[0:00] Living God, we believe that you enabled the Apostle John to remember this event and then to write the story accurately for us.
[0:22] And I pray now in your mercy and grace that you would draw us into the greater reality to which these words are pointing as never before.
[0:36] For we pray it in Jesus' name and for the greater fame of his name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.
[0:47] Amen. Amen. Amen. Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done. Could this be the Messiah?
[1:02] Her words dance with joy and wonder. Can you hear it as she speaks? Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done.
[1:14] Could this be the Messiah? Amen. To be told everything you have ever done could be very terrifying.
[1:25] Could be told, being told everything you have ever done could generate an explosion of guilt and shame that would crush your spirit and could immobilize you.
[1:41] Yet this unnamed Samaritan woman rejoices in a Jewish man who tells her everything she's ever done.
[1:52] Why? Why? Because the man who told her everything she had ever done treated her with uncommon decency, with incredible dignity.
[2:06] The man even offers her a gift, living water, he called it, a gift she did not immediately understand but which she began to experience even as he talked to her.
[2:20] She felt safe in this man's presence. She felt loved in this man's presence. She felt alive in this man's presence. And she simply had to tell others about him.
[2:32] She wanted everyone else she knows to know him and experience his kind of love. Come and see a man who told me everything I've ever done. Could this be the Messiah?
[2:43] It happens to everyone who authentically encounters Jesus Christ. There is a passion that others know him.
[2:57] You cannot keep him to yourself. Come and see a man who told me everything I've ever done. And they did. And they did. The people of her village did.
[3:10] They came and they saw. And when they came and saw, some came to saving faith in Jesus and confessed him to be the savior of the world.
[3:21] Illustrating what Jesus said to his disciples. Look, the fields are ripe for harvest. The people of this woman's village have been ready to hear and receive the woman's good news.
[3:36] Does Jesus say the same thing about our village, our city, in our time? Yes.
[3:48] I think he does. I think he says it is time to gather fruit for eternal life. Many church historians and mission experts claim that the church in North America has been handed an unprecedented opportunity for evangelism.
[4:09] We are living in what the theologians call a kairos moment. One of those periods of time when the fields are ripe for harvest. They are?
[4:21] Really? Why do the experts make that claim? Because of all the change we are experiencing. Since the collapse of the World Trade Center towers on September 11th of 2001, the world has gone through more change than all the change the world experienced up to that horrific event.
[4:45] I mean, just look at what we have to do now to get on an airplane. Or look at the massive increase in technology. Or look at the changes in national boundaries, some of them freely chosen, some of them being imposed upon people.
[5:02] Or look at the amazing changes in the moral order of our time. The Supreme Court of Canada's recent ruling on physician-assisted dying is just one example.
[5:15] And the hard reality is that there is now no longer any agreed upon basis on which to make moral and ethical decisions.
[5:28] Some days it feels like there is nothing holding it together anymore. As a result, people are, on the whole, restless, rootless, searching for something that both makes sense of life and actually gives life.
[5:49] This is how designer and illustrator Kim Kranz expressed it in the lifestyle section of the Globe and Mail yesterday. People are looking for a connection.
[5:59] People are looking for a connection to something larger than themselves. To something they can't explain. To something that rekindles their sense of wonder about life.
[6:13] A few years before 9-11, Diogenes Allen, who was professor of philosophy at Princeton Seminary, argued that we were on the verge of the greatest opportunity for evangelism the church in the West had ever witnessed.
[6:28] In his book, Christian Belief in the Postmodern World, Dr. Allen argues that the basic presuppositions of Western civilization, those erected during the so-called Enlightenment, were beginning to crumble.
[6:44] This was largely due, says Dr. Allen, to 20th century revolution in science and philosophy, which undermined modernity, birthed by these basic assumptions of the Enlightenment.
[6:57] In particular, Dr. Allen says that philosophers were grappling with the obvious fact that humanity is not as good as the Enlightenment ideology fought and taught.
[7:13] There is an increasing recognition, he wrote, that evil is real and that it cannot be removed by mere education or social reform, nor by military might, I think he would add, post 9-11.
[7:27] The saviors of the 20th century, he said, the gods of science and education, materialism and militarism, have not delivered the promised goods. The gods have not gained an upper hand on poverty and crime and racism and addiction and prejudice and abuse.
