Sharing the Good News Naturally

This morning, we are continuing our series on organic outreach, how to share the gospel naturally. I, as a pastor, have had many conversations with people in the church where you get the sense that we want to be able to share the good news with people. We just don't know how. And so the idea of this series has been to try and explain some of the urgency and the call that we are given as a church to do this, but also to give some helpful tools, helpful tips on how to be trained and equipped to share the wonderful news of Jesus Christ. And like Brendan's prayed, His death and His resurrection that is so, so good for humanity.

We've seen over the past few weeks a few things. We've seen what motivates us to do our outreach. We've seen that it is tied with a deep love for God. John Piper said, mission exists because the worship of God doesn't. And if we love God so much, if we truly love Him and we want to see Him glorified, we want to get as many people involved in that worship of Him as possible, and therefore, we must reach out.

We must share the gospel so that more people can glorify our God because He is so worthy. We read it again this morning in the Psalms. The Psalmist inevitably says, may the whole earth know. May the whole earth proclaim this, because the whole earth is not big enough for You. And so we are driven by our love for God and then we are also driven by a love for our fellow man.

If we truly love ourselves, as Jesus said, love your neighbour as you love yourself, we love the fact that we're saved. Don't we? We love what Jesus has done for us. And therefore, if we love our fellow men, we would want that for them too. We are driven.

We are driven, motivated to outreach because we love our fellow man. And then we saw that we are to also look at the harvest field to which Christ calls us, and we are to pray for workers to be sent into that harvest field. The third point there sort of follows on that salvation is a work of God. Only God can bring life into a dead heart. And therefore, we must be on our knees praying that the Lord will bring that life into people's hearts.

We are dependent on God to save people, and yet God invites us to pray for more harvest workers, and we are to pray for the heart of those who are lost. And so we've been laying some very important theological foundations into why we must be called into this work of gospel ministry. But this morning, we're going to take it another step further. We're going to look at how this affects our day-to-day life, how it affects our living. We're going to turn to John chapter 17 this morning, which is our text, and we're going to read from verse six.

John chapter 17 from verse six to the end of the chapter. This is a prayer by Jesus to God the Father. Jesus prayed, I have manifested Your name to the people whom You gave Me out of the world. Yours they were and You gave them to Me and they have kept Your word. Now they know that everything that You have given Me is from You.

For I have given them the words that You gave Me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from You and they have believed that You sent Me. I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours. All Mine are Yours and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them. And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world.

And I'm coming to You. Holy Father, keep them in Your name, which You have given Me that they may be one even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in Your name, which You have given Me. I have guarded them and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction that the scripture might be fulfilled. But now I'm coming to You and these things I speak in the world that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves.

I've given them Your word and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that You take them out of the world, but that You keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth.

As You sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake, I consecrate Myself that they also may be sanctified in truth. I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word.

That they may all be one just as You Father are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in us so that the world may believe that You have sent Me. The glory that You have given Me, I have given to them that they may be one even as we are one. I in them and You in Me that they may become perfectly one so that the world may know that You sent Me and loved them even as You loved Me. Father, I desire that they also whom You have given Me may be with me where I am to see My glory that You have given Me because You loved Me before the foundation of the world. Oh, righteous Father, even though the world does not know You, I know You, and these know that You have sent Me.

I made known to them Your name, and I will continue to make it known that the love with which You have loved Me may be in them, and I in them. So far, our reading. I am sure you agree that this is one of the most marvellous passages in the whole of scripture. In context, if you don't remember, if you flick forward a few pages and flick back a few pages, you sort of get a good understanding. That's how the real pastors do it.

We just cheat by looking forward and back in the story, and we get an understanding of where this takes place. This happens a day before Jesus goes to the cross. This is the night before He goes to be crucified. And Jesus, knowing the time of that crucifixion is drawing near and knowing that everything would change after this. Everything would change after this.

He prays for His disciples who will be left behind. But because this prayer is recorded for us, we get a powerful picture of how Jesus saw His disciples and saw the purpose of which they will now enter into in light of the cross. And so from this passage, we as Christians are helped to understand our identity in relation with Jesus Christ and God the Father. I mean, it's hard to miss. Right?

