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Brenton
 Welcome back to Further. I am Brenton Grimm. Chris Carr, welcome back. How you doing?

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Chris
 Pretty good.

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Brenton
 Yeah.

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Chris
 Good. Getting ready for a big week. Actually, I guess we're already in the midst of it, certainly here as the staff. And a lot to plan in. And

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Chris
 yeah, prep him for the three services, change of service time, new ministry year starting. So it's pretty busy around the office today. It's always busy, but especially a lot of things to get

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Chris
 tackled and

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Chris
 looking forward to it, though. Hopefully, we're going to have a great year of ministry and continue to see the Lord's blessings.

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Brenton
 Yeah, I guess I don't know how much this has been talked about the Burlington campus. That's where I'm at most of the time. But as we go to three services in Burlington, what's the hope? What's the excitement around that for you?

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Chris
 Well, I think we've been pretty convinced that--

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Chris
 or at least I'd say I've been pretty convinced. I can't necessarily speak for everybody on our leadership team. But I've been fairly convinced that over the last several years, our growth at the Burlington campus has been limited just simply because of a lack of space, first of all, in the parking lot.

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Chris
 And then second even in the auditorium. And so for people who are committed and are all in, so to speak, to use that phrase, it probably doesn't seem like that big of an issue because

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Chris
 we're going to come, regardless of what the parking situation is, and even if it's a little hard to find a seat. But that's not the way it is for new people. It's not the way it is for unchurched people. And if somebody is hesitant about coming, unsure, they pull up and you got to park down the hill or a couple of blocks away to get there. It's just like this is too much. It's just another reason to keep them from doing that. And

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Chris
 then you go in and you can't find a seat because you're maybe a little bit later new. You don't know where to go. And it's just like, do they really want me here? Because it's kind of making it kind of hard to-- we're not trying to make it hard.

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Chris
 So

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Chris
 there's that. I'm hoping with the later service time that we're going to be able to reach a group of people that may be

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Chris
 the early services. That's not their normal Sunday routine, maybe to sleep in. They don't have a normal rhythm. Again, for us church people, so to speak, yeah, you get up and go to church on Sunday morning and sometimes pretty early or mid-morning. And I think there's a lot of people,

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Chris
 particularly in Burlington, and I think Fort Madison would fit into this as well, who likes Sunday mornings, normal sleep in. And they're not getting up until a little bit later. And so maybe this, there's a spot, and hopefully our people are out inviting and like, okay, we can come in and we're just going to be able to minister to more people.

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Chris
 We know for sure that there's a lot

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Chris
 more people, tens of thousands of people in Burlington just by itself. But if you just then, the reach of the Burlington campus is similar to what it's been at Danville for decades.

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Chris
 There's a pretty big

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Chris
 radius where people come from. And so we've got lots of people that need to

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Chris
 either come to know Jesus or they need to be

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Chris
 discipled and taught. And so I think this just opens up the opportunity. And I

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Chris
 think

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Chris
 we're going to see the Lord just be faithful to continue to move his work here forward through this.

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Brenton
 Yeah, that's good. I don't know, my wife and I really appreciated the 1115 service when we were in Ames. So I get it.

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 (Laughing)

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Chris
 Yeah,

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Chris
 it's not going to be for everybody, but again, one

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Chris
 of the things I didn't bring up in this Salt and Light series, one of the many things that I didn't that I could have is like, the church is the only organization in the world that exists

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Chris
 really for people that are

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Chris
 not a part of it.

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 (Laughing)

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Chris
 That's not the only reason that we exist, but like we're not here for us.

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Chris
 We're here for the Lord to worship him and to serve him. But

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Chris
 part of that serving him, a big part of it is serving his interests and his mission and even worship. And we see this in the Psalms, like we worship to,

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Chris
 our worship is to be where we're calling other people into

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Chris
 that worship. So yeah.

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Brenton
 We had a submitted question. I kind of want to start with it. We don't need to spend a lot of time on it, but just on the topic of Salt and Light, he asked how has Harmony Bible Church been Salt and Light in the past, specifically over the last 12 years, but also what do you think the Lord has for us in the years to come?

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Chris
 Yeah, that was a big question. So I could talk about this a lot. I will be, I promise I will be brief. Well,

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Chris
 this really, the official, the first like official steps, like the first action is more than 12 years. It really goes back nearly 14, but 13 plus years is where we bought this old bar on Maple Street in Burlington.

