OK.  I have been in the ministry for about 14 years now.  I have had the honor of leading a lot of people to the Lord.  Nearly everyone of them when we started talking said that they were a Christian…

Therefore, stop asking this question, “Are you a Christian?”  95% of America would say that they are a Christian.   Almsot like it is synonomous with being an American.  Many can’t even tell you what one is and they claim to be one!

Start asking a question like this, “Tell me about your faith journey or tell me about your spiritual life.”  The answer to that question will reveal if they are a born again follower of Jesus.

Try it and don’t forget to ask those people in the church either!  They might not know what a Christian is either.

We finished up our leadership collaboration with Leadership Network in Dallas this past week and it has been quite a journey.  We went to Fort Worth, TX to the stockyards on Tuesday.  It looks like old time Texas with old saloons, cowboys on horses, and a long horn cattle drive where 6 cowboys lead about 20 long horn cattle down the street for people to take pictures of.  Something struck me as I stood about 5 feet from a 1000 lb longhorn walking down the street.  If one of these guys were to take off, the cowboys would be able to lasso him and hold him check…maybe.  But if all of them said, “We’re done walking this same circle track day in and day out.  There’s got to be something else out there that is better than this;” there would be a stampede and the only thing we could have done is watch the dust.

Being the missional church is simply the people of God partnering with God in his redemptive mission in the world.  This includes not only saving souls but bringing the kingdom of heaven to this earth, which is far better than what we are experiencing now.  We are serving our city into a better tomorrow.  That’s what it is all about.  If a few people want to see it happen, there are probably a few cowboys that will see to it that things are done as they always have been done.  If we stampede, there will be better community when the dust settles.  Lives will be transformed which will mean that businesses will operate more effectively, schools will be the top of the state, crime will plummet, and God will be glorified.

Continue to serve your city into a better tomorrow.

I am praying with my boys last night, and Caden (6) got up to go downstairs to get something to drink.  That left me and Connor (4) laying in bed waiting on Caden to come back to tell Tommy and Johnny stories, outlandish stories of two boys that get into mischief that are made up on the spot and involve flying elephants sometimes.  So I here is our conversation.

Daddy:  Who is Jesus?

Connor:  God’s son.

Daddy:  Why did he come here to earth?

Connor:  To die on a cross.

Daddy:  Why did he die on a cross.

Connor:  To protect us.

At this point I was thinking.  I haven’t ever heard that one before.  I wonder where he is going with this one.  So I ask,

Daddy:  To protect us from who?

Connor:  God…

Wow.  Connor just took it to another level.  I’m thinking he is a theological genius.  Jesus died to protect us from the wrath of God.  Precisely the point.  Many times we throw around terminology like, Jesus died for our sins, and people do not understand the why.  They think it is simply eternal life.  But in order that we might be made righteous, he died in order to protect us from just and righteous punishment for our sins.  In essence he protects us from God and takes on the wrath himself and pays the penalty in order that God might be both a merciful God and a just God.

So I ask, “Why was he protecting us from?”

Connor sucked his teeth and did this funny things with his eyes he does, and then shook his head and said,

Connor:  Just don’t worry about it, Dad.

I thought, that is precisely what Satan tries to convince the world. 

Just don’t worry about it.

You don’t even know me.  How can you love me?”

That is what was said to one of my former students who went on a mission trip to New York City.  She was under the impression that they would be feeding the homeless and talking to them about Jesus.  Instead she found herself standing on a street corner with a bright red apron with praying hands on it doing surveys and asking people if she could pray with them while they were scurrying to work in Times Square.  They were trained to do the surveys in such a way that would lead them into a presentation of the gospel.  The first four questions served as a switch and bait to get to the real reason they were stopped.  Many “seeds” were planted they were told as the gospel was peddled, but ironically no one came to know the Lord. 

Back to the man.  He had been watching them for a while and asked her what they were doing.  She said, “We are from South Carolina and we came here to love on the people.”  That is when he said his line that has been ringing in her ears ever since.  He then began to ask her questions she didn’t know how to answer so she called in the reinforcements….the trained professional who began to debate him over the existence of God.  Afterwards they probably got together and patted themselves on the back for the arguments they refuted.  At any rate she was discouraged with the entire week.

We are training people to evangelize in a world that does not exist anymore.  A forgotten world where people are sitting on their stoops waiting for company with a warm pie they baked just in case someone stopped by to talk with them.  A forgotten world that is not so busy.  A forgotten world that is not skeptical of strangers.  A forgotten world where it took more faith to be an agnostic than a believer. 

Allow me to offer a different strategy.  Love first, serve first, tell second.  Several of our ninth grade girls did an extreme makeover on children’s rooms in an apartment complex.  They then during christmas used their own money to buy clothes for the girls and a dress for the mom.  The girls burst into the bathroom to try on their new clothes.  They came out and had a beauty show for them.  The girls then sat them down and told them the Christmas story for the first time in their lives.  Guess what?  They listened and they trusted them. 

That’s the new world.  Maybe it has always been there.  Of course it is easier to knock on doors and not get dirty with the lives of those who are hurting. 

Allow the love that God so lavished upon you in Christ to be poured out on those in the world.  Then when they ask you why…pull the trigger and tell them about Jesus.