I am in them, them in Me, we in You. It's really you'd have to be pretty thick not to see that this is a relational thing that Jesus is praying about. But there's another aspect here that is perhaps a little less obvious, and that is the disciples' relationship to the world. The disciples' relationship to the world around them. One thing that stands out sharply in this prayer is the distinction that Jesus draws between His people and the world.

Let's have a quick look if you have your Bibles open. Verse six, Jesus prays, I have manifested, I have revealed Your name to the people whom You gave Me out of the world. Verse nine, I am not praying for the world, but for those whom You have given Me. Verse 16, these disciples are not of the world even as I am not of the world.

Verse 23, may they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that You sent Me. So there is a distinction between the world and the disciples, the world and the followers of Jesus that is being made. Again and again throughout the prayer, Jesus is setting up this distinction between those who follow Him and those who don't. Those who believe that He has been sent from God and those who believe He wasn't sent from God. Now what does this mean for us?

What does this mean for the Christian? What is the implication of who Jesus believes us to be? Well, basically, Jesus is saying that we don't belong in this world. Right? We don't fit in quite easily.

This world, in other words, is not our home. The apostle Peter in 1 Peter 2:11 says that we are, in fact, aliens and strangers in this world passing through. Why are we so displaced? Why are we so alien and foreign to this world? Well, it's because the non-believing world and the social structures of this world, the popular psychologies, the current-day ethics do not set our agendas anymore.

They don't rule our minds and our hearts anymore. Christians are displaced. We are distinct from this world because we follow someone else. And He now gives us a new agenda. He defines what our goals in life should be.

Doesn't He? He defines what we should love and who we should love and what we should fear. The agenda is the very word of God. And He says it in verse eight, I have given them the words that You have given Me. This is the agenda.

And this agenda is what restores what God intended humanity to fully be. It is a redemptive word. It's a redemptive agenda restoring people to become what God always wanted them to be. Jesus prays in verse 17, sanctify them in Your truth. Your word is truth.

And this word sanctify means to make holy. And it can also mean to purify. So God's word has taken root in the genuine Christian's heart so that they cannot help but start transforming. Now the agenda from God's word starts resonating within the Christian. It starts working within us so that we may read it and listen to this and we are moved by it.

We can say that is true. Yes. That is true. That makes a difference to my life. What I read here is good.

But then it doesn't even stop there. There's a final glorious step that happens and something that Jesus also mentions in this prayer later on in verse 22. Have a listen to this. Jesus says, the glory, Father, that You have given Me, I have given to them. This is an absolutely staggering statement.

If you stop and think about what Jesus is saying here, this is what Jesus is saying, God's glory enjoyed and celebrated in the intra-Trinitarian glory of the Godhead, of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. The Trinity who beautifully knew and experienced and delighted with one another before the first word of creation was ever spoken. Jesus says, the glory that You gave Me and honoured Me with before the foundations of the earth, I am giving to them. So the Christian, my friends, are partakers of the divine nature itself. We're invited into God's glory.

Paul says in 2 Corinthians 3:18 that the Christian is being transformed from one glory to the other with ever increasing glory. One day, we will be perfectly conformed to that glory. 1 John chapter 3 verse 1 says, beloved, now we are children of God. Now we are children of God and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know this.

We know this, that when He appears, we shall be like Him. All His glory, all His beauty, all His perfection, and somehow we will drink that in. Friends, this would be unbelievable. This would be unbelievable to me if it wasn't in God's word. And if that word didn't set my agenda.

The glory given to Christ, Christ has passed on to us. And so back to the question, why are Christians displaced in this world? Because we belong to someone else. We follow someone else. We are united with Jesus Christ and who He is and what He says has now become the most important thing in all of existence to us.

And so on the one hand, we have a unique identity that sets us apart. And then on the other hand, Jesus is clear that this unique identity is to be lived out in the world around us. This identity is to be lived out before the watching eyes of a watching world. Verse 18, we see that, don't we? Very, very clearly and it's almost as if Jesus is giving Matthew 28 in summary here in verse 18.

As You sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. Just as Jesus, the messenger, the spokesperson, the prophet of God came to reveal the divine plan of salvation through His preaching, through His ministry to people. Something of that mission is now given to the church. Something of that mission is given to the disciples. As You sent Me, so I send them.

