Please be seated. As you open in your Bibles to Colossians chapter four, I'd like to just render a couple points of thanksgiving before we turn to God's word together. But the first of which, I am just grateful in God's kindness that you have called Charles Williams to be your associate pastor. I've known Charles for a number of years, and though I didn't have a vote when you had your vote that day to call him, I was rejoicing in it. One of the things you may or may not know is he is a fantastic cook. And this was the first way that I met him, actually, at a gathering of pastors, where he was in charge of the grill, and he cooked up this absolutely fantastic pork shoulder. It was so good, it could make a vegetarian repent. It was really great. And ever since then, we've had just a fun relationship. I'm confident he will serve up an even finer meal for you from the ministry of God's word. Secondly, I'm just very grateful for your care of our family. You know that Heather and the kids are members here. We're very grateful for that as we are doing the work of church planting in Daytona Beach. You can pray for our family. We close on a house tomorrow. We begin moving. And if you noticed Heather earlier today, she has a broken foot. So if you wonder if God has a sense of humor, I'm pretty sure that the answer is yes. So I'd like to now ask if you would to please stand with me as we read God's word together. From Colossians 4, we're gonna read verses two through six. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of the living God will endure forever. So as people strive to hear and heed it faithfully together, this is God's word. continues steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. At the same time pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison, that I may make it clear which is how I ought to speak. walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. Let us pray. Dear Holy Spirit, we thank you for your word that you've granted to us. Surely it is life-giving. And in a world full of perishing things, we ask, Lord, that more and more you would attune our hearts to that eternal life that we have already in Christ Jesus. We pray that you would help us to not only understand your word, but to believe it, to obey it, rightly practicing it in our lives for your glory and even for our good. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Please be seated. One of the subjects that I enjoy talking about and engaging, not just in a classroom setting, but in a very practical setting, is the subject of evangelism. And a phrase that's become very popular on the subject is that of cultivating a culture of evangelism. How do you cultivate a culture of evangelism? Let that kind of sit as a backdrop even as we work our way through the sermon this evening. I want to approach that subject by asking this question, what is the most important thing that the church does? You don't need to answer out loud, but think about it for a moment. What is the most important thing that the church does? Well, some years ago when I was studying for a THM writing on a fellow that I like a lot named Gerhardus Voss, I went up to the library at Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia where they have an archive down in the basement. You know you're a nerd when you like to go into the basements of libraries to read really old books. And down there they had some splendid little artifacts from some of the old Princeton guys that somehow ended up at Westminster. And the librarian there, this beautiful older godly saint named Grace Mullen, gave me a guided tour and showed me some fantastic things, including a handwritten sermon by a man you should know named J. Gresham Machen. one of the men who had a significant part in the founding of the OPC in the 1930s. And there in the bottom of this archive library was a handwritten sermon of Machen that he preached when he was a student at Westminster, and he happened to preach it on a day when Curtis Voss was there in the chapel. What's interesting about the sermon is that the sermon is written in a color of ink, and then over on the margin is a different color. And Machen says in the sermon, in the regular ink, that evangelism is the most important thing that the church does. That was Machin's view as a student. And then over on the side it said, Dr. Voss disagreed with me. As soon as I saw that, the little boy in me got really excited. This is like Rumble in the Jungle, right? Like Voss disagrees with Machin, mano y mano. And what might Voss have said? How might he have disagreed with Machen? If Machen says that evangelism is the most important thing that the church does, why might Voss have disagreed? Would you agree or disagree? Well, it says, continuing in the different colored ink, that Voss argued that worship is the most important thing that the church does. And you should agree with that correction, because evangelism is not the most important thing that the church does. I'm gonna explain why. Worship is the most important thing that the church does, and the reasons for that should be kind of obvious once we think about it. Evangelism is something that we do in this present evil age, but when you pause and think for a moment, in heaven, how much evangelism will you do? None. In heaven, all you will do is worship with the evangelized. To say it differently, in this present evil age, not only are we able to worship in the age to come, our worship will be perfected, and for all eternity we will glorify and enjoy God with those who have been evangelized in this present evil