A great sermon I just have to blog about

whats up blogger world...I'm back from Colorado, in Cary,NC with my folks and brother. It's nice being back, and having a full pantry to raid.

I just listened to a sermon by Andy Stanley in the series "Go Fish" that really struck a cord with me. It's the second sermon of the series titled "Why fish?" Please give it 38 minutes, here's a few reasons why I liked it so much.

1. Andy clearly communicates why culture dislikes Christians sharing their faith.
- I found it so interesting that the story of Acts 4:1-22 refelects how today's culture sees Christians. They say, just take out Jesus, believe whatever you want, but just don't TELL anyone about it. Non-believers today are more tolerant of religions than ever, however, when any one view is pressed against someone, they feel pushed away, because that doesn't fit into the overall view of the real religion of our culture, which is tolerance. If your view shows a level of intolerance, you can't have a seat at the table. The high priests didn't mind that Peter and John were believers, or even that they healed a blind man. They were perplexed and frustrated because they were preaching a message of "salvation under one name."
2. Peter and John's boldness was to what they had seen.
Jesus was a historical person. He wasn't just an experience that some people had and others didn't. He really walked on the earth, and really died, and really rose again. Peter and John's testimony is rooted in history, which is why they are so bold in the face of oppression. Religions rooted in experience or an unreliable testimony is faulty(Mormanism, scientology, other cults immeidately come to mind). The testimony of the believers, the fact that they would risk their lives and die for Jesus shows that Christ really did live, and the people that truly followed him were transformed by his love and teachings.

The one thing I didn't like, is that Stanley just uses this appeal of attesting to what we've seen and heard to share our faith. He repeatedly said that our doctrine "might not be good", or that we might not understand all of it at the moment, and that's fine, especially seeing that Peter and John were fisherman. But the Christian faith is a rational faith for the skeptic. It has just as much validity to the intellectual as it does the common man like Peter and John. There must be balance in this, and we do need to learn doctrine, have sufficient responses to the tough questions about Christianity.

Still, Stanley says that salvation must be explained, and that it is not intuitive. This is so true. Nobody comes to the conclusion of Jesus dying for all sins on their own. You may believe God exists on your own, but the gospel of Jesus is not necessairly logical. Its foolishness to some and a stumbling block to others. But if it is only explained on testimony of changed lives, the minds of people will not be satisfied. As Christians, we must have a balanced presentation of a changed live through a testimony, as well as the appeal to the intellectual questions. Not all of those questions can or will be answered, but we must be ready to share the reasoning for our faith.


I see that we must speak the truth to people that don't know Christ. But I knew that before. This message helped me see how we appeal to people. We do evangelism and love our neighbor because God has done a great work in our lives, and redeemed us from sin. For us not to speak would be foolish and selfish. We must attest to the history of Jesus, but also do it with love and humility. If only put the message of Christ lumped together with all other religions, then we have not portrayed him rightly.

I still have more thoughts on this, but this is all for now..