Now some Christian authors and thinkers have used the phrase incarnational ministry to talk about this. The idea is that as Christ became man, incarnate meaning in the flesh, to enter the world to speak and communicate on our terms, so God is sending us to incarnate our worlds, to enter into the world around us. Remember in Philippians 2, Paul saying that Christ did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but He emptied Himself, becoming nothing, taking the form of humanity. This is what incarnation is.

Now I want to also point out just for the sake of balance that there are other writers that aren't too comfortable talking about mission with the word incarnation. Because they point out that the incarnation of Christ is utterly unique. It was a unique event only reserved for the Son of God. And if we start using this word in different context, we start confusing things, which is helpful for us to be aware of.

But I think that John 17 is actually alluding to something similar to this incarnation. Verse 18 doesn't simply say, as You sent Me to the world, I send them to the world. The Greek preposition eis, that's the Greek, literally means into. It's important that Christ entered the world. He didn't simply visit.

He didn't set up a holy heavenly kingdom somewhere in Israel and from there sort of give His royal edicts. He didn't set up a temple somewhere that people could come into the holy of holies and hear what He has to say. Christ entered the world. He walked the earth. And now in a similar way, His followers are sent by Him into the world.

But it's a world that is not theirs anymore. Just as this world did not recognise Him. Just as He Himself says, just as He wasn't a part of that world. And so if we are unified with Christ, then this world is different to us, but we are also called to enter into it like He did. And so living incarnational lives simply means following the example of Jesus who goes before us.

To live in such a way that we reveal the message and the power, the love and the grace of Jesus. That we reach out like He did with compassion. That we share Christ's passion for the lost and so also share in Jesus' passion for God's priorities. Now we're going to talk about how that looks like practically soon, but I want to address two quick dangers if we hold onto this incarnational idea. The first is that if we are being in the world, we will be tempted to forget who we are and we will start believing the agenda set by the world again.

Now this is understandable and I think if you've been a Christian longer than five seconds, you know what I mean by this. We have emotions and we have thoughts that we share very much with those around us who don't believe in Jesus. We are human after all, but incarnational living will fail to effectively reach people if people see that we have the same priorities, the same fears, the same desires reflected in our lives as we see in their own. Our words will be empty to them because you're simply dealing with these problems the same way I'm dealing with these problems. You are getting angry in the same way I'm getting angry.

You have anxiety about the same things I have anxiety about. And I use the word problem very intentionally because every human priority is done to solve a problem. What is wealth? What is status? What is influence?

What is the desire for popularity? These are all things we desire and work hard towards in order to solve problems of loneliness, of insecurity, of fear of rejection, of powerlessness. These things we aspire to, you could give anything, any example. They are to solve problems. And so if you fall on one side of the incarnational model of outreach and become too much like the world, you lose all the power for outreach because you are dealing with the problems in the same way as the world does.

And there is a new agenda. There is a hope that cannot be met in any other way than through Jesus Christ. That is what we hold. Now on the other hand, we are also tempted to remove ourselves from the world. That is the flip side of the coin.

And I say you will be tempted because every Christian will have to walk this fine line between the two extremes, the tightrope, because we have an agenda set by a holy God, and because we will see the danger of the futility of the world's thinking now, we will shake our heads at the way people are trying to solve their problems and think how futile. How can they go down that path? And we think to ourselves, I am never going to go down that path again. And we choose to distance ourselves from that. Now additionally, many of us have been hurt very badly once upon a time, perhaps before we were Christians, by going down those paths.

And so very understandably, we want to withdraw from that. But friends, again, we are challenged if we step back from the world because of fear or because we lack a genuine sympathy for the lost, who are trying their best to try and make sense of their world, then we will fail to represent Christ there as well. Our lives lived for Jesus, lived like Jesus, need to be lived before a world in the presence of the world so that they may witness the hope that we have. And so that cliché holds true. We are to be in the world, but not of it.

We are to be in the world, but not of it. Now the aim of the series organic outreach was meant to be practical. And so we've been looking at how to train ourselves as Christians to witness and share the message of Jesus Christ effectively. So I want to give us three ideas. And please write them down or take photos if you can read it on the screen there, and think about them in your context because this will look different for each of us.