age, We can do that with them now, with one another, and in heaven, we'll never stop doing it. To say it in really big words for a moment, evangelism is semi-eschatological. It's bound to this present evil age. Worship is eschatological. It is the life, the activity, the very atmosphere of heaven itself. And as one author has very helpfully said, evangelism exists for one simple reason. Worship doesn't. Right? We want our triune God to be worshiped, and evangelism really is a means of gathering together those who will worship him, those who will glorify and enjoy him for all eternity, even with us. But now let me make a sub-point here. If you are willing to kindly agree with Voss, and Machen agreed with Voss's correction, let's say that worship is the most important thing that the church does. But number two's not too bad. Evangelism, one could still say, if it's not the most important thing that the church does, it's still something very significantly important in the life of the church. And so I wanna press into that, thinking about ways that we, together as a church, cultivate a culture of evangelism. And I'm gonna use some of the verbiage of our text here as something of our outline, as Paul encourages us to pray, to walk, and to speak. And so we'll first think about praying for church leaders and missionaries. Now, if this were a talk on evangelism, and you were kind of coming at me with a question, so what can we do as a church evangelistically to help reach our community, which is a great question to ask, of course, the first thing I would say that the Bible says is to pray. This is one of the clearest texts, I think, in the entire New Testament on the subject of evangelism. And it's magnificently important to observe that as Paul is going to get to the subject of evangelism, he doesn't get to evangelism by talking about evangelism. He actually gets to evangelism by first talking about prayer. Prayer is the doorway to effective evangelism. His request, look at verse two, continues steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. So he has this general orientation to prayer that the church, as a faithful church, ought to be a praying church, a steadfast church, a continuing steadfastly in prayer church, and as they pray, they are being watchful in it with thanksgiving. Thanksgiving, in Paul's rhetoric, is very often attached to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you look at all of his letters, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and he goes on to say how he prays for the church with thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is very often bound to the fact of the resurrection. So when Paul says that we ought to pray, being watchful in it with thanksgiving, it's almost he's saying our Our prayer should be shaped by the reality of the resurrected Christ for whom we watch and wait for His appearing and on whom we depend for all of our hope and trust. Prayer is anchored in the resurrection. Prayer is affected by the resurrection. The fact that we can pray in our prayer is actually heard is because Jesus has already ascended into heaven. The father always hears the voice of his son. But that doesn't say a lot about evangelism. It says a lot about prayer. This is the general posture of the church. the general posture of the church, in a certain sense, is on her knees, praying. And as it relates to evangelism, then, at verse three, he says, at the same time, or as you are praying, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison, that I may make it clear which is how I ought to speak, what is the mystery of Christ Paul is called to proclaim. It's the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. His perfect obedience, his sacrifice on our behalf for the wages of our sins, his death in our place in judgment, his resurrection in our place in triumph. This is the mystery of the gospel hidden in the ages past, now revealed in the fullness of time that Paul is boldly proclaiming. And as he boldly proclaims, he asked the church that the church would pray for him. Though he puts it in the plural and I want to make something out of it for a moment You're gonna get frustrated with me because it's gonna feel like I'm taking something away And then by the end, I'm going to give it back to you, and perhaps by then you'll be happy with me again. But what is it that I may take away? I want you to notice Colossians 4, 2 through 6, is not only a really helpful text on the subject of evangelism, it actually makes a great categorical distinction. Because in the first part, Paul recognizes those who are called, ordained, and sent as evangelists or missionaries, and he asked particularly for prayer for people in that category, those whom the church has sent as missionaries, evangelists, pastors, if you will. In the second verses, five and six, he'll talk about lay people that are not called, ordained, and sent. Does that distinction even matter to you? It should. Much harm has been done on the subject of evangelism. One of my seminary students a few years ago came up with a great phrase. I so wish I'd been the one to come up with it, but you know, I mean, nothing said from a pulpit is brand new, right? And if it was, that'd be a little bit bad. All good stuff written is borrowed from somebody. So anyway, the term that he came up with was evangelegalism. Isn't that a great phrase? Evangelicalism. You know what evangelicalism is? It's when you take all the burden weight of the Great Commission and you drop it on the shoulders of those that were not called to that Great Commission. Collapsing