Preached · November 26, 2017
Wrapping up the series
Well, good morning, everybody. My name is Anthony. You haven't had to see me in a while, because we have another preacher now, so that's cool. But I get this weekend, get to teach the weekend after Thanksgiving, and get the privilege of wrapping up the series that we're currently in, "Sorry, I'm Not Sorry." Next week is going to begin Advent, those four weeks leading up to Christmas, the celebration of the coming and the return of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.
But today we are wrapping up our series on apologetics—defending, talking about, and sharing our Christian faith. To review, we've spent some weeks talking about the who, what, when, why, and where of evangelism, of sharing our faith, of apologetics. So we talked about the who, the fact that there's no such thing as an inherited faith, that we are the ones who need to make that decision for our own. We talked about the what of apologetics: that we live out our theology, we practice what we say we believe. And so that can be the best apologetic, the best defense of our faith to the world, when we live out our faith. We talked about the when: when is the last time that someone has asked you why you have the faith and the hope that you have? And if it has been a while since someone has asked you, then maybe we have some questions that we need to ask ourselves, but if we are living out our faith. Last week, Brandon shared about the why: that God has elected us, predestined us for a purpose, an instrumental purpose in bringing others into the shepherd's fold, into the king's kingdom.
And this week, we're talking about the where. Where do we share about our faith? How do we do this? In what places, in what domain do we share our faith?
Some weird laws
But before we get to that, I want to talk about some weird laws. The thing about weird laws that I love is that you always know that there's a story behind them. Like, why does this law exist? So I wanted to share just a few with you. I promise this relates to the message today.
In Vermont, a wife must obtain written permission from her husband before wearing false teeth. What's the story there? I want to know so badly. In Wichita, Kansas, the mistreatment of mothers-in-law can be used as grounds for a divorce. So watch out there. Mothers-in-law, you need to move to Wichita; you might be safe. On Cape Cod, the groom-to-be must prove his manliness before marriage by hunting and killing either six blackbirds or three crows. So men, work on your sharpshooter skills. I would not be married if that were the case for me. In Kentucky, it is illegal to marry the same man four times. What's the story? Don't you want to know that story? And in Hartford, Connecticut, it's illegal to kiss your wife in public on Sundays.
In Arkansas, it is strictly prohibited to pronounce "Arkansas" incorrectly. The state code includes a pronunciation guide. It is illegal to build, maintain, or use a nuclear weapon within Chico, California city limits. An infraction carries a $500 fine. That'll stop the terrorists.
Okay, let's transition to weird church or Christian laws. In Alabama, it's illegal to wear a fake mustache that causes laughter in church. So if you can pull one off that doesn't cause laughter, you're fine. In Delaware, it's illegal to whisper in church. So no secrets. In Omaha, it's illegal to sneeze or burp during a church service. And in New York, it's illegal to pass gas in a church service with the intention of causing a disturbance. Otherwise, you're fine. In Nicholas County, West Virginia, no clergy members may tell jokes or humorous stories from the pulpit during church services. Which means, if we were in West Virginia, some of you could live out your dream right now and call the cops to get this preacher off the stage.
Jesus plus
Now, the reason I start with that is that from the very first days after the ascension of Jesus, Christians, brothers and sisters, we have loved to add laws. We have loved to create laws and rules and regulations on top of what Jesus has said. One of the biggest temptations of any Christian group is "Jesus plus." It can't honestly just be as simple as grace. It can't honestly just be as simple as faith. It can't honestly just be Jesus. Certainly I have to do other things to earn God's favor. And there are things I can't do, I must not do, or else I will lose God's favor, I will lose God's love. The biggest danger in any Christian community is Jesus plus something.
And one of the great examples of that kind of logic—of adding ridiculous rules and regulations and stipulations—comes from how I have heard Christians read the book of Philippians chapter 4, verse 8.
