Featured How would you reach these people?

Including, quite probably, in our churches.

 

Some years ago there was a group in San Diego who believed they were the only "true church" and all other churches were apostate and serving Satan. They would picket churches with signs that contained statements to that effect.

It was August, in San Diego. The temperature was over 100 degrees in the shade, and there was no shade. There were about 10 picketers, and after Sunday School they were looking pretty beaten down by the heat.

My lead deacon came to me and asked what we should do. I suggested we set up a portable canopy, put out some chairs to sit in the shade of the canopy, and provide a cooler full of ice and bottles of water.

He laughed and said, "Good idea." He grabbed the church secretary and had her print up a bunch of labels on our label maker which said, "Galatians 6:10 As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith."

When we finished the morning service and went outside we noticed they were all gone. When some of the deacons went out to get the canopy and chairs we noticed a note tucked under the cooler. "Thank you for your kindness. We apologize for our wrong assumption. May God richly bless your ministry."

Sort of the Christian version of "Kill them with kindness."

 

How do you know that? Can you see everyone's hearts?

 

The force is strong with this one

 

He never does. He just accuses you of being a detractor. LOL!

 

Try Post # 17

 

It’s a difficult issue with two problematic extremes (positions that I believe are often reactions against the other). We have some churches and Christians who would accept the lifestyle as normal while viewing its rejecters as intolerant bigots. They ultimately stifle the gospel by allowing sin into the assembly. There are others who preach against the lifestyle to a worldly audience. These stifle the gospel by replacing it with condemnation.

I agree that Southern Baptists (and, more broadly, conservative evangelicals) often fail in dealing with this sin. Had I to choose this failure as opposed to acceptance of the sin, I would. But that does not mean we Southern Baptists have done a good job in this area.

Part of the issue is that Scripture never separates the sin from the sinner. Sins are manifestations of a deeper problem with the person. There are many Southern Baptists who look upon this lifestyle as no more or less than any other sin – and this divorced from the person doing the sinning. The Bible, however, presents sexual immorality as a more depraved sinfulness with this lifestyle as the product of degrading passions. Sinners seek the dark because they do not want their sinful deeds exposed. A thief does not uphold his thievery for the world to see. Neither does a murderer, or a liar. But this lifestyle is presented as a digression of sin to the point that those who practice these things not only have a sense of pride in their sin but they also encourage it as normal.

A church should never invite sin into its assembly. Biblically, the congregation does not invite sinners (here, I mean the lost) into the assembly but rather goes out to witness and gathers for nourishment. So churches should take a very hard stand on sin, and on this lifestyle, within the church. But churches also need to stop expecting the lost to act as if they were saved.

 

The problem with many of those tracts (and increasingly with WOTM's evangelistic model) is that it assumes the lost are culturally Christian when so many reject even the fundamental basis of deistic faith.

More than ever I think that we need to move from things like WOTM and simply witness in a biblical manner by communicating the gospel message.