Gone Fishin' September 2018 Newsletter

Hi Everyone

We are out on the streets this Saturday.

Here's this month's Gone Fishin' newsletter.

Enjoy!

“I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.” (2 Timothy 4:1-5)

Hi Everyone

We had another great time last month. The weather has been a bit of a mixed bag lately, but that’s no excuse to sit on our hands, and leave the lost to their peril!

Did you know that there are only two occasions when we should preach the Gospel?

That’s right - when it’s in season, and when it’s out of season. They are the only two times. Any other time, we can take a break from it.

Basically, what Paul, the writer of Timothy is saying, is that there is no such thing as a bad time to tell sinners the Good News.

Although the context in 2 Timothy is regarding unregenerate Christians and false teachers, we can apply this to non-church goers as well. After all, they too can take on board all the good stuff regarding Christianity, and filter out all the stuff they don’t like.

Everybody loves to hear about how much we should love and accept each other. About how much God loves us. About how forgiving God is. That’s the Christianity that the whole world loves.

And what is the reason we love it? Because it meets all the requirements of our own personal God we have fashioned in our heart.

However, what we also need to know is that this is only one side of the Christian coin.

Yes, we should love and accept each other. Yes, God loves us. Yes, He is forgiving.

But on the other side of the coin, why do we need His forgiveness? What exactly does He forgive us from? What happens if we don’t meet the requirements of God’s forgiveness?

The Law and the Gospel are two sides to the same coin:

one exposes broken, silent, repentant sinners before God;

the other shows how Christ can reconcile broken, silent, repentant sinners back to God.

This is why the law must be preached first. We need to explain the why before we tell them the how. If we don’t, then we end up giving people false hope, and filling our pews with unregenerate, unrepentant sinners, who will heap up teachers for themselves that say exactly what they want them to.

So, we fulfill our ministry. We do the work of an evangelist. We preach the full Gospel.

We preach it anytime, anywhere.

We preach it in-season, and we preach it out-of-season.

We preach it whether we want to, or whether we don’t.

We preach it whether the weather is nice, or horrible.

We preach it whether they want to hear it, or they don’t.

We preach it whether they will hug us, or hit us, for preaching it.

We preach it whether they will kiss us, or kick us (or, in extreme cases, kill us).

Jordan’s ‘God’

Jordan, a pleasant young Maori gentleman, was waiting in his hi-vis overalls for a friend, outside the fried chicken shop. 
I offered Jordan a Million-dollar Gospel tract, and asked him what happens after we die.

He said he didn’t really know, but if there was a heaven, he was sure he would get there because he was a pretty good person.

I asked him exactly how good he needed to be to make it to heaven. According to Jordan, all he needed to do was to treat people nicely, and try to do what was right.

A few choice questions soon exposed how good (or bad) Jordan really was. He soon realised that he fell way short of the perfect standard he had to meet. I then shared with him the only way he could meet this standard, and how God can forgive him.

As his friend arrived, I gave him a Good Person cartoon tract. He shook my hand, thanked me, and went inside for lunch.

Jordan had fashioned his own requirements for getting into heaven. Then he fashioned his own ‘God’ - a judge that would accept his standard of goodness.

Jordan was an idolater, creating a God in his own imagination that didn’t exist.

I pray - now that he has seen both sides of the Gospel coin - he now realises that the only person he is fooling about how good he is, is himself, and has fully repented for his sins.

I’ll see you at my place this Saturday at 10am for prayer, before venturing out to the streets again!

Blessings

Craig.

Witnessing Tip: Listen!

When witnessing, it’s really easy to keep interrupting the person to make a point.

But sometimes it’s better to let them have their say on a matter before answering them.

It may make the conversation longer, but it shows them you care about their opinion, and it may make them more willing to hear your viewpoint as well.