Be people of the Word
So I invite you to turn your Bibles to the book of Philippians chapter 4, verse 8. If you've got an iPad, that's fine, or a phone. And I want to alert you to something. Over the next couple of weeks, we're going to be making a transition of how teaching works here at Good News. We feel it's really important that believers in Jesus, followers of Jesus, are comfortable and familiar with using their Bibles. We want that to be not just second nature, but first in nature, that you know how to use your Bibles. And so what we're going to be doing is no longer putting the words on the screen. They'll be on the screen for the next couple of weeks as a transition period. But eventually, the words will no longer be on the screen, because we want you to actually pick up your Bible, or pick up your iPad, or pick up your phone, and read it along with everyone else. So there are ushers who have some Bibles available. If you forgot or neglected to bring a Bible today, no shame in that. You can just raise your hand, and there will be an usher who will hand you a Bible. All the Bibles are the same, and we've got the page number on there, so if you're not sure where the book of Philippians is, you can just turn to the page number and you'll be fine. And we'll keep making this announcement until we finally make the hard break and make that expectation clear: that when you come to church, bring a Bible.
All right, Philippians chapter 4, verse 8. In our series, we've been talking about the what, the when, the where, the why of apologetics. Today is the where question. Where is this supposed to happen? Where do we share our faith? And so Philippians chapter 4, verse 8, says this. Let's stand for the public reading of the Word of God. At the end, just to remind you, I'm going to say, "The Word of the Lord," and you're going to say, "Thanks be to God," and then we can sit down. So let me read this for us. It says:
Brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.
The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated.
Not a "circle the wagons" manifesto
Now, typically, when I've heard this passage taught on, I've been taught to see it as a restriction, a narrowing in. As one writer puts it, it's a "circle the wagons" manifesto. Batten down the hatches. Keep your mind sealed off from the foul air of sinful society. Build the church walls thicker. Paul is encouraging his readers to shelter themselves from society.
And in fact, there is an entire industry that makes their money off the backs of well-meaning Christians, to sell Christian versions of things that already exist. So we've got Christian t-shirts and movies and rock and roll bands and novelists, and Christians even have their own brand of chewing gum and mints—Testamints, "pass the word." And some of this is fine. Maybe the movie Fireproof and the subsequent marketing of books and Bible studies and posters and pledges and other memorabilia helped your marriage. And there's some legitimately good Christian bands out there. And what dad can't resist a good Abercrombie and Fitch, "A Breadcrumb and Fish" pun?
But a lot of this merchandising, this whole concept of there being a Christian version and product of anything that the world has to offer, has to do with an idea that Christians need to separate themselves from culture as far as they can—that the world can dirty and sully Christians, corrupt us in some way. You know the old phrase, "Don't smoke, don't chew, and don't go with girls that do." And the fact is, this is not what Jesus and his first followers taught at all.
Sent into the world
So, as always, we need to remind ourselves of the mission of followers of Jesus and his church. The Great Commission from Jesus says to go and make disciples. And our own vision statement says that we are to go and make radical, reproducing apprentices of Jesus Christ. This church, this community, all followers of Jesus are about finding the lost, finding those who don't know Jesus, and introducing them to him. We reach out to bring the lost in, so that we may introduce them up to the Father. That is our primary mission and goal as a church.
And it used to be, back in the good old days, whenever those were, that you could staff a church, put up a sign that says "church that way," host a service, and lost people would just come streaming in. But that's just not the way it works anymore. We talked about this a few years ago, but I want to remind you of a couple statistics: the double 85 million. There's a group of 85 million people who call themselves Christians. They would say they follow Jesus, but they have little to zero connection to a local church. That's the first 85 million people in America. And the second 85 million is a whole separate group of people who do not claim to follow Jesus. They do not claim to know God, and they have no intention whatsoever of ever entering into a church.