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Chris
 And we've done a lot of crazy things over this last 12, 13 years, but that was

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Chris
 one of the biggest ones, like what you're doing what? And at

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Chris
 the time and probably still today, one of the materially anyways, neediest places in Southeast Iowa, and this old dilapidated bar that used to have a brothel on the second floor, and we bought it and started remodeling it. And that's where the, we founded the Maple Leaf Center and we started to minister to the community there on South Hill.

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Chris
 And the whole point of that is we want to be salt and light. And of course, Pastor Nathan Williams led the charge there and he's been a centerpiece in this from almost the get go there. And so that there was that.

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Chris
 And then of course, the Burlington campus followed for Madison campus.

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Chris
 And then we founded City Hope and all of the different ministries that are there. And those continue, they're Celebrate Recovery, there's our counseling ministry, which ministered yes to our people, but it also they minister to a lot of people outside of our community. And there's now the Disaster Relief Team, they were just in action recently, like last week in New London. And

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Chris
 so I could go on and on there, but there's a lot of different things there. And what does the Lord has for us in the years to come? Well, the opportunities for

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Chris
 City Hope are just almost unlimited. We're only kind of limited there by resources, which is people and finances.

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Chris
 Because there's, we'll never, like Jesus said, the poor will always be amongst you, so there's always gonna be need there and these are so great.

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Chris
 But like Lord willing,

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Chris
 we're gonna have more and more ministries

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Chris
 coming out of City Hope in more and more locations. So we basically are in Fort Madison and Burlington with a little bit maybe in Mount Pleasant, but we would love to see that expand. We have our office building in Minneapolis, which we purchased as part of All In and we're gonna be remodeling that here in the days ahead. And so that's gonna be, what is that? It's kind of a beach head. You think about a lighthouse, there's another metaphor that we could use, but that Minneapolis office is gonna be kind of a lighthouse or a beach head and go to another, and then it's a for an incursion into that communities and

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Chris
 taking the light of Christ and is serving us all. West of Illinois, like Lord willing in the days ahead, we don't know exactly when. Like I personally, I could see the day where we have a campus and community ministry is going somewhere over there. We go West to Mount Pleasant. I think that's a real possibility for a future campus and more ministry that is there. We'll just see what the Lord wants to do, but I think that that's very possible.

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Brenton
 Yeah, well, there's been a lot of expansion and a lot of things happened over the last 12 years. Yeah.

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Brenton
 All right, let's get into the sermon. You cited some research showing that many evangelicals today believe that people are born basically good. This is not new. You know, historically, this dates back to the fifth century from a theologian named Pelagius. So this belief system still is known by Pelagian, by the name Pelagianism.

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Brenton
 It's also been considered a heresy by the church, essentially, since it was first named.

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Brenton
 So eventually, Pelagius denied that humanity inherits a sinful nature and taught that people are capable of choosing righteousness without a prior work of grace by the Spirit. So

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Brenton
 would you say that this has seen a resurgence lately, or is this kind of always kind of hung around?

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Chris
 Yeah, a little history here. I don't know

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Chris
 how interesting people are in history, but I think it's important for us to recognize. So you have

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Chris
 the Protestant Reformation, which Luther and Calvin and others

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Chris
 really spoke against both Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism, which you probably will bring up here in a minute.

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Chris
 But then you have a followup there on the Enlightenment. And so the Enlightenment,

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Chris
 there's a lot we could talk about there, but basically, humanity,

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Chris
 science, our non-human knowledge, intellect, all of that, that

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Chris
 becomes our religion, essentially.

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Chris
 And led to, we're making progress, and eventually, we're gonna arrive at this kind of utopia. And then we arrive in the 20th century,

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Chris
 World War I, World War II, and you get out of that, and then the 60s, and all of a sudden, okay, so maybe we're not.

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Chris
 I mean, it's actually interesting if you see some of the writers at the beginning of the 20th century, and then in the middle of the 20th century, and they're like, oh, so optimistic early on, and then, oh,

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Chris
 now it's utopia, now it's dystopia.

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 (Chuckles)

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Chris
 But I think we've seen, now there's been a resurgence, I really do think there's a resurgence of it.

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Brenton
 Of the Enlightenment, you mean?

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Chris
 Well, of this idea that human beings,

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Chris
 we're gonna get better, we're improving, we are gonna be able to solve the problem, or solve our problems ourselves.

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Chris
 And not that in the middle of the 20th century, God's gonna solve our problems for us. Like, it wasn't necessarily people turn to God, although there was some of that.