all the distinctions of what it means to be ordained and called and sent and placing the burden of the whole Great Commission on stay-at-home moms. Are they called to go baptize, teach everything that Jesus commanded? Like do we thrust the entirety of the weight of the Great Commission onto the shoulders of every person in the pew without distinction? The answer is no. And this text actually makes those distinctions really clear. Apostles pray for us, who are the us? Us are those who are in prison with him. Other missionaries who have been called, ordained, and sent. And what does he ask for? That as the church prays for them, that God may open to us a door for the word. This is a great little pun. Why? Because Paul, when writing this letter to the Colossians, is in prison in Rome. And the doors are locked. to his prison cell. And he says, pray that a door would open. But what's great is he doesn't say pray that the doors would open for us, but that the door would open for the word. The gospel is not imprisoned. Paul is in chains. Paul is in prison. But the gospel cannot be chained. And so Paul, so selflessly, as an apostle, as a missionary and evangelist, he doesn't ask for his own release. He doesn't say, come bring me a key, break me out of here. He says, pray that even here in jail, even amidst this trying hard providence, a door be open for the word. It's beautiful. That he would do what? With that door of opportunity, declare the mystery of Christ, the gospel, as he has been called to, ordained to, and sent to do so. That's what he wants the church to pray that he would do. Why is Paul in prison? Because of the gospel. Because of the name of Jesus. That's why he's in jail. Many people go to jail because they deserve it. In high school, I got arrested. I went to jail. I deserved to be there. I did exactly what I was declared guilty of doing. Paul is in jail for the gospel. And he says, even here, while I'm in chain, in prison, behind bars, pray that I would continue to be bold and declare the mystery of the gospel, even to my persecutors, to my false condemners, to my judges, to the guards, to everyone around me, to those that could beat me, harm me, take my life, starve me, that I would be bold with the gospel to them. And then he makes it clear almost as though he doesn't have a choice, that I may not only preach it boldly, but that I would make it clear which is how I ought to speak. So let me just for a minute kind of prod graciously, is everyone in the church called to do what Paul here says that he is called to do? And the answer is no. To collapse that distinction, in a certain sense, is a form of pastoral harm or abuse. Evangelicalism. Because ordination means something. When the church calls and sends somebody, it means something. And yet those who are called to do this work, we ought to be praying that they will actually do that work, do it boldly, and do it faithfully. As a pastor, as a church planter, having a sense that people are praying for you puts wind under your wings, to sound a little bit cheesy almost about it. And yet it's so true. Paul pleads with the church that they would participate in the work of the Great Commission. As one author puts it, everyone in the church is caught up in the Great Commission, but in different ways. Many are being sent. Everyone participates in the sending. And that's not just writing checks and putting up pictures on refrigerators. It's a ministry of prayer for those who have been called to go out and to proclaim the gospel. It's remarkable that Paul talks this way from prison, especially if you think about something like the book of Acts that begins at Acts 1. Jesus says, you're gonna go, you're gonna proclaim, the Spirit's here, it is now, the kingdom is on, right? Like you get this sense like, okay, we are clearly on the winning side, and the other side's gonna go down with a puff, right? And how does the book of Acts end? Where is Paul? In jail. here, writing letters like this. But the gospel, in a certain sense, which turns the world upside down, it does so just as the way of the Savior. In a certain sense, it wins by loses. It lives through death. It triumphs, even in the face of apparent defeat. The Spirit works in ways that we do not understand, that the world does not understand. And yet, even in prison, the gospel is bearing fruit. Even in prison, the Great Commission is being carried out. Even in chains, the gospel is bowled as a lion, as Paul does what he and the other missionaries are called to do. Where might this prayer take place? If Paul's request is that the church might pray, and we could have rightfully this goal of cultivating a culture of evangelism, one of my good friends says that all pastoral leadership flows downhill from the pulpit. I love that phrase. It really is true. As goes the pulpit, so goes the church. Where do we pray? We pray from the pulpit in our shepherding and congregational prayers. We pray in our prayer meetings on Wednesday nights, unless it's New Year's Eve and you're not gonna come because you caught that. We pray in elder visitation visits when elders come, and we ramp the question of prayer requests, and we pray for our unsafe family members, our neighbors, and our friends. It occurs in those occasions of family worship when we get together and we pray alongside one another, and we go around the room, we have prayer requests, and we pray privately. But do our prayers include prayer for the unconverted? That's really who Paul is asking the church to pray for. His prayers, not narrowly for himself, but for the ministry that