Which means that this church could have the best preaching, the best music, the best children's and youth ministry, the best ushers, the best Christian t-shirts, the best bands and movies and mints, and it wouldn't do a darn thing to introduce anybody to Jesus, to make a disciple, to save the lost. Now, fortunately, most of you only spend about an hour here or so each week. So thank goodness that when Jesus set out his master plan for the church to make disciples, he wasn't thinking that a single hour on Sunday would do it. We are the people who have gathered, and we will soon be the people who have scattered into hundreds of towns and communities and neighborhoods. And so this fits perfectly into the plan that Jesus had as he laid it out in the Gospels.
For instance, in Jesus' final discourse to his disciples in the book of John, Jesus begins to pray to the Father on our behalf. He prays to God, he says:
My prayer is not that you would take them out of the world, but that you would protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Father, sanctify them by your truth. Your word is truth. And as you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.
The Essenes and the Shakers
So when Jesus was ministering in the first century, there was this group of Jewish believers called the Essenes. You've heard of the Pharisees. You've heard of the Sadducees. But the Essenes? Only a couple of you—and there's a reason for that. The Essenes believed that any day now, the Son of Righteousness, their version of the Messiah, was going to come. And so the Essenes' response was to remove themselves from society, to remove themselves from civilization, move out into the desert, and wait for their Messiah. And they and their religious movement died out there.
You may have heard of the Shakers, or have some Shaker furniture. The Shakers were a 19th-century, 1800s group of Christians that wanted to create a commune, kind of a Christian utopia. And so they would move into these communes, these little villages, and they would make really great furniture, and they were called Shakers because they would shake during their church services. But they had a couple of rules: one, don't evangelize; and two, don't make babies. Well, today, there are two Shakers left, Brother Arnold and Sister June, age 77. And they hope that new Shakers will come into their community. However, their membership books were closed permanently in 1957. Not a great growth strategy.
So when Jesus prays this, he has the Essenes in mind. He has the Shakers in mind. This is precisely not what happens to followers of Jesus, not what happens to Christians. And can you hear the magnitude of what Jesus is saying? As the Father has sent Jesus into the world, so Jesus is sending us. And how was Jesus sent into the world? He lived among the people. He had friends and buddies. He knew all the people with a bad reputation in town. In fact, it seemed that Jesus would gravitate to people with a bad reputation. Mary Magdalene, demon-possessed. Simon the Zealot was a religious terrorist. Judas Iscariot was a political assassin. Levi Matthew, a Roman sympathizer and tax collector. This was Jesus' reputation throughout the whole country: a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners. Which means that we should be asking ourselves: do we hang out with people who give us a bad reputation for the sake of Jesus?
Nothing outside a person defiles them
Jesus lived in this culture that cared a lot about who you hung out with. Who you ate with was almost more important than who you slept with. And Jesus seemed to eat with anybody. Jesus also lived in a culture that cared a lot about what you consumed. In our culture, we talk a lot about consumption—media consumption, news and television and music and movies and books. In Jesus' day, consumption meant literally consumption: what you ate. But it also affected who you hung out with, who you were allowed to touch and come into contact with.
And this is what Jesus has to say in Mark 7. Jesus called the crowd to him and said:
Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person's heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality and theft and murder and adultery and greed and malice and deceit and lewdness and envy and slander and arrogance and folly. All of these evils come from inside and defile a person.
And so the implications of Jesus' teaching were lived out in the first-century church, who then started to no longer follow Jewish kosher food laws, and Jewish Christians started going into Gentile houses, something that was previously a prohibited act. And notice throughout the Gospels that Jesus would regularly touch those who were considered unclean, people with demons and sicknesses, and never once do we ever see Jesus considering himself unclean, making sacrifices for himself at temple. In fact, the whole reason why this passage exists is that people are claiming that Jesus doesn't even so much as wash his hands. And so Paul, that great apostle Paul, took Jesus' words so seriously that he said even if there was a sheep or a cow or some animal sacrificed to an idol at some pagan temple, and then the meat of that animal was sold at market, go ahead and eat it. There's no such thing as idols anyway. And once again, it's nothing from the outside that defiles you; it's what's inside of you already.
