Speak the Truth Boldly
Tom Shrader argues that making the invisible God visible and speaking the truth boldly are inseparable callings — failing at either makes a believer a hypocrite or a coward. Drawing from Matthew 5:16, 2 Corinthians 5, and the early sermons in Acts, he builds the case that every Christian is a missionary sent to their own neighborhood, workplace, and community. He closes by identifying two communication barriers — the curse of knowledge and feature creep — that prevent believers from clearly sharing the gospel with people who have never heard it.
“God's got a plan to bring His message of redemption to the world, and that plan is to use you.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Tools for Finishing Strong
Recorded: 2007 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 46 min
Themes: evangelism, boldness, truth telling, witnessing, salt and light, missions, courage, sharing faith, afraid to share faith, new believer, feeling like a hypocrite, coworker evangelism, neighbor outreach, young adult, everyday missionary, struggling with courage
Scripture: Matthew 5:13, Matthew 5:14, Matthew 5:16, Romans 1:16, Romans 1:18-21, 2 Corinthians 5:17-20, 1 Corinthians 15:1-8, Acts 2:32, Acts 3:12, Acts 4:1-2, Acts 4:8-10
Theological Themes: missiology, great commission, incarnational witness, soteriology, ambassador, sanctification, biblical witness, proclamation
Full Transcript
Think Locally: Every Believer Is a Missionary
Open your Bibles to Matthew chapter five, verse sixteen. That will continue our journey through what has now been eight or nine weeks. I did not know this series was going to be this long. I thought — I told you last time we were together — that I would wrap this up today, but that is not true. It is going to go at least one more week, and it is not because I do not know what I am doing, although that may be part of it. It is simply that this thing keeps getting bigger and bigger, and I would think for you all that would be a good thing. When something is big and exciting and real and alive to me, hopefully I can bring it to you.
Chuck Holmes came by my office this morning, and I said, I do not know — this is so big and clear in my mind, and whether it gets communicated to you or not, I do not know. I hope that it does. I prepared and studied and I am ready, so let us take a second and invite God to take this and use it.
*Father, thank you for Your word and this truth. You have called us to live a distinctive life, and You have called us to be salt and light right here. We pray that we are faithful to that. I am so excited by this message and what You are saying, and it is so clear to me, but I have learned that that does not mean it will be clearly communicated. So God, I pray that You would give me clarity of thought and the right words to speak in the right manner, and that all those things I say that are garbled and not right — that Your Spirit would take them and correct them, fix them, and apply them to our ears so that we can hear, and into our hearts so that our life is transformed and changed. We pray these things to You in Jesus' name.*
Last week, Mike did a wonderful job of taking your horizons and expanding them, giving you a global perspective. The World Ministry Team transformed the campus, and although I was not here, all I heard were wonderful things all week — how exciting it was, how relevant it was, how encouraging it was. If I were to summarize it, Mike was saying: think globally. I want to continue that today, but I want to flip it around and say: think locally. My premise is really simple — every one of us is a missionary, called by God to minister to the world we find ourselves in. That is the point I want to make to you today.
Salt and Light: The Foundation
We began this whole journey last summer when I spent a great deal of time in Matthew chapter five, verse sixteen, and the surrounding verses. Look at verse thirteen: *"You are the salt of the earth."* We have talked about what that means. Verse fourteen: *"You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel basket, but they put it on a lamp stand, so it gives light to all who are in the house."* So you are the salt of the earth and you are the light of the world. The logical extension of that is verse sixteen: *"Let your light shine before men in such a way that they see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven."*
I have spent hours and hours thinking about that verse, praying about it, and studying it, but even now after all that study, I am essentially back where I started. There are really two parts here. God is saying in His word, first of all, let your light shine in such a way that men see your good works. In other words, your life is to be distinctively different. There is something visibly unique about you — about the way you live, the way you operate your business, your family, your life in general. In short, as we have said throughout this series: you are to make the invisible God visible. They see God working through you.