he and the other part of us have to the unconverted. Where does this take us then, if there are certain people that are called and burdened with the weight of the Great Commission upon their shoulders, what about the rest of the church? Well, that's what we're gonna unpack in the next two points, moving down to verses five and six and a bit more slowly. Looking at verse five, and this is point two, walk in wisdom toward outsiders making the best use of the time. I absolutely love this verse. I love this verse for all kinds of reasons. First of all, the language of walking is all over the Bible. Walking here ought not to be thought of as like a one-time stroll, but a general description of one's lifestyle. It's a summary of your character before a watching world. And Paul says, in that light, in that context, walk in wisdom. And notice, there's directional language. He's not just saying, walk this way, but walk toward, not away from, and I'll come back to that in a moment. Walk toward, but that language of walking, it really is indicative of a lifestyle. Think about it. In Genesis, we're told God speaks to Abraham, and he says, Abraham, walk before me and be blameless. We're told of Noah, Noah walked with God. That's not a one-time stroll, that's a life of communion and fellowship. Enoch walked with God and he was not, for God took him, gone. Not because he one-time strolled past God, but because he walked in fellowship with God. In the law, Israel is repeatedly told to walk or to live in God's ways and not to walk in the ways of the pagans around them. I have a quote here from Leviticus, but since you've already read 59 verses, I feel nervous. Leviticus 26, 23, and if by this discipline you are not turned to me, but walk contrary to me, then I will also walk contrary to you, and I myself will strike you sevenfold for your sins. Walking is so much more than a moment. It's a lifetime. Psalm 23, even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we may pass through it in a moment, but we live in it. for a lifetime. Psalm 119.1, blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord. Do you see the point? What Paul's describing here is a manner of living before a watching world. Proverbs 1.15, my son, do not walk in the way with them, hold back your foot from them and from their paths. So I wanna stretch you here a little bit because if I, this is what I took away a few minutes ago. The burden of the Great Commission, we're going to say rightly, does not rest upon the shoulders of every individual in the church without distinction. But is there any place for the unordained? For the average person in the pew? The real church, if you will? And the answer, of course, is yes. And I don't mind stretching it here because it's just what the text does. The very fact that Paul speaks this way ought to make very clear, not only is he not talking to the ordained, we already did that, he made that distinction clear, now he's talking to all of us, and he says, walk towards those who are outsiders. The Christian life, the identity, the posture of the church is never described in retreating position in the Bible. It's never described as freaking out, pulling the parachute, running for its life. That's just not the way the church is described consistently as going or walking. And this includes lay people, it includes you, me, it includes our kids. In my impression as a young pastor of only 23 years, my sense is that at times there is a trend in the church to want to strongly and powerfully engage everything cultural and political, and it's that. And there's this other thing that's almost like we're going to retreat into our little quiet places and sort of hope the world doesn't find us and will leave us alone. And I certainly appreciate both tendencies or dynamics, but is retreat really ever an option? There was a movie some years ago, The Village. These families who had been harmed by the world and they decided to huddle together, right? I'll get in trouble, I'll say it once. They must have been like the perfectors of the homeschool movement. Okay, and they all kind of come together, and their plan was to go out in the middle of the woods, and they'd build this village, and they'd wrap the walls in trees and branches and hope the world would never see them, even if it was flying over them, literally. And they created lies that they told their children so that fear would keep them home. The world is too dangerous for you. Where is that for a Christian? Walk in wisdom, Paul says, and I'll come to wisdom just for a moment. But there is a temptation among us, even us reformed folks. The shire is awfully attractive, right? The hobbits said it well. The world of adventure is filled with far too much danger. And there's something to be said about a nice, calm, peaceful life. A few years ago, there was a book that became, I think regrettably, too popular, too fast, The Benedict Option. The point it had right, the world has lost its mind. The point it had wrong is maybe we should try like the family version of the monastic movement and just retreat into ourselves and just kind of keep our heads down. That's not what the Bible calls us to do. In fact, what is commanded here is the perfect opposite direction to walk toward, not with or away from. Be wise. What is wisdom? Paul says, walk in wisdom towards. What is wisdom? Well, there are many definitions. I'll give you a shot at one. I would suggest wisdom is something like this. It's applying the specific truth. of God's Word to the bending specifics of everyday life. What time should you go to