[7:43] And the great dream that given enough time and money, we mere human beings could recreate paradise on earth has now been exposed as a painful illusion.
[7:55] Dr. Allen acknowledged that most people in the West were not aware, as scientists and philosophers were and are, that the Enlightenment is a spent force.
[8:06] And he predicted, and this was before 9-11 and all of the turmoil since, that when the dust settled, we will see the fields are ripe for harvest.
[8:20] So, George Hunter III, dean of the E. Stanley Jones School of Evangelism and World Mission can say, the situation we face today is very much like what the apostolic church faced.
[8:32] We are living in a new apostolic age when the church will once again discover the joy of being an apostolic community, a missionary community, an evangelizing community.
[8:46] Now, I know that this word evangelism scares a lot of people. It may scare you. Sadly, the word carries a lot of negative baggage.
[8:59] But the word need not scare us. The word evangelism is built on the word evangel. And evangel means good news.
[9:10] In the first century, there were many people and many movements with their evangelists. The Roman emperors had their evangelists, their good newses.
[9:21] And they sent their evangelists throughout the Roman Empire through their evangelists. To evangelize, therefore, simply means to good news eyes.
[9:34] To evangelize is to share good news, to good news eyes. To tell other people in word and deed the wonderfully good, good news of what the living God has done, is doing, and will do in Jesus of Nazareth.
[9:48] Maybe what will help is to avoid the word evangelize and just use the term good news eyes. Will you say it with me? Good news eyes.
[10:01] Again, please, all of you. Good news eyes. People in our time are dying for good news. Am I right?
[10:13] Dying for good news. Yes, many are suspicious of Christians and the church. And many are angry with Christians and the church.
[10:25] But as sad as that fact is, I submit to you that the suspicion and anger actually are an opportunity for dialogue. Why are you so suspicious?
[10:41] Why are you angry? Why are you angry? How did the church hurt you? Our contemporaries are dying to hear good news.
[10:52] So, I want to be alive in and I want to be sharing good news. So do you. We want to be good newsizers. Right? Right?
[11:06] Right? Right? But how? How do we do it? Answer. Follow the lead of the Samaritan woman.
[11:18] I think she is a model, one of the best models of what it means to good news eyes. She's one of the best models because of her motive and her method.
[11:32] Her motive and her method. Consider first her motive. Why did the woman do it? Answer. Because she could not keep the good news to herself.
[11:48] As simple as that. Because she could not keep what she found to herself. She had received living water. She had drunk living water.
[11:59] Which Jesus says becomes a well in you. Gushing up to eternal life. The woman at the well had become a well. And she could not stop the well from gushing. The water automatically spilled over from within her.
[12:14] The good news simply oozed out of her. She could not keep it to herself. John tells us that after her conversation with Jesus, the woman left her water pot and went into the city.
[12:28] Why? Because in her enthusiasm she was not thinking clearly. Or because she concluded she wouldn't need the water pot anymore. Or because she wanted to leave it to Jesus so he could use it to draw water from the well.
[12:38] Or because she fully intended to come back. As soon as she began to taste this living water, she wanted to share it. And so she left her pot there because she was coming back.
[12:51] And she was bringing with her as many people who would come back with her. She had begun to drink living water and was becoming a well. A well that cannot but gush forth.
[13:02] She could not keep this good news to herself. Once she had beheld the glory of God in the face of Jesus, she had to tell others. Now this is the pattern we see in the rest of the New Testament.
[13:14] People encounter Jesus in some way. Jesus touches them in some life-changing way. And they simply have to tell another human being. In chapter 1 of John's Gospel, Andrew meets Jesus.
[13:28] He immediately goes and finds his brother Simon Peter and brings him to Jesus. Philip meets Jesus and he immediately goes and looks for his friend Nathanael. Philip says, we have found him of whom Moses and the prophets spoke, Jesus of Nazareth.
[13:42] Nathanael responds, can anything good come out of Nazareth? Philip says, come and see. No one who met the man from Galilee could keep it to her or himself.
[13:54] No one. Even those Jesus ordered not to speak of him had to. They simply had to share the healing they'd experienced in him.
[14:07] As I've suggested before, maybe this is one of the best keys to getting the word out in our time. Exhort us not to tell anyone. Maybe Jesus should just say, keep me to yourself.
