Why Do We Evangelize?

Luke 10, and we begin with verse 25, the parable of the Good Samaritan. On one occasion, an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus.

! Teacher, he asked, what must I do to inherit eternal life? What is written in the law, he replied, how do you read it? He answered, love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and love your neighbor as yourself.

You have answered correctly, Jesus replied, do this and you will live. But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, and who is my neighbor?

In reply, Jesus said, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. When he fell into the hands of robbers, they stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead.

A priest happened to be going down that same the same road. And when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, pass by on the other side.

But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was, and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine.

Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him. The next day, he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper.

Look after him, he said. And when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have. Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?

The expert in the law replied, the one who had mercy on him. Jesus told him, go and do likewise.

Please open your Bibles or keep them open to Luke chapter 10. As we gather for worship tonight, here in this place, there are two things happening elsewhere.

One is that God is being worshipped in heaven tonight. By men and women and boys and girls who were at one time rebels against him.

Opposed to his kingdom. Followers of Satan on their way to hell. But somewhere, they met someone who told them about Jesus.

They found a Bible or a church or a friend who knew the truth. They learned they were sinners and they learned that those sins could be forgiven. And now they are in heaven worshipping God.

The Ethiopian eunuch is there because Philip explained to him that passage of scripture he was reading that day. The 3,000 from the day of Pentecost are in heaven today because Peter preached the way of salvation.

They heard and believed. They're there, of course, you understand because God saved them. But he used Philip and Peter, didn't he? To bring about those ends.

And there are people dying and entering God's presence every minute that will spend eternity with him. Because at some point, they heard the truth of the gospel.

And what a great thing that is. God is being worshipped in heaven tonight. Isn't that what we want? We want for God to be worshipped. That's why we've gathered here. Is to worship our God.

But the other thing that is taking place at this moment is that people are right now suffering in hell. And every minute, more people are headed there for an eternity of torment.

People who either never heard the truth because no one told them. Or who heard that truth and rejected it. Somebody takes the time to measure the annual mortality rate of every country in the world.

And they average those together into the mortality rate for the whole world. How many people die every year? Out of a thousand people in the world, every year, 8.6 of them will die.

8.6 out of a thousand. And we can do the math. The population of the world is up to 6.7 billion people. That's 6.700.000.000 people in our world.

And with that mortality rate, that means that 57.620.000 people will die this year. 57.620.000 people will die this year.

Now, we're going to be very generous here for a moment. Some statistics show that one in every six people is a Christian. Or claims to be a Christian. We know that not everyone who claims to be a Christian is a Christian.

We understand that. But we'll be generous and say one in every six people in the world is a Christian. That means that if 57.620.000 people die this year, of those about 57 million plus 9.600.000 will go to heaven.

And that's great. 9.6 million more people in glory worshiping God. Those numbers are sort of staggering to us. But it also means that 48 million and change are headed for hell this year.

This year alone. 48 more million people on their way to destruction. And likely more than that. Maybe big numbers don't do it for you because you can't even imagine 48 million people.

I can't really either. Okay. In the United States, the mortality rate is a little bit lower. It's 8.2 instead of 8.6 out of every 1,000 people. That's one in every 122 people will die this year.

We've got around 230 people here on a Sunday morning in our church. Two of them will be dead by next year at this time. Now, maybe the two out of those 240-something people will come from outside our walls.

We understand that. That might not be this 230 people. But that's the nature of the statistics. Of the reality of death. And Bremen.

We have 4,500 people. 37 of them will be dead by next year at this time. A handful of them on their way to heaven. The majority on their way to hell.

I can throw numbers at you all day long. The reality is that everyone is going to die. Whether it's this year or next year or 50 years from now. Everyone is going to die.

And there is only one of two eternal destinies for each one who dies. Death is inevitable. That's why funeral homes stay in business. That's why there's a cemetery in this town full of bodies decaying in the ground.

And those two things that are happening tonight. God being worshipped in heaven and people suffering in hell are the reasons why we do evangelism.

Last week we considered what evangelism is. Tonight, why do we do it? Because it brings people to God. So that they might worship Him.