Then He says, let them glorify your Father who is in heaven. They see your good works, and they glorify your Father in heaven. The point we have made is this: they will not do that naturally. That is not something that happens on its own. They will see something distinct and different about you, and their tendency will be to praise you. We will look at a great example of that a little later this morning. Their tendency will be to say, "You are really something special. There is something great about you. How did you get this way? Are you just wired that way? Is that your temperament?" At that point, what we have to do is direct them toward God. Once they see these good works, we must point their praise and glory to Him.
Two Inseparable Principles
So here is what we do: we make the invisible God visible, and then the second step is we speak the truth boldly. This whole series has come full circle. That is where we started, and that is where we are going to end — this week and next. These two principles are inseparable.
If you let them see your good works, if you make the invisible God visible, but you fail to speak the truth boldly — you fail to direct their praise and glory to God — then what you are is a coward. You made the invisible God visible, but you would not speak. On the other hand, if you speak the truth boldly but you have not made the invisible God visible, you are a hypocrite. No one I know says, "I want to be a hypocrite," or "I want to be a coward." Everyone wants to be somebody used by God, and here is what He says: you have to take these two things and put them together. You cannot separate them.
You let your light shine in such a way that it is distinct, it is unique, it is different. They see it. You capture their attention. They want to know what it is about you. And you say, "It is not me — it is the Christ who lives in me." I want to drive this home, so I am going to give you three illustrations — two of them positive, and one or two of them —
Two Personal Failures
Let me begin with two stories from my own life — one where I was a coward, and one where I was a hypocrite.
The coward story first. I had a friend I had known almost all my life. We went to kindergarten together, grade school together, high school together. He was contemplating moving down here from back home, and he called me about it. I said I would love to have him come down, and in fact he could even stay with us while he looked around. So we arranged that, and this was years ago.
The last evening he and I decided to go to an ASU football game — the old days, when it was forty-two to nothing by halftime or something. We watched the first half and then went to dinner. We were eating our salad when he said, "Tom, there's something different about you." I had made the invisible God visible. And I said, "Well, I've lost a little weight." At this moment you're probably saying, "Well, how fat was the old boy?"
Dinner came, and we were eating when he said, "Tom, I know I said this before, but there's something really different about you." I gave a vague answer. We were eating dessert when he said for the third time, "Tom, there's something different about you. I know you. I grew up with you. I know what you're like. I've known you all the way up until you were twenty-two or twenty-three or twenty-four. I've been in the house. I've seen you with the girls. I've seen you with Susan. I've watched you. You are very different than you used to be — there's something distinct and different about you." And I looked him right in the eye and said, "Living in Arizona really agrees with me." After my third denial, you could hear a rooster crowing echoing throughout the restaurant.
Do you see what happened? He had made the invisible God visible. This little light of mine — he saw something different, something unique, a new creature. But when it was time to speak the truth boldly, I caved.
The Hypocrite Story
I give you the other story because I have failed in the opposite direction as well. God saved me in March of 1980, and in June or July of that same year — so I had been a Christian four or five months — I saw in the sports page that on Friday they were having nickel beer and quarter hot dog day at Prescott Downs. Some of you may not know what Prescott Downs is — that is the racetrack up in Prescott, since it gets a little warm for horses down here.
So I saw the paper, called an old friend, and we had our administrative assistant drive us up there. I had a lot of quarter hot dogs and an awful lot of nickel beer. On the way home, driving back toward Phoenix, we stopped at the Circle K and Dairy Queen at the edge of Prescott — in those days, if you missed those, you didn't get anything until you reached Phoenix. I was in the back seat, our gal was driving, and my friend was in the front seat. We got to Dunlap and the freeway, and I said, "Jesus Christ has changed my life." He looked around and said, "You look like the same blank-and-drunk to me."
I had spoken the truth boldly, but I had not made the invisible God visible. You cannot separate these two things. You are a coward or a hypocrite. That is exactly what Matthew 5:16 is all about — make the invisible God visible, and then they will have to glorify the Father.
