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Who Was Asbury?

Revival starts with prayer. Someone somewhere was asking God to start a revival within the next generation long before students at Asbury University in Wilmore, KY decided to stay and praise God after a regularly scheduled chapel meeting. It’s interesting that about the same amount of people who frequented the campus during the two week revival–50,000 people–was about the same amount of people who died in a horrible earthquake in Northern Syria and Southern Turkey around the same time. As Jesus would say, the people in Kentucky weren’t any better than the people in Syria or Turkey–“Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish” (Read Luke 13:1-5). “See, now is the acceptable time; now is the day of salvation (2 Corinthians 6:2).”

It’s not that revival isn’t for all ages. It’s that in the history of revivals and spiritual awakenings, God has often used the young to spark the flame. I think there is something some people are missing in this latest revival and bringing this out in the open is the reason for this post. Who was Francis Asbury, anyways? In his book Revival And Revivalism, Church historian Iain Murray says this,

“By 1778, with one exception, every Methodist preacher who had been sent across the Atlantic had returned to England. The exception was Francis Asbury who had arrived in 1771. For nearly half a century Asbury’s calm leadership in the work of evangelistic itinerary and church organization did more than any other figure to establish Methodism in North America. The opinion of Abel Stevens on Asbury is perhaps overstated but it bears repetition: ‘Neither Wesley nor Whitefield labored as energetically as this obscure man. He exceeded them in the extent of his annual travels, the frequency of his sermons, and the hardships of his daily life.’ . . . unlike the Church of England, Methodism was inherently a spiritual movement.”

Could it be that God is still honoring this man and this movement amidst a university that has yet to bend the knee to its culture? If you’ve been keeping up at all with the Methodist church in America lately, you know there has been quite a divide amongst the churches over cultural issues such as LGBTQ+, etc. Read on,

In his book about “Defining Moments That Shaped Our Enduring Foundations of Faith,” Pastor Robert J. Morgan writes,

“The Cane Ridge Revival was started by Presbyterian Barton Stone, but its combustion fired up the Methodists, whose circuit riders tackled the frontier—Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio, Illinois, and points beyond. Two names top the list of those riders, and they were as different as lightning and thunder. Bishop Francis Asbury was lightning. John Wesley appointed him to oversee the Methodist work in America, and for nearly half a century Asbury traveled three hundred thousand miles by horse and carriage, preaching more than sixteen thousand sermons. He began his work in America in 1771, at age twenty-two, and he became part of the Second Great Awakening . . . When Francis Asbury arrived in America, there were fewer than six hundred Methodists in the country. By the time he died, the number had grown to two hundred thousand. But the middle of the 1800’s, one in every thirty-six Americans was Methodist.”

This post isn’t about putting in a plug for the Methodist church. It’s about recognizing a man who was aflame for God! God could use any man from any denomination if he so chose. He also could use a donkey and he has before (Numbers 22:21-39). Oh, that we would have more Asbury’s—itinerant evangelists—willing to travel this world over to save men’s and women’s souls from an everlasting hell.

The current Asbury revival touched many denominations and people around the world. As the revival spread to local colleges and universities, it’s interesting to note the circuitous path. The revival went to regions that Asbury himself would have been well familiar with. He traveled those same roads, albeit by horse. The current revival made its circuit primarily through the form of social media and word of mouth.

The thing I loved about this revival was how the school’s administrators handled it. In a school of only two thousand students, the campus itself didn’t have the infrastructure or capacity to sustain a large number of outsiders coming to campus. It got to a point where administrators would only allow those 26 and younger into chapel for the services. They emphasized the next generation because the next generation is our heritage (Psalm 127:3). We all need revival but church statistics will tell you our nation sorely needs a revival within the next generation. This revival gives The Church and America hope! God is not finished with our nation or the next generation! Let’s not give up on them or our country so soon. Jesus doesn’t, Asbury wouldn’t, and neither should we.

Our ultimate hope is in Christ! America isn’t going to last forever. Neither will this generation. The Bible tells us so. However, our attitude needs to be like the apostle Paul’s, “I have become all things to all people, so that I may by every possible means save some.” Now, we don’t save people. Jesus does. But if we don’t get on our horse and go, who is going to get saved? Asbury knew this and that’s why he rode like the dickens. Paul knew it too and that’s why he made three missionary journeys (kind of looks like a circle to me).

I’ve heard it said that the gospel is a movement to be advanced and the church is an institution to be maintained. We could quibble some over the statement but there is some truth in it. Maybe it would be better stated that we need a gospel movement today in our institutional churches. What God has done before, God can do again! This wasn’t the first revival Asbury University had experienced. They had also experienced a revival around the time of the Jesus Movement in 1970. We could use another revolution today. We need churches willing to accept those who are different from them and give them time to explore the faith. This doesn’t mean we allow, for ex., the LGBTQ+ community to become members in our church. It does, however mean that we invite their community in and make them feel welcome. And if you want to go the extra mile, pick them up and bring them with you.

