Category Archives: evangelism

Give the World a Smile

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For about 4 more weeks I’m driving from Lynchburg to UVA for CPE.  It’s about an hour drive each way. Most evenings on the drive back to Lynchburg on Route 29, somewhere around entering Nelson County, there is a man standing in the median on the road.  He stands there most evenings when I drive through.  He stands there and when each car, both 29 northbound and southbound, he will face that car, smile, and wave as if he knows each person that is passing him.

Today, I waved and smiled back.

I don’t know why he does this everyday, though I think it would be interesting to talk to him and find out.  But, what a difference he is making everyday! And he’s doing in a no-budget kind of way.  Something so simple, yet so powerful.

What if our churches were more like this man?  Giving the world that passes them by a smile everyday.

Religious Respect?

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Recently members of the US military personal were caught having burned copies of the Koran, the religious book of the Islamic faith.  President Obama apologized to the Afghan people for this act of disrespect.  There has been a lot of hoopla around this.  Should the President have apologized?

In a recent interview with ABC News, General John Allen, the top U. S. Commander in Afghanistan had the following to say:

“Why wouldn’t we [apologize]?” the general asked. “This is the central word of God for them. Why wouldn’t we? We didn’t do it on purpose but we should apologize and we did.”

I agree with the General.  By apologizing we are saying we respect that this is part of their religion, their belief system.  It may not be mine, or yours, but it deserves to be respected in the same ways we expect others to respect ours.

I think one of the problems we face as a people, not just a Christian-people, is our inability to respect other beliefs.  We are called to love God and to love each other.  Does that not mean we are to respect others’ faith? It’s almost as if we have forgotten our past.

Christian history has told how Christians were disrespected for their faith, and treated poorly for it.  Christian history has told us how Christians disrespected other faiths and treated them poorly for it.

In the Gospel of Luke Jesus, a Jewish man, takes the time to talk with a Samaritan woman.  This was unheard of for various reasons, Jesus was a man talking to a woman.  Jesus was a Jew talking to a Samaritan.  Jesus was a teacher of the Law talking to a known sinner.  Jesus did what Jesus does best – erase the lines of separation.  Jesus didn’t tell the woman all the reasons why she was wrong.  He showed respect, compassion, and love.  And as a result, she believed.

It seems since the beginning of time humanity has used one religion to disrespect another. It was done to the Hebrews and by the Hebrews.  It was done to the early Christians, and it has been done by Christians since.  It has been done to the Muslims and by the Muslims.  When does it end?  Are we in some weird stage of humanity’s life span where we learn nothing from the past?  We just continue in this endless cycle of disrespect of religions?  Is this what God wants?

Burning another religion’s holy book – the equivalent of our Bible – is not out of respect, compassion, or love.  It does not point to a love of God or a love for others.  And telling a President, regardless of political standing, not to apologize is not a sign of respect, compassion, or love.

So, all of this pondering has left me with more questions – go figure.  But, I would love to hear what you think about all this.  Feel free to leave your thoughts or questions below.

Plunder the Egyptians

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Albert Outler, in his Theology in the Wesleyan Spirit, discusses how John Wesley “plundered the Egyptians” in order to communicate the Gospel.  Wesley, whom Outler calls a “folk theologian”, found ways in which to effectively communicate the Gospel to large crowds.

Outler explains that the early church father, Origen coined this metaphor upon reading Exodus 12:28-36.   A metaphor, as Outler explains, “pointing to the freedom that Christians have (by divine allowance) to explore, appraise, and appropriate all the insights and resources of any and all secular culture” (77).

The 20th century theologian Paul Tillich, in his Theology of Culture, suggests that religion and culture need to come together like a fine balanced weaving.  One cannot over power (or over shadow) the other.  A balance between religion and culture is needed, Tillich argues, in order to effectively communicate the gospel.

Kenda Creasy Dean and Ron Foster, in their book The Godbearing Life, suggest that one of the roles of youth ministry today is to translate the gospel.  We can translate  the gospel using elements of culture such as literature (both classic and modern), science, philosophy, flim/television, and technology.   If we do not make the connection between our lives, our world, and the Gospels, then the Gospel will never get translated.

Wesley was known as a man of “just one book”, that book being the Bible.  For Wesley, Scripture was primary.  According to Outler, “It was [Wesley's] profound sense of the Bible as a ‘speaking book’ that gave him his freedom to ‘plunder the Egyptians’ and guided him in the use he made of their treasures” (80).  Wesley lived in the Scriptures. And by doing so, he was able translate the Gospel  he lived in, in an effective way that took the Gospel to places it otherwise may never have gone.

Aren’t we called to do the same?