Making the Invisible God Visible
I had a friend who had been through an awful lot in his life — business issues, a divorce, sickness, and he was dying. Another mutual friend went to visit him in the hospital and said, "I don't know how you do this. I don't know how you can put up with all these things you've had in your life, and now the sickness, and you're probably going to die." He did, in fact, die. The visiting friend kept saying, "There's something really incredible about you." And my friend said, "No, it's not me. Jesus Christ saved my life, and when He saved my life, He changed my life."
Do you see that? Make the invisible God visible — speak the truth boldly. We have spent five, six, seven weeks talking about making the invisible God visible. Today I want to shift the spotlight to the second part of this: speaking the truth boldly.
Turning to Romans and Acts
We are going to make a few turns today. In Romans chapter 1 — Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans — Paul is beginning to write his blanket indictment of mankind. Verses 18 through 21 are very familiar: he talks about how God has made Himself obvious and evident through creation. All you have to do is look around — look at the order, look at the stars, the moon, the planets, the human body itself speaks of the Creator.
I was talking with a friend this week, and they mentioned they had gone to hear someone preach. They had brought new believers and some people who had been around a while, and they said it was very distracting because the speaker was jumping from passage to passage to passage. I know what that is like, and I consciously make an effort to work from at most two primary passages, referencing others along the way. Today and next week are really an exception to that — we are going to hang a great deal around the book of Acts, and we will spend significant time there and in First and Second Corinthians. But we begin in Romans chapter 1, just before Paul launches into his indictment of mankind.
The Gospel: God's Power for Salvation
Paul writes this, Romans chapter 1, verse 16: "I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, also to the Greek." It is a strange way that he phrases that. He says, "I am not ashamed." Why might somebody think that he would be ashamed?
At this point in time, Paul has been beaten, smuggled out of town, incarcerated, laughed at, humiliated, ridiculed, and stoned — meaning people tried to kill him. And he said, you can bring all that on, just bring it on. None of that — not the criticism, the ridicule, persecution, physical or emotional or relational — none of that is going to make me ashamed of the gospel.
I am proud of the gospel. Why? Because it is the power of God for salvation. It is the power by which God saves — better words perhaps in translation — delivers or rescues. The gospel is God delivering or rescuing us from our lostness, from our ignorance, from our spiritual condition, from our sin, from false religion, and ultimately from His wrath.
I preach the gospel boldly because it is the only way by which God can take us from death to life, from darkness to light, from danger to security. What I want to talk about today is the message itself. If we are to speak the truth boldly, what is it that we are to declare boldly? Today is the message — this thing that Paul calls the gospel, the power for salvation.
The Message of Reconciliation
Turning to 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 17: "If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature, the old things have passed away, behold the new things have come." Then verse 18: "Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and then He gave us the ministry of reconciliation."
Here is the message. The message is that God reconciled us to Himself, the vehicle for that reconciliation was Jesus Christ, and now He says, "I have given you the ministry of reconciliation." Verse 19 continues: "that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation."
Because that is true, verse 20 follows: therefore we are ambassadors for Christ. This is the message we carry — a life that has been changed and a message of reconciliation, a life that has been transformed and a message of transformation.
You Are a Missionary
Last week, Mike got us thinking globally, and we do not want to change that. God is doing incredible things around the world. He is using some people from here — some who are going directly, some who are part of a sending team — and He is using millions of other Christians around the world.
When I hear the word "missionary," I tend to think of a foreign land. I think of shots, a passport, a visa. I think of a language barrier. When Patrick and Alicia Havens and their family go to Morocco, one of the things they have to navigate is that they do not speak the language. There is also a cultural barrier — a certain way to dress and act, and even when you learn the language, there are certain things you say and certain times you do not say them.
I also associate missions with a huge cost. Most people, when they are around missionaries, are in awe of them — primarily because the missionaries are doing something they were called to do, and the onlooker was not called to do it. When you try to envision yourself doing something you were not called to do, you think it would be really hard. I look at somebody doing something they are called to do, but since I am not called to do it, I find myself thinking, "I don't know how you do that."
Beyond the awe, I see people willing to take a huge risk. I see people who are genuinely serious about their faith. You do not move from here to somewhere else, leave family and friends behind, without a significant sacrifice — and that says something about how seriously these people hold their faith.
