Taken by surprise 2

“We dare not think that God is absent or daydreaming. The do-nothing God. He is not tucked away in some far corner of the universe, uncaring, unfeeling, unthinking ... uninvolved. Count on it – God intrudes in glorious and myriad ways. And thank His holy name He does!” So writes Joni Eareckson Tada in the introduction to her book Glorious Intruder.

In my last blog, I described the first of two “divine intrusions”. Not only did God intrude in my life, but at the same time, he was working in the other leaders of Harvest to re-align our priorities to His. The first intrusion was about discipleship; the second is about reaching the lost. Here is how it happened:

Having realised last year that God wanted us to focus on discipleship, my first reaction was to begin preparing a sermon on discipleship. I turned to the Great Commission in Matthew 28:16-20. I noted that the Great Commission was the mission or assignment that God gave the disciples just before He left the earth. Therefore it was very important. Further, the Great Commission was open-ended. That is to say, it still applies today.

In the Greek, it was clear that the only command in the Great Commission was “make disciples”. The process of making disciples involved “going”, “baptising” and “teaching” – these were participles that modified the imperative verb “make disciples”. Hmm ... when Jesus commands something, we should listen up.

I was humming. There was lots of evidence to back up the proposition that discipleship was important to God, and it still is today. Brilliant! I would be able to preach with authority and conviction...

At this point a little question popped into my mind:

“So, who are you going to disciple at Harvest?”

“Um ... Harvesters?” I replied.

“That would involve the ‘teaching’ bit. But what about the ‘going’ and ‘baptising’ bit?”

It was a short conversation with scintillating input from me, but I can tell you - it grabbed my attention. The Glorious Intruder had intruded!

I realised that I was trying to separate evangelism from discipleship. But why was that the case? It was painful to admit that I wasn’t really concerned about the lost. I would rather have “played church” than run the risk of actually reaching out. Yes, Christians must be discipled from the point of conversion onwards, but our churches should be bringing new “babies” into the family all the time. We do not exist for ourselves alone.

But what was I going to do about it. And did I really care? In some ways, I did not want to pray “give me your heart for the lost, Jesus” because I was quite happy as I was. So in the end, I prayed along the lines recommended by Selwyn Hughes: I’m not really willing to pray “give me your heart for the lost”, but I am willing to be made willing. Then I went out and started acting as though I did have a heart for the lost.

Amazingly – and unfortunately this part of the story is for another day – God got me involved in some life changing conversions. I’m talking about the kind of change where the “before” and “after” photos can hardly be recognised as the same person. Boy was it exciting! I don’t think I had ever experienced such motivation and joy in ministry. And without realising it, God had begun working with me to align my heart to His.

Needless to say, God has been working in our leadership team too, so that since we have the discipleship structures in place, we are planning to get intentional about outreach. That is why we have invited Anthony Dee to visit us in term 1 of 2013. He will give us some practical training in evangelism. Further, we are planning a big Alpha drive in term 2.

However, as a church, we must begin right away by inviting God to change our priorities in the area evangelism. If we don’t, we will not be in a position to seize the opportunities that God is planning to send our way next year. If God doesn’t change your heart, you may perceive Harvest’s outreach efforts as an irritation or a threat to your comfort. Worst of all, you might miss the joy God has planned for you because of apathy. Ask God to work with your heart. He may not change it in the same way He changed mine. But if you ask Him to, you can be sure of one thing: He will!

Cheers for now - Ian