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Chris
 But I do think we're back to, with largely because of the rise of technology, and also what's happened with our education

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Chris
 system, and those two things are obviously linked together, I think there is certainly a resurgence of that.

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Brenton
 Okay, okay, so if you

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Brenton
 accept this belief system that we're essentially born good, what changes in the gospel if we treat our human nature this way? Especially since most of the people that would hold this belief would still concede that eventually we're gonna sin, right? So eventually we're going to be in need of a savior, we're just not born that way. Why is this something that we hold so tightly to?

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Chris
 Well, I mean,

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Chris
 fundamentally we hold to it because this is what the Bible teaches. And then another step of that is that this is the gospel, the gospel is

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Chris
 salvation is by God's grace alone, through faith alone, and Jesus Christ alone. And so

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Chris
 a lone word is repeated

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Chris
 for emphasis

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Chris
 because it's not anything of ourselves. And at the end of the day, even when people would acknowledge that at some point we will sin and have a need for a savior, they invariably

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Chris
 will still hold to the fact that human beings have some good in them and then therefore in some way can contribute to their salvation. And if we in any way

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Chris
 hold to the fact that we can contribute to our salvation, we have undermined not part of the gospel with the gospel as a whole. So

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Chris
 I think one of the big dangers is we think that, you know, like

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Chris
 we can compromise a little bit of the gospel and still be okay, as long as we get the main point, right? That's just not the way

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Chris
 that works. And Paul gets to that in Romans, it's just that no one may boast, right?

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Chris
 I mean, that's the Ephesians, the Ephesians two, but it's also the kind of the emphasis of Romans nine specifically.

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Brenton
 Yeah, well, I think the other part that could be brought up there too is Romans five, right? This is where

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Brenton
 Paul's talking about essentially a headship, right? That just, you know, just as we were under Adam, right? So this idea of original sin is very clear in Paul's writings.

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Brenton
 I don't know that you, if we're not able to take the headship of Adam, I don't know if you can follow his argument to the point where we now have the headship of Christ either. So I think that's an important part to take both sides of his argument.

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Brenton
 So how would, like I think probably most of people here at Harmony have an idea of where we stand, but how would you define harmony stance on this issue?

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Chris
 Well, specify what exactly the issue is.

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Brenton
 Original sin maybe is the.

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Chris
 I mean,

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Chris
 in Adam's fall, we sinned all.

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Chris
 So is a simple way to remember it is so that we inherited not only the consequences of Adam's sin, but actually

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Chris
 the sin nature. And so we,

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Chris
 you know, there's an old question. Do we sin because we sinners or are we sinners because we sin? And the answer to that is we sin because we're sinners. And that's Psalm 51. And David and sin, my mother conceived me, not talking about her sin, but that I was a sinner from the moment of conception. That's what the scripture teaches. And so, which means that there is nothing good in our sinful nature. Again, Romans.

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Chris
 By nature, children of wrath. Yeah, we, and that's Ephesians two, by nature.

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Chris
 We are children

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Chris
 of wrath. It's not popular. It's not like,

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Chris
 you know,

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Chris
 it's not something that's easy to accept. And I don't want to just step over that or anything like that. That's our position is like, we talk about depravity

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Chris
 which means total depravity, which means that there's nothing. So it doesn't mean that we're as bad as we possibly could be. It means that there's no part of us that has not been affected by sin.

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Brenton
 Yep.

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Brenton
 Are there practical areas of life that are affected by our view around this topic? I mean,

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Brenton
 what are the practical outworkings of our understanding of anthropology in this case?

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Chris
 Well, I mean, that's a massive question.

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Chris
 I think part of it is to recognize that sin affects everything that we do, that even the good things that we do,

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Chris
 apart from the spirits regenerating work, we even, like Isaiah says, our

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Chris
 good deeds are as filthy rags, which means that even when we do a good thing, we do it for the wrong reason. Yep. And it merits no

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Chris
 favor before God or merit before God.

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Chris
 So like even good people apart from Christ,

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Chris
 yeah, that doesn't mean that they don't have anything good in them, doesn't mean they don't do good things, contribute to society or anything like that. It just means that they still are dead in their transgressions and sins, and they need the

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Chris
 gospel of Christ. It means that

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Chris
 all of the areas of life, you mentioned politics and education, those are by nature going to be affected by sin because they're sinners who are involved in that. Parenting means like our kids, and this is hard, like the child when he was born is beautiful, wonderful, created in the image of God, but it also fallen and

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Chris
 have a sinful heart. And to recognize that our kids, what they don't need is to learn how to be good human beings.