Here is the point. Here is what you need to get today: if you are a Christian, you are a missionary. I know there are some precise terms that some might object to at this point, but I do not object. If you are a Christian, you are a missionary. Most of you — many of you, almost all of you — are going to be missionaries right here. You are a missionary to Gilbert, or Queen Creek, or Mesa, or Chandler, or Phoenix, or the Valley of the Sun.
Ambassadors in a Foreign Land
Peter says we are aliens in a foreign land. Paul says our citizenship is not really here but in heaven. Therefore, what Paul says here makes total sense: you are an ambassador. You are an ambassador for Christ. You are a missionary.
You are to live your life in a specific way that this community is impacted by your existence. The fact that you are a follower of Christ and a resident of Gilbert means that this city is better off because you are here. You bring to it a life that has been changed and a message of reconciliation. You bring a life that has been transformed and a message of transformation. You simply begin to live like a Christian, and all of a sudden you impact your mission field.
Nothing about this is new. This is how God planned to work from the very beginning. God's plan is to have us understand that we have been reconciled to Him through Christ, and that we therefore have a ministry of reconciliation. There is no plan B. This is how He works. One of the early church historians was commenting on church growth...
Informal Missionaries
The church was expanding. Just a handful of rebels, and now there was a movement. Here is what one historian wrote: the feat of Christianity was accomplished by means of informal missionaries. People living their lives. This thing just began to grow. How does the church expand? People are informal missionaries. They come into a dark world and bring light to it. They come into a world that is dead and bring life. They come into a world that feels very precarious and dangerous and bring security through their message.
Edward Gibbon, in his book *The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire*, writing about the early church, puts it this way: "It became the most sacred duty of a new convert to diffuse among his friends and neighbors the blessing he had received." In other words, I have been reconciled to God through Christ, and now I go and take that to my friends and my neighbors.
When we use the word missionary, I want you to understand that, just like those early believers, you are in a foreign land. Your residency is not here. Your citizenship is in heaven. The people around you speak a language that is oftentimes very different from yours. They have a culture that is very different from yours.
The Cost of Living for Others
There are huge costs associated with being a missionary. The first of these, and perhaps the greatest, is that you have to live for something other than yourself. Even as followers of Christ, our natural flinch is to ask, "What about me?"
Here is one of my favorite stories that illustrates that. This is back in the old days when we were doing services at 8, 9, 10, 11. We didn't have the video, so I'm standing by Mary's desk — she's the receptionist — and all I hear is her say, "East Valley Bible Church, this is Mary, can I help you? Uh-huh. 8, 9, 10, 11, 4, 5, and 6." Obviously the question was about service times. "8, 9, 10, 11, 4, 5, and 6. No? I'm sorry, that's all they have." At some point they were going to swing by your house and do this in your bedroom — I don't know how to make it any more convenient than that.
It's the simple, easy things, isn't it? It's saying, "I've got a ticket for Friday night, but other people can't go on Saturday, so I'll trade my ticket." It's understanding that the morning is crowded, so I'll go at 4. Those small sacrifices.
Witnessing Is Every Christian's Job
James Boice, writing in the context of his study on John the Baptist, says this: "I suppose the greatest mistake a person can make as he reads about the witness of John the Baptist is to think he is somehow particular or doing something unique. But that is an error, and a serious one. Witnessing is every Christian's job. If we are to witness for Jesus, we must first forget about ourselves, and we must first think about other people and their need for a Savior."
So here is the point. God has a plan to bring His message of redemption to the world, and that plan is to use you. That is a huge deal. That is an exciting deal.
I have a lot of things that excite me. Every Sunday I get an email from Neil, and I got one today where he was talking about some difficulties. I emailed him back and said, "Don't lose heart — it's just six months till college football." I love college football. I go to the Iowa website and look at the recruits. But this is not college football. This is not just a new product you are rolling out. This is a plan to take the message of redemption to your world.
