Our Approach Needs to Change

[Christ's Free Servant]

VisionLife, don't get me wrong here.  I think your point is valid.

All I am saying is that just like your father preached too much on hell and judgment, it is also possible to preach too much on just the love of God.

God will judge all people, but loves them so much He provided a way for all to be saved.

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Exactly! Why can't I say things that simply?

[Christ's Free Servant]

I was simply talking about the approach, not the longstanding friendship or discipleship that may be gained after a loving approach is taken.  Someday I know God will allow me the opportunity to share my testimony with other young people who have spent a large majority of their lives on the streets.  I attend Scum of The Earth church here in Denver, Colo. and the head pastor got up and said to the entire congregation that God wants leaders who have been completely broken in life.  God wants people who have been there and hit rock bottom.  Out of all the churches I've ever attended or visited (there's a lot of them!) I've never heard a pastor speak so candidly.

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I've been to the "bottom" and back. I hear you!!

[keslc]

I hear you! I've been down much the same road as you. I grew up in a very legalistic home environment. My dad was abusing all of us in every way possible and hitting us over the head with the Bible all at the same time. Three of my siblings rejected Christianity for a time because of the obvious contradictions, but one sister and I clung to God with all our hearts. God became my father and my mother and my closest and dearest friend. He would listen to my cries and he would not criticize me or yell at me (well, a couple of times he had to yell at me), but he would take me in his arms and comfort and encourage and instruct and sometimes rebuke me, too. But, I always knew his rebuke was in love. This is why I have such a close relationship with him to this date.

I went on the bandwagon of trying to rescue all the hurting, all the rejected and neglected, all the oppressed and forsaken and forgotten, and I'm still ministering to those who have been rejected and neglected. But, I have learned something in the process. It is called "tough love." You see, God is both a God of grace, mercy and love and he is a God of justice and judgment and wrath. The old time way of doing things was to preach mainly the wrath part of God and to try to scare people out of hell and into heaven, and if this is not done in love, mixed with God's grace, then you are right, it will turn people away from Christianity.

Nonetheless, the problem with the popular teaching of today is that we want all grace, mercy and love but we don't want to accept God's chastisement, correction, discipline, etc. We want to see only the "good" side of God, and so what happens is we have this distorted view of God as this big cuddly grandfather who will let us get away with murder all in the name of "grace." But, God is not like that.

Ok, I do have a point here. I totally agree with what you are saying and I feel what you are saying from personal experience and I agree that the preachers you speak of are probably preaching harshly, but the scriptures do talk much about the other side of God and to preach accurately, we must give the whole message. God does love us and he is gracious and forgiving and patient with us, but he will send people to hell and hell is real and he will pour out his wrath upon this world of ours in the very near future.

So, we have to find the right balance. We can't be all "I'm ok, you're ok, everyone's ok," but at the same time we can't be all heavy handed either. It is a difficult balance. But, we need to not forget to stand in awe of God and to humble ourselves before him and we need not forget to fear him with a healthy fear and respect. I think this is lost today, honestly.

Sorry for going on so long. This has all been a transition in my life from a harsh judgmental legalistic upbringing to all grace, kindness, love, etc. to finding the right balance between tolerance in order to love and confronting sin out of true love. And, I must admit that I don't always balance both sides very well, but I'm learning. It is really odd that God would choose me to give messages of God's judgments, because I have fought so hard for people to feel loved, accepted, needed, valued and wanted most all of my life. I still do fight that fight, but at the same time God is saying that "tough love" is coming, because people have failed to honor God as God and to stand in awe of him. Well, he used Paul, a killer of Christians to be the leader of the Christian movement at that time in history, so why not use someone who has rejected the idea of judgment most of her life to be a deliverer of God's message of his coming judgments.

We need to find the right balance, we need to examine the motives of our hearts, and we need to make sure whatever we are doing we are doing it in love.

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AMEN!!!!!!

Awesome post! Thank you so much for sharing your testimony!! I think you hit the nail square on the head! AWESOME!

[Christ's Free Servant]

      AMEN!!!!!!

Awesome post! Thank you so much for sharing your testimony!! I think you hit the nail square on the head! AWESOME!   

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You are welcome!

[hmh]

God will give you the guidance on how to witness to a particular person. One person might need the tenderness shown because they are fragile, while another person might need the fire and brimstone approach. Each one is unique and God is a personal God. Ask him and he will show you what's best for the one you're about to witness to.