[14:22] Don't let anyone else know who I am and what I've brought to the world. Keep it to yourself. No way.
[14:34] Living water automatically spills over the walls of the well. Come and see. Come and see a man who told me everything I've done.
[14:46] The point I'm making is this. Good newsizing is not something we crank ourselves up to do.
[14:57] Good newsizing is the natural overflow of being touched by, captured by, and filled with Jesus. Which is why early in my ministry, I think it was about 1978 or so, I decided that I would not, as a pastor, exhort the people of God to do evangelism.
[15:21] You've probably noticed that in the six years I've been with you. I do not exhort the people of God to do evangelism. Yes, we are sent. In the story of John 4, Jesus says, I sent you.
[15:34] Later he will say, as the Father sent me, I sent you. And yes, not to go is to disobey, to be AWOL. Not being involved in some way of getting the good news into our city is disobedience.
[15:47] John Stott rightly called it our guilty silence. So in one sense, it would be wholly appropriate for me and other pastors to exhort us all to do evangelism.
[15:58] But I've not chosen to do that, take that tact. For I'm convinced that if we are alive in Jesus Christ, good newsizing happens naturally.
[16:10] When you drink living water, it springs up and it spills over to others. So if the people of God are not good newsizing, the problem is not disobedience.
[16:25] The problem is the people of God are not filled with the life of Jesus. And the solution is not to exhort us to go. The solution is to exhort us to come.
[16:37] Come and drink and eat and be filled with Jesus. The woman of Samaria was freshly alive in the life of Jesus.
[16:47] And she could not keep the life of Jesus to herself. She simply had to share him with others. And as is the case for us, it was for her.
[16:59] That was a scary thing for her to do. She's an outcast in her village, which is why she comes to Jacob's well at the hottest time of the day. She's not welcome to be there in the cool of the morning or the evening when the cool women come out to draw the water.
[17:12] She takes a big risk to go back to her village and speak to people who are intentionally distancing themselves from her. But she did it because what she found in this man was so good, she would risk losing respect from her contemporaries to share the news.
[17:32] She simply had to tell them, Come see a man who told me everything I've ever done. Could this be the Messiah? Consider now her method.
[17:43] It's so liberating. Simple. It's not something she sat down and wrote out and calculated. Her method flows from her motive.
[17:56] She simply did what her heart was pounding to do. In the woman's method, I see four specific how-to's for good newsizing.
[18:08] First, she simply invited people to take a look. Come and see. She did not shove anything down anyone's throat.
[18:19] She did not try to convert anyone. She simply invited them to take a look. No pressure. No sales job. No hype. Just an invitation. Come and see.
[18:30] She had tasted living water. And she invited other people to taste it too. Or as D.T. Niles of Sri Lanka put it, now changing the imagery. Evangelism is one beggar telling the other beggars where to find the bread.
[18:50] Come and see. Note, not go and see. Not go over there and check him out. But come and see. Come with me and let us check him out together.
[19:03] Now, how can we do this in our time? How can we do this in our city? How can we be an inviting people? Most of us are so busy, we don't even really think about sharing Jesus with other people, and let alone think about how to invite them to do so.
[19:23] Most of us, like our contemporaries, are disconnected from our neighbors and our coworkers. Most of us, like our contemporaries, live fenced in behind our protective walls. So how can we be a more inviting people?
[19:35] Well, one simple way is just pay attention to the people around us. Just pay attention to people. Neighbors, as we cross paths on our way to the garbage can.
[19:49] Cashiers at the grocery store or the bank. People who are standing or sitting next to us on the bus or the train. People in the next cubicle. People just be attentive to the people and the normal flow of life, and we will see and hear this dying for good news.
[20:09] Another simple way is to share a meal with people. Something happens around meals that doesn't happen anywhere else. You agree? There's something magical about meals.
[20:20] And look at Jesus' earthly life. How much redemptive ministry took place around a meal. At a meal, walls slowly come down. Sometimes without noticing, the walls simply melt away.
[20:32] At meals, the deeper issues of the heart begin to surface, most of the time without even intending to. I know of congregations who are encouraging their members to hold good news parties or come and see parties.