Sent to Your World
When we say "the world," that can get too big. So let's make it concrete: your neighborhood, your job, your club, your restaurant, wherever you spend time, your school. God has uniquely placed you and prepared you. He has allowed things to come into your life — some of it has been hard. Some of it is the result of sin. Some of it is just the result of life. Some of it is the loss of people you love. Some of it is sickness.
And now He says, you are the missionary. You go. You go to Banner Desert or Bank of America or Intel or Basha High. You go to Mesquite Junior High. You go to your friends and your neighbors, your schoolmates, your coworkers. You go, because there is a message — the message of forgiveness and hope and love — and you are the only one who has it. Nobody else has it but a biblical Christian. You go and you take that message.
Divine Interruptions
Oftentimes, when you are trying to figure out who it is He has sent you to, pay attention to what I call divine interruptions. Those are the people who call at the most inopportune time and say, "Do you have a minute?" And you think, do you understand the Cowboys are on? I have a minute, but not right now. Those people who come by the office when you are genuinely too busy and say, "My world is falling apart."
God says He has a big job to do and asks who He should send. Just like Isaiah — that is where we started this series — once you see God for who He really is, you see yourself for who you are. And when He says He has a job to do, you ought to be saying, "Here I am. Send me." I have been prepared. I have been reconciled. I understand that God, You did this to me through Christ, and You have given me a word of reconciliation. Now I am ready to go.
The Gospel in a Nutshell
Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Your message is the gospel. What is the gospel? Larry Wright always called this passage "the gospel in a nutshell." Here it is. 1 Corinthians chapter 15, verse 1: "Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preach to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preach to you, unless you believed in vain."
Here is the gospel that Paul preaches. Number one, Christ died. Number two, He died for our sins. Number three, it was predicted, forecast, prophesied — it was according to the Scripture. Number four, He was buried. Number five, He was raised on the third day. Number six, it was done according to the Scripture. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes will not perish but have eternal life. That is the gospel.
Christ died. Why did He die? He died for a purpose — He died for our sins. How do we know that? The Scriptures told us. Then what happened? What do you do with a dead man? You bury him. But unlike every other dead person, He rose again on the third day.
The Empty Tomb
There is some big claim going around where a group of men say they have found a tomb inscribed with the names of Jesus, Mary, Mary Magdalene, and Jesus' son. There is no way. I do not need to study it. I do not need to research it. Here is what I know: there is an empty tomb. He rose from the dead.
If that tomb does in fact contain Jesus' body, then we are wasting our time. Put a for-sale sign out front. If Jesus died and did not rise from the dead, we are out of business. That is exactly what Paul says later in this same passage — if Christ did not rise from the dead, then our faith is useless.
Think about what happens when you start talking to people about this. All the people at work who could not find a Bible if they had to suddenly want to talk to you about this discovery. You point them to what the Scripture says, and they say, "I don't care about the Scripture." They dismiss the Scripture, because that is exactly what they have to do. That is the gospel: you have sinned, Christ died, He paid the price, He rose from the dead.
Peter Preaches on Pentecost
Since that is the gospel, we should look at those early sermons and see it in action. Turn to the book of Acts. Look at a couple of messages Peter preaches and notice how he goes right to the heart of this message.
This is Peter preaching on Pentecost, Acts chapter 2, verse 22: "Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs, which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know." In other words, you saw this — Lazarus was raised from the dead, five thousand were fed, deaf men could hear, blind men could see. You know all of this.
He continues: "this Man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death. But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power." Notice what Peter is saying — this was not an accident. This was all God's plan. Because he is speaking to Jews, he then takes all of this and ties it to the Old Testament prophecies, showing that what happened to Jesus is exactly what was foretold. Christ died. He was crucified. Why? Scripture tells us — for sin, for our sin.
Glory Goes to God Alone
Now look at chapter 3. Remember what was said — when people see your good works, their instinct is going to be to glorify you. In Acts chapter 3, Peter and John are moving through the temple and there is a man who has been lame from birth. Peter is the instrument God uses to heal him. All the people see this man walking around and they begin to cling to Peter and John, praising them.