Paul in Athens
The apostle Paul lives this out in the book of Acts, chapter 17. While on a missionary journey, getting ready to have a philosophical debate with some religious opponents in Athens, this is what Paul does. Verse 16: "Paul was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols." Verse 23, Paul talking: "For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD."
So the first thing Paul does when he goes to a town to share the good news about Jesus is that he walks around their pagan temples and marketplaces. He makes himself a student of their culture. He studies carefully how they act and worship. He studies what they study. He observes who and how and why they worship. So much so that when Paul begins preaching to them, can you guess what he quotes? Is it the Hebrew Scriptures, or maybe something written by his mentor, the rabbi Gamaliel? Maybe some early Christian texts or quotes of Jesus? No, instead Paul quotes two Greek poets, basically quoting the first-century pop culture equivalent of Beyoncé and Blake Shelton. This is what Paul says: "For in him we live and move and have our being." And the second quote: "We are his offspring."
That means that Paul's evangelistic strategy—Kelly, it took a lot for me to put that Blake Shelton reference in there; that's for you—the way that he was able to defend his Christian faith to a bunch of Greek philosophers and Stoics, was to not only know his own gospel, his own Scriptures, his own faith, but also to be entirely fluent in the culture and religions and entertainment of the culture that he was evangelizing to.
And this fits with what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9:
Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law, so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law, so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people, so that by all possible means I might save some. And I do this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.
In other words, Paul was able to take on the fluency and the knowledge of whatever culture he was in, so that he might save some. He could quote poets. He knew their religions, their culture, their entertainment—all that he might have the ability to have conversations with those who didn't yet know Jesus.
Reading Philippians 4:8 again
So with that background, that understanding of the life of Jesus and the life of Paul, let's go back to Philippians 4:8. "Brothers and sisters, whatever is true and noble and right and pure and lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or if anything is praiseworthy, think about such things."
When I've heard this and been taught on this, it's been taught as restrictive—something that puts in limits and boundaries. But seeing this in the light of the lives of Paul and Jesus, I think we would be better off seeing this as an opening up, an undoing of the boundaries, an invitation to appreciate and appropriate the very best of what our culture has to offer.
Remember, there are 85 million people who are never going to walk into the doors of this church or any church in this country. And so when you're trying to tell them about Jesus—and we assume that you are trying to tell people about Jesus—what are you going to be talking to them about? Because talking to them about the latest Christian CD or movie, is that going to make a lick of difference to those who think your music isn't great and your movies are poorly made?
Let's read this text with a specific emphasis on the words: "Brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or if anything is praiseworthy, think about such things." Doesn't this give you a different flavor, a different connotation of what this passage is about? Don't you get the idea that we ought to be out there searching for things that are pure and noble and right and lovely?
This is the way John Calvin puts it: if Buddha or Gandhi or Beyoncé or Arnold Schwarzenegger or President Obama has said something true, guess what? It's true. Closer to modern day, here's what Christian hip-hop artist Propaganda has to say:
I really wish Christians would stop saying that we are in a culture war. You're not at war with culture. You're a contributor. You're at war with darkness. And this means that some of your allies may not be members of your faith. Darkness is far more cunning than to just follow along religious and political lines.
This means that we're not at war with culture, but we do get to appropriate culture. Whenever we see truth, even if it's not from people who call themselves Christians, we get to claim it as God's truth.
Logizomai: reckon it
The word Paul uses for "think about" is logizomai. It means to reckon. So say, for instance—we gotta love the word "reckon"—say you go fishing with your buddy, and you each catch some fish, but then your buddy gets a call and has to leave on some sort of emergency, and he forgets to take his fish with him. What would you say? "I reckon these are my fish now." That's the kind of word that Paul is using: to reckon, to take into account.
What Paul is saying is that if anything is true, or noble, or right, or pure, or lovely, we get to reckon it as God's truth, to count it as our own. Whenever a culture stumbles onto truth, we get to claim it. Jesus says that he is the truth, and so that means whenever we find anyone talking about it, singing about it, we've found Jesus. Which means that we should make it our business to find Jesus wherever we can find him.
