follow up.

I am so looking forward to Sunday. I can't wait to see how God moves in our community.
-Bud

Jesus' 7 step plan of Evangelism

     You know lately I have questioned the amount of personal evangelism I have been doing. As a leader in the church, I believe that stuff has to start with me. I can't expect my people to share their faith if I'm not doing it on a regular basis. The thing is though, it always seems so uncomfortable. It's not supposed to be uncomfortable. It wasn't uncomfortable for Jesus or Paul.

     I was at Centennial Park in Nashville a couple weeks ago. I was engaging Millennials, specifically, in conversation about God. I was asking, "How do you respond to someone who says God is good?" I found this to be a very direct way to begin a spiritual conversation. It allowed me to quickly see their stance and potential objections towards "religion." It wasn't a terrible idea. Although, I was probably a little more direct than I should have been, but it lead me to search the Bible. I wanted to see how Jesus did evangelism.

I found some personal insight I want to share. I found the answer in John chapter 4:5-26 when Jesus engages a Samaritan woman at the well. Here's 7 steps to follow.

Contact other people socially (vv. 1-6). Even the places and people that you have tried to ignore in the past, even the despised Samaria. 

Establish a common interest (vv. 7-9). In this encounter, the common interest was water. Find common ground; kids, sports, work, cars, tattoos, etc.

Arouse curiosity (vv. 10-12). Jesus talked about living water, which was certainly interesting. Make them want the conversation to continue. 

Do not rush things (vv. 13-15). Too often, my struggle. I have been guilty of the Jesus Juke.

Cultivate, don’t condemn (vv. 16-19). In other words, if we come down too hard on the person, they will set up walls and not be willing to listen to us. Love them.

Don’t get sidetracked with secondary issues (vv. 20-24). Don't let the basketball talk go on forever. March is over :)

Bring your listener face to face with Jesus Christ (vv. 25-26). "Then Jesus told her, "I am the Messiah!" John 4:26"

Points adapted from notes by Fritz Ridenour.

What Can You Do To Help The Philippines?

Words cannot describe the destruction that the Philippines have faced in the last several months. It has been natural disaster followed by natural disaster with Typhoon Haiyan hitting most recently. My heart absolutely breaks for these people. I did not include any pictures of the death and destruction in this post. I didn't want to expose you to the true condition of this country if you were not ready. Click here if you want to see the true condition. I hope that your love compels you to respond to the needs of these people.

I have never been to the Philippines before, but about a year ago God placed this country and these people on my heart. I have consistently brought this up to my wife and friends about how I really feel a connection and obligation to these people. Just in my everyday life, I see things that really have no connection with the country, but my mind is always making this connection. Honestly, it makes no sense to me. It is not something that is attractive to me based on the standards of this world, but I truly know that God has placed this seed in my heart for a reason.

Going to the Philippines is not something that I have pursued in the last year. I felt that if this was God's will that there would be a time when an opportunity would present itself. I just knew that I would need to prepare myself and my family to step through that door if and when the opportunity presented itself.

After I heard of the pending storm and then the devastation afterwards, I honestly thought... I have to go help these people. I need to fly to the other side of the globe and help. They are going to need me. Then I began to refocus and pray about it. Then just so happened I read a blog post by Ed Stetzer (found here) and it honestly let me refocus. His words began to make sense. They need money. There are people who already have their boots on the ground, there are people who are trained to respond in these situations, and honestly I don't even have a passport.

The blog post linked above lays out ways that you and I can help support relief efforts for the Philippines.  I encourage you to consider giving. Give to an established, reputable organization that already has a presence in that country.  The International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention has begun its relief efforts. (Southern Baptists have the third largest disaster relief system, behind the Red Cross and Salvation Army.) The IMB has people on the ground in the Philippines.

Above all else pray. Pray for the people. Pray for their recovery and health. Pray for God's comfort in their grieving. Pray for the leaders guidance. Pray for a quick response. Pray for the people responding. If you feel called to go, pray for the opportunities and means. If you are being called God will provide the means. 

Please join me in praying for the Philippines. 

Mission of the Church

If we consider our purpose here on earth as followers of Christ, you could list several things that the Bible clearly calls us to be about. At Oak Street Baptist Church, we recently preached through a series called, "Be the Church God has called you to be". The first emphasis was "you" are the church. The church is not a building or denomination, but rather a group of believers gathered together.

We spent the remainder of the series casting the vision God provided to us for the church and exploring things the church should be about. Obviously, we were not limiting the church to this list, but these are things we felt were important to cover as they were explained in the Word. We looked at worship, prayer, love, connection, reaching, and teaching.

Although, after the fact, I begin to look back and question our thoughts. Let me explain.
Here on earth we worship, no doubt we our commanded to worship an almighty God. Although, I can only think about how our worship will be perfected in heaven. We will continue to worship while in heaven, and it will not even begin to compare to the worship that we give here on earth. I get so emotional when I think of the worship told in Revelation. There will be a day when our worship is perfected.

Here on earth we pray, several times Jesus prays for our benefit. So we know how to pray and know the importance of prayer. The Holy Spirit prays for us even when we don't know what to pray. The purpose of prayer is to be in conversation with God. We are speaking to Him, and he speaks to us through our silent times in prayer. Although, when we get to heaven we will be in the presence of God. We will not need to pray. We will be in communion with God. It will be perfected.

Here on earth, we struggle to love unloving people. We are by nature self absorbed, selfish people, and it is a struggle to love others as ourselves. Jesus tells us that people will know we are His disciples by the way we love one another (my paraphrase John 13:35). Loving people here on earth is important, but I can't stop thinking about how our love will be perfected when we are fully conformed to the image of Christ. Our love for others will be perfected.

So this brings me to my point. Many of the things we say are very important for the church to do here on earth will be perfected in heaven. I am not saying we should not be about worship, prayer, love, etc. We should devote ourselves to those things, but I think Jesus' last words here on earth is a reflection of the church's mission.

Matthew 28:18-20 (NLT)
We will not make disciples in heaven. Jesus gives us a job to do while we are here on earth, make disciples. You will not be reaching people with the Gospel in heaven. There will be no evangelism. There will be no teaching in heaven. We will be in complete knowledge.
18 Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. 19 Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations,[a] baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. 20 Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

If you are not making disciples, those people you know who don't know Jesus will never be able to experience the confident hope we have in Christ here on earth. I think, more importantly, they will never experience the perfected worship of God and be in perfect communion with God in heaven. The fact is there is a real place for people who reject Christ. It is an eternity away from God. The Bible tells us it is a place of everlasting fire.

If you don't know Jesus, I'd love to talk to you.

If you know Jesus and are not sharing His message, I encourage you to do so. We are commanded to make disciples of all nations. Last count, there are over 6,500 unreached people groups in the world. That is almost 4 Billion people who have not been reached with the message of the Gospel.

Pray for opportunities to share the message. Pray that you will proclaim it boldly. Pray for the Word to penetrate hearts. Start by praying right now, follow through with the action of sharing the word in your context.

Until the work is done...
Bud