Peter immediately redirects them. Verse 12: "Men of Israel, why do you marvel at this, or why do you gaze at us, as if by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified His servant Jesus, the one whom you delivered up and disowned in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release Him. But you disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked for a murderer to be granted to you. But you put to death the Prince of life, the one whom God raised from the dead, a fact to which we are witnesses."
These are facts. The bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ is at the core of this. If He did not rise from the dead, then all of our preaching is in vain. Looking at these very first sermons of Peter, what is the call to action? Repent. Here is the gospel — Christ died. What do you do? You repent.
The Persecution Begins
Chapter 4, verses 1 and 2 — now the opposition arrives. While they are speaking to the people, the priests, the captain of the temple guard, and the Sadducees came upon them, being greatly disturbed. Why? Because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection of the dead. Christ died. Believe in Him.
The Gospel in a Nutshell
Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, addresses the rulers and elders of the people in Acts 4:8: "If we are on trial today for a benefit done to a sick man as to how this man was made well, let it be known to all of you, to all the people of Israel, that it was by the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, whom you crucified, who God raised from the dead."
There is the message. There is the gospel in a nutshell. Christ came, He died for your sin, He was buried, and He was raised again. If you believe in Him, you have eternal life. If you don't, you won't.
It is the gospel — the good news. It is the message of forgiveness and hope and love and acceptance and security. It means being in right relationship, restored, reconciled, a new creature, and a significant part of the army that God has assembled to invade the world with this message of reconciliation. It is a wonderful truth, and at its core is Jesus' death for your sin.
So what do people need? They certainly need hope and acceptance and security, but more than anything else, we need to find forgiveness. We need to find some way to undo the consequence of our sin — the wage of our sin, which is death. That is the message.
The Curse of Knowledge
About a month ago I was reading a book called *Made to Stick*, written by two brothers, Chip and Dan Heath. It is a book written to businessmen, business leaders, and communicators. It is not a book on preaching at all, though it turns out to be a wonderful book on preaching.
As I read through it, I came across two things that made me think immediately of this lesson and this message. Here is what they write about why they wrote the book: "We wrote this book to help you make your ideas stick. By stick we mean that your ideas are understood and remembered and have a lasting impact. They change your audience's opinion and behavior."
They go on to identify two problems they see with messages. The first is called the curse of knowledge. They describe a study done at Stanford University in which people were divided into two groups: tappers and listeners. The tapper was assigned to tap out a song that would be familiar to the listener, without telling the listener what the song was. The listener's job was to identify the song from the tapping alone.
To illustrate, consider a song so familiar it seems like you should always get it — Happy Birthday. Here is what the study discovered. When asked whether the listener would identify the song correctly, tappers predicted success about fifty percent of the time. In reality, listeners got it right only two-and-a-half percent of the time. Half the time the tapper is thinking, "You've got this," and almost no one is actually hearing it. That is the curse of knowledge.
Here is what the authors write: "It's hard to be a tapper. The problem is the tappers have been given knowledge — the song title — that makes it impossible for them to imagine what it's like to lack that knowledge. When they're tapping, they can't imagine what it's like for the listener to hear isolated taps rather than the song. This is the curse of knowledge. Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it's like to not know it. Our knowledge has cursed us. It has become difficult for us to share knowledge with others because we can't readily recreate the listener's state of mind."
Think about it. It is physically and mentally impossible, once you know "Jingle Bells," to tap it out without your mind going right along with the melody. The song is completely clear to you as the tapper, and you are looking at the listener thinking, "How can you not get this?" But they have never heard it before. The authors put it this way: "Reversing the process is as impossible as unringing the bell. You can't unlearn what you already know." They identify only two ways to beat the curse of knowledge: one, don't learn anything; two, take your ideas and transform them.
Applying the Curse of Knowledge to the Gospel
What does any of this have to do with sharing the message? Everything. This is what I find happening all the time when people go out to share the gospel. You have the curse of knowledge. You know what all the words mean. You have all the verses figured out. It is so clear in your mind that you cannot understand how someone could possibly not see it.