Our nation has changed and is changing. A Jesus Revolution will look different in the USA than it did in the 1970’s. In the 70’s, hippies by the scores were being saved by Jesus and allowed in his church. Sinners come in all different shapes and sizes. If we can’t be hospitable to sinners in the form that they come in today, why should we expect God to save anybody? Our job is simple. GO! Preach and live out the gospel regardless of the person standing in front of you. And don’t forget to pray. God will take care of the rest. If you need an evangelistic tool to help you along the way, give The 3 Circles a try.

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Letter To A Christian Student

I don’t believe I have ever used an entire post on my blog to address students. After all, most people who read this blog are either leaders, parents, or educators of the next generation. However, I feel that time has come. If you happen to be a ministry leader, parent, or Christian educator, don’t stop reading now. You may just find some material for your next lesson, lecture, or sit-down.

Dear Christian Student,

You are living in unprecedented times. Culture in the form of media, technology, and even education teach you sex education and gender ideology from kindergarten on. You are taught through social media and public school that gender is fluid, not connected to biological sex, and that you can choose to be whatever you feel like being. Many of you lost your childhood when you were given computers and or smartphones and saw things on them you should never have seen. Covid and subsequent government mandates that followed have only helped to delay your holistic growth and development. You feel like you are behind in home, school, and church because you are. You have been discriminated against in society at-large and are continuing to be discriminated against today.

Yet, know this—there is hope! Though you may feel like you are the least of the least, God says that with him, you’re the best of the best!

In Judges chapter 6, the Midianites are oppressing Israel when God chooses to raise up an unlikely hero:

14The LORD turned to him [Gideon] and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?” 15″But Lord , “Gideon asked, “how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.” 16The LORD answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites together.”

You may feel just like Gideon: How could God use me? I am only a youth. I am weak and puny. This sounds like the excuse the prophet Jeremiah came up with when God first told him he had been appointed as a prophet unto the nations:

6 “Ah, Sovereign Lord ,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am only a child.” 7 But the Lord said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am only a child.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. 8 Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the Lord . –Jeremiah 1

You need to understand that God often chooses the most unlikely to pull off God-sized feats. In 1 Corinthians 1, we find these words penned by the apostle Paul who himself claimed to be timid in action and ineloquent in speech:

26 Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28 He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things–and the things that are not–to nullify the things that are, 29 so that no one may boast before him. 30 It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God–that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. 31Therefore, as it is written: “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.”

You may feel like God doesn’t want to use you or that God can’t use your generation, but oh contraire! As the story of Gideon continues in Judges 7, you will find God raising up an army for Gideon to lead into battle. However, God isn’t looking for a large number in this army, but rather a faithful few. Left to our flesh and human reasoning, God’s wisdom doesn’t make any sense. First, God allows 22,000 soldiers to take off. They were afraid to fight and God allowed them to leave. Then in verse 4, God says, “There are still too many men.” So Gideon follows God’s further instructions and the army is reduced from 10,000 down to 300. Verse 2 tells us why God chose to use only 300 Israelites to defeat 135,000 Midianites: “In order that Israel may not boast against me that her own strength has saved her.”

God chooses to uses the least, the weakest, the inferior so that through less, he can gain more glory. A big God deserves glory for himself! May we not boast in our strength, but only in Christ’s. We are saved through the strength his grace provides and not our own (Ephesians 2:8).

You may look around and see less people in your generation following the Lord. You are no doubt experiencing more peer pressure to conform to the world’s standards than the generations that came before you. But again, what you need to understand is that God often chooses to do more with less. His thoughts are not our thoughts and his ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8). Throughout the history of revivals and great awakenings, God has often used the young to spark the fires.

Just like the Hall of Faith mentioned in Hebrews 11, I don’t have time to mention all of the examples in the Bible where God used ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary feats. Goliath looked down on David when he was a youth but you know the end of that story. Paul told young Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:12: Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity. The suffering and persecution you and your generation of Christ-followers have endured today has only served to make you stronger in the Lord. Though there may be less of you out there, your fortitude and resilience has increased.

In the words of the band Unspoken: “Keep fighting the good fight, Keep letting your light shine, ‘Cause I’m never gonna leave you
Always gonna see you through to the other side”

Run the race God has for you and never look back!

In Christ,

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Get off of yourself

If you take a selfie, what do you see?

Have you ever thought about how self-oriented our society is?

I’m not a huge fan of using the self-prefix because it often leans towards revealing our selfishness. For example, it is said you can self-teach yourself by turning to self-help in order to self-discover how you can become a self-made man or woman with a good self-image and high self-esteem. In this way, you will be a self-confident, self-sufficient, and self-reliant person who is self-aware, self-disciplined, and under self-control. Your self-actualization and self-realization along with your self-centered self-beliefs will give you self-assurance and not self-doubt. It is this type of self-reflection and self-interest that will allow you to become self-serving and not self-righteous, self-employed and not self-indulgent. You know, just believe in yourself always being sure In your self because if you’re true to yourself and you do you, then you can have your best life now … you only live once … if it’s true for yourself, it must be true.