[20:47] Two or three disciples get together and plan a meal at one of their homes. They invite five to nine other people to come to this meal, being very upfront that during the meal sometime they're going to share what they found in Jesus.
[20:59] One of the hosts prepares a brief, winsome, creative presentation and then opens the evening for interaction. It's a very non-threatening way to say, come and see. Now the key to such events is listening.
[21:14] Yes, the goal is to share the good news, but the sharing is done in the context of listening. Listening to others' stories.
[21:25] Listening to others' pains and joys and longing and fear. Someone has said, people cannot hear until they have been heard. Or, I'm sure you've heard the line, no one will care to know what you know until they know that you care.
[21:41] So how can we as a gathered community be more inviting? What can we do to let people know they're truly welcome here?
[21:52] What can we do to make the building say, come and see? Hang colorful banners all over the place? Use this new sign more creatively? Or, maybe we ought to create some billboards that are all over the campus with sayings like, tough week, we're here to listen.
[22:11] Or, confused? Let's talk. Or, searching? We found something that might help. Or, lonely? We understand. Come have supper with us.
[22:23] You get the point. How do we in word and deed say, come and see? Second, the woman of Samaria put the spotlight on the person, on Jesus himself. Come see a man, she says.
[22:36] She did not invite people to come and consider a new religion. She did not invite people to consider a new organization. She did not invite people to consider a new program. She invited to consider a person.
[22:48] Come and see a man. This is critical to observe if we're going to be effective good newsizers. Keep the spotlight on Jesus.
[22:59] It's so easy for the issue to become Christianity or the church. Neither is the issue. What is Christianity anyway?
[23:11] It's a relationship with a person. And what is the church anyway? It's a community gathered by and to and around a person. He is the issue. Keep the spotlight on him.
[23:23] Now, as I've engaged contemporaries in our city, I very soon hear an earful of criticism of Christianity and the church.
[23:33] Is that your experience? Folks point to all the awful, sinful things done in the name of Christianity. And I used to defend Christianity and show all the good things done by Christians throughout the ages.
[23:48] And there's a lot. And all the things being done by Christians in our time. Jamie going to Uganda. But I do not do that anymore. I simply confess the sins of the church.
[24:00] I agree with what Parker Palmer recently wrote. If the church cannot engage and support us in our full humanity, it does not have a future nor does it deserve a future.
[24:14] But Jesus does want our full human flourishing. So shift the focus to him. Yes, I agree. We who name his name have blown it many times and we likely will again.
[24:26] And I'm really sorry about that. But Jesus himself never did such things. He never would. What do you make of him? The woman is focused.
[24:38] Come see a man. Because it's all about the man. Third, the woman of Samaria shared her own experience of Jesus. Come see a man who told me everything I've ever done.
[24:49] That is, she told her story, not the whole story. Now, if I had been the one who had the encounter at the well, if I had been the one to run back to the village after the encounter at the well, I would have shared very different aspects of the good news.
[25:08] See, what impresses me about this encounter is that Jesus jumps over all kinds of walls to reach her. He breaks through all kinds of barriers to offer her new life. He jumps over the racial wall.
[25:19] Samaritans despise Jews and Jews despise Samaritans. He jumps over the gender wall. He, a male, talked with her, a female, in public. As John tells us, Jesus' disciples marveled that he was talking with a woman.
[25:34] And Jesus jumped over the sin wall, the sin barrier. The holy one reached out to her, the unholy one. So I would have run back to the village telling the news about Jesus jumping over walls.
[25:47] I guess many of you would have too. Come see a man who overcame every barrier to befriend me. Or, I would have shared the good news about Jesus' gift that he was offering, this living water.
[26:02] Imagine, a kind of water that quenches the deepest longings of the human spirit. A kind of water that becomes a well in those who drink it, springing up to this life that has no end.
[26:13] A kind of water that becomes an ever-present source of satisfaction placed at the core of our being. Come see a man who gave me a drink of life I never thought I could experience.
[26:26] Or, I would have shared the stunning news of Jesus' claim. After the woman hears Jesus talk about worship, though she likes what he says, she says, I'm going to wait until Messiah comes and he will explain everything to us.
[26:43] Jesus responds, I who speak to you am he. Now, literally, Jesus says, I am the one who speaks to you. Yes, I am the Messiah for whom you are waiting.
