Posts Tagged ‘witnessing’

Showing Beats Telling Every Time

April 4, 2016

I picked up the morning paper and immediately saw articles about problems caused in people because of drugs. Overdoses among those released from prison are proportionately high. Locking people in prison for using drugs had essentially no effect.

There are many other stories about what drugs and addictions do to people daily in every news source.

There are other things that people do that destroy their lives–physically, emotionally, relationally. We know about them. We see them. We read ancient texts that describe them. It’s not a new phenomena.

Yet, what have followers of Jesus really done about it?

Do we point fingers and preach (telling) about how bad those things are?

Do we support locking people away in prisons or other institutions? Anything to get them off the streets and away from our sight?

Helping people after they’ve gone far down the wrong road is exceedingly difficult. There are people who do that. They should be celebrated as heroes. (How about that media? Celebrating people who help rather than loud-mouthed politicians? Maybe that would solve a few things?)

What about before they get so far down that road?

I wrote Friday about repentance. Turning away from the road you’re on and going down a different one. About how Matthew says Jesus began his ministry the same way–preaching repentance.

However, Jesus did it differently than John. Reading at the end of Matthew’s report, Jesus leaves his followers (us) the “Great Commission”. I love the way Jon Swanson approaches his writing. I wish I could be like him. But I guess I’m more like me. Today, Jon paraphrased that passage:

“Make more followers of me the same way I made followers of me. Spend time with people, showing them how you live. When you do, make sure that you are choosing to spend some of that time with every class of people. The kind you fit with, and the kind you don’t.”

What if we (including me…and you) did more of this when we can reach people before they get too far down that road?

I’ve always liked the heart of American liberalism more than that of American conservatives. The emphasis on helping people. However, they picked up some ideas in the early 20th century from Europe about using the power of government to help. Governments really can’t solve all problems.

Who can help? Who can solve the problems?

Well, Jesus of course. But not miraculously by some lightning strike from the sky, but through his followers. Who show people how to live and save them one person at a time. And one at a time until we reach every single living person. Isn’t that what we were commissioned to do when we signed up?

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A Teaching Moment Missed

September 28, 2015

He did something kind for the harried server at the busy family restaurant.

She said, “Thank you.”

Later, one of the man’s companions said, “Just what was that ‘thank you’ from the server? Why should you care. I don’t care anything about her.”

A second companion agreed. Then the next. And the next. Until it was five wondering why care about the server.

Jesus said, “And the second [commandment] is like the first, you shall love your neighbor.”

This was a group of people who, if you asked them, would profess to be Christians. 

Yet…

I get the feeling that they are more similar to the Pharisees than to Jesus. Religious rules. Care more for themselves than for others.

That feeling is almost a national crisis. I think it is the underlying cause of our political divisiveness. It does not matter which end of the spectrum you find yourself. So often it seems that people are more interested in themselves than in others.

I self-identify as “liberal” because of the peace and justice movements of the 50s and 60s. But that isn’t “liberal” any longer. Big city people tell me I’m conservative (because I’m personally conservative in finances and ethics). But I do not self-identify with those people either. 

But, I digress.

Was that a teaching moment?

Jesus would have answered. He’d have had a cute story with a sharp point. It would have left them thinking. Sometimes people were converted because of his stories. Sometimes they went away sad.

In my case (being the man in the story), the big pitch came across the plate, and I whiffed.

Do we let teaching moments slide by because we don’t wish to seem obnoxious? Or, we seek to avoid confrontation or bad scenes? Or, because we give up and believe that people so focused on themselves can not be brought to an understanding of others?

Or–just a lack of courage?

There was a teaching moment to try to get people with Jesus in their heads to Jesus in their hearts. And I failed Jesus.

Maybe not the next time.

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