bed? The Bible doesn't tell you, but you should at some point. When have you eaten enough? Well, the Bible doesn't necessarily draw that line for you, but there is a line to be found. So many things in life are really the application of biblical principles. That's what wisdom is. taking the clear truths of God's Word and applying them to the bending specifics of everyday, ordinary life. So when Paul says, walk in wisdom towards those who are outside, he doesn't just say walk toward outsiders or walk with outsiders. He employs wisdom as a filter or a category of discernment. What would be an example of walking foolishly? Missionary dating. Young people, I guess I should have to say this to older people as well. If you're dating a non-Christian, knock it off. It is foolish. It is sinful. It is deceitful. The heart is wicked, deceitful and desperate. You won't evangelize the non-Christian. The non-Christian will evangelize you, and you'll likely end up with your heart broken. So if you're dating a non-Christian, just go ahead and knock it off now. I'm sorry to be so forceful, but the pain coming later will be more so. That's not the kind of advice Paul is giving here. But he is suggesting that we ought to be intentional about finding ways where we can walk toward outsiders, toward those who are outside the church. Sometimes I'll find myself in context talking about this subject, and people say things that completely baffle me. Like for a late-age teenager to say, I have absolutely zero contact with non-Christians. My entire world is defined by a Christian-only dynamic. That's a little puzzling to me. I'm not quite sure how that happened except for very remote parts of the Midwest and like three cities left in Northern Canada. And even there, they have the internet. That little rural village that people once daydreamed of is completely gone. The internet came, changed it. It will never be the same. What is Paul encouraging us to do? Well, I'm going to just make a couple practical suggestions here, no law from above, but having things like hobbies. where we engage non-Christians. In my view, one of the places where non-Christians are most willing to be evangelized, most easily accessed and evangelized, is where they recreate. Have you ever noticed that the word recreation and recreation are the exact same word, just simply with a different emphasis on a proper syllable? Recreation and recreation, even the non-Christian knows we need a reboot. There are places where they literally drop their hair. And some of the most effective places that I've seen evangelism happen is where I go to drop my hair, i.e. the ocean, or where I take my kids, where people go to recreate. They go and they engage a sport. And then they sit on the sidelines for a little bit and trade asthma inhalers and talk about life and death. Why? Because their heart rate is so high. One more sprint down the basketball court and that's it. Right, or there was a shark today, and someone got bit, or an accident on the way, and someone got hurt. It's in those warp and woof of life moments that people are very often willing to be evangelized. Go where the pain is. Pain, sadly, but unambiguously, creates a gospel stage. Hospitals, places where single moms are raising their kids. Where the pain is, there very often are gospel opportunities. I like to ask this question, it's a painful question. If your church disappeared, would your community know it? If your church disappeared, would your community know it? I think it's an intriguing question. So we need, at least according to the language here, some contact time with non-Christians. Otherwise, you're hiding your light under a basket. And Jesus had a little bit of something to say about that. What about your kids? Let me get in a little bit of trouble with you, but as I speak now, remember I'm a father of four, 18, 17, eight and six, two sons, two daughters. I'm a pretty protective papa bear. And I know what the world looks like and I don't want my kids to be raised in it or to be defined by it or seduced by it. But what about them? I think there's a wonderful and pressing challenge in front of the church right now to lead our kids, not simply in like categories of truth, how to distinguish right and wrong, but how to evangelistically engage outsiders, how to hold conversation with non-Christians. It's one thing to sit in a classroom and be taught worldview. It's a totally different thing to engage non-Christians out at the beach on a college campus where it's not simply safe to trap your ideas in your head, but somebody's gonna make you talk about them, press you to live consistently with them or to violate them. Can they hold their own in a conversation? In my opinion, we need to train our covenant kids what it looks like to walk in wisdom, toward outsiders. If you're simply parenting by defense, I think you've got it wrong. Even sports have figured out the best defense is a good evangelistic plan, by which we mean offense. One of our favorite movies in our household, which I'm kind of banned from watching because I tend to cry a lot during movies. I'm a total softie for a lot of these kids' movies, especially if there's adoption in there. I'm just toast, and I get rebuked before. Now, Dad, it's okay if we watch this, but you're not going to start crying, are you? I end up crying anyway. But how to train your dragon. is a fantastic movie. Story of an overbearing single dad. The mom passed away, or at least so you think, in the first movie. And the little boy, Hiccup, is very curious and inquisitive, bright. He's always getting