And so God is praised. Souls are saved and they go to heaven and they worship Him. Which is the goal. It's our aim. It's to worship God. And also it warns us of hell and the dangers that are there.

So that people might avoid such a horrible place. Does that sound familiar to you at all? It should. It's the two greatest commandments. The two reasons we do evangelism are the two greatest commandments.

To love the Lord your God with all of your heart and soul and strength and mind. And to love your neighbor as yourself. And if you love God, you'll want to see Him worshipped. And if you love your neighbor, you won't want Him to spend an eternity in hell.

Now, evangelism is simply, as we saw last time, sharing the good news of how through the work of Jesus Christ, others can be delivered from the power and penalty of their sin before a holy Creator God.

And calling them to respond to that message. Calling them to repentance and faith. Tonight, why should we do evangelism? Well, because we are to love God and we are to love our neighbor.

And we'll also consider tonight some of the reasons why we don't do evangelism as we should. Before we dive into those things, last week I gave you some names of others on whose work I'm depending.

I'm standing on the shoulders of greater men. I mentioned Pastor Bob's evangelism class. And J.I. Packer. And Will Metzger. And Ernie Riesinger. And Mark Dever. There's one other name that I should have mentioned.

Perhaps before any of the others. And it's not a name that any of you will know. But I want to give credit where credit is due. And the other person is a good friend of mine.

His name is Rush Witt. He was a good friend of mine in college. We've stayed in touch. And he has taught me as much by his personal example and by his words as anyone has about personal evangelism.

Some of what's already been said tonight has been helped by him. And so I'm thankful for him. And so tonight then, why should we do evangelism and what are some of the reasons that we don't, even though we should?

And the two reasons are what we've said. The first is love to God. Love to God demands evangelism. We should be motivated by worship.

If we're believers in God, we will want him to be worshipped. Again, it's why we come here each Lord's Day to praise him, to honor him. It's why we should be pained when we look around our world and we look around our culture and we see that God is not being worshipped.

We see our world, our culture, our government, our schools abandoning God. He's not receiving the glory that is to his name. In fact, he's receiving the opposite most times. He's being blasphemed in the world.

And that should pain us because we want God to be worshipped and everywhere we look, that's not happening. It ought to cause us sorrow. It ought to cause us righteous anger.

And it ought to inspire us to go and tell other people about him so that instead of blaspheming him, they will worship him. Worship is the goal.

Listen to what John Piper says. He talks about missions here, but in many ways, missions and evangelism are the same thing. They're telling people it just may be that your context is different.

He says missions is not the ultimate goal of the church. You go to some churches and you think that missions and evangelism is the ultimate goal. It's all they do. It's all they talk about. There's an imbalance there.

It's good that they do those things, but there's an imbalance. It's not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Missions exists because worship doesn't. Worship, therefore, is the fuel and goal of missions.

It is the goal of missions because in missions we simply aim to bring the nations into the white-hot enjoyment of God's glory. The goal of missions is the gladness of the peoples and the greatness of God.

And then he quotes Psalm 97. The Lord reigns. Let the earth rejoice. Let the many coastlands be glad. The reason that we do missions and evangelism is because there's people out there that aren't worshiping God, that aren't delighting in Him, that aren't rejoicing in Him.

And so we want them to. And this is a high motive. Love for God. Worshiping God. It will continue even if our love for the lost grows cold.

We're going to talk about our love for the lost in a minute. Our love to our neighbor. But our love to our neighbor will fluctuate. It will be all over the map. And our love to God will too, but for a different reason. Love towards men will change as they change.

We will be encouraged with them one day and we will be frustrated the next. Because their interest in the gospel will be up and then it will be down. They will reject us. We will get tired of being rejected. We will get tired of loving men.

I've heard missionaries in their more honest moments. At least one has said this to me. He said, you have to be motivated by something greater than the love for the lost.

He said, I get sick of these people. That's an honest confession. It's not a right attitude. But we grow tired. We get sick of it. And we'll be frustrated and fed up and want to throw in the towel and say, you know what?

It's not worth it. But love to God cannot change because of God. Because He does not change. The people around us will change. God does not. And so we must be motivated by love to Him.