[26:55] But more, I am, I am, I am. The very words the living God uses in the encounter with Moses at the burning bush. I am. Whoa, who are you? I am.
[27:06] I would have run back to the village with my head shaking in wonder. Actually, I probably would not have been able to run at all. I probably would have fallen at his feet in worship.
[27:18] And then, after recovering from the trauma, the shock, I would have run with all my strength to tell the village, come, see a man who claims to be God.
[27:31] But the woman was telling her story, not mine. And not the whole story. No one can tell the whole story in one little sentence. What touched the Samaritan woman was Jesus' amazing knowledge of her.
[27:46] The man knows my past and yet does not condemn me. The man bestowed on me this wonderful sense of worth. That's what grabbed her and so that is what she shares.
[27:58] This is so liberating as we seek to be good newsizers. We do not know, have to know, everything about Jesus to do this. Just what we ourselves have experienced.
[28:10] The risen Jesus calls us to be his witnesses. Acts 1, 8. Actually, he doesn't call us to be his witnesses. He promises that he'll make us witnesses. A witness is brought into the courtroom to tell only what she or he personally knows.
[28:23] Only what she or he actually heard or saw. The witness does not have to know the whole story. Which means that as we dialogue with our contemporaries, it's perfectly right to say, I do not know.
[28:41] I do not know what Jesus meant by what he said on this text. I don't know why Jesus did what he did on that day. In the ninth chapter of his gospel, John tells about the man Jesus healed who was blind from birth.
[28:57] And because the healing took place on the Sabbath, this poor guy is interrogated at length by the religious authorities who did this. What do you say about him? Give God the glory.
[29:08] We know this man's a sinner. Referring to Jesus, this man's a sinner. And I love how the man responded. Whether he is a sinner or not, I do not know.
[29:20] But, this I do know, whereas I was blind, now I see. Like a Samaritan woman, he simply told his own story of Jesus and his love, not the whole story, just his own.
[29:35] What is your story? Leighton Ford says, we will not be able to keep from telling our stories because we are our stories. At this point in the journey with Jesus, how would you complete the sentence that begins, come see a man who?
[29:51] How would you finish that sentence? Or, what is one thing I do know? Is it, come see a man who relieved the burden of guilt? Is it, come see a man who took away my shame?
[30:06] Is it, come see a man who does not count my sins against me? Is it, come see a man who delivers me from the fires of hell? Is it, come see a man who opens the door to eternal life for me?
[30:19] Is it, come see a man who meets me in my depression and lifts my soul? Is it, come see a man who is giving order to my previously disoriented life?
[30:30] Is it, come see a man who empowers me to forgive those who hurt me? Is it, come see a man who does not abandon me when I go through tough times? Is it, come see a man who freed me from addiction?
[30:43] Is it, come see a man who cleanses me in a way I never thought I could be clean? Is it, come see a man who freed me to walk? For me right now?
[30:54] Come see a man who overcomes evil. Boy, I want the world to know that. Come see a man who takes away my fear of dying.
[31:08] Come see a man who is for us, really for us. Come see a man who is unconditionally and totally for us. Come see a man who seems to get more wonderful as I age and approach my time of departure.
[31:26] Come see a man who commands my destiny. No power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from this man's hand. We simply tell our own stories and let that be enough to point to the Savior of the world.
[31:43] Which brings us to the fourth how-to for good newsizing we learned from the Samaritan woman. She invited her village to consider the implications of her story. Could this be the Messiah?
[31:57] If he's able to tell me everything I ever did, could this be the Messiah? Could this be the one we've been waiting for? Could he? He simply posed the question, what do you think?
[32:09] What do you make of this Jesus? Could he be the one you have been searching for all of your life? I'm convinced that when people begin to entertain those such questions, they're not far from the kingdom of God.
[32:24] Because questions have a way of getting into us and then getting a hold of us. And I think the evangelistic task is fundamentally to pose the question. Could Jesus be the one who heals the hole in the soul of the human species?
[32:44] Could he? Come and see. Did the woman at Samaria, the woman at the well, have any inkling of the privilege she had in saying those words, come and see?
[32:58] For you see, she's not the first one to say them. We've already noticed that Philip said it. But more importantly, before Philip, Jesus is the first person to use those words.