There’s only one problem with all this mumbo jumbo. Can you guess what it is? You’re right if you said its your self. Most of today’s postmodern and new age philosophy is laced with subjective opinion over objective fact. And you guessed it – its philosophical “truths” begin and end with the self. The problem with the self is itself is not God. Left alone by itself, the self can have a form of godless denying the power thereof (2 Tim 3:5). This is why many new agers claim to be divine gods themselves.

But what did Jesus, who actually was God, say? Jesus said for one to truly find oneself, he or she must lose himself or herself for the sake of Christ (Mat 10:39). Jesus said, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it” (Luke 9:23).” If you lose your self for Christ by repenting of your sin and turning to follow Christ, Christ will save you from yourself. The self comes off the throne of your heart and Christ comes to sit up on it. The world’s wisdom is antithetical to the wisdom of God. True, God’s wisdom makes no sense to the world because Christ and the cross are considered folly, but to those whom would believe, their life — their self — will be made anew (1 Cor 1:18; 2 Cor 5:17). In fact, in heaven, they will be given a new name (Rev 2:17). I don’t claim to understand all these mysteries, but I do believe what the Word of God says is true. Losing yourself for Christ begins and ends with believing what God says is true about yourself and not what you say. Without Christ, we’re all aimless wanderers left to wonder what this life is all about. The good news is there is hope and his name is Jesus.

I don’t mean to bash all self-hyphenated words. We need a next generation who is self-motivated and self-driven. We need self-initiators: If something needs done, don’t ask for permission, go do it. We need self-feeders: Listen to the sermon podcast or watch the worship service livestream in your down-time, write or read that next great Christian novel, and keep praying, fasting, and reading your Bible app devotions. We need self-starters: Set some goals for yourself and start out to meet them. You can set spiritual goals, physical goals, financial goals, emotional goals, academic goals, etc.

Our culture and society is highly individualistic. I think that is why these self-words are so pervasive in pop-psychology and pop-culture. After all, if you can pull yourself up by your own bootstraps to become that self-made man or woman you’ve always wanted to be, don’t you deserve some credit for that?

Because you’ve been made in the image of God, perhaps you do deserve some. But the truth is without God, you wouldn’t even be here. And knowing that fact, I would say ultimately, you deserve none. God is our Creator and Sustainer. Without him, we can do nothing. What I hope for is that for some reading this post, he will become more than the One who made you and keeps you alive. He can become your Lord and Savior! Repent of your sin and yourself today and believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Your works won’t save you, only His work on the cross.

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A Blog about the heartland

This post will comprise my insights on an amalgamation of current events in our culture that have recently occurred and are about to happen:

Unless you have been hiding under a rock, you are familiar with the Uvalde, TX school shooting and other recent shootings that have followed thereafter. As I watched the press conference on FOX News to this historic shooting in our nation, I read a headline that said “Man had evil in his heart.” The only thing I could think as I read that headline was “Duh”. But as I thought about the headline more, a lot of thoughts began to surface. I liked how the headline pointed out that this shooting was the cause of an individual and not the cause of a gun. After all, people pull triggers, not guns. But what I didn’t like about the headline is the fact that every man has evil in his heart (Romans 1:18 – 3:20). This biblical doctrine is known as the total depravity of man. None of us is good, not one (Romans 3:9). Obviously, there are degrees to evil for the average person doesn’t leave his home and go out on a mass murdering rampage. However, to act like the shooter is the only one to have evil in his heart or that we are by our nature, better that the shooter is a gross misunderstanding of Scripture. Scripture is quite clear that God alone is good (Mark 10:18). We have all sinned is some way, shape, or form and need forgiveness from a Savior named Jesus who never has.

A few weeks ago, the movie Top Gun: Maverick came out! I have never waited so long for a movie to come out. The main reason I had to wait so long was due to the interruption caused by Covid-19. The original release date was July 12, 2019. Thus all in all, with previews included, I must have waited nearly four years or more for this one movie. I must say the movie was worth the wait! I watched it on IMAX and there wasn’t a dull moment. If F/A-18 E/F Super Hornets can’t get your heart racing and your motor running, I don’t know what can. For many, the movie was a return to the good ole’ movies of the 1980’s. People enjoyed the patriotism exhibitied in the movie as well as the non-wokeness. It is still possible to see a movie that isn’t politically motivated—Thank you Tom Cruise!