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Chris
 Yes, they don't need to do that, but what they truly need is they need, we need to parent in such a way that we're parenting the heart, not their outward, just simply outward of obedience and conformity.

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Chris
 And then you talk about evangelism is like,

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Chris
 yeah, I mean, we could talk a long, long

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Chris
 about that, but

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Chris
 there's a lot of evangelism, I think that is inadequate where we're just asking, like we just think that people need to, they need to just step into the light or whatever. It's

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Chris
 ultimately about their choice. They do have to make a choice, but we recognize that God has to give them the ability to make that choice because He has to give them a new heart.

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Chris
 And it does impact, I think, the way that we even make evangelistic calls and we're actually calling people. So a lot of times here with evangelism is we leave out the repentance part and not recognize that people not only need to believe in Jesus, okay? Like how we use that, generally use that term, because truly to believe in Jesus means to repent term from our sin and recognize that we can't save ourselves. And so we're actually turning from our efforts to save ourselves and trusting in Him to save Him and communicating that with people.

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Brenton
 Yeah, I think specifically with the evangelism part, I think it's so important for us to remember that people in their natural state are enemies of God too. It's not like a just bradest prayer and

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Brenton
 we have the ability to convince them into it.

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Chris
 So I mean, you talk about people, there has been a whole style of ministry or really philosophy or method of ministry called the seeker sensitive movement. It's now been now the attractional church to just a different label for pretty much the same approach. But it's this idea is like people are seeking after God. And it's still interesting there, like even the terminology and Romans three, no one sees after God. So it's like, and we're getting off here maybe a little bit but I think it's an important thing to think is like, what happens then is we're like, what are people gonna be interested, what's gonna attract people? Like,

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Chris
 what are the kind of things that we can do to like,

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Chris
 whether it has to do with music or like our sermons or the way that we're gonna preach, the services that we're gonna put together, it's all around like, what is, you know, Hollywood doing or whatever. And the problem with that is what you win people with, you gotta keep them with and

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Chris
 A, a lot of times the gospel is missing and then B, it's not what actually helped people to grow

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Chris
 in the image and likeness of Christ.

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Brenton
 Yeah, okay. All right, we'll move on. You said that we shine through both presence and proclamation

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Brenton
 through what people see in our lives and what they hear from us, but unbelievers are often just as generous or just as sacrificial and compassionate as believers are. So what should actually be the distinctive, should be distinctive about the presence of Christians, should there be something qualitatively different about Christian love, generosity, your service, or does that deed usually look the same as it would from an unbeliever?

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Chris
 Well, okay, first I wanna say, we really had to take both of the salt and light together. I separated them simply for the sake of emphasis and time,

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Chris
 but I gave three Ps, presence,

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Chris
 purity and proclamation. We need all three of them. And the good deeds part of like, yeah, there's a lot of unbelievers and sometimes unbelievers are more generous, sacrificial, compassionate than believers are. But it's

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Chris
 not just that,

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Chris
 it's this purity where we have a different

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Chris
 conduct and character. And when I'm talking about conduct, I'm not talking about good works as much as like

[01:24:53:00 - 01:24:53:00]
Chris
 the

[01:24:55:02 - 01:24:58:22]
Chris
 way that we are conducting ourselves in terms of the things that we,

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Chris
 many times we won't do, we're not giving ourselves to, we're not engaging in.

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Chris
 But then the character thing of

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Chris
 patience and joy and peace, the fruit of the spirit.

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Chris
 And other that not that unbelievers can't have, you know, some of the fruit of the spirit,

[01:25:24:02 - 01:25:38:16]
Chris
 but that's where then the last P is not the most important, but it's, you have to have all three of them. And then that's proclamation. And as we are present and pure and doing these good works,

[01:25:39:22 - 01:25:57:23]
Chris
 we want people to begin to ask questions and we want people to say, hey, there seems to be something different here. And so then we can share like the reason that we do. So Peter talks about that, that should be ready to share the reason for the hope that you have. And so yes,

[01:26:00:00 - 01:26:20:05]
Chris
 the good deeds that we do may not be any different at times from the world. And even our character might, they may be, yeah, there are, I know a lot of unbelievers who are really good people in the sense that they just are joyful, they are generous, compassionate, a lot of times more than me,

[01:26:21:12 - 01:26:26:21]
Chris
 but they're not doing it out of a love for Christ. They're doing it