The desire to see Him worshipped. Another reason we evangelize out of love to God is very simply that it is our duty. God tells us to do it. And if we love God, then we will obey Him.

You remember 1 John 5.3. This is love for God to obey His commands. The way that people know you love God is if you obey Him. And evangelism is one of God's commands.

It is one of the means He has ordained for the salvation of men's souls. We'll talk about this more, I think, next time when we see who is to do the work of evangelism. But just listen to the commands that God gives us and understand that if we love God, we'll be keeping these commands.

We won't get to pick and choose which commands we want to keep. We keep His commands if we love Him. Matthew 28.19 You know it well. Some people say that command is just for the disciples, just for the apostles.

Then why does Jesus promise to be with us to the end of the age? If the promise extends to the end of the age, then the command extends to the end of the age. And here we are, and the age has not ended yet.

And so that duty to go and make disciples of all nations is still with the church. And you are the church. And so it is your duty, and if we love God, we will fulfill it. 1 Peter 3.15 But in your heart, set apart Christ as Lord.

Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that you have. The reason for the hope you have is the gospel.

Always be ready to share the gospel with those that ask about your hope. It's the clear command of Scripture that God's people are to evangelize. And so, in love to God, we must obey.

Also out of love to God, our hearts are to be full of love for God. And we saw last time, Matthew 12.34 For out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks.

If we love God in our heart, then we will love to tell others about Him with our mouth. Back to John Piper for a moment. Worship is also the fuel for missions.

Passion for God. And worship precedes the offer of God in preaching. You can't commend what you don't cherish. Missionaries will never call out, let the nations be glad.

Who cannot say from the heart, and then he quotes from the Psalms again, I rejoice in the Lord. I will be glad and exult in you. I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. Missions begins and ends in worship.

We come to worship because we love God. That's what's in our hearts. That should overflow out of our hearts onto our lips. We love Him in our heart, and so we're eager to call others to love Him as well.

Do you treasure Christ? Do you love Him? Then you must speak of Him. And so the first big reason that we do evangelism is because we love God.

We want to see Him worshipped. We want to obey Him. And we can't help it because what's in our hearts should come out in our mouths. But the second thing is love to neighbor.

Love to neighbor. And don't let what I said earlier about the difficulty of loving your neighbor put you off. This is our duty. This is what we are called to. Just because they are frustrating us doesn't give us a right to not love them anymore.

Love to our fellow man dictates that we tell them the good news. Is it loving someone to allow them to run headlong into hell? Of course not.

No more loving than it would be to not warn a blind person that there's a pit up ahead, that they're going to fall into if they continue down their present course. We would never allow something like that to happen.

And then how much more should we not allow someone who's about to lose their soul, that there's spiritual blindness there, how much more should we warn them? And there are many people.

We noticed at the beginning all around us, some 48 million this year will run headlong into hell. There's a world full of hell-bound sinners. Should we not have compassion on them?

Wasn't this the heart of our Savior? When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it.

Luke 19. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem. These are Jesus' words. Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often have I longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.

Do you long for the salvation of men's souls like Jesus did? Have you wept over those who reject Jesus? When we sing the words, Pity the nations, O our God.

Constrain the earth to come. Send thy victorious word abroad and bring the strangers home. Is it your heart's desire that strangers would come home, that God would pity the nations? When we sing, Why was I made to hear thy voice?

And enter while there's room, when thousands, and it's not thousands, it's millions, every year when millions make a wretched choice. Rather starve than come, does your heart ache for the millions?

It was Paul's heart. Romans 10. Brothers, my heart's desire. Prayer to God for the Israelites, is that they may be saved. Do you long for the salvation of men's souls?

Paul longed for his countrymen. Do you long for your families, your countrymen, people from other countries, to know the Lord? Then, like Paul, you will be praying for it. My heart's desire and prayer to God, is that they may be saved.

Do your prayers reflect your heart, for the desire, the salvation of souls. If we love men's souls, it means our evangelism won't just be a cold presentation of facts.

It will be a warm, hearted, loving appeal for lost sinners to come to Jesus. It's part of following Christ our Lord, walking in God's way. We're not out just scalp hunting, looking to put notches in our evangelistic belt.