However, with the celebration of July 4 around the corner, I do need to point out a warning. Patriotism is a great thing, but as James K.A. Smith has often noted, patriotism can easily slip into a cultural liturgy of its own whereby we end up worshipping our own nation more than we do the God of the nations. In the movie, the F/A-18 pilots on mission must maintain contact with their air traffic control tower so that communications can remain intact and directions can be followed. Perhaps you remember the original Top Gun where the F-16 pilot requested a tower fly-by, was denied, and then directly disobeyed orders, resulting in the commander spilling coffee on himself inside the tower. This was a humorous scene in the movie but acts of disobedience in real-life can often prove disastrous. Actions have consequences, but all actions begin in the heart. This is why Jesus equated murder to hate and adultery to lust (Matthew 5:21-30). The heart is our air traffic control tower. In it, we have the choice to obey God or disobey him. The heart is much more than an internal organ. Rather, the heart comprises all that we are as persons. It includes our mind, will, emotions, and more. Thus, I think it fair for me to say out of my heart that the shooter in Uvalde, TX did not obey God when he acted on his impulse to murder innocent children and that his act was unpatriotic to the core.

We have lots to thank God for this July 4! I still believe the USA is the most blessed nation on earth. However, our hearts remain rotten until we submit them unto the Lord Jesus Christ. Even then, we have much to root out (Romans 12:2; 2 Cor. 10:5). Moving toward Christ-likeness is a never-ending journey this side of heaven and is what I call discipleship. The capacity to accept the Savior and to follow him is what makes life worth the living. Over the centuries, there have been a great number of Americans who have taken up their cross and this is what has truly made America great! I am grateful for soldiers who have sacrificed their life so that I have may have freedom but I am even more grateful for a Savior that has sacrificed his life so that I might have forgiveness. If memory serves me correct, I once came across a coin that said “Stand for the flag” on one side and “Kneel for the cross” on the other. Is this what your heart is telling you?

How will you be celebrating the Fourth this year? America at its heart contains many good things. I’ll be celebrating with family and friends and by watching a baseball game with fireworks to follow. This brings to mind a quote from another famous movie: “They’ll watch the game and it’ll be as if they dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick they’ll have to brush them away from their faces. People will come Ray. The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it’s a part of our past, Ray. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again.” – Terrence Mann in Field of Dreams. If I have time this Fourth, I might even eat some ice cream and apple pie!

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Untold Billions

If you read my last post, some of you may be left with wondering questions. Rather than delve into what is happening at the top levels of Christian leadership in Christian churches, schools, denominations, and institutions, let me summarize these cultural battles as a battle where the sufficiency of Scripture is being fought over. In my own denomination, a fight for the inerrancy of Scripture began taking place a little over forty years ago. This is not where the fight is today. The point of this post and my last post is not to say that these cultural battles are unimportant, but rather to say that the things we are fighting over are secondary to getting the gospel out to the nations.

Cultural restoration is often emphasized as part of the gospel today. “Social” justice is often included in these new definitions of the gospel. I think this adding to the gospel is where many go wrong. People who have been transformed by Jesus and his gospel do in a sense bring about restoration in culture. But, (1) Gospel transformation in one’s life must come first and (2) The culture, though restored in a sense, will never be fully restored or redeemed through a Christian’s best efforts because culture, like Christians, continue to exist in a fallen state. I am not saying here that Christians aren’t saved or that their cultural restoration efforts don’t matter. I’m simply saying the best Christian still sins and our best efforts in restoring culture on earth today continue to leave an imperfect culture. Full restoration for Christians and culture will not come about until the end of this present age when God, in his infinite wisdom and timing, decides to create (or renew) a new heaven and earth and therein give Christians their new resurrected bodies. Then and only then will there be no more crying, dying, or pain.

Until then, obeying the Great Commission is to be the priority of all Christians. We are to be proclaiming the gospel or “good news” of Jesus Christ with our lips and we are to be promoting this same gospel with our lives. At a recent gospel conference, Pastor David Platt ended his platform time by saying to all brothers and sisters in Christ, “We can fight hell for the good of the nations or we can fight each other while the nations go to hell.” Right on! We can continue fighting each others over cultural issues or we can get busy obeying the Great Commission. We do need to face our culture and stand up for truth but we don’t have time to face and fight each other while untold billions go to hell.

Sources vary but the number of people unreached is somewhere in the 2-4 billion range.

It has been said that the central mission in the Great Commission is international missions. A quick survey of the life of Paul and his missionary journeys is enough to justify this statement. Paul was always running about to spread the gospel in regions of the world where the gospel had not been preached. In other words, Paul was all about reaching the unreached. The Joshua Project reports these figures about unreached people groups:

“So how many of the approximately 17,400 ethnic people groups are considered unreached i.e. less than 2% Christ-follower and less than 5% Professing Christian? The latest estimates suggest that approximately 7,400 people groups are considered unreached. That means over 40% of the world’s people groups have no indigenous community of believing Christians able to evangelize the rest of their people group. Over 42% of the world’s population live in these over 7,400 people groups.”