But the first thing I think on how to live incarnationally is to make time for people. That is a massive one for us today. One of the things that stands out as you read the gospels is that Jesus was never too busy for the broken and the hurting. On a number of occasions, even when He was tired and looking to get away, His response to people showed He made them a priority. There's so many examples.

We won't go through them, but in Matthew 5, Jesus lands with His boat after being on the Sea of Galilee and He saw a large crowd moving up to catch up with Him. And the Bible says Jesus had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. When Jesus came upon people in need, He acted with compassion, with love, even when it was inconvenient. Remember the story of the lady with the bleeding? And she couldn't stop and it was a serious illness.

And she reached out to Jesus and she touched Him and Jesus stops in His tracks even though He is being mobbed by dozens of people. And He goes and He speaks to her. He wants to communicate with her. To reach out organically. To reach out naturally, which I propose to you is the most effective way of evangelism, is to see your whole life as an opportunity to embody the love of Jesus and tell someone about Him.

And this will mean you make time for people. Time to build those relationships with people who don't know Jesus. Time for dealing with people's needs even when they come by unexpectedly. It takes time to listen to people's struggles. It takes time to build friendships with them.

It takes time before they respect and love you enough to give you permission to speak into their lives. No one will take you seriously if you bust down their door, tell them to repent, to give their lives over to Jesus, and smoke bomb out of there. Now often we think evangelism or outreach is all about talking. It's about what we say, when we say it, how we do that. But actually listening is far more important sometimes.

As we ask questions and we listen carefully to their answers, two things happen. One is that we start building trust with that person. When someone is being listened to, they are far more likely to have you speak to them. The other is that listening and asking questions enables you to bring the good news to bear on their life and their situation in a meaningful way. You understand where they're at.

You understand what they're grappling with. You understand that problem that they're trying to solve. And it will take you just a little bit of thinking how Jesus has solved that problem. So first means making time for people, intentionally building relationships, intentionally listening to where they're at. Secondly, incarnational living means sacrificial living.

One of the things that makes the incarnation of Jesus so amazing, so amazing, is the sacrifice that He went through. If people are going to experience the life, the hope, the love of Jesus through us, then they need to see our willingness to sacrifice our lives. Intentionally connecting with people around us will take some form of sacrifice. It doesn't mean it will be your entire life, but it will mean investing energy that you thought you could otherwise spend on yourself or your family. Loving people can be draining and hard work.

It will mean investing time that you could otherwise spend doing things that might be considered more fun. Time. You invest that. You sacrifice that. Thirdly, it may mean investing money.

Paying for that dinner, shouting, inviting that person over to your place. Money that could otherwise be spent on things again for yourself, for your family. Incarnational living means sacrificial living. But again, the Philippians 2 passage on Jesus' incarnation shows the centrality of sacrifice in entering into the world. Jesus gave up everything, even equality with God to come to Earth to seek and save what was lost.

And so as people that have experienced the blessing of this sacrificial life of Christ and His incarnation, we can and we should be deeply moved in our willingness to sacrifice certain things for the world, for the friends and family we have to whom we've been sent. So I want to warn you here to not be surprised or annoyed when God brings someone across your path that needs time. Someone across your path that needs energy, that needs you to stay up a little bit later than you were hoping to. To put in that extra $50 or whatever that you were thinking of saving for something else. But think of it this way, it'll be an honour to serve them.

It is an honour to God. It brings God the glory when you serve them because it was an honour to be served by Jesus in the first place. And then our third and final point this morning in how we can live incarnationally is to pray with people. And prayer has been a constant theme in this series, but praying with people. When people share a joy or a fear, listen to that.

Concentrate when they're speaking to you. Don't just tell them you'll pray for them and then walk away. Offer to pray for them there. I cannot tell you how powerful this is and yet how simple it is. The reality is, people probably think they aren't cared for.

Why? Because people generally feel that they aren't cared for. But if you pray for them, you share a concern and an intentional love that is quite surprising, that is actually really refreshing. Listen to what their pain or their joy is and ask if you can pray about that. Either with a petition, Lord, please help so-and-so in this situation.