[01:26:28:08 - 01:26:45:19]
Chris
 a lot of times because that's, there's actually their means of salvation. That's how they're just means of justification. And so that's where the proclamation comes in is like, we are giving ourselves to these things because this is who our God is. This is what he's called us to, but also because they give us an opportunity

[01:26:46:22 - 01:26:49:21]
Chris
 to share the gospel. So again, you talk about the city hope,

[01:26:52:21 - 01:26:58:01]
Chris
 why do we have the food pantry, the medical clinic, the hub,

[01:27:00:00 - 01:27:00:23]
Chris
 bridges,

[01:27:02:10 - 01:27:25:05]
Chris
 all these different ministries? Well, first of all, because God cares about those issues and tells us to take care of the vulnerable, the poor, the widow, the orphan. And that reflects our obedience to him and that we care and show that this is what Christians care about, because this is what God cares about. But then also in that is like, we want to

[01:27:26:20 - 01:27:31:23]
Chris
 have an opportunity to meet people's spiritual needs and a lot of times,

[01:27:32:23 - 01:27:35:17]
Chris
 I mean, this is a little cliche,

[01:27:37:18 - 01:27:41:11]
Chris
 but I'm sure we all heard what you say before, people,

[01:27:42:12 - 01:27:47:17]
Chris
 they're not gonna care about what you have to say unless they know that you first care about them, right?

[01:27:48:21 - 01:28:14:04]
Chris
 And so, and we're not just doing it just to get an opportunity to share, but yes, those two things are linked, because if we really do care about people, we're gonna care about their spiritual needs as much as anything. And I love what Jesus says in Matthew nine, I think this is a really key passage. It says Jesus was traveling throughout all of the villages and

[01:28:17:02 - 01:28:29:12]
Chris
 towns and he was preaching the gospel. So there's a proclamation and he was healing the sick. So it's word indeed. It wasn't one or the other. This is what the kingdom is.

[01:28:31:15 - 01:28:34:20]
Chris
 And then he says, and he looked at people and he had compassion because they were

[01:28:36:03 - 01:29:00:14]
Chris
 harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Then he says, "Hey, pray to the Lord of the harvest "that I'll send people into the harvest." And so we're supposed to be praying that God will send people in the harvest and then that will include us. And what is the harvest? Like, how do you reap that harvest? Well, how did Jesus do it? We're proclaiming the word and meeting material needs.

[01:29:00:14 - 01:29:15:13]
Brenton
 Yeah, yeah, that's helpful. As I was thinking through this, like verse 16 says in the same way, "Let your light shine before others "so that they may see your good works "and give glory to your Father who is in heaven."

[01:29:17:09 - 01:29:18:06]
Brenton
 And just like

[01:29:19:08 - 01:29:30:13]
Brenton
 the works, I like how you put that, because you need all three, right? It's not just gonna be the works because anyone can do those works, but that's not necessarily gonna lead to glorifying God.

[01:29:30:13 - 01:29:37:21]
Chris
 Right, well, here's a great story. You heard me tell this briefly this morning in our staff meeting Sunday. I've got

[01:29:39:16 - 01:30:38:09]
Chris
 a lady from our church come up with a guy I've never met before. And she comes up and says, "Hey, this gave me his name "and his wife passed away recently, "but she just came to know Jesus." And so now she's in, she's with the Lord, and we're talking to him and just learned that that largely came about because of our benevolence ministry. And so people here at our church gave to the Benevolence Fund, and we have staff and volunteers who take that money, and they meet with people, figure out how to help them the best with their financial needs. But when they do, we're gonna share the gospel. And so it's just a perfect example of how it happens. And here now, I mean, a woman's eternity has been changed, and her husband now is coming to church, and now we have the opportunity to share the gospel with him. So

[01:30:39:18 - 01:30:45:14]
Chris
 I love it. I love it because it's just the picture of what it's meant to be. Yeah, for sure.

[01:30:45:14 - 01:31:18:19]
Brenton
 What about the times when, again, thinking back to verse 16, that people will see the works and give glory to God. What about the times where we are fulfilling all three of those things, but the culture sees it as bad, right? So specifically one that comes to mind is protesting abortion, right? So we would see that as protecting the vulnerable. They would see that as not that. So how can we fit that into what Jesus is saying here?

[01:31:18:19 - 01:31:29:21]
Chris
 Well, the longer and longer that I'm at this pastor thing, the more convinced I am of just the essential nature of the Sermon on the Mount,

[01:31:31:07 - 01:31:42:01]
Chris
 and especially the first 16 verses. So if we go to the Beatitudes, the last Beatitude, "Blessed are those who persecuted for righteousness' sake,

[01:31:43:17 - 01:31:57:12]
Chris
 and then blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you, and under all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account." What's so interesting is those first seven Beatitudes are like, "Hey, you're doing all these great things. You're being merciful. You're being peacemakers.

