What is a Sharing Church?
A sermon preached at Queen Street Baptist Church.
Introduction
We have been looking at the mission of Queen Street Baptist Church. We have looked at our qualities as a welcoming, growing and worshiping church. We are now going to look at what it means to be sharing church. But we should begin by asking if we have anything to share?
One of the most important questions that any church or Christian organization can ask is about what would happen if we decided to shut the doors forever. If we decided that after this service we would shut down the church and never open again, would anyone miss us? Would our community even notice that we were no longer operating? Or would life for this community continue on business as usual with hardly a raised eyebrow that there was one less church in St. Catharines?
We have something very important to share and that is the Gospel. But what is the Gospel? The Gospel is the breaking in of the kingdom of God into our world through Jesus. What does this look like? It includes both the offer of salvation and forgiveness of sins and the working toward seeing God’s will being done in our world, especially among those in most need. Think of the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, one earth as it is in heaven.” That is our mission and purpose.
Unfortunately, not everyone has been comfortable with this full picture of the Gospel. Some time in the early twentieth century, there was a split in the understanding of the nature of the Gospel. Conservative churches embraced a Gospel that was purely about saving souls and getting people into heaven. Liberal churches embraced a Gospel that was purely about saving lives and providing for earthly needs. Each side avoided the other position with all their effort out of fear of getting the wrong label.
This is one of the saddest chapters in the church’s history as this split was never meant to happen. We should care about people’s needs in this life and we should care about people becoming followers of Jesus and having assurance of eternal life. I would suggest that we cannot work on either aspect of the Gospel effectively unless we are doing both. Let us take a look at what this looks like, as we seek to share both the love and the truth of Jesus Christ.
Share Love
People tend to write off cliches but sometimes cliches become cliches because they are true. One of these is “People don’t care what you know until they know that you care.”
The church is to care for people in need, it is part of our mission. This is not an invention of the Christian church, it has been God’s plan all along. If you read through the Old Testament, you will see that God cares not only for proper rituals and personal holiness but also kindness and mercy to the stranger. This is often aimed at the alien, the widow and the orphan, but this is just shorthand for anyone who is powerless and needs help.
God commanded the Israelites to integrate care for the needy into their regular routine. Often it was when this was neglected, that Israel got in trouble. Sometimes it was start with a shift from outward focus to inward focus that would be the start of the slippery slope toward idolatry and apostasy.
Ironically, the ultimate image of this error was found within the borders of Israel itself. The Dead Sea is an amazing place. It has water flowing into it but no water flowing out of it. So the incredibly high salt content, despite being a wonderful tourist attraction, makes it impossible for life to flourish. This is what happens to God’s people when we only take in and refuse to pour out. We become dead.
We can point fingers at Israel all we want but the church is made up of human beings as much as they were, and our track record is not perfect.
It has been when the church has been outward focused that the church has grown and thrived. Throughout the ages, people have noticed when Christians have made a difference. We can be proud of Christians who helped abolish the slave trade and fought for civil rights. We can be proud of Christian organizations that provide medicine, food and education to those in third world countries. But this pride must not lead to complacency.
One of the fears that some people have is about how successful this will be. What if we are enabling people to live in poverty? What if the few people we help will not make a dent in the larger problems of society? What if people take advantage of our generosity?
I would say that God calls us to help those in need. Period. We do not have to answer to God for what others do with what we give them. I have been scammed numerous times by people who have asked the church for help. What we need to remember is that we will be judged by how faithful we are with what we have been given and others will be judged by how faithful they are with what they have been given. Accepting this removes a tremendous burden.
I would say that God calls us to help those in need. Period. Share on X
I must also say that helping people is not a gimmick to seek a conversion. Sharing the salvation story is important and we are going to look at that. But people know when we are pretending to care in order to fulfill our religious duty to share our faith. It doesn’t work. People deserve to be helped because they are created in the image of God and not just because it might open an evangelistic door.
Sharing Truth
A frequent saying among Christians is “Preach the gospel, and if necessary, use words.” While I appreciate the spirit behind the statement, I’m not sure how useful it is. It does remind us that our lifestyle is an important part of how we share Jesus. People tend to notice those who put others first and who are kind to other people. If we are jerks, people are not going to want to know Jesus. But at the same time, people need to know more than that Christians can be nice people. The Gospel is not that Christians are nice, even though the Gospel does transform us into better people. The Gospel is about what God has done for humanity through Jesus Christ.
At some point, we need to share with people that there really was a Jesus and he really did die on the cross for our sins and he really did rise from the dead. This may bother some people and even offend them but it is the truth. Of course we need to share the message respectfully and lovingly. Greg Koukl, an American apologist, says, “The message of the cross is offensive enough, we should not add to the offence.”
This is not about shoving religion down people’s throats or hating other religions or anything else. It is simply that if we love others, we want to share the truth that we have. True love loves truth.
True love loves truth. Share on X
We face the same challenge as when we care for people’s physical needs. Some people will reject our message and some may even mock and insult our beliefs. We cannot take that burden on. All we can do is to share the truth of Jesus to the best of our ability and then it is between the person and God. God is calling us to faithfulness, not to guaranteed success. If we can just move people the slightest way closer to faith, then we have done well. It does not land all on us.
If we can just move people the slightest way closer to faith, then we have done well. Share on X
One of the ways that we share the truth is by telling the big story, that Jesus died for our sins and that he rose again. But we have another, although related, story to tell. We have our story and what we have experienced with Jesus.
Some people fear that telling our testimony is too subjective and that we should just stick to the cross. However, we see in Acts that Paul’s conversion story is repeated a number of times. His story was worth sharing and so is ours.
We all have a unique story and we should not compare to those of other people. Some people have testimonies that tell of a rough life with risky behaviours and a dramatic conversion. Others have testimonies of a lifelong desire to follow Jesus and wise decisions that avoided many unfortunate circumstances. We need all of our stories. I encourage you to write out your story of faith and consider sharing it. God often uses our story, not get people to want to be like us, but to point people to the cross. God loves us enough to intervene in our lives, let us share that with the people around us.
Conclusion
Queen Street Baptist Church is a sharing church. We exist to share God’s saving love. If we were to disappear from this community tomorrow, there would be an important witness to Jesus that would be missing. We are here to share the Gospel, the full Gospel, not just the part that makes us comfortable. We share love and truth. We are active in helping people in relevant and practical ways. This includes Out of the Cold but in many other ways as well. We seek to make a difference in people’s lives. One of the ways that we show love is also by sharing the truth. The truth is that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and he rose again on the third day. This is the truth. That event is not just a point in history, it is also something that touches our lives. We all have a story about the way we have encountered Jesus. Every story is different but every story revolves around the grace of God. These are the things that we need to share.