Excuse me! With about half of the world’s population living in unreached territory, wouldn’t a Christian be better served to do everything they can to reach these people with the gospel vs. doing everything they can to win an argument. If your focused on reaching the unreached and might I add reaching the unsaved in our own country, you won’t have time to tweet damaging remarks about other Christian leaders. This is what I meant about putting your mouse down and picking your cross up. Deny yourself, pick up your cross, and go reach “the unreachables” for Jesus.

The Joshua Project goes on to report via International Mission Board statistics that “there is possibly over 3000 ethnic people groups that are not only unreached, but also completely unengaged meaning there is no known active on-site church planting effort underway and few, if any, known believers . . . To say that a people group is unengaged means there are definitely no missionaries, in all likelihood no outreach, no church or fellowship of believers, no Christian materials, and few if any Bibles in these people groups.”

If you are a leader of the next generation, don’t dodge questions about cultural issues. Answer the questions the best you can based off what the Word of God says. The Scriptures are sufficient and contained within are all that is needed for life and godliness in this age! But more than that, make sure you are taking the next generation on mission. For college students, this definitely means taking them around the world. Middle and High school students may or may not have that privilege, but you can definitely take them across country or at least out of state. And children can do all kinds of local missions at home!

This is no time to sit back or to criticize other ministries. Get busy going after the billions and I don’t mean money.

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Don’t qualify if you’re qualified

Just Say No!

As I look into the future, I don’t like what I see. I don’t claim to be a prophet, but common sense tells me Christians are becoming angrier with one another. Whether its Christian schools, churches, or denominations, alliances are being formed and lines are being drawn. Divisions are occurring on a scale the likes I could have never imagined happening in my lifetime. Many students, teachers, and church members won’t understand my critique because what is happening now is happening within the upper echelons of Christian leadership, namely that of pastors, administrators, and presidents.

In an age of social media and the blogosphere, Christian leader after Christian leader are calling out other Christian leaders for things tweeted, written, said, or recorded which they believe are unbiblical. Unfortunately, much of what is reported is a line or two that have been completely taken out of context. Wouldn’t it be better if this type of behavior took place behind closed doors and in a face-to-face meeting? What benefit does it serve to drag the world into circumstances and situations they could care less about? We Christian leaders have not been responsible in the use of platforms given to us on social media and we need to repent. We have not led the way when it comes to showing the world how to love one another on social media and sometimes not even in-person. How can we expect God to send us revival and a spiritual awakening if there is no unity among us at the top? Do we not believe our irreverence will not soon seep down to those under us?

No doubt, we live in challenging times. Totalitarianism is creeping upon us and we have to confront cultural issues such as CRT/I, transgenderism, and women pastors. But how we do this should be of the upmost importance. Here’s the thing: We Christian leaders are not perfect, we live in the same fallen world that you do, and we make many mistakes along the way. This is all the more reason that we ask you that grace be given and forgiveness be offered. The times are complicated and many times we leaders rush to make statements that we just as soon rush to retract.

When we preach or teach, we need to speak to cultural issues only when the Bible speaks to cultural issues. In other words, I am not going out of my way to address “Progressive” Christianity, “Gay” Christianity, or “social” justice unless the passage I am preaching or teaching on somehow relates to these issues. There is a time and a place to address these topics. Blogging and in-person conversations are not a bad place to start, if done correctly. That being the case, let me say that we don’t need to qualify many of the cultural issues we are encountering. We don’t need “social” justice. We need justice. We don’t need “Gay” Christianity or “Progressive” Christianity. We need Christianity. We don’t need critical race theory. We need to critically address the theory. It is a theory, not fact.

I feel all of the above items are worth mentioning, but what concerns me the most is our abdication of the gospel. The gospel is to be our first priority. In capitulating to culture, the gospel gets lost. Sure, you may still preach the gospel, teach the gospel, and share the gospel, but your people are not dumb. They know when you spend more time fighting cultural battles than you do fighting for the gospel. They know when you spend more time defending yourself than you do defending the gospel. Some of the things you do are good, but are they the best?

As we leaders fight one another, the world looks at us and says, “Why should I become a Christian?” As we leaders fight one another, the next generation says, “I think I’ll stay out of church.” As we leaders fight one another, more and more leaders from our own ranks leave us. And might I add that many of these leaders are good leaders. For the sake of the gospel, I say this to every Christian leader: Put down your mouse and pick up your cross.

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Reaching a post-christian generation

Image result for afternoon tea britian

It’s probably been a little over a decade ago now, but I can still remember a man on Christian radio talking about how America was a post-Christian nation. The comment rubbed a lot of Christians the wrong way, but even then, I could understand the sentiment. Any “Christian” country is always a generation away from becoming post-Christian. Europe, particularly England, has served the United States for many years now as an example of what happens when the transition is made.