[01:31:59:22 - 01:32:00:10]
Chris
 You're

[01:32:01:13 - 01:32:11:01]
Chris
 hunger and thirsting for righteousness." And all of these great things that people, you would think that people would love, oh, and by the way, when you do these things, there are going to be people who are going to persecute you, revile you,

[01:32:12:11 - 01:32:24:05]
Chris
 and really what Jesus is saying there, and then he follows that up by, "You are salt of the earth and the light of the world." So we actually are salt of the earth and light of the world. As we are doing that, we are going to be

[01:32:25:07 - 01:32:32:17]
Chris
 persecuted at times that people are gonna hate it. The great thing about it is that just gives us another opportunity to say, "Okay, we're not going to,

[01:32:34:20 - 01:32:36:15]
Chris
 we're not gonna respond in kind.

[01:32:37:19 - 01:32:47:21]
Chris
 Like we're going to be gracious, we're gonna be compassionate, we're going to, in some ways, turn the other cheek." And Jesus will go on somewhere, and I was like, "If they wanna take your cloak,

[01:32:50:16 - 01:32:57:11]
Chris
 give them some more clothes. They make you walk a mile, go with them too." And now,

[01:32:58:23 - 01:33:13:22]
Chris
 we gotta compliment that with other things that the New Testament says. So that's not the whole story, but it just is like when we are persecuted for stands on things like abortion or sexuality, marriage,

[01:33:15:18 - 01:33:21:21]
Chris
 then we A, should expect it, and B, like, "Oh, this is an opportunity." Yeah.

[01:33:23:02 - 01:33:28:22]
Brenton
 An opportunity in the way that we handle that, like the way that we respond to that?

[01:33:28:22 - 01:33:33:18]
Chris
 Yeah, absolutely. It's the way that we respond to...

[01:33:36:01 - 01:33:47:07]
Chris
 And this is actually what happened. I talk about the early church on a regular basis, but this is literally what happened, is they were persecuted in great ways, and they

[01:33:49:00 - 01:33:57:00]
Chris
 didn't respond in kind, they didn't retaliate, and the Lord used that in a great way to build this church.

[01:33:58:07 - 01:33:58:13]
Chris
 Okay.

[01:34:01:00 - 01:34:05:10]
Brenton
 You said that we need to feel burdened for the people around us who are still in darkness.

[01:34:06:18 - 01:34:21:06]
Brenton
 If we really believe what we say, we believe about eternity and people's need for Jesus. Why do you think so many of us, including mature Christians, feel so little urgency about unbelievers?

[01:34:22:22 - 01:34:23:11]
Chris
 Well,

[01:34:25:10 - 01:34:33:12]
Chris
 I'd have to push back and say, can you be a mature Christian and actually feel a little urgency about unbelievers? That's fair.

[01:34:35:14 - 01:34:46:09]
Chris
 I think there's a multilayered answer to this question, but I begin with where I ended on Sunday in 2 Corinthians 4.6, is that

[01:34:47:17 - 01:34:51:05]
Chris
 the reality is we just do not

[01:34:52:10 - 01:34:53:16]
Chris
 believe,

[01:34:55:15 - 01:35:07:15]
Chris
 or we believe, but we really are not overwhelmed nearly enough by the greatness of Jesus Christ. Because if we're overwhelmed by how great He is and how awesome He is, then

[01:35:08:16 - 01:35:11:10]
Chris
 that's gonna compel us to tell other people.

[01:35:12:12 - 01:35:28:15]
Chris
 And not only compel us, we're just gonna naturally, this is, He's so great. I'm one of the people to know about Him. But part parcel of that is also recognizing what He's done for us. He's done this for me. How can I not

[01:35:30:13 - 01:35:48:03]
Chris
 do this for other people and not we're doing the same thing that Jesus did for us for other people, but we are telling them so that they can experience it. So really it's fundamentally not so much about caring about unbelievers. It is that, but it's first and foremost being

[01:35:50:06 - 01:35:51:04]
Chris
 truly

[01:35:53:16 - 01:35:58:01]
Chris
 consumed with how great Christ is and what He's done for us.