[33:09] To two disciples of John the Baptist who were curious about Jesus, Jesus turned and said, come and see. Come and see. And Jesus' invitation is heard all over the place once we have ears to hear.
[33:23] In the beginning was the word. All things came into being by him. And from the beginning the word has called out, come and see. The very fabric of the universe resonates with the call.
[33:36] And to us, he has given the unspeakable privilege of amplifying that call for people in our time. Come and see.
[33:50] I suggest we do three things right now. And they're in your outline in case you haven't been following that. You can turn to that because I'm going to invite you to write something. I suggest we do three things.
[34:01] First of all, list five people or more, but five people with whom you would like to see someone share the good news before Easter.
[34:15] Notice how I put that. Someone. It may be you. Maybe somebody else. Five people for whom we will pray that someone share the good news with them before Easter.
[34:30] Second, write out the way you finish the sentence. Come see a man who, if you were given a chance this afternoon to complete that sentence, what would you say?
[34:41] I encourage you to write something out. You may write many out. And then third, ask Jesus for a drink. Ask Jesus for another drink of living water.
[34:56] Water that makes us into wells that simply has to spill over into the world. I'll give you a few moments to list, write, and ask, and then we'll entertain some of the questions you've texted to us.
[35:10] Thank you. Thank you.
[35:45] Thank you. Okay. Thank God for the sun.
[36:05] I mean, the sun, but I'm getting so many texts I can't keep up with them. And it's interesting because there's a lot of different questions than from the first service.
[36:17] I'll start with this one. How would you, Darrell, tell the good news about the living water to someone whose world is falling apart, someone who's experienced something tragic?
[36:34] Maybe even someone who's like a Muslim that doesn't necessarily subscribe to who Jesus Christ says he is. How would you tell that person the good news?
[36:45] It depends on what they've told me beforehand. It depends upon how much of the story I know and how much of the story they've invited me to. So let's say, which one do you want me to take?
[36:58] The person who's going through a tragic thing or the person who's a Muslim? Let's, okay, let's, either one, well, they're different. But either one, this is how I do it.
[37:13] May I say something to you? There is someone who knows what you're going through.
[37:25] And he knows it all. And he has offered himself to be present to you. I can't promise you what he'll do, but he'll be present and he'll give his very self to you.
[37:37] And he has the capacity to do something about this circumstance. To a Muslim, thank you for asking the question about Jesus.
[37:47] Thank you. Your faith even speaks of Jesus. Thank you. If I may, again, now it depends upon how much this person's told me, may I just tell you that this Jesus is more than we know.
[38:03] And he offers to us more than a new law. He offers to us more than a new movement.
[38:14] He offers us life. And this life is variously spoken of as water and bread and light. And I just wonder if this isn't what you've been searching for in Isa.
[38:28] Something like that. Then who knows where it goes. Sure. Then you have to listen real hard. This is related.
[38:39] There are multiple people who have written that said they've been a Christian and professed Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior for many years, but they don't feel alive in Christ. They don't know how to know him personally or how to be filled with him.
[38:54] What do they do? Come to First Baptist. No. No. No. Again, I would need to know a little bit more. My hunch would be twofold.
[39:06] One could be, and this happens to all of us. We come to Christ, begin to experience his life, and then we get caught up in all of the activities with it. Especially in church leadership.
[39:17] I have to watch this for members of the mats and CLT. I'm watching for you, Nelson, when you come on to CLT. You get so busy doing the things of the church.
[39:27] And slowly but surely, we're not at the well anymore. So I'd want to find out that and encourage people just to go back to that. The other thing I would want to explore and have done many times is often someone has experienced some pain either with the church or a sense of disappointment that Jesus didn't deliver in the way that they thought he would.
[39:50] So I'd want to explore that. And then to then open that up and say, let's give him another chance. Let's see if he can bring some healing to this wound and break through some of this disappointment or anger or pain.
[40:06] You have time for a couple more? I think we've got a couple. Yeah, we can do two more. There's some really good questions. One is... And we're going to try to answer some of those on the website, right? Yes, correct.
[40:16] Don't people have to know about their sin in order to understand grace, in order to appreciate Jesus? Are you just promoting attraction in doing this rather than the truth?