In doing so, church planters and missionaries to England provide American pastors a template to follow as pastors attempt to reach the next generation on American soil. Perhaps you are one that still doesn’t like that term post-Christian. No problem-let’s just substitute the words “biblically illiterate.” To reach this biblically illiterate generation, you’re going to have to start playing the long game. What I mean by the long game is that it is not only going to take longer for Gen Z to accept Christ into their lives, it is also going to take longer for Gen Z to visit your physical church. That phenomenon was taking place pre-Covid and those who have been working with the next generation for a while can verify the fact.

Playing the long game may or may not be your cup of tea. However, an afternoon with a cuppa (that’s how they say it in England) of tea in one hand and a scone or a crumpet in the other hand is going to require a sit-down occasion with some conversation tossed in. Evangelists in America have long promoted the value of having spiritual conversations with others while at Starbucks. It just happens to be that we prefer coffee and cinnamon rolls on this side of the ocean.

The point is someone is more likely to visit your physical church if they have first attended your neighborhood small group or created an ongoing relationship with you through frequent visits, encounters, and stops at Starbucks. I think the Starbucks dining table is where the sketched diagram of the gospel on a napkin became popular. I am sure you have heard of 3 Circles. Starbucks creates a sense of community and this is what the next generation craves most.

But you already knew all of that! Perhaps what you don’t know, however, is that since so many people in England have never been to a church or may not even know where one is, a strategy called “Bible-talks” has arisen. Call it “God-talks”, “Jesus-talks”, “Faith-talks”, or whatever you like, the key principle is that a group of young people are exposed to stories found in the Bible before they are invited to church.

I have been thinking a lot about what this approach might look like in America. If the screen door to your church is your church’s website or social media feed (where one can first watch the worship service virtually) and your front door is defined as either your physical gathering/worship service(s) on Sunday morning or an in-person small group that meets somewhere throughout the week, then perhaps the step taken in-between the two doors needs to be some kind of digital discipleship group.

I am not referring to a digital discipleship group for believers perse, but rather a digital discipleship group for the unchurched (which includes both Christians and non-Christians). This once-a-week or once-a-month or even once-a-quarter online meeting could be designed to accomplish various goals. One group might meet weekly and discuss a chapter they read out of the book of John. Another larger-sized group might meet once-a-month where a facilitator leads a discussion on topics related to how Christians are perceived by the unchurched (Barna’s list includes “hypocritical, get saved, antihomosexual, sheltered, too political, judgmental”). Finally, a once-a-quarter group meeting could be something as simple as hosting a vocational seminar on Zoom or Facebook where your church brings in Christians from various sectors to speak on work as worship. Gen Z is dying to know how faith and life relates to their work. Talks like these offered by the church, led by a Christian leader, and offered to the next generation can go a long way in breaking down the barriers held between our faith and culture.

Having then tasted some of the Holy Spirit and Christian love coming out of these groups and talks, some of the de-churched, unchurched, and never-churched may just be willing to give your virtual and finally your physical church’s worship service a try. Baseball fans in America know the season is upon them (that is, if MLB doesn’t strike). However, they also know the season and the games themselves are long. New rules have been implemented to speed up the game, but clearing 30 minutes of a 4-hour game isn’t exactly pushing it.

If you like slow and are willing to be patient, you and your church may find yourself soon reaping a large harvest out of the next generation. To stay in the game, you need to remind yourself that God’s Word never returns void and that God himself is longsuffering, not wishing that any should perish (Isaiah 55:11; 2 Peter 3:9). Godspeed and Play Ball!

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Virtually spiritual

Alter Ego' winner Jake Thomsen 'stoked' to work with will.i.am

Holograms, drones, artificial intelligence, gamer-tags . . . these are all part of the world we live in now. In this world, we often distinguish between that which is real and that which is virtual. We use such terms as physical/digital or in-person/online to describe these two different present realities. Our lives are spent and shared in both real space and virtual space.

Your avatar may or may not look or sound like the real you. Your social media profile may or may not be a fabrication of your true self and identity. You may have friends in the real world that you see everyday while at the same time you have friends in the virtual world you’ve never seen a day of your life. You may have money in a brick-and-mortar bank or you may have crypto-currency locked up in a virtual vault.

Our home, work, and third-place lives seemingly alternate in and between these two different realities. Living by all appearances what seems to be alternate lives at times may make you feel like you are two different people. Of course, in the virtual world, you may not even be a person. You may be a fake person, an animal, a robot, or whatever other category your avatar falls under. Under this description, alter-ego wouldn’t even fit the label.