One writer puts it like this—it's a good thing to read on Christ the King Sunday: "There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is sovereign over all, does not cry, 'Mine.'" Sometimes Jesus sounds a lot like Audrey. "Mine," my two-year-old says.
Discernment, not rejection
So, of course, we've got to do some "what-abouts." What about bad entertainment corrupting me, or my kids, or our culture? And so what I'm pointing out today is that there is a difference between discernment and rejection. I think that there are some things that cannot be redeemed, that cannot be used for good. There are true and noble and right things, and there are things that are not true and noble and right: music that subjugates and promotes violence against women, or narratives that say that one race or culture is superior to another, or cultural liturgies that would help us pledge our allegiance to anything but Jesus and his kingdom.
What we want to avoid is the creation of a ghetto or a monastery, where we have so little contact with culture, with the world, so little contact with them that we are rendered ineffective in serving it and proclaiming the gospel to it. But, of course, we also need to not become indistinguishable from our culture. The book of Peter says that we are aliens and refugees and foreign nationals in a world and a culture that's hostile to us. Paul says that we are ambassadors, we are spies, that we are in the business of kingdom espionage. We learn the language of the world so that we can then throw a revolution and turn it upside down.
The other thing to keep in mind is that the smallest common denominator in God's kingdom is two. When Jesus sent his disciples out into mission, it was always in groups of two or more. The original church, they met in homes, in the oikos, the household, the family on mission. That means we are never meant to embark on mission alone, which means that if we are going to make it our mission to become students of our world's culture, we don't do it alone. We need partners and friends and family who keep us accountable to make sure that we are not becoming corrupted or tempted.
And thirdly, we need to indeed flee from temptation. And so if being around a certain kind of person or music or culture tends to lead us down paths of destruction, then certainly flee. But we must also hold that in the tension that Jesus expects us to grow up and to mature and to lean into places that are hard and uncomfortable, to do things that aren't easy. So never use "flee from temptation" as an excuse to not love our neighbor, to not go and find those who don't know Jesus even in dark places.
Implication: broaden your "whatever"
So let's talk implication. What does this mean as we live a "sorry, not sorry" life? It means we need to broaden our definition of "whatever," to go looking for truth in unlikely places, because you just might find Jesus. Whatever is pure and noble and true and beautiful and lovely, those are things not just found at the Dove Awards or in Christian movies. They might be at the art museum, the movie theater, on iTunes or on HBO.
Jesus' expectation of us is to go and make disciples. And for Paul, that meant going into pagan temples, learning Greek poetry, being able to stand toe-to-toe with philosophers and kings. And so for us, that might mean taking meals to the workers at the strip club, like some do each month here at Good News. That might mean learning to like comic book movies, since they don't appear to be stopping making them anytime soon. It might mean being able to admit that hip-hop and rap is the most listened-to music in the nation, so it might behoove us to start listening to some of it—and maybe even a bit of country too.
It's up to you to figure out what your next step is. But it's time to recognize that God can show up in the places we least expect him, even in the mundane, even in things as simple as grain and grapes.
Communion
So I want to invite the worship team, Pastor Brandon, and our servers forward, and we are moving into a time of communion, a time where we physically are reminded that God shows up in unexpected places—that what is good and true and noble and right and pure can show up even in things as simple as a loaf of bread and a cup of juice. And so if God can do that, if God can place the presence of Jesus in there, then how much more should we go looking for the presence of Jesus in the places that we least expect it?
Would you pray with me? Almighty God, we thank you for the challenge and the invitation of your Word: the invitation to be known as people who share your gospel without shame, who are not afraid of the darkness, for we know that greater is he who is within us than he who is in the world. And so may we be bold and courageous to go and to shine your light in dark places, and to find your truth wherever you have placed it. Father, as we turn our attention to your presence at the table, may you join us together in the unity of the Holy Spirit, that we are one body. And God, if it be your will, may we break bread for you. We pray these things in Christ's name. Amen.