[01:35:59:05 - 01:36:11:02]
Chris
 No, you get excited. I mean, again, this is a simple illustration, but we talk to other people about what we care about and what we're excited about. Whether it's football, like

[01:36:12:09 - 01:36:16:18]
Chris
 here we are, it's football season again. And I'm thrilled about that. Okay?

[01:36:18:02 - 01:36:32:22]
Chris
 For another few weeks, yeah. But do we get more excited about the Hawkeyes, the Bears, Packers, the Chiefs, whoever, than we are about Jesus? And we can say all the way, the day that we want, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[01:36:34:03 - 01:36:41:07]
Chris
 But do you talk to people about football and you talk to people about Jesus? And that's just, I mean, I feel conviction about that

[01:36:42:13 - 01:36:48:14]
Chris
 in my own life. Then the third thing is, is do we really believe that people are gonna spend, do we really believe this

[01:36:49:20 - 01:36:50:14]
Chris
 thing about hell?

[01:36:51:17 - 01:37:00:06]
Chris
 People are gonna live forever and they're gonna suffer forever apart from Him. And that we may be the only hope that they have of that changing.

[01:37:01:21 - 01:37:07:13]
Chris
 Not that we're the hope, but the only, like again, you and you only, if we don't tell them who will.

[01:37:10:15 - 01:37:14:23]
Brenton
 Is that burden that you're talking about something, I mean,

[01:37:16:03 - 01:37:20:08]
Brenton
 you're saying that the primary way to deal with that is to

[01:37:21:22 - 01:37:22:11]
Brenton
 find

[01:37:23:19 - 01:37:39:06]
Brenton
 more of a belief, more of a love for Christ. Is that something that we can cultivate in ourselves? Is that a work of the Spirit? How, like, if we find ourselves in that situation where we're just not bothered by it, what is the next step for us?

[01:37:39:06 - 01:37:51:02]
Chris
 The second thing is 5, 14 and 15, for the love of Christ compels us. We are convinced that one died for all and he died for all that we might no longer live for ourselves but for him who died and rose again.

[01:37:52:21 - 01:38:01:21]
Chris
 That word compel means literally forced, like pressed, like we must do this.

[01:38:02:23 - 01:38:14:12]
Chris
 And so the way that we can cultivate it, ultimately it's just the Spirit's work, but like I talked about on Sunday, we have to give the Spirit something to work with.

[01:38:15:20 - 01:38:25:17]
Chris
 Now again, he doesn't need, he doesn't have to have that. Like he can very well just do it on his own, but that's not the normal

[01:38:26:23 - 01:38:30:03]
Chris
 rhythm of how it works. So we,

[01:38:31:16 - 01:38:39:09]
Chris
 this is actually literally, I go back to the Beatitudes. What are the Beatitudes meant to make us do? Well, we, you know, I love,

[01:38:40:15 - 01:38:48:09]
Chris
 Tim Keller pointed this out to me years ago. He goes like, if you really understand the Sermon on the Mount, we would say, God saved me from the Sermon on the Mount.

[01:38:49:21 - 01:39:08:20]
Chris
 And because you read it and you're like, I'm not any, like, I'm not any of these things, but all of that is meant to drive us back to the first Beatitude, blessed are the poor in spirit, which means blessed are the God dependent. So if we look at me and go, I don't have, if we look at our neighbors, like I just moved into a new neighborhood two weeks ago,

[01:39:10:02 - 01:39:12:22]
Chris
 and I've been thinking about this. I

[01:39:14:10 - 01:39:19:07]
Chris
 look out at these houses and these people, none of which I know

[01:39:21:04 - 01:39:39:09]
Chris
 and really know. Like if I don't have a desire to see them come to know Christ, like, what do I do with that? Well, the first thing is like, I'm something's wrong and I can't change this and I need you to.

[01:39:40:12 - 01:39:49:21]
Chris
 But Jesus says blessed are the poor in spirit, theirs is a kingdom of heaven. And so when we are poor in spirit, and then the second one is blessed are those who mourn. I'm mourning over the fact that I'm not

[01:39:51:14 - 01:39:58:06]
Chris
 where I need to be and should be. And then we turn ourselves to the Lord and ask Him the changes.

[01:39:59:20 - 01:40:03:04]
Brenton
 I should have brought this one up earlier, but we had another one that was submitted.

[01:40:04:11 - 01:40:22:00]
Brenton
 He said, you made very clear that our presence alone doesn't share the gospel and that we need to proclaim it. But what are the potential dangers of a preach the gospel at all times, use words if necessary, approach to evangelism? Are there times where this may apply?