The virtual world has rapidly changed the world as we know it and COVID-19 has done nothing but accelerate that speed of change. Now, what does this all mean for the church? In their book Faith For Exiles, David Kinnaman & Mark Matlock say,

“Speaking of church—that’s different in digital Babylon too. Christians—even those who are very committed—are busier than ever, attend church less frequently, and have many options for socializing outside a faith community. It is not uncommon for people to attend events and services at multiple churches. Faith-based media is so easily accessible and portable that we’ve got a whole class of people whom the early church would have found almost unrecognizable: Christian consumers. Youth group used to serve as a main social outlet for teens and kids, but it is being replaced by sports and social media. The number of hours connecting, learning, and being discipled in a close-knit church community is now a drop of water in the ocean of content pouring out of their screens. Much more could be said, but the point is this: we are on the front end of a digital revolution that is tinkering with what it means to be human. And we ain’t seen nothin’ yet. We are all residents of digital Babylon. We are all exiles now.”

Mind you, the above excerpt was written pre-covid. You may not like or approve of the diagnosis, but you would be hard-pressed to disprove the facts. Is youth group becoming an archaic relic of the past? Is the transgender movement, advances in the field of robotics, and automation itself changing the essence of what it means to be human? All of this talk is kind of scary until you realize one thing: The Bible portrays a world that is spiritual, whether that world is real or virtual. What I am saying is everything you do in the real world is spiritual and everything you do in the virtual world is spiritual. You can escape the real world by going virtual, but you can’t escape the spiritual world because God created you as spirit.

To be human is to have been given a body and a soul-spirit. Since humans were made in the image of God their Creator, humans themselves have been created with the capacity to create. However, not everything that humans create bring glory to God their Creator. Much of what humans have created in the real world and in the virtual world have been found lacking. Whether its a nuclear bomb or an online predator, the world as we know it is not right and is missing something.

Without Jesus, this world has no hope. Without Jesus, man’s spirit will never truly awaken and inside his heart will remain a God-shaped vacuum. Only Christ satisfies in this life, the virtual life, and the life to come. I hope you have met the Savior. If you have, take some time to think about how you can use your God-given creative abilities to worship and praise God. I think what you will find is that you can bring glory to God whether He finds you online or off.

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COME!

Image result for illegal immigrants

I have a song I am going to request that you look up. But, before I make that request, I want you to meditate on The Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20). For centuries, the prevailing notion when it came to The Great Commission was that the apostles and the early church had fulfilled the mandate and it thus no longer applied. Christians didn’t sense a need to obey the Great Commission because they thought it had already been obeyed in full. After all, Jesus commanded the Eleven to reach the known world with the gospel and they did. Case closed — right? Wrong!

Missionary William Carey, father of what’s known as the modern-day missions movement, wrote a dissertation in the 16th century entitled An Enquiry into the Obligation of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathen that restored the idea that the Great Commission is for Christians of every age to obey and fulfill. Rather than getting into the semantics of The Great Commission (the main verb, subordinate participles, different translations, or parsing the Greek), let me just say the main point of the verse is for Christ-followers to be Making Disciples. While there are some who want to argue whether the “GO” in the Great Commission means to intentionally go or means “as you are going,” I prefer to ask, “How good is our going?”

When it comes to missions, part of our going includes giving. However, the statistics on going and giving seem underwhelming to say the least. “Americans have recently spent more money buying Halloween costumes for their pets than the amount given to reach the unreached.” Perhaps, just perhaps, we are not going and giving as much as we think we are. Due to our unwillingness to go, perhaps God has another plan. Don’t get me wrong — when it comes to going, God has no Plan B. The Church is God’s plan to reach the known world. There is no other plan. But if the American Church won’t go to the nations as much as God has called us to, perhaps God is in his sovereignty is allowing the nations to come to us. The question then becomes, will we “GO” to those in our own nation.

Really, we have two choices. We can sit and bemoan the fact that illegal immigrants are crossing our borders by the droves everyday. Or we can get inspired to do what Jesus has called us to do and go reach them for Christ. Maybe you need to take time to go and learn a new language. What if we were discipling in droves rather than complaining in droves? We have not just been unfaithful to obey the Great Commission. We’ve also been unfaithful to leading, planting, and building multi-ethnic churches. If you’ll do a serious study of the early churches in the Epistles, you won’t find a homogenous church. But what you will find is tons and tons of churches made up of Jewish and Gentile believers who have been brought together by the blood of the Lamb. Only Jesus can heal our nation’s wounds. Only Jesus can bring the races together. Only Jesus can inspire us to GO or now GO to those who are coming!

Look up and listen to Neil Diamond’s song They coming to America and get inspired. Immigrants from “all over the world are coming to America” and they “want to be free.” True freedom is found in Christ, not a nation. Immigrants are coming to America and looking for a “home.” This earth is not our home, but Heaven is. Immigrants are “traveling light and are coming in the eye of the storm.” Yes, immigrants are coming and many Americans are upset that they are coming. But, “they coming to America today.” TODAY is the day of salvation! Will you GO? Will you make disciples of the nations in America today?

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Need of the Hour

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In recent posts, I discussed an urgent need of the Church. I stated the Church needs to recommit itself to soul-winning and I even gave an evangelistic method that I think works well in our day and time.