I've won this many souls. Yes, we want to win lots of souls, but it's so that God will be worshipped, and so they will be delivered from an eternity of suffering.

It's not for our glory and good name. Packer says, if we ourselves have known anything of the love of Christ for us, and haven't we known something of the love of Christ for us?

And if our hearts have felt any measure of gratitude for the grace that has saved us from death and hell, then this attitude of compassion and care for our spiritually needy fellow men ought to come naturally and spontaneously to us, does it?

Is it natural? Is it spontaneous for you to long for the souls of lost men? You say, I don't know who my neighbor is. Love my neighbor. Is that just the guy that lives next door to me?

That's the question that the expert in the law asked Jesus in the parable, or before Jesus tells the parable. And what's his answer? Well, our neighbor is whoever it is that God puts in our path that is hurting, that is suffering.

In this case tonight, talking about evangelism, it's the person God puts in our path that is in need of the truth of Jesus, the Savior of sinners. I wonder how many needy sinners I have passed by from on the other side.

I wonder how many of us have been just like that priest and Levite and seen someone that was in far greater need than the man in the story. They were in need for their souls.

And we walk by on the other side. How many times have we denied by the way that we live? We come to church and we say we long to see the church is full.

We pity the nations. We mourn for lost souls. We believe these things and then we go out and when we see lost souls, our hearts are not moved and we go by on the other side and we deny by the way we live what we profess with our mouth.

If we're followers of Jesus, we will love God and we will love our neighbor and when we fail to do evangelism, we are failing in both of the greatest commandments that God has given.

And so that's why we should do evangelism. Out of love to God and love for our fellow men. So understanding those things, let's take some moments now to consider some of the reasons why we don't.

Some of the excuses that we use. some of the things that we use as reasons to get around doing evangelism. If we think of it in terms of the two greatest commandments, it must boil down to a failure to love God and to love our neighbor.

Or to put it another way, we love ourselves too much. Many of the reasons that we'll note here in some way are a reflection of our shortcomings in doing nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility, consider others better than yourselves.

Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Many of these things we're just looking out for our own interests and not the interests of those around us.

Mark Dever, this pastor in Washington, D.C., and he makes an excellent observation. It's obvious, but it reveals the foolishness of some of the ways we manage to rationalize our way around witnessing.

He says, even at the time you are not witnessing, you're busy spinning, justifying, rationalizing, and explaining to your conscience why it was really wise and faithful and kind and obedient not to share the gospel with a particular person at that time and in that situation.

Have you ever been? I've done that. I read that and I saw myself because I've been sitting there with the opportunity to share the gospel and I'm thinking of all the reasons why I shouldn't show them that love and mercy.

Why I shouldn't obey God. Rationalizing it. Justifying it. And so let's take some of those reasons and unmask them tonight. It seems that often we don't really believe in the power of the gospel and the promise of God.

We think, that person will never come to Christ. I won't even bother sharing the gospel with them. They are beyond hope. It's obvious that they will never believe.

But in doubting that God is able to save our blasphemous neighbor or our God-hating classmate or our alcoholic co-worker, we forget the clear demonstrations of God's power and the salvation of the most unlikely individuals.

A persecutor of the church like the Apostle Paul. Anybody in Paul's day would say, no way. No way. God saved him.

A womanizer like Augustine. Augustine, one of the early church fathers, great theologian. He was a partier, a womanizer.

His mother prayed for him every day. And the Lord heard those prayers. His mother didn't give up. But everyone around him probably had. Or many. And God saved him.

A blasphemous slave trader like John Newton. A drug addict like Josh Hamilton. Anybody here know who Josh Hamilton is? Anybody? I've got a few.

Josh Hamilton is a professional baseball player. Hugely talented young man. Came up, drafted number one pick in the major leagues. Made it to the major leagues.

And then, fell into serious, serious drug and alcohol abuse. Destroyed his life. Obviously was no longer able to play baseball. And God got a hold of that young man's life.

And stopped him. And today, he is again playing Major League Baseball, which is remarkable in and of itself. Put on a show like you've never seen and probably never will see again.