in trouble. He's like the runt of the litter. He's frail. The overbearing Viking dad's always trying to protect his son, keep him as close as he can to home, under the wing, if you will. And, of course, the dragons come and attack the village, and Hiccup breaks the rules, and he gets out, and he tries to stop the dragons, and he ends up destroying half the village. And when the day is all done, the dad's having a beer with his friend, and he's absolutely exacerbated, and he says in his big Viking voice, I just don't know what I'm going to do with them. And his friend, who's a little bit more level-headed and calm, because he has no kids, says to Stoick the Viking, you're not always going to be able to protect them. You're not always gonna be there. One of these days, he's gonna get out there again. He's probably out there right now. You're just gonna have to train him. I think that's where we're at. We're not always gonna be there to protect him. They're gonna get out there. They may be out there right now. We're just gonna have to train up a generation of kids that know how to walk in wisdom toward outsiders. I think it's one of the pressing challenges before the church today. And it brings to our third point, which is speaking. I won't say a lot here. It's just one verse, but I do want to say a few things about what Paul says. Verse six, let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. Now be with me here. Verse six assumes that we are speaking to outsiders. How do you know? Because it tells you how to do it. You've already been told to walk in wisdom toward outsiders. Now he says, and this is how you should speak. So my point is, quietism, isolationism, are not even contemplated as categories for the church. He assumes that we are walking in wisdom toward outsiders. Many things in the Bible are assumed like this, and arguments built upon it. Why? Because the church is in the world, but not of the world. It is virtually impossible, though some try really hard, to live isolated lives anymore. The question is not, will we talk with outsiders? That is assumed. But how shall we talk to outsiders? That's what is addressed. And he gives us a few categories. One, gracious, kind words. People can sense kindness. They can distinguish it from harshness. You know the difference in your home, and people know the difference on the street corner. Kindness, undeserved gestures of respect, of compassion, of sympathy. That subtle way in which we esteem others is more important than ourselves, and even the manner of our speaking displays it, reflecting the very grace that we have received like mirrors being held up back onto other people, speaking graciously to people. I have been in the presence of many people doing what they call evangelism, which I'm not sure is a very gracious packaging, harsh, condemning, severe. Not much gospel, awful lot of law. I don't think that's what Paul is commending here. Season with salt. This is Old Testament sacrifice language. It's kind of curious. What is he saying? That our words should only be gracious towards the individual. They should be fit for the presence of God. It's almost as though he's saying, and we have all broken this, including myself in many ways, about that if you wouldn't say it in the presence of God, you shouldn't say it in front of a non-Christian even, let alone a Christian. If we were honest, we would admit that there are times when our speech is unbecoming of our profession. There are times when we laugh at the wrong jokes. There are times when we're the ones telling. The wrong jokes. There are times where, regrettably and shamefully, we have given our non-Christian friends a reason to question our profession and if Christians really are any different from the world. That is what Paul is saying. If we would not say it in front of God, we should quite likely not be saying it in front of people. Why? Well, it goes back to this salt idea. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. You are that which preserves. You are that which illumines. You are that which guides. And when the salt of the earth and the light of the world is tainted and dark, it gives a confusing signal. It leads a crooked direction. It's not always a safe guide. And there's a clear evangelistic implication here. What Paul is doing is saying, on the one hand, please pray for those who are ordained, that they would do what they're supposed to do. But as a church, we all have a part in the Great Commission, striving toward an evangelistic end. In my experience with lay people, some of the very best evangelists, if you want to use that word, I mean it in a lowercase e, not the ordained sense, but some of the very best evangelists I've met are not ordained. In fact, they're not even all men. In fact, you had one of them here in your congregation some years ago as an intern, and his wife, if you remember, Ben and Tiffany, after they got converted through our church's ministry at Flagler, they would go out and do evangelism with me at colleges, street corners, and Tiffany was fantastic at it. She still is. Some of us, have a lot of opportunities evangelistically and are somewhat socially extroverted. The other 99% of us are normal people and may find those opportunities come very slowly. And I'm not trying to get, you'll be happy when I say this, I'm not trying to get the introverts of the room to pretend they're extroverts. Nor am I trying to quiet the extroverts in the room. from their social inclinations. Some will have many opportunities evangelistically. Some may have far fewer. Some love talking to