If you are a Pastor, a good place to start for emphasizing the importance of evangelism and for helping your congregation to rediscover a passion for such would be the book of Acts. Most pastors know this as common knowledge. However, what many pastors often miss is that the early church, along with its earliest apostles, were disobedient to the Lord’s command to take the gospel to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the Uttermost parts of the world. As Jews, the apostles and the multitude of disciples were perfectly comfortable with staying home and taking the gospel to Jerusalem. After all, they didn’t have to move (We like our couches). But Samaria??? To those Gentiles???

It was only under persecution (after Stephen was martyred for his faith) that the church was forced to scatter, that Jesus’ disciples became obedient to task of worldwide evangelism. Evangelism is so much more than telling only those you like about Jesus or than telling only those who look and sound like you about Jesus. The narrative in the book of Acts that many pastors either miss or skip over is the narrative that the early churches (read the rest of the NT letters) instantaneously became multi-ethnic congregations because the disciples in Acts finally got on with being Jesus’ witnesses outside of Jerusalem.

To every degree possible, churches should strive to be multi-ethnic, multi-class, and multi-generational. This is what it means to be the church and more importantly, this is what it means to be “in Christ.” Those barriers that used to divide us and those barriers that still divide those “of the world” have been overcome by Jesus. This is what led Peter, who was once a racist himself, to declare that Christians of all color (The Church!) “are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession.” And why? “that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9). Thus, evangelism isn’t a call for one ethnicity to share Jesus with one’s own ethnicity. Rather, sharing Jesus with others (Evangelism) is for all ethnicities to share with all other ethnicities.

Besides rooting out racism and building multiethnic churches, the church has many more needs this hour. At this moment, I will only delineate on a few, and of which I think are most prominent. Having written to pastors, let me now share a word with next generation pastors, leaders, etc. It should come as no surprise to you when you see a surge in gender dysphoria and transgenderism within our nation and church’s children and youth. What are you to do about it?

Just as I encouraged Pastors in this post to start with the book of Acts for highlighting the ministry of evangelism in their churches, I want to encourage you to start with the book of Ephesians for teaching “Identity in Christ” to your students. I am convinced the first thing churches need to teach new believers is what their new identity in Christ is all about. There are many resources available for such an undertaking. However, I want to share a particular resource because it comes at this subject from an angle that most resources do not. In Building a Multiethnic Church, Dr. Derwin Gray approaches “Identity in Christ” from a church perspective and not just an individualistic perspective. Thus, when teaching about how identity in Christ applies to the multiethnic local churches in Ephesus, Dr. Gray says, “We”, not “I”. And this interpretation would have been exactly what Paul had in mind when he wrote to the church of Ephesus (Ephesians 1:1):

-WE ARE SAINTS (EPHESIANS 1:1-2)

-WE ARE BLESSED (EPEHSIANS 1:3)

-WE ARE CHOSEN (EPHESIANS 1:4)

-WE ARE HOLY AND BLAMELESS (EPHESIANS 1:4)

-WE ARE LOVED (EPHESIANS 1:5)

-WE ARE ADOPTED SONS AND DAUGHTERS (EPHESIANS 1:5)

-WE ARE A PEOPLE OF PRAISE (EPHESIANS 1:6)

-WE ARE REDEEMED (EPHESIANS 1:7)

-WE ARE FORGIVEN (EPHESIANS 1:7-10)

-WE HAVE AN INHERITANCE (EPHESIANS 1:11-12)

-WE ARE SEALED AND FILLED WITH GOD THE HOLY SPIRIT (EPHESIANS 1:13-14; 5:18)

-WE ARE POWERFUL IN CHRIST (EPHESIANS 1:15-22)

-WE ARE ALIVE (EPHESIANS 2:1-5)

-WE ARE TROPHIES OF GRACE SEATED IN HEAVEN (EPHESIANS 2:6-7)

-WE ARE GRACED (EPHESIANS 2:8-9)

-WE ARE GOD’S WORKMANSHIP (EPHESIANS 2:10)

-WE ARE BROUGHT NEAR TO CHRIST (EPHESIANS 2:11-13)

-WE ARE A NEW HUMANITY (EPHESIANS 2:14-16)

-WE ARE CITIZENS AND MEMBERS OF GOD’S HOUSEHOLD (EPHESIANS 2:18-20)

-WE ARE GOD’S NEW TEMPLE (EPHESIANS 2:20-22)

Yes, We Are! And may I remind you the “WE” is people of every nation, tribe, and ethnicity, according to the book of Revelation. Peter got it! And Paul, the one formerly known as Saul who overlooked and approved of Stephen’s death, got it! With God’s help, Peter and Paul discovered their new identity. And so too can your students!

Finally, both churches and youth groups need to allow more time for members and students alike to testify of the grace of God in and upon their own life. Testimony time doesn’t have to be just a time to share one’s salvation story. Testimonies can include what God is doing in and with you on a weekly basis!