It's a home run derby a few weeks ago. And afterwards, he's being interviewed and he said, it's amazing over the past few years what God has done in my life and how quickly He has done it.

And from all signs, it appears to be a genuine work. Time will tell. But if people like these are not beyond God's reach, why should they be beyond your reach?

Why should you not reach out to them with the gospel? Maybe that's too extreme for you can see a radical conversion happening. But what about your neighbor? He's not a terrible person, but he's totally satisfied with who he is, with his life.

He doesn't feel a need for church or for God. He's just complacent. That's where my doubts begin to flare up. Someone who's totally content and they see no need for the gospel.

These too can be reached by the grace of God. We need to have our faith strengthened. Read God's Word. Read the remarkable accounts of God's salvation. Read biographies of those who have been saved by grace. Radical sinners or complacent ones.

Pray, Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief. We're to walk by faith in this world and not by sight, but God has given us many examples to see with our own eyes of how He saves sinners.

And so why should we doubt His power? Let us not doubt it then. Rather, think on the promises of God and ask whether the problem is with God's power or with your weak faith.

and it's not with God's power. It's our failure to believe. Who is that person in your life? The one that will never come to Christ in your estimation.

Pick that person out and pray for them. Pray for them every day this week. Pray for them. Pray that God will give you courage to open your mouth and speak to them. Pray that He'll give you courage to invite them to come next Sunday to our evangelistic Lord's Day.

That one that's beyond hope. I think oftentimes we doubt the power of God. But I think another reason we don't do evangelism sometimes is that we don't really believe in the judgments and wrath of God like we should.

We don't really believe in hell like we say we do. If I do believe in hell then why am I not more concerned about people going there? You think about the numbers that we spoke of earlier.

48 million people this year in this world will die. And depart for eternal destruction. That's 131,506 every day. Over 5,000 every hour.

91 people every minute. That's three people every two seconds. One, two, three. In two seconds.

Three more people gone to eternal punishment. Do you really believe that hell is a real place where the suffering is unspeakable and unending?

It cannot fail to move us. Read the scriptures on hell and believe them. Revelation 20, 15. If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

Matthew 13, 41 and 42. The Son of Man will send out his angels and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin. And all who do evil, they will throw them into the fiery furnace where they will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Or Mark 9. If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.

Read the scriptures on hell. Pick up Ted Donnelly's book on heaven and hell. Read those chapters on hell. Believe it. If you can find the sermons, I meant to look and I didn't. I don't know if they're still available.

He preached four sermons. Edward Donnelly or Ted Donnelly preached at a family conference years ago and I was there. And on Wednesday night I've never seen anything like what has closest thing to revival that I've ever seen with my own eyes.

He preached on the reality of hell and what it will be like. And many were saved that night, but do whatever it takes to burn it into your mind that hell is a real place.

And that the judgment there is unspeakable. The torment there is unlike anything that will be experienced in this life. And understand that every two seconds, three more people.

Think of the people that you see each day as souls with one of two possible eternal destinies. When you see somebody, a person is going to spend eternity either in heaven or in hell.

It becomes a very difficult part of our faith living what we believe, our theoretical view versus our practical view. Pastor John talked about it with regard to our doctrine of God. What about what we believe about hell?

It's easy in some respects to talk about it to say we believe it. It seems like in practice we don't believe it. May God help us to believe His Word is true.

Another reason, and I think this is one of the most common, why we don't engage in evangelism and witnessing is because we are afraid or ashamed. We are afraid of what people will think about us.

We are afraid people will think that we're crazy. One of those fanatics. We fear that we won't be liked. All sorts of fear. Probably afraid that we'll be rejected. Afraid that we'll fail.

Afraid that we'll stumble over our words and people will laugh at us. We're simply afraid or ashamed. And Packer again says, if it is a false shame, which is not shame at all, but pride in disguise that keeps our tongue from Christian witness when we're with other people, we need to press upon our conscience this question.

Are you too proud to share the Gospel with others? Does it keep your lips silent and afraid? Because you're afraid of what people will think. He asks this question, which matters more? Our reputation or their salvation?