[Gerioke]

God will give you the guidance on how to witness to a particular person.  One person might need the tenderness shown because they are fragile, while another person might need the fire and brimstone approach.  Each one is unique and God is a personal God.  Ask him and he will show you what's best for the one you're about to witness to.

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This too is a valid approach

[OneAccord]

I think it's pretty hard to get someone saved by the threat of wrath and judgement. Most people are hurting and suffering and need to hear about God's love, mercy and compassion and not be threatened with hell. Most unbelieving folks don't feel drawn to worship a God that would burn them forever and ever.

As for the balance between the love and the wrath, I think it's easier to accept God's stern but loving chastisement after you have been saved and desparately want to please Him and begin to hunger and thirst after righteousness.

Love conquers all, love covers a mulititude of sin. You can't over-emphasize God's love too much (as someone said you could earlier in this thread) because God IS love. Paul preached far more on God's love than on His wrath. We should do the same.

We should be sensitive to who we witness to, and not wound them more with threats and ultimatums. This can get downright abusive. My daughter was hurt severely by a woman screaming at her that she was going to hell. I can't stand it when people preach like that to the hurting multitudes out there like sheep without a shepherd. It makes me sick to my stomach.

I had another expereince of bringing a group of friends to church, which was a HUGE deal to even get them through the door, and the preacher preached on hell for the whole sermon and these folks never looked back. I was furious at the preacher for that sermon and never invite people to church anymore for that reason.

[Gerioke]

Some people appreciate the truth and bluntness. I prefer the love approach but that doesn't always work either

[Christ's Free Servant]

I think it's pretty hard to get someone saved by the threat of wrath and judgement.  Most people are hurting and suffering and need to hear about God's love, mercy and compassion and not be threatened with hell.  Most unbelieving folks don't feel drawn to worship a God that would burn them forever and ever. 

As for the balance between the love and the wrath, I think it's easier to accept God's stern but loving chastisement after you have been saved and desparately want to please Him and begin to hunger and thirst after righteousness. 

Love conquers all, love covers a mulititude of sin.  You can't over-emphasize God's love too much (as someone said you could earlier in this thread) because God IS love.  Paul preached far more on God's love than on His wrath.  We should do the same. 

We should be sensitive to who we witness to, and not wound them more with threats and ultimatums.  This can get downright abusive. My daughter was hurt severely by a woman screaming at her that she was going to hell.  I can't stand it when people preach like that to the hurting multitudes out there like sheep without a shepherd.  It makes me sick to my stomach.

I had another expereince of bringing a group of friends to church, which was a HUGE deal to even get them through the door, and the preacher preached on hell for the whole sermon and these folks never looked back.  I was furious at the preacher for that sermon and never invite people to church anymore for that reason.

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What did Jesus do? What was his approach? Did he have a balance in his message? Or was it all one-sided? I guess when trying to decide the best approach to most anything, he is our best example. I guess we would have to look at all the gospels and see what balance he had in his earthly teaching.

The other thing I wonder is if we are giving an all love and grace message and we don't tell the whole story, then aren't we misrepresenting the gospel? I mean, aren't we giving people a false idea of what it means to be a Christian? And, we risk false confessions of Christ?

I agree that we should not begin a conversation with "repent or burn in hell," but I do believe we need to tell people that becoming a Christian means death. It means dying to our old way of living and walking in newness of life. We need to call them to repentance. We need to explain what they are being saved from and to.

One of my main concerns with the church today is that we have a lop-sided approach to sharing the gospel and I wonder how many genuine conversions it is producing compared to how many false conversions. If we give the salesman approach to sharing the gospel where we share only the benefits and then the person finds out there is a downside to this Christianity thing, and that God requires obedience, and they don't obey but rather they hold on to this idea that since they prayed a prayer and they now go to church and they don't do really bad stuff that they now have their ticket into heaven, how many of them do you think are going to hear the words: "well done, thou good and faithful servant"? And, how many will hear: "depart from me, I never knew you"?

[nebula]

Well, standing on a street corner or behind the pulpit and yelling, "You're going to Hell!" is not the best way in the world to express the Lord's seriousness about sin.

Yet, one of the most powerful sermons, I hear, was John Wesley(?)'s famous "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." From what I heard, he wasn't screaming the message, though, but when he preached it, the people actually felt like they were touched by flames!