"Methodists don't do that, Do They!"
It's great to be here today. I can't think of a better place to be right now…except if I was sitting in the congregation or with the choir rather than standing up here. But I'm here for a reason, whether I like it or not. Actually I've been doing a few out-of-the-box, scary things lately…and Susan is a little concerned.
Before I start, I want to thank Jack for offering his sermon time to allow me to speak and I assure you I will not take any more time than Jack usually takes up here.
Methodist's don't do that, do they?
OK, so what is it that Methodists don't do…it's the E word, evangelism. Ah, evangelism, you mean going out and talking to people about Jesus? Isn't that what the Mormons and the Jehovah Witnesses do? But Methodists, they don't do that…do they?
Actually, that's what the early Methodist's did, starting with John Wesley.
The early Methodists were trying to do what Jesus wants us to do. And what does Jesus want us to do? Well, the first and last action Jesus told us in the scriptures is to spread his message of love and salvation.
In Mark: (1:16-18) the first direction he gave and it was to his new disciples was when he said, "Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of men." Come, not go, but come, an invitation to follow Jesus and HE, Jesus, will make us fishers of men and women.
In Matthew 28:19, know as the great commission and Jesus' last words were, "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always to the very end of the age."
Billy Graham in his autobiography entitled "Just as I am" said:
"God created his church to extend his kingdom. The proclamation of the Gospel lies at the very heart of our mission to the world. That is why we must recover the biblical meaning of evangelism in its deepest sense and fullest scope…
Without proclamation, God's purpose will not come to pass, for without it, humanity will never come to Christ and to acknowledge him as Lord.
Evangelism is not a calling reserved exclusively for the clergy. I believe one of the greatest priorities of the church today is to mobilize the laity to do the work of evangelism."
So says Billy Graham.
Ok, so evangelism is important. But today's Methodists don't do that, do they? Can't we just be good examples and smile a lot? Won't it rub off on those with whom we come in contact today, kind of like wet paint?
Why do we hesitate when it comes to sharing the Jesus we know? Is it fear, pride, desire to fit in, desire to be unseen? Is it that we don't want to push our religion on others who are free to choose their own beliefs?
What if I told you that there is a non-confrontational, love-filled way to evangelize, a way that is not pushy, that allows people to accept Christ for themselves, a way that even Methodists may find appropriate?
Last February, Susan, and I were in Vero Beach Florida on our way to visit her parents. On Sunday we picked a United Methodist Church in the area to attend. The Lay Leader of the Melbourne District of the Methodist Church gave the sermon as a guest speaker. What he spoke about was the sermon I had been waiting three years to hear…a Methodist way to do evangelism. So it was by chance or I believe it was really God's intent that we just happened to be in Vero Beach and just happened to go to that Methodist church and that just happened to be the day of this lay leader's sermon on evangelism.
It was through the sermon that I learned about an organization called Celebrate Jesus. Celebrate Jesus is a non-profit group that was originally started in 1984 by Methodists in England. Although it has Methodist roots, it is now non-denominational. They are primarily in Florida and for the past 5 years have focused on a different district in the Florida Conference of the UMC. This year, the Melbourne District sponsored Celebrate Jesus Mission 2003. This is a district that runs from just north of Melbourne and Cape Canaveral to the south that includes Vero Beach, Ft. Pearce, Stuart and it ends just north of West Palm Beach. Twenty-one of the twenty-four churches that participated were Methodist.
So after hearing the sermon I signed up for a week on a Celebrate Jesus team in Florida in July. I wasn't exactly sure of what I was getting into. I knew I was going to be with a group of Methodists in Florida but what would they be like? Would they be too evangelical with palms to the sky when they prayed and sang? I figured whatever it was going to be, I could tolerate it for a week. I knew I was going to sleep on the floor with my air mattress and sleeping bag that I brought with me on the plane. But I also knew that it was going to be …something very new and different.
Three hundred people had signed up to be on the Celebrate Jesus teams. Most of the people were from Florida with a few from other states as well as England. I was the only one from New Jersey. I was assigned to the Aldersgate United Methodist Church in Palm City, which is just west of Stuart. There were nine people on our Celebrate Jesus team. The local church had been preparing for this week since last November and their active participation was key to the mission's success.
I can tell you are very anxious to hear what the technique is for evangelism. We did random acts of kindness for people in the community. The main activity is to go door-to-door. We went in teams of two people, one from the Church and one from the Celebrate Jesus team. At the front door, we handed out a free gift. In our case it was a jar opener in the shape of a heart that had printed on it, Turn your Heart to Jesus. Then we invited them to a block party to be held at the church on Friday from 5 to 8 in the evening and gave them a flyer with the details…hot dogs, hamburgers, soda, a moon bounce and games and crafts for kids, face painting by clowns, snow cones, a praise band, and it was all free. There were great, donated door prizes that I occasionally by mistake said were raffle prizes but nothing was raffled, it was all free. We told them that the free gift and block party are free just like Jesus' love is free. Then we asked if they had a prayer request either for them or a family member or a friend. We would either pray right there with them or write down the request and take it back to the church where we would pray for them. For one of my personal experiences, there was a mother with children who wanted us to pray for a child who had Hodgkin's Disease and when the mother finished with that request, her ten year old son asked that we pray for his friend, Joey, who lived two blocks away whose mother just died.