And I think too often we answer the question the wrong way. At least practically. We say my reputation is more important. We must remember that if we are ashamed of Jesus, He will so be of us.

Mark 38. If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of Him when He comes in His Father's glory with the holy angels.

I think Paul's words to Timothy are very helpful. 2 Timothy 1, 7 and 8. Why don't you turn there? These are important verses. When we think about our fear, our hesitancy to speak the Gospel.

2 Timothy 1, 7 and 8. For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, or we could say a spirit of fear, but a spirit of power, of love, and of self-discipline.

So, do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord or ashamed of me, His prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the Gospel by the power of God.

See the connection between us having received a spirit of power and not being ashamed. I'm not going to tell you, I'm not here to say, don't be afraid anymore. I'm here to tell you that you haven't received a spirit of fear.

That you do have a spirit of power. I'm here to say, be what you already are. Live out what God has already given you, which is not a spirit of fear, and so don't live in fear.

He's given a spirit of power. And so live in that power through Christ. Don't be afraid of what others think because God is faithful.

But some still say, it's fine to read that I have a spirit of power. It feels very much like I have a spirit of fear. Listen to the words of Deuteronomy 31 and verse 6.

The Israelites are on the edge of the promised land. And they're about to go in and Moses is speaking to them and he says, be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them.

And if you stop there, that's a really tall order. Be strong and courageous and don't be afraid. And the people are thinking, we're going into the land where we're outnumbered. There's more of them than there are of us.

And they're bigger. There's giants in the land. I mean, that's what kept them out of the promised land for 40 years was their lack of faith that God could deliver. There's giants in the land. We're on the wrong side of the Jordan River and there's no bridge to the other side.

It's easy to stand there and say, be courageous and don't be afraid, but it doesn't stop there. There's more. Be courageous. Don't be afraid or terrified because of them.

Four. Because for the Lord, your God goes with you. He will never leave you nor forsake you. The basis for the command, don't be afraid, be courageous, is that God is with them and he won't leave them.

He won't forsake them. You say, that's Israel. That's right. But what did Jesus promise us in the Great Commission when he's telling us to go and make disciples? What does he say? I am with you.

Same promise that God gave to the Israelites. I am with you. Even to the end of the age. That means he won't forsake us. And so when we're told to not be afraid, to be courageous and to go and to spread the gospel, we remember, I have a spirit of power, not of fear.

And God is with me. Therefore, I need not fear. I can heed that command to be courageous and to go. To share the gospel with others. One other thought about fear.

Instead of fearing men, we should fear God. Metzger says, we need to displace our fear of others with a fear of someone, capital S, he's talking about God, of someone else.

It's like David facing Goliath. You remember all of the Israelites were shaking in their boots because there's this great giant and they're all afraid. And David has the two concerns that we've spoken of tonight.

He says, who is this Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? Do you see his concern for God's glory? He wants God to be worshipped. And this Philistine is blaspheming God.

David's concerned for God's glory. He's concerned that God be worshipped and praised. But, think about fear for a moment. He's motivated by that love to God. But then we hear him say, David said to Saul, let no one lose heart.

Let no one be afraid. Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine. Your servant will go and fight him. The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine.

You see, David feared God. He didn't fear Goliath like the rest of the Israelites did. And so too, when we face our Goliath, that impossible case, the one that we'll never believe or convinced, we don't need to be afraid of speaking the truth to them.

We need to fear God and seek for His honor and glory by sharing the gospel with that one. Fear God. Well, some will say, it just doesn't fit my personality.

Obedience to God is not optional, dependent upon our personalities. You say, it's just in my personality to be sort of antagonistic towards people.

I don't get it. I really don't like people. I hate people. That's my personality. I can't help it. So I'm going to, I'm going to murder pretty much everybody I see because it's, it's just, I just, I don't get along well with others.

I don't play well with others. So I hate. That's who I am. I can't help it. Anybody that said that, you say, well, that's not, it's not optional. God says, you shall not murder.

And Jesus defines that as hating people. So you can't, you can't hate. It's obedience. But it seems many times people say, witnessing does not fit my personality. Evangelism doesn't fit my personality.

