Evangelism God's Way, Part 1

The point: Do not be involved in any evangelistic endeavor that takes away from the honor of God.

Martin uses the imagery of a tree firmly rooted in healthy, nourishing soil, with taproots, trunk, branches, and leafage, to organize the series on evangelism. The 'soil' is the Word of God, and the 'taproots' are foundational biblical perspectives on people.

And the organizing imagery that I'm going to use for these few messages is that of a tree firmly rooted in healthy, nourishing soil. If I had a blackboard, I'd draw it for you. If you have a blackboard, you have my desk. In preparation, I drew it to help me in trying to organize my thoughts.

2:43 - 3:04 Read in full sermon

The point: Engage in evangelistic efforts that glorify God and expect the Holy Spirit's power by framing and carrying them out in keeping with Scripture.

He criticizes modern evangelistic activities rooted in 'Madison Avenue, pop psychology, and secular marketing and sales techniques,' where the 'consumer is king,' leading to 'wood, hay, and stubble' results.

Much in the way of evangelistic activity in our day, many of the prophets of the Old and the New Testament and the programs that are floated and promoted, many of the schemes that are foisted upon evangelicalism are not rooted in the healthy soil of Scripture, but rather in the poisoned, noxious soil of Madison Avenue, pop psychology, and secular marketing and sales techniques in which the consumer is king. And there are books written, that tell you how to evangelize an un-evangelized community, and how to plant a church in that community. You begin by taking a survey of the people in that com...

3:49 - 4:56 Read in full sermon

The point: Engage in evangelistic efforts that glorify God and expect the Holy Spirit's power by framing and carrying them out in keeping with Scripture.

Paul's analogy of an athlete not being crowned unless he keeps the rules is used to emphasize that evangelistic endeavors must adhere strictly to the rules (precepts, principles, precedents) of Scripture.

No. You remember what Paul said to Timothy. A man is not crowned in the games unless he keeps the rules. He cannot establish the rules of the contest and expect to win the crown.

6:08 - 6:23 Read in full sermon

The point: Understand and passionately believe that people are uniquely created in the image of God if we are to engage in God-honoring, Spirit-empowered, evangelistic endeavors.

Martin quotes J.I. Packer's 'Concise Theology' to explain that being made in God's image means humans reflect God's holy ways and act as His representatives, possessing a unique dignity.

Dr. Packer, in his very helpful little book, Concise Theology, commenting on this concept, of man created in the image of God, writes, the statement at the start of the Bible, that God made man in his own image so that humans are like God as no other earthly creatures are, tells us that the special dignity of being human is that as humans we may reflect and reproduce at our own creaturely level. The holy ways of God and thus act as his direct representatives on earth. This is what humans are made to do. And in one sense, we are human only to the extent that we're doing it. What does it mean to...

18:38 - 19:41 Read in full sermon

The point: Understand and passionately believe that people are uniquely created in the image of God if we are to engage in God-honoring, Spirit-empowered, evangelistic endeavors.

He contrasts humans with animals (cow, whale, leopard), noting that only humans, made in God's image, have the capacity to know, commune with, worship, and delight in their Creator, and possess a 'God-shaped hole'.

And it tells us that the special dignity of being human is that as humans we may reflect and reproduce at our own creaturely level the holy ways of God and thus act as his direct representatives on earth. And growing out of that heightened dignity of what it is to be a man, a woman, a boy, a girl, is the fact that only man made in the image of God has a capacity to know and consciously commune and fellowship with God. No cow, no whale that plies the seas, no beautifully spotted leopard, whatever it reflects of God's wisdom and power and aesthetic sensitivities, that creature has no capacity to...

19:42 - 21:03 Read in full sermon

The point: View those who do not know God as moral thieves, robbing God of the purpose of their creation, and pity them for robbing themselves of their humanity.

Martin uses the psalmist's comparison of men who do not come to grips with their identity as image-bearers to 'beasts that perish,' satisfied only with animal instincts, to highlight the degradation of those who rob God of His due.

robbing God of the very purpose of their creation, made to glorify Him, made to delight in Him, made to commune with God, made to find their highest joys in God. They are robbing God of His due from them. And we need to pity them for they rob themselves of the very essence of what it is to be human, made in the image of God and become, in a very real sense, as the psalmist says in several instances, they become like beasts. Beasts that simply are satisfied simply with the filling of their bellies and the fulfilling of their animal instincts.

23:02 - 23:53 Read in full sermon

The point: Cultivate in our minds and hearts a conviction that people are really fallen and ruined in connection with Adam.

He imagines meeting someone in a remote place and telling them, 'Sir, I know the name of your most distant relative, and I know that your relationship to him is the most significant thing about you,' to illustrate the universal significance of Adam as our first father.

In other words, I may be taken back into some remote place and I meet someone far removed from the civilized life. I can look him in the eye and say through an interpreter, Sir, I know the name of your most distant relative and I know that your relationship to him is the most significant thing about you.

25:30 - 25:56 Read in full sermon

The point: Understand and passionately believe that people are who and what God says they are: uniquely created in His image, tragically fallen in Adam, and in a condition of total depravity, total inability, yet total accountabili…

To illustrate total accountability, he uses the example of shooting a man: even if provoked for a decade, the shooter is accountable for squeezing the trigger, regardless of genetic predispositions.

You shoot a man, you will be held accountable for squeezing the trigger. Even if that man provoked you day in and day out for a decade, you still pulled the trigger.

38:44 - 38:57 Read in full sermon

The point: Have a right and a duty to look upon every living human being as savable, one whom God can save by His grace, and never mark anyone off as unsavable.

He suggests that if a vote were taken in the early church, Saul of Tarsus would have been deemed the 'least likely man to become a Christian,' yet God saved him, demonstrating that no one is 'unsavable'.

in the way of truth. in the way of truth. the way of truth and holiness. But, and here's the wonderful thing, we have a right, we have a duty to look upon every living human being as savable, as one whom God can save by His grace, one whom God is able to transform by His power, no matter how unsavable He may look at any given moment. We have no right to mark off anyone as unsavable. I'm sure if a vote had been taken in the early church, when Paul was breathing out threatenings and slaughters and ripping mothers from their children and husbands from their wives, and you were to have had some ki...

45:59 - 47:00 Read in full sermon