strangers. Others have a hard time with it. But either way, we are called to walk wisely toward those who are outside and even to make the best use of our time. There's language here that you may know how you ought to answer each person. This is great. This is the language of accommodation. Not all people are the same. Did you know that? They don't look the same. They don't smell the same. They don't listen the same. People, to say it differently, in many ways, are like books. And every book is a little different. Each person reads a little differently. Each person around this room is a little different, even from the people in your family that are much like you, but they're not identical. People need to be studied for their uniqueness. Every person bears the image of God, but in a nuanced way. Have you ever thought about that? Every person bears the image of God in a nuanced way. Someone once said, God is so big that it takes all the religions of the world to reveal him. That's foolishness. It's really bad. But let me tweak it, and you may agree with this. He is so big that all those who bear his image do so in beautiful, nuanced ways. I'm after something here. What Paul is saying, what I am saying, is that when we look at people, we shouldn't just see enemies, unbelievers, people that don't look like us, live like us, vote like us, sound like us. We should see people who bear the image of God, and because they bear the image of God, they're reachable by the grip and grace of God, and God uses means. The means that he uses to gather and build his church is his church, through the ordained means that happen on the Lord's day, and through the informal means of his people walking in wisdom, toward those who are outside. Everything Paul is saying here in verses five and six tends towards a compassionate disposition, not a combative one. There is a difference between having a compassionate disposition towards non-Christians and a combative one. I wanna end with a reference back to Machen. I know my time is over. But what are some obstacles? If we're desirous as a church, which I hope we are, to cultivate a culture of evangelism and to do that faithfully in the sight of God according to his word, what are some obstacles to evangelism? Well, last year, which is barely last year, a couple days, it's two years ago, but 1923, 100 years ago last year, was the year that Machen wrote a fantastic book, Christianity and Liberalism. If you didn't study it in 2023, you should probably repent, because, I mean, you know, it's the 100-year birthday. But you can still do it now, and it'd be great. But in that book, Machen talks a lot about the obstacles to the church carrying out her mission in the world. And he builds a genius, a genius argument. As chapter by chapter, he talks about the dangers of liberalism and syncretism and relativism and atheism, all the bad isms. And you kind of like ride that wave going like, I'm totally with you. Those things are bad. They're bad for the church. They've poisoned the mind of the world. They're what's wrong with the world. And then he gets to the end and he pulls the pin and says, but those aren't the real threat to the church faithfully carrying out her commission. The real threat, Machen says, to the church carrying out the commission is not liberalism, syncretism, relativism, or atheism, it's this, quietism, indifferentism, and isolationism. And I think he's right. The older I get, the longer we do this together, it's not nearly the sins of commission that burden us, is it? It's the sins of omission. The things we've left undone, maybe even with good intentions, but nonetheless compromising our identity and who we are. One of my favorite theologians says, gone are the days of just hanging out a shingle. We're a faithful church waiting for people to come. When I was studying in Holland, there was a little cliche. I'll say it in English. My Dutch wouldn't impress you anyway. We are the true church. The doors are open. Let them come. That is not the Great Commission, and that is not what Paul is saying to the church. We are to pray for those who are sent, and we are to walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, praying, speaking, and walking, that they too might know the mystery of the gospel. Let's pray. Our great God in heaven, we thank you and marvel, not simply at the mystery of the gospel, but of your plan for your church, that you would tell very imperfect people in Colossus to walk toward outsiders, as the very apostle who planted that church is imprisoned and his life threatened. And yet, Lord, we recognize that in the gospel, we are called to lose our lives, to give it away, to die that we might live. And we ask the Lord that he'd be pleased to grant to our churches and to this particular church a harvest of souls, that those who are called to preach and evangelize would do so faithfully. and that those who are called, even as lay people, young and old, to walk in wisdom toward outsiders, studying people like books, speaking gracious words, knowing how to answer each person, not simply apologetically, but compassionately. Lord, use us, imperfect as we are, sinful and struggling, even at times fearful as we are. And as we do this, we pray, oh Lord, that you would be glorified because we know evangelism is not the most important thing that the church does. Worship is. But as the old hymn goes, how we long to see your churches full of all those who from every nation, tribe, and tongue will gather together to bow the knee and lift up the name, even the name of Jesus. In his name we pray, amen.