Oh, okay, no problem. When in reality, it's a matter of obedience. Love to God and love to men.

I want to be sensitive here. That didn't sound very sensitive. I understand that. You may have a difficult time conversing with others. You may stumble when you talk about the weather and to think about talking about the gospel is such a monumental task that you think it's impossible.

It's, it's, it's not just beyond my personality. It's beyond my gifts. These things are understood, but there are people in your life. Perhaps they are your children.

Friends of yours that are in need of the gospel that you do talk to. That you're able to converse with. And you do it on a regular basis. And it's a matter of conversing about God and how you can be right with Him.

Sharing the truth with them. You can take the gospel in written form and put it into their hands. We'll talk more when we get to how to do evangelism about some of these things. I understand that certain personalities will be an obstacle to evangelism, but obstacles are not things to send us running in the other direction.

There are things to be, by God's grace, overcome. And so, let me challenge some of you who believe it is not in your personality or your gift range to evangelize, to tell you that a very simple thing, in some ways, it doesn't even require you to open your mouth, although that would be helpful.

There are some of these on the table in the back. There are invitations for our evangelistic Lord's Day next Sunday when Pastor Bob will bring a pointedly evangelistic message and we want you to invite friends and family that need to hear the gospel.

It's a very simple thing to take one of these and to put it in someone's hands and to say, we'd love to see you at our church next week. So I challenge you to go back to the table after the service is over and to get at least one of these, preferably more, and to take them and to put them in the hands of people that need to hear the gospel.

And maybe they'll come. Oh, that person will never come. See, there's our weak faith again. Pray that they'll come. Trust the Lord to do that work. And some will come by God's grace and hear the truth.

And that is a way of doing evangelism. Some people don't want to inconvenience other people. That's just an excuse. We don't want to bother other people.

And it's true that we don't want to be obnoxious in the way we present the gospel. If a person requests that you stop, I think in most situations that should be respected.

But sharing the gospel is not an inconvenience. It is a necessity. You say, well, people will view me as intolerant. It's not the tolerant thing to do to tell them that they're a sinner and to tell them about the gospel.

But that doesn't let us off the hook. Jesus doesn't say, go and make disciples so long as no one is offended by it. Jesus is a stumbling block. The message of truth will offend people so long as it is not your presentation that is offensive.

So long as you are not being rude and obnoxious and truly inconsiderate of other people, we'll be persecuted for our faith and spreading the gospel so long as that persecution isn't a result of our insensitivity, our poor timing, but rather a result of the message.

The message of the cross will cause people to stumble. Salvation is only in Christ. It is exclusive. But if people complain about that, you can show them the inclusiveness of Christianity. It is for anyone who will believe.

Anyone. And so don't be put off by cries of intolerance or inconvenience. Another reason many don't do evangelism is because they don't want to ruin a good friendship.

And herein, I think, lies the great danger of relationship evangelism. We'll talk about that more. I keep saying that, but you can't put everything in one message. We're going to talk about relationship evangelism. And basically, the premise is that we'll have a better foundation for sharing the gospel with someone with whom we've developed a friendship, a relationship.

We have a basis from which to work with them. We have common ground. We have a relationship where they'll respect us, where they'll listen to us, where they'll hear us. And that is true. And that is an excellent way to do evangelism.

But the danger in that is you establish this friendship and it grows and it develops. And then time comes to think, well, they might be ready to hear the gospel. And then you're paralyzed that sharing the gospel is going to ruin that friendship.

Oh, I've established this friendship. I don't want to blow it now. I don't want to ruin it. I don't want to bring up Jesus and have them be offended and then lose the friendship. There's the danger in it.

Many people don't want to ruin a good friendship and so they never open their mouth and tell their friends about their Savior. They get so comfortable in the relationship that they never share the gospel.

But the greater danger is that if they don't, your friendship won't last beyond this lifetime and into the next because they won't be there to enjoy it. It's a little bit like being at the beach with a friend and you see your friend out swimming and they're enjoying it and you're glad that they're having a good time out in the ocean.