But they have never heard it. They do not know. You are the tapper; you have the knowledge. They are the listener. When you are out there sharing the gospel, it is so familiar and so real to you that you are sharing verses, explaining what God has done, walking through the Greek, making what seems to you like an obvious case — and the person across from you has no idea what you are talking about.
The answer is not to unlearn the message. What you have to do is begin to understand what it was like the very first time you heard it. I see this all the time at funerals. I will give a gospel presentation, and when it is over, all the Christians are saying how terrific it was. But if I talk to someone who does not know the Lord, they will say they had no idea what I said.
The Curse of Knowledge
When we carry the gospel into the marketplace, we have to begin to understand what it is like to be a lost person. We have an entire language so ingrained in us that we forget others simply do not share it. When you say the word "sin," they think Saddam Hussein — they do not think of themselves. If you use a word like "propitiation" or "justice," you are wasting your time. It is not that you are so smart and they are so stupid; it is simply that you inhabit a whole world of language they have never entered.
One of the biggest problems we face is that we can get inside this little Christian bubble and never get out of it. All we do is sit and talk about how bad it is out in the world. But God saved you to send you into that world.
Feature Creep
The second thing researchers discovered is something called feature creep, and they used the VCR as an illustration. You may have one at home — a TV, a TiVo, some other things, and a VCR that is flashing 12 o'clock that no one has ever been able to fix. Tech people get excited and say, "This is incredible, we can do this and we can do this," when all anyone wanted to do was press play.
When the Palm Pilot came out in 1994, the designers said they did not want a team of tech people designing it. They wanted it to do four things: calculate, make notes, list tasks, and store contacts. They did not care if the thing could make coffee. They wanted four things and nothing more. It is like the new cell phones — no one bought a cell phone to take pictures. People just wanted to talk.
Keeping the Gospel Simple
How does feature creep relate to the gospel? Imagine you just finished a class on the doctrines of grace. You sit down with someone, begin to share, they start to respond, and you sense they are getting it. Then you stop and say, "Well, I want to be theologically correct here — you cannot actually get it. Only God can place it in you, and if you were not determined before the foundations of the earth, you are never going to receive it." That is not part of the message.
Here is the message: if you are lost, you can be found. You do not need to read John Owen and all the rest to understand the gospel. But people get so much knowledge, and that is a good thing — our doctrine is real, it is exciting, it has transformed our lives. Yet when we sit down with someone and begin talking about these very heavy things, it is like taking a third grader straight into calculus. They are not there. They are not ready. God saved you for a reason, and that reason is not to overwhelm a seeking person with every layer of systematic theology on the first conversation.
The Message in a Sentence
If you run into somebody tomorrow at Costco and they say, "I couldn't get to church — what did Tom say?" here is what you tell them. If you are a follower of Christ, you are a missionary. This world, and specifically the place where you live right now, is supposed to be a better place because you live there. The place where you work is supposed to be a better place because you work there. And even a hard moment — even being let go from a job — is an opportunity to let people see how you handle it.
So if someone asks what the message was, here it is: Christ died for our sins and rose again, and there is hope and forgiveness in Him and Him alone. We are supposed to take that message, live it out, and let it transform our lives. In one sense, we are simply letting our lives shine so that everyone around us sees something unique, and when they ask what it is, we say it is Jesus. That is the message.
Closing Prayer
Next, we will turn from the message to the messenger — examining our heart condition, our mindset, and our motivation as we take this truth into the world.
Father, thank You for this wonderful truth. God, I pray that East Valley Bible Church collectively, and every one of us here today, would understand the huge privilege we have to just be salt and light, to just be who You have made us. God, I pray that as You bring people into our lives and they begin to ask what is different about us, or what is this gospel, or why do we go to church and who is Jesus, that You would give us a clarity of thought. I pray we would have the ability to put ourselves into their shoes, to hear what we are trying to say through their ears, and to communicate in a way that is clear. God, we can communicate all we want, but if You do not bless it, nothing will happen. The blessing of it we leave to You. What we pray is that You would make us good and faithful stewards of this ministry of reconciliation that You have placed in our lives. God, do that — would You please? We ask it of You in Jesus' name, Amen.