Other random acts of kindness included washing windshields at local gas stations, doing a puppet ministry at a local park, handing out jars of candy to businesses and then returning in several days to refill them and handing out soda and water at shopping centers. The idea was for people to receive multiple acts of kindness during the week to really start to let the idea sink in that just like these nice things that were happening to them, Jesus' love is also nice and it's free.
Because I had come a distance to Florida, I was invited to take a tour on Wednesday to visit some of the other 24 churches. While we were in Satellite Beach, I joined three other men, one of whom was a District Superintendent, to do random acts of kindness. We went to businesses to clean their toilets. Yes, you heard correctly, to clean toilets, public toilets. We first went to a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant and cleaned their restrooms. Then two of us went next door to an automotive store that had a showroom and a garage area. When we told them what we wanted to do, they said, "You don't want to clean OUR toilets." But we insisted. I got to clean the one in the garage area. It looked like it hadn't been cleaned in over a year. You couldn't tell that the fixtures were white. But can you imagine when these men who worked at the shop went home that evening and told their families what happened, about some guys cleaning their really dirty toilets and it had something to do with Jesus' love being free, what their reaction would be? Now the real down side of me cleaning toilets is that Susan now knows it and life at home will never be the same.
At mid week, we had a rally of over 1,000 people at the Ft. Pearce civic center where teams and church members from the 24 churches came. In addition to great up beat Christian music, each of the 24 churches gave a highlight of things that happened so far into the week.
o Two teenage boys were handing out water and soda at a shopping center and they decided to go across the parking lot to another area. They passed a woman who was sitting in her car. They offered her some water and she told them through the closed car window that she couldn't move. The boys opened the door and gave her some aid and called 9-11. She was having a stroke and just somehow God intervened and her life was saved.
o Two people from Celebrate Jesus were in a laundromat, putting quarters in the washing machines, paying for people's clothes to be washed. Since you have a captive audience while their clothes are being washed they spoke with a woman who asked that they pray that she finds a new job. So they made that prayer and took a prayer request to continue to pray for her. As the two hung around waiting for more people to enter the laundromat, the woman, they had been talking to, came up to them and said the reason she wants a new job is that she is a prostitute, and wants a new life.
The block party that we had on Friday evening was a great success. Aldersgate UMC is a small church that had 45 people at its Sunday service and we had 450 people come to the party. Other larger churches had over 1,000 people attend.
After the week ended, I was very excited about evangelism and that is something for a quiet, introverted person. I was wondering how long the excitement would last and how quickly I would get back to my pre Celebrate Jesus ways. But as God led me to that mission, He continues to lead me and give me signs that this is what I should be doing.
So, what's next? I'm signing up to go to the next Celebrate Jesus Mission. It will be in the Sarasota District from July 17 to 24. I figure I bought a new sleeping bag and air mattress so I might as well go again. I'd also like to start an Evangelism Team here and think about local opportunities to do random acts of kindness in Jesus' name in the Red Bank area. Anyone who would like to join me is welcome. Susan has said that she is interested. She feels that any calling that has me cleaning toilets is worth looking into.
So, once we are able to bring people to Christ, they need to learn more about what it means to be a Christian. Through my Florida friends, I've learned of an education program called the Alpha Course. It's basically Christianity 101. It's a 10-week course with a retreat. It is designed for people who are new to a relationship with Jesus. Frankly, I'm very interested in the material myself. Our Church Council approved this course and the Evangelism Team, once we establish one, and working with Education, which is led by Peter Delaney, will be organizing it this fall and presenting it after the first of the year.
So the goal of evangelism is to help bring people to their own decision to follow Jesus and help them find a church home that is appropriate for them. If it happens to be our church, that's great. If it happens to be another church, that is also great.
When my brother-in-law heard what I was doing in Florida, he said, "this man needs to find a job!" I guess after many many years of being a Christian, I feel like I'm finally getting it…let Thy will be done, not my will…even if it means doing something scary. I've spent my whole life trying to fit in and now I'm doing something that seems weird to our secular world and even our Methodist world. Methodists don't do that, or should we?
Prayer:
Let us pray,
Our Father and our God, we know through the scriptures that Your plan to extend Your kingdom is through us. And you know that it is very difficult for us to proclaim your love and salvation to others. But we know that you are not asking us to go and bring others to Christ by ourselves…that we can only do evangelism with Your help.
Help us to let go of what we think we need to do and help us to trust in You. Help us to have igniting ministries that set our hearts not to warming but on fire. And we know that when we bring Christ into the lives of others we can't help but bring him into our own lives even more.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen