Our Fifth Journey
Last night was our fifth trip on a Friday night to one of the main bar/nightclub districts in our city. Two men to whom our group spoke clearly were under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and I believe we saw one of them saved last night.
That young man had come to the area looking for something to do and to take his mind off things and saw a banner with Isaiah 55:6-7 on it. This man said he could not read it from the other side of the street and came across to find out what it said. He had a long conversation — more than an hour — with Arnold, one of the brothers with us. He was moved to conviction and weeping, but left with a lightness and joy. Arnold is following up with him.
We’ve been their often enough now that people recognize us. One man talked to me who had seen us in driving rain and sleet two weeks previous and asked how much we were being paid. He remarked as how those of us with what appears to be a true faith have such peace and joy in our convictions. We explained to him that faith is a gift of God (Ephesians 2:8) and that it was given freely, not by works or rituals. I think we planted a seed and we hope to have another divine appointment with him next time.
Prior to our night of witnessing, our dear brother Justin — who each time organizes our mission to this nightclub district — asked us to watch this from John Piper:
Triperspectivalism, Leadership, and Church Planting « Provocations & Pantings
Tim Brister has collected a terrific catalog of links on the triperspective philosophy of ministry based on the three offices of Christ: Prophet, Priest and King:
Triperspectivalism, Leadership, and Church Planting « Provocations & Pantings.
Loving People
Tim Chester’s currently blogging on three keys to effective evangelism: loving Jesus, loving people and living life. Today he writes:
“Some people love the idea of ministry. They like the idea of being a minister or missionary. But they don’t really love people. They don’t make good evangelists!”
I’m reminded of what I heard Albert Mohler say, that we need to love people more than they love their sin.
Read more: Effective evangelism #2: love people « Tim Chester.
Give Them A Shot
My intention on this blog is not to post a bunch of stuff poking fun at other churches, but this video reminded me of the saying, “What you win them with is what you win them to.” When a church tries to be cool enough for the world, inevitably it falls short in the coolness department. And by being of the world instead of in it, it loses its reason for being.
I’m all for a little marketing — that is, making yourself known to your community. But if you want to reach people, how about witnessing to them where they are, rather than leaving a gimmicky tchotchke in an attempt to seem edgy.
And believe me, I’m no fundamentalist; I’m not saying this in any way to be moralistic or legalistic.
What I am saying is this: making yourself out to be just like the world does not advance the Gospel. Appearing edgy doesn’t make you radical; it makes you conformist (as does dressing from the Mark Driscoll collection at Sears.)
We don’t have to be posers. Christianity is the most radical thing ever to hit this planet.
(HT: A Little Leaven)
On point:
“When you listen to the radio, you hear the canned, frozen, processed flutter being dished to the world as the American kind of music. . . . I need substance in my life. And the world needs substance. The world doesn’t need any more hip. Hip is dead. The world doesn’t need any more cool, more clever. The world needs more substantial things. The world needs more greatness.”
Billy Joel, A&E Monthly (HT: Ray Ortlund, Christ is deeper still)
Taking It To The Streets
Last Friday night, four of us from our fellowship and three brothers from other solid churches in town hit the entertainment district of East Avenue and Alexander Street in downtown Rochester, N.Y. for about an hour and a half near midnight. Some of the men have participated in a banner ministry for a while — raising banners with Scripture along busy streets or sidewalks and witnessing to those who stop by.
Our group of four had a banner with Romans 6:23 on it. Two young men took the time to interact with us. One had been raised in a Catholic church and was antagonistic toward the faith. The second wanted to know what “the wages of sin is death” meant and asked, “Don’t we all die?” Both took 10-15 minutes out of their nights to chat.
We plan to return to that area on a regular basis. I plan to post more thoughts on that night and on our future visits.
What do you mean, ‘missional and reformed’?
I’m a member of Evangelical Church of Fairport, a small, independently-organized church which is a member of F.I.R.E. As such, our beliefs are baptistic and essentially reformed or Calvinist.
Our elders have given us a direction to break out of the mold of reformed churches being enclaves of the “frozen chosen” and instead to be a church that is intentionally missional in its approach to our community. As chair of our missions board — and as someone who has felt an intense call to ministry — I’ve been given a pretty large responsibility to help our fellowship at ECF begin organized outreach and evangelism programs to meet our elders’ vision.
I’ve followed church-planting movements that are deliberately missional with great interest, and I hope to one day help plant a church within the city limits of Rochester, N.Y., where I live and of which Fairport, N.Y., is a suburban village. Our challenge at ECF will be to transform an established church into one that is intentionally missional and one that has the same sort of vision that a church plant has.
We’ll see how God leads us in this. We’re going to be about the business of the Great Commission and we have every faith that the Lord will build His church. It is a huge blessing to be a part of this.
This blog will serve three purposes: first, to chronicle the journey as we move forward; second, to share articles and blog posts I find that I believe will be helpful to others; and third, to solicit comments and input on the first two.
Some of the features here are still under construction, but I invite you to come back often and subscribe via RSS if you follow blogs that way by clicking on the RSS icon at the upper right of the top of this page. I’ll be sharing thoughts and updates on a number of things, including street preaching and witnessing last night here in Rochester.