No Vacancy!

If you went by the fellowship hall during the revival workshop by Andy Lambert and Laura Campbell you may have thought you heard Johnny Cash singing, “There’s A Train A Comin”.  It was just Andy singing a song he wrote about Sampson and his hair to that tune.

“To love people without sharing your faith is to love them incompletely.”  This sums up what I learned at Andy Lambert and Laura Campbell’s workshop during revival.  The one thing that kept coming up in the discussion about evangelism was people not wanting to offend someone.  This is an increasingly secular world and society tells us to be kind and let our lives speak to people.  I know that people would see a lot of flaws in mine, it certainly would not always show Jesus!  Dr. Scott Jones said, “When you love people poorly, you share your faith poorly.”

In this dark world the need for Jesus and the Good News has never been greater!  Reaching this younger generation is going to be very different.  As Laura taught us it is about relationships.  We have to be with someone three to six times to begin to have a relationship.  We do not have to be able to quote Scripture!  We just have to share how God has impacted our lives.  No one can debate what God has done for you and you don’t have to defend it.  And, as a church, we are going to have to be creative on how to present the Gospel.  The Gospel does not change but the way we present it will have to.  

Everyone has a hole that is empty.  If you don’t fill it with Jesus, it will be filled with something else.  You have probably heard this many times.  Luke 11: 24-26, “When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’  When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order.  Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first.”  I like how The Message says it, “... On return, it finds the person swept and dusted, but vacant.”  The hole was empty so the impure spirits filled it.  We want a no vacancy, neon sign lit up on our heart!  And we want that for others!  Let’s be intentional!  

Andy asked, “are we lying to people about Jesus?  Then he said, “we have to tell the Truth!”