Skip to main content

Come and See

In John 1:29-34, John the Baptist exclaims that Jesus is the "lamb of God." The next day he was with a couple of his disciples when he sees Jesus pass by and tells them to look at the lamb of God. They start following Jesus who eventually turns around asks them what they want. They ask, "Rabbi, where are you staying?"

Jesus could have responded with, "At the corner of Wilson Lane and Jefferson St," and be done with it. Instead, he says, "Come, and you will see." The disciples end up spending the entire day with Jesus and when they leave, Andrew goes immediately to tell his brother Simon (who Jesus would re-name Peter) about Jesus and bring him to spend time with him as well. The rest is history.

This story is indicative of the way Jesus started his revolution of faith: through inviting people to follow him and experience first-hand what the kingdom was all about. Jesus could have had a discussion with the disciples in which he told them where he was staying, talk about the weather, talk about the kingdom some, and then move on. Instead, he invited them to spend the day with him, experiencing what he was all about and they immediately became disciples and then brought others to experience the same adventure of following Jesus.

The most effective witness is inviting someone to experience the way of Jesus. Invite them to join you as you serve in the community and discuss why this is important to God. Spend time with them in the daily routines of your life and show how viewing your whole life as an act of worship gives a new perspective. Let them experience a heart-felt worship service where they see the value of living in community.

Most witnessing paradigms are based on convincing people to believe the right theological concepts and once you get that settled they are ready to experience God and engage in His work. Jesus models a different way in which he invites people to follow him, to experience the way of Jesus, and in the process the theological framework will come into focus.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Advent Struggle -- Part 2

There's been a lot of excellent discussion on the previous post. I've stayed out of it for the most part to let everyone else let their thoughts be known. I thought I would write another post explaining my thoughts in a little more detail. There has been some discussion over this issue of style versus theology (At least at the very beginning). I think I might have used that terminology and I want to clarify that I reject the false dichotomy of style VERSUS theology because our style and methodologies REVEAL our theology. The methods we use to present a message tends to reveal as much about the message as the message itself. In no way do I believe that all young adults want praise music, full band, nice lyric graphics projected, etc. However, I think that the 90% (no real data just a guesstimate) of Adventist churches who think of that worship style as being from the devil reveals one of the major issues at the heart of the crisis -- The Adventist response to culture. The tradit...
29 comments
Read more

The Advent Struggle

I've been trying to write this for literally a month but haven't been able to. Not sure why but it just hasn't flowed. So, here's the attempt: On a regular basis, I hear from or about friends who have stopped going to church. There are numerous reasons why they are leaving but one common thread seems to be a feeling that church has become meaningless. They've felt this for a long time but kept going because they hoped it would get better or just because they'd feel guilty if they didn't. But, they aren't going to play the game anymore. The young adult exodus out of the church isn't news to really anyone but there's something important that I think will make this crisis be more severe. When you examine recent Adventist history, there have been several crises of faith including EGW and Inspiration, Desmond Ford, and Creation/Science (to a small degree). What are the characteristics of all of them? 1. They are based on a doctrinal position and are v...
35 comments
Read more

Life of a Pastor

It was shaping up to be a long, draining Sabbath an Adventist pastor experiences quite often. I got up around 7am and didn't finish the day until 10pm (I did get a chance to sneak a nap in so that helped). Although too long, it provided a lot of thought-provoking experiences that made it manageable. The week turned out to be filled with good news. On Monday, a member had a baby so that was exciting. Another member had back surgery on Tuesday that went well. Wednesday, one of our members' sons was had a very rare and serious surgery. It literally took all day but by late afternoon we got the great news that everything had gone well. So, we were coming to church in a celebrative mood. Then, before Sabbath School started, a mother and daughter-in-law were crying and hugging each other because another daughter-in-law was given bad news about her cancer. The doctors have told her she has two months to live. This actual is quite typical in church. You have people coming full of prais...
3 comments
Read more