But then you see some shark fins swimming out in the water and you think to yourself, you know what? I really don't want to spoil their nice time out in the ocean. And they're probably going to be mad at me if I do and I don't want to jeopardize our relationship by warning them of the danger and ruining the good time that they're having.

That's stupid, you say. Right. It is. How much more so to not warn people of the eternal danger that they're about to face that's impending, that could come at any time because you don't want them to be upset with you.

You don't want to ruin your friendship. Another reason that people will give is that I just don't know how. I don't know how to share the Gospel with other people.

The solution to that one is simple. Learn. Get Will Metzger's book to tell the truth and read it. Take Pastor Bob's evangelism class the next time he holds it.

And in reality, you do know how. You know what the Gospel has meant to you. You know how it's applied to you every day of your life. You take that and you can apply it to others. You know the testimony of how God changed your life.

You can share that with someone else and say, He can do the same for you as He has done for me. Listen, as we proceed through this series, find help in it and apply these truths to your heart.

Again, pick up some of those books and read them if you have the time. Make the time to do it. But learn. And lastly, and this brings us back to where we started, I think we don't do evangelism like we should because we don't love God like we should.

At least I don't. if what comes out of our mouths is a reflection of what's in our hearts, then perhaps there's not very much of God in our hearts.

Why don't we love Him more? And why isn't that shown in our speaking of Him more? I think it's because we don't love Him like we should, because we don't know Him as well as we should.

We don't spend time with Him like we could and should. Our times of talking to Him in prayer and listening to Him and His Word are abbreviated. They're short.

They are whenever we can find a spare moment instead of being the priority. Our hearts are cold and callous by the world.

We have lots of time in the world, don't we? At work, at school, with our friends, our contacts, and then we come home and we're filled with more of the world and what we watch and listen to and read.

And is it any wonder that if our hearts are so full of everything that the world offers us, that when we come to the Scriptures, we find them cold and sometimes lifeless?

Hopefully, it's not always that way. I'm talking about extremes, but see if this is not true, at least sometimes in your heart. The things of the world crowd out the glory of God and His truth.

Jesus' words that our mouths speak out of the overflow of the heart are not so much an indictment of what we speak as of what's in our hearts. And so if all this series on evangelism does is to make us realize that we don't know and love God like we should, then it will have served its purpose.

If we walk away after these six or eight or whatever it will be weeks studying evangelism, and there's people that know and love God better, and I will praise the Lord for it. Because you know what will happen?

It's glorious to have people that know and love God, and then out of that will come people that speak about their God, that tell others about Him. Evangelism will follow as a natural result, and so meditate on our glorious, on our big God and what He has done.

Meditate on Christ and His cross. Learn to know and love God again. Fill your heart with Him and His truth. Spend less time with the world and more time with Him this week. And then you won't be able to help but to speak of Him.

So tonight, may God help us to love Him and to love our neighbor instead of passing by on the other side of the road. Let's take our hymnals tonight and turn to Hymn 704.

Hymn 704. It's Jesus, keep me near the cross. It's really just the last thing that we spoke of.

Near the cross, our hearts will be inflamed with love for God. Near the cross, the truth of God's Word, the truth of what happened at the cross will fill our hearts and overflow on our lips.

If our love to God is weak, then at the cross, we're reminded of His love to us even as we sang of earlier tonight. The love of God for us. Such a remarkable thing. And in considering that love, we should be inspired to love Him more.

So may God indeed keep us near the cross that we might speak of that cross to others around us. Let's pray. Our Father, we look forward to the day when our souls will find rest beyond the river.

But we know that many who cross the river of death will not find rest, but eternal torment. We pray that You would move us with love for these who are on their way to destruction.

And we pray that You would move us with greater and greater love for You. Forgive us for not loving You like we should. We pray that You will warm our hearts, that You would help us to put off those things that hinder and encumber us and make us cold to You and Your Word.

And may we pursue them with all of our heart and soul and mind and strength, for that is how we are to love You. And so we pray that You would make us faithful to keep Your two great commandments.

Strengthen us for these things, for we are not sufficient in them in our own strength. So come and arm us for the fight. Give us grace to love You, to love our neighbor, we pray in Jesus' name.

Amen. Amen. may may