God, please heal so-and-so. God, please protect so-and-so or a thanksgiving. God, I thank you for. And when we offer to pray with people, two things again happen. First, it shows that we care.

People don't believe that we care. Normally, naturally, we think everyone's got their own issues. People are just trying to get by. So this idea of, you know, I'll pray for you is a nice sort of cliché sort of thing and you just move on. My thoughts are with you.

Thoughts and prayers with you. But when you say, I want to pray for you now, something amazing happens and there is this moment where you bring the spiritual into the physical. That's the second thing that's amazing about this. God is no longer now a concept. God is not some philosophical idea that you can sort of debate about and you say, nah.

I don't think there's something that's created us, something out there. But as soon as you pray and have been given permission to pray, this is a god now that I can speak to. This is a God that enters into my life, that knows about my issues now. That's very, very different to think about God in that sort of way. This is why our outreach can be organic.

That's a very natural thing to do. You do not have to be a preacher in order to pray. Jesus lived that incarnational ministry because He was sent by God the Father into the world, and now He sends us back into the world, the world that we were saved out of in order to continue that mission. I want to finish by telling you a story of a man called Damian DeVeuster, affectionately known as Father Damian. He was a Belgian-born Roman Catholic priest who was a missionary to the leper colony in Hawaii at the turn of the nineteenth century.

He's renowned for his ministry to people with leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, who had been placed by the Roman Catholic Church on this government-sanctioned quarantine island called Molokai in Hawaii. Now initially, Father Damian had only accepted to serve there on a short-term basis to provide some help in the dire circumstances of the island. But soon, Damien recognised that the exiles were deeply hurt by the fact that they had been rejected and ostracised by everyone. He realised that if he was to leave or go back, he would just be another man who had turned away to head back to safety and comfort. He also knew that if he was ever to contract the disease, he would die within three to four years.

By God's leading, he felt convicted to remain on that island for the rest of his life. And shortly after this decision, shortly after he made this decision, he led a Sunday mass and he led the sick people there in worship. And then when it came to the sermon, he started with the words, we lepers. Though there was no sign of infection in his body, he considered himself one of them for the purpose of making Jesus known to them. He made his mission his life.

His life his mission. At the age of 49, Father Damien did die of leprosy among the people that he had come to call his own. The Lord may not call us to anything incredible like this international ministry. But friend, He has called you. He is calling you today.

You've been called into the lives of your co-workers, into your playgroup mums and dads. Your café baristas that know that you like a flat white with one sugar to go. Your school friends. And Father Damien went to a place without any hope to bring hope that no disease could ever rob by itself. How could he do that?

Because he had a hope that cannot be taken away, not even in the most forsaken place like the Molokai leper colony. And we have the same hope, friends, in our hearts, the hope of our Saviour, Jesus Christ, who has died for us, who has won the battle for us, who has given us the assurance of forgiveness. And we have this hope in jars of clay to show forth the immeasurable glory of our God who has saved us. We have a work to do, friends. Let's do it.

Let me pray for us. Heavenly Father, we thank You for this wonderful truth that You have given us in Your word. The fact that You are calling us and drawing us, that You have unified us with Yourself, Lord, that we are even in this time sharing in some way the glory that You have known for all eternity. Lord, and we sense that glory even as we worship today, the joy and the peace and the comfort of this great power, this great salvation that we have received. Lord, all our problems have been solved.

And even those problems that cause fear from time to time, Lord, they will fade. They will be resolved in light of Your glorious grace, in light of a perfect eternity. They have been solved. And so, Father, we pray for our friends and our colleagues, our co-workers, our clients, our patients, our baristas, our playgroup mums. Lord, may they hear and see the grace that we have received.

And Father, may we urgently work to invite, to share, to teach, to discuss who You are. Father, help us to make time. Help us to live sacrificially with our time, with our money, with our energy. And, Father, help us to have those moments of listening carefully, being able to pray. Father, even right now, I pray the dangerous prayer that the people sitting here will be given the opportunity to do so even this week, even this week.

And, Lord, help us not to be surprised by that. Help us not to be shy about that, but to take that on as something that You have ordained, something that You have predestined for us to be involved in. We ask this, Lord, by the power and the sanctifying presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Amen.