Tomorrow’s Sermon: Intentional Mission

I’m experimenting again with the way I’ve put my sermon together. This one began rather like last week’s more narrative approach, but I think it’s ended up more of a halfway house between that and a conventional three-point sermon. See what you think. Most of all, I hope the message is helpful and challenging.

Luke 8:26-39

Chapter 1
(Intentionality)
Have you ever found yourself off the beaten track, in an unfamiliar place? In
‘the country of the Gerasenes’ (verse 26), Jesus and the disciples are off the
beaten track, even though it is ‘opposite Galilee.’ Why? They are in Gentile
territory. Jesus spends most of his ministry among his fellow Jews. But here he
takes a deliberate journey into a Gentile region. It’s not as though the boat
has blown them off course: this incident happens immediately after Jesus has
calmed the storm on Galilee (8:22-25). This is a deliberate course of action.
Jesus intentionally goes outside the ‘chosen people.’ He prefigures the later
mission to all the world that Luke will describe in his second volume, the Acts
of the Apostles.

Jesus, then, is modelling an approach to mission for us. It
is the model of being intentional. He
intentionally goes to those outside the household of faith. He deliberately
sets out to meet such people. It is a strategy those of us in the traditional
churches have forgotten for decades, if not centuries. Our approach to mission
has been based on people coming to us. When people don’t come, we ask, ‘Why won’t
people come to us?’ In times when churchgoing was more naturally part of the
culture, churches unbiblically sat back and waited for new members to arrive.

It hasn’t happened like that for a long time, but we haven’t
adjusted. The forays we make into the outside world are often about protecting
our own moral standards and keeping our own integrity. The latest example is
the sixteen-year-old schoolgirl who has taken her former school to court,
because they would not allow her under uniform rules to wear a silver ring that
symbolised her commitment to sexual abstinence outside marriage. Much as I
agree with her ethical beliefs, it hasn’t done anything positive for Christian
witness.

Jesus calls us instead to take deliberate steps into the
world outside of the people of God, with the intention of blessing people,
rather than haranguing them. His call is not to stay on our side of the lake
with our people, with Galilee in between us to protect us from unwelcome
intruders. The Jesus who ventured into the territory of the Gerasenes asks us
to stop cocooning ourselves in the private society of the church, get in the
boat, sail over the sea, even if the water is choppy, and make ourselves known
in the world. He is telling us not to be afraid of the world, even if it is
full of people whose values and beliefs contradict ours. Go looking, he says.
You don’t know who you will find. Someone will need God’s love.

It’s one reason why there are certain evenings blocked in my
diary to babysit the children, because Debbie will be out – not having a wild
social life, but making a contribution in the community where we live. Within
weeks of us arriving, not only had we signed Rebekah up for the pre-school on
our estate, Debbie had joined the pre-school committee. It has always been our
intention to be involved in the community, not simply the church. We have
sought to build friendships in that network of young parents. Debbie is about
to take over as chair of the pre-school committee, because parents and staff
have come to value and respect her. Just this week I had a baptism request from
a young mother, as a result of our efforts to build friendships.

It can be hard for a minister not to have time consumed by
the church, but blocking my diary and being at the pre-school gate are part of
it for me. I am only challenging you to do what I am endeavouring to do myself.
There is something seriously wrong when our whole time is taken up with church.
I think the enemy smiles and knows he has won a victory when church prevents us
from involvement in the world, for then the church has contradicted her very
purpose of mission in the world.

So go looking for people who need God’s love, just as Jesus
did. And sure enough, when he did, it wasn’t long before he discovered one such
person. A man who can no longer live in the city, because the demons have so
stripped him of his dignity as well as his clothes that he now lives in caves,
rather like someone roughing it in a cemetery (verse 27). Although it’s a
different cause, this description of the man may have some similarities with
people who come into contact with agencies like Chelmsford CHESS. Drugs, drink
and family break-ups cause similar loss of money, dignity and shelter to that
suffered by this man who was afflicted by demons.

Chapter 2
(Initiative)
And when Jesus comes across him, the man falls at his feet and cries out, ‘What
have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not
torment me’ (verse 28). But he does so, because ‘Jesus had commanded the
unclean spirit to come out of the man’ (verse 29). In other words, not only has
Jesus been intentional in going to Gentile territory, he has now taken the initiative in this situation of need.
Jesus hasn’t been the English gentleman who waits to be introduced, nor has he
waited for an invitation to help: he has seen a need and decided to get his
hands dirty without waiting for permission or invitation. A need is there, and
that is enough for Jesus. He takes the initiative.

And it’s important that Jesus takes the initiative. Mere
human attempts to deal with the man have centred on restraint. So dangerous was
he that ‘he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he
would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds’ (verse 29).
But Jesus has the authority to do what mere human restraint cannot do. He can
do more than restrain the man. He can bring healing in the deepest sense.

For this is why Jesus calls us to move intentionally into
the world and take the initiative when meeting people in need. His Gospel
transforms and heals people at every level. Cases like the one in this story
are rare, and in fifteen years in the ministry I can only recall one case that
was remotely similar. It involved not a person but a house. When a colleague
and I prayed in the spiritually infested house, the owner became a Christian.