[40:28] Am I promoting attraction? Attraction over promotion is what the person said. But I think they mean, if I understand them right, are you just trying to attract them rather than point out the gravity of their, maybe their life or their situation?
[40:43] That's a really good question. And there are different movements that come at that differently and all kinds... tons of books about that right now. It's hard to speak personally. I won't tell the whole story.
[40:54] I'll just tell my story. This is what I operate with. Every human being has been made by Jesus Christ. And I think every human being knows their sin.
[41:05] I don't have to tell them. I just need to let them know there's somebody who's done something about that. Even the most arrogant person, when they're alone, just knows this isn't right.
[41:21] Something's off. Sometimes the Spirit will lead you to tell them. But most of the time they just know. So my posture has been to say, I've got good news for you. The Holy Spirit will do the...
[41:34] Well, John 16. The Spirit's job is to convict, not mine. He'll do that. And if a person is already open to a dialogue with Jesus, I know a lot's already happened.
[41:45] They've come a long, long way. And the field's ripe for grace. Okay. Thank you.
[41:55] What about a person who used to be a Christian who drank the water but got burned by the church? How do you encourage them to come back to the water? And as we know, that's a lot of people have experienced that.
[42:11] It's similar to the second question you raised. Well, if the person wants to have dialogue with me or with us, I would say, let's talk about that getting burned experience.
[42:23] And my experience has been, when people tell me these stories of how they got burned with the church, my first response is to say, I am so sorry because that is not the church of Jesus Christ.
[42:39] That's a perversion of the church. And I'm sorry you experienced that. And if you'll give us a chance, we'll try to do it differently. I can't promise you that we'll do it perfectly. And let's talk about that. And people will.
[42:49] And then pray through it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sadly, that happens. All right. You have time for one more?
[43:03] Do they have time for one more? Yeah. Okay. Should we do one more? Just one more? All right. So often on social media, Christians, the church, and God are being attacked.
[43:14] How can we give this message of come and see in these instances? Oh, boy.
[43:25] The church does get attacked. And especially this word evangelical. And that's sad because evangelical means full of a gospel. The problem is many of us evangelicals have filled that word gospel with moralism, with duty, with condemnation, with judgment.
[43:44] And sadly, that's what people are picking up on. So it's going to require conversation to help somebody. I'd love to meet with newscasters. Just say, can I just give you a different perspective on what evangelical means and point you to some situations where there is healthy evangelicalism.
[43:59] So I think that's what we're... Let's fill that... Well, maybe give up the word. But if we're going to keep the word, let's fill it with gospel.
[44:11] So people begin to experience this differently. How does the question end? I lost it as I started talking. You probably can't. It's on the... I can't read your writing. But I can.
[44:23] Yeah, but you can. That's why you type your memos to the staff as an executive minister. Okay. Exactly. So the last question. What about Ephesians 4, where some of us are called to be apostles, some of us are called to be evangelists.
[44:39] What if we're an introvert? And then what if we try and do this and we say, come, come to Jesus and nobody follows? We're out of time.
[44:54] Very good questions. I'm an introvert. I'm an introvert. So I can answer that. I've never been comfortable.
[45:05] When you go to missions conferences and you're hammered away. Holy moly. You've heard me speak of this often. That's why I've adopted. That's why I've adopted. You've heard me speak of this often.
[45:17] That's why I've adopted. You've heard me speak of this often. That's why I've adopted the posture. Listen. Introverts know how to do this. So I enter into a relationship at our strata on the train.
[45:31] I know most of the people in these markets around here. And my posture is, listen. And I'm waiting for the opportunity when I can give an account for the hope that is in me, says Peter.
[45:43] And then it's, come see. I think I have good news for you. So I wait. And I think we all have to wait. You can't force this. But the text is saying that the fields are ripe.
[45:56] The Spirit is creating these opportunities more than we know. And if we wait and listen, we'll have them. So that's how an introvert does it. Now, yeah, it's painful when someone dismisses you and says awful words about you or about the Savior.
[46:16] But I've learned to live with the fact that somebody walks away from me just dismissing it, you know, kind of this way. All of this is because Jesus already got under their skin and they don't know what to do with it.
[46:28] Just give it time. The Spirit will bring them. Anyway, that's my posture. Grace, you want to come and lead us in our closing song? Okay.
[46:39] Okay. Okay. Thank you.