[01:40:22:00 - 01:40:46:12]
Chris
 Well, I'm so glad that this question came up because I actually thought about this last week and I just didn't again have time to really get into this. So this quote, preach the gospel at all times, use words if necessary is a false attribution to a guy by the name of St. Francis of Assisi. So you've probably heard it if you've been around the church some point. And it's falsely attributed to him because

[01:40:47:13 - 01:40:52:06]
Chris
 St. Francis was part of a preaching order. So for him to say, you don't really need words,

[01:40:53:17 - 01:40:54:01]
Chris
 like

[01:40:55:05 - 01:41:05:02]
Chris
 this doesn't really fit. More than that, this is one of the dumbest things that's ever been stated in the history of the world or in the history of the church. And I really mean that.

[01:41:07:00 - 01:41:13:19]
Chris
 Preach the gospel at all times, use words if necessary. The gospel, if we're gonna preach the gospel, we have to use words.

[01:41:15:18 - 01:41:28:05]
Chris
 How will they, Romans 10, how will they believe unless they hear and how will they hear unless someone does good deeds to them? No, unless someone preaches to them. And so

[01:41:30:14 - 01:42:04:10]
Chris
 again, I try to be clear about this. We can do all the good deeds in the world and that'll make the world a better place temporarily. But we're actually not going to eternally be helping anybody if we don't actually share the gospel with them. And so proclamation requires us actually speaking the gospel. Could be writing, but it's verbal. It's not like nobody is ever gonna look at your life, just look at what you are doing serving at

[01:42:07:15 - 01:42:09:13]
Chris
 the food pantry and get saved.

[01:42:11:17 - 01:42:24:17]
Chris
 They have to hear the gospel for them to be saved. And I can't be like, I know you're like, okay, you're with me in this, but we have to be just abundantly, abundantly clear

[01:42:26:00 - 01:42:28:06]
Chris
 about this because it

[01:42:29:12 - 01:42:41:21]
Chris
 is the gospel that is the power of salvation. And the gospel is the good news, the heralding of what God has done for us in Christ Jesus. It's not, the gospel is not Christians do good things and

[01:42:43:11 - 01:42:49:21]
Chris
 yeah. Yeah, for sure. Those are, we do good things because of the gospel, but we gotta get them in the right order.

[01:42:49:21 - 01:43:18:20]
Brenton
 Yeah, okay, so-- Okay, off of my soapbox. So, well, let me put you back on. So, the other side of that, and he kind of brings this up to is maybe there's a family situation, someone that you've been trying to evangelize to for a long time. You've spoken a lot. Is there a time to pull back and to just, I wouldn't say kill them with kindness, but let them look at your life after this has been, where would be some wisdom in how to handle a situation like that?

[01:43:18:20 - 01:43:19:07]
Chris
 Yeah, again,

[01:43:20:20 - 01:43:22:08]
Chris
 every situation is,

[01:43:23:18 - 01:43:29:10]
Chris
 is unique, but this is where it's gotta be, it's gotta be both. And here's one of the problems in a lot of homes

[01:43:30:14 - 01:43:32:11]
Chris
 is that parents are like,

[01:43:34:15 - 01:43:51:18]
Chris
 people hear the gospel, the kids hear the gospel, but the way that the parents are not living, like the lifestyle that the parents are living is not attractive to their children in the sense that they maybe have anger issues, they're demanding,

[01:43:52:18 - 01:44:06:01]
Chris
 they're controlling, and they tell the gospel because they want their kid to go to heaven when they die, but their character is not being transformed by the gospel. So, it is, yeah, and there are times especially

[01:44:07:13 - 01:44:14:01]
Chris
 where if you keep talking about it, you're just gonna drive the person further and further away. And so,

[01:44:15:04 - 01:44:27:05]
Chris
 you have to win them over, and that's actually what, if we take this into marriage in 1 Peter chapter three, Peter tells believing wives with unbelieving husbands is that they might be won over without word

[01:44:28:13 - 01:44:29:20]
Chris
 by your, like,

[01:44:30:22 - 01:44:45:23]
Chris
 he's actually saying don't, in some ways, don't sit there and preach at your husband all the time, but win him over by the way that you are loving him and caring for him and maybe even serving him in some ways.

[01:44:45:23 - 01:44:49:16]
Brenton
 All right, good, we'll wrap there. Thanks, Chris.

[01:44:51:01 - 01:44:56:18]
Brenton
 If you have any questions, feel free to send them to us, ask at furtherpodcast.com, and we'll talk to you next week.

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 (Upbeat Music)