But there are countless other circumstances where deep human
need is met with the wholeness of the Gospel. I have heard psychiatrists say
that their hospital wards would not be so full, if only many of their patients
knew about forgiveness (not that I lump all psychiatric conditions under that
heading, of course). And there are people whose family circumstances would
change with some Christian support, with some teaching on relationships
modelled in the flesh, and with prayer. All it requires is that we, like Jesus,
take the initiative.

And maybe that’s where we come unstuck. We may lack the
nerve to offer help from a spiritual perspective. We may feel like we are up
against a ‘Legion’ of sin (a Roman legion had five to six thousand soldiers). However,
if we think most people are going to turn us down or we face insurmountable
opposition, we have believed another lie of the enemy. There are a few who will
decline, or fail to appreciate the offer. But many people will be glad when
Christians offer both practical help and prayer. Look on the door of St Mary’s in
the village and see the box for people’s prayer requests. But I would suggest
being bolder than that. I know churches who prayerfully walk around their area,
systematically dropping literature through doors inviting residents to name
their prayer requests and then returning a few days later to collect the
requests. This is one major step in taking the initiative to meet human need in
Christ’s name and introduce people to the transforming power of a life lived in
fellowship with him.

Chapter 3 (Effects)
It isn’t that suddenly everything becomes perfect, as if the kingdom of God had
come in all its fullness. After all, in the story, Jesus conceded to the
request of the demons not to be sent to the abyss, that is, the place of their
ultimate judgment (verse 31). Instead, he allowed them to remain in some sense,
in that they went into the pigs (verses 32-33), where they unleashed the same
destructive forces on the pigs with which they had tormented the man.

What we can be sure of, though, is that the kind of mission
that is intentionally in the world and takes the initiative to meet material,
social, emotional and spiritual need will have clear effects.

There is an economic effect as a result of Jesus’ action. The
herdsmen lose their pigs. No wonder the locals are fearful and want Jesus to
leave (verse 37). It’s not the only time in Luke’s writings that an exorcism
leads to economic effects. You only have to think of Acts 16, where Paul and
Silas are in Philippi. They are hounded by a demonised young slave woman, whose
owners use her fortune-telling ability to make money. Eventually Paul, who has
also demonstrated intentional mission, gets fed up and takes the initiative. He
casts out the demon. A riot ensues, because the slave girl’s owners have lost
their immoral and unjust source of income.

Christian mission frequently has this economic effect. It explains
the opposition to Wilberforce and his co-conspirators against the slave trade. It
explains the devious tactics against the fair trade movement today, where
banana pickers are sacked one day and re-engaged the next, under worse terms. The
owners know that fair trade means lost profit for them, and the Christian
church rightly weighs in on this subject.

But there are also beneficial effects for the previously
demonised man. There is a spiritual effect: the first thing we read about him
after Jesus’ intervention is that he is ‘sitting at the feet of Jesus.’ While this
might describe his physical posture, it is also the language of discipleship. It
is what Jesus commended Mary for doing while her sister Martha was distracted
and stressed (10:38-42). The goal of mission is that people will gather, not
around our feet, but at the feet of Jesus, and learn from him. It is a goal to
see people not simply receive benefits or make decisions but become ‘fully
devoted followers’ of Jesus Christ.

And that isn’t all. This isn’t something that just stops
with conversion. The effect of Jesus’ mission on the man is not only spiritual,
it is also social. He is ‘clothed and in his right mind’ (verse 35). He can ‘[r]eturn
to [his] home’ (verse 39). The man can re-integrate into society. He is able to
go back to his family. People will not tell their children to steer clear of
him, because he is no longer naked, and nor is he behaving in a disturbed way.

It all happens rather quickly for this man, but often for us
these social transformations will happen over a period of time, with sustained
commitment by existing Christians to stay alongside people who were damaged
before meeting Christ. It’s like the story of the

man who was having coffee after a church service. The people
around him were discussing the sermon on miracles and someone asked him, ‘Do
you believe that Jesus turned water into wine?’

‘I’m only a  beginner,’
he said, ‘I can’t speak about water into wine yet, but in the few weeks I’ve
known Christ, he’s managed to turn beer into furniture and betting slips into
groceries.’[1]

There is a final effect: mission begets mission. The man
begs to go with Jesus (verse 38) when he heads for the boat to leave the area
(verse 37). It’s rather like the way we want to stay enjoying our cosy
fellowship with Christians. Just as Jesus models intentional mission to others,
so he calls the healed man to the same:

‘Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for
you.’ So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done
for him. (verse 39)

Mission needs to turn full circle. Off goes the man, telling
the story of Jesus’ work in his life. How can it be anything else, if we all
have our story of Christ’s work in our lives? The missionary call cannot be
left to the specialists. The only requirement for participation in mission
Jesus-style is to have a story of what he has done for me. Any suggestion that
mission in the local church means no more than raising money for others is
contrary to the teaching of Jesus. He mobilises every one of us. When we leave
here this morning, we are not being sent home, we are being sent into the world
– intentionally. And there Jesus calls us to take the initiative in meeting
needs in his name, leaving his transforming mark in the economic, spiritual and
social aspects of life.

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