Latest / Harvest After Sunday / Bonus Episode: What To Do When Someone Rejects the Gospel
Transcript
- Harvest Media: Welcome to the Harvest After Sunday podcast. I'm Natalie and we have a little bonus episode for you guys today where we're going to be answering a listener's question. So just as a reminder, we have a forum where you can submit questions, either maybe a follow-up question from a previous episode that we've had that we did not discuss on that episode or a a different question or submit topics that you'd like to hear us discuss. So we had a listener submit a question and I'm here with Steph. Stefan, our pastor of preaching and teaching at Harvest. I'm gonna read the submitted question and then you can answer it for us. So this is from a church member who says, I've had some great conversations with some of my lost friends and open doors as we've talked honestly about the gospel and I'm invited people to church and church events. Recently, though, I've received messages from a few people saying they're no longer interested in coming to church and need some space. Honestly, that has left me discouraged. And unsure how to respond. How do I balance boldly continuing to share the gospel with respecting their request for space? Should I take a step back in how I interact with them with spiritual topics? That's a really great question. It is. And it is it is an inevitable experience of someone who's living on mission. and so I think the first thing that I would say is Great job being faithful to the mission. Like great job talking with people, inviting them to church, having spiritual conversations, taking the risk of of having that negative response because you genuinely care about their spiritual well being. Like you couldn't ask for more. but we do understand that experience of I have sought to care for the lost in my life by trying to point them to Jesus and they didn't want it and that is discouraging. But it shouldn't be discouraging to the point where I give up. And so I think that there I think there is there's a mindset that we should have About when people respond negatively to the gospel. There is a response that we should then have that reflects Christ. And then there is a now I'm I'm now stepping forward in continual faithfulness to the mission and what that looks like. So We see in the ministry of Jesus, and in the ministry of Paul and in the ministry of the Old Testament prophets and all the other apostles in the New Testament, we see every person in Scripture who is saying, Thus says the Lord, and is calling people to faithfulness in the Lord, we see them receive negative responses from people. Jesus himself, the incarnate Son of God, who is the very Word who became flesh, had many people who turned away. Especially if you if you look in in John 6, pretty much everybody who was following him and who did make a big deal out of him and loved him, there came a point where what he said was too hard to accept, and they turned and left. And he turns to his disciples and says, Are you gonna leave me as well? And Peter, you know, so beautifully says, Where else would we go? You have the words of eternal life. What do we see in that? We see that some will hear the words of Christ as being too much to accept, and they will turn and they will walk away. And Christ did not run after them. He let them walk away. when the rich young ruler comes to Jesus and says, What do I need to do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus gives him a list of things, and the lister the the young ruler says, I've I've done all that. What else? And Jesus says, One thing you lack, sell everything that you have, and then follow me. And the young ruler walked away sad because he was very wealthy. Because Christ wasn't worth more than his own riches. Christ didn't. After him. Instead, it was a moment to instruct his disciples in the difficulty of accepting the words of Christ. So what we see patterned in the ministry of Jesus is that some listen and believe and follow him, but others, his words are too difficult to accept and they walk away. And so if it happened to Christ, who Always said what was true in the perfect way, where there was no malice in his tone. He he a bruised reed he did not break, like he cared for people and dealt with people perfectly, and people still walked away from him. How much the more you and I will there be times where people don't want to hear the message that we proclaim? Jesus instructs us in Matthew seven how we should think about that. So he says, do not cast your pearls before swine or throw what is valuable to the dogs lest they turn and attack you. now he's not calling people pigs like we think of today. You think of pigs and dogs in the first century. pigs were unclean, dogs were violent. Dogs weren't pets back back in the first century. They were wild animals, they scavenged around the city. If you tried to take one of them as your pet, it would turn and attack you. Well, the gospel is is the treasure, the valuable pearls that we are we're holding out to people. This this pearl of great price, this invaluable treasure I want to offer to you. And either because of love of their own sin or hatred of righteousness, they'll reject it. So ri pigs represent uncleanness, so love of sin. The violence of dogs represents hatred toward that which is righteous. Paul says in Romans one that because of unrighteousness, people have suppressed the truth and exchanged the truth of God for a lie. kind of we put all this together and what it should help us to understand is when someone rejects the offer of the gospel, it is not a statement about us as people. It is a statement about the message. And so while it can be discouraging because I can think, well, maybe I did it wrong, or maybe this is my fault, at the end of the day, it should be heartbreaking to us, like this truth that this person needs. They are not embracing it, they're rejecting it. But it happened to Jesus, it happened to the Apostle Paul. It's gonna happen to everybody who's faithful to God's mission. And so when I see it happen, while it should be heartbreaking, it doesn't have to be debilitating. I can say, well, that they loved the world more than they loved Christ, and now I see it. So that makes sense out of the response. Well, now how are we supposed to respond to that? Do we do we pound down the door and like, no, you need to hear this? Right. Well remember, Jesus said, Don't throw your pearls before big pigs or cast what is valuable to the dogs lest they turn and attack you. So the instruction there is when someone shows that they do not want the gospel, it is not your responsibility to convince them that they should want it. You can't you can't change someone else's desires. You can inform what they need to know. You can't change their heart. So if someone shows if someone says to me, Hey, I would really appreciate if you just stopped inviting me to church. Okay. You respect that. Yeah, I'm gonna r you know what? I'm gonna respect that. Thanks thanks for being honest with me. I care about you and so I believe this is the best thing that you could ever have in your life. Because I believe there is a God and that you're gonna stand before him one day, and because I care about you, I don't want you to stand before him not having been made right with him. But if what you're telling me is you would rather I not talk to you about that anymore, then I won't. That's not saying I'm cutting that person out of my life. That is saying I will I will respect your request, but I still care about you. I will still seek your good. I will still seek to reflect Christ in front of you. When life falls apart for you, because someday something will, it does for everybody in a world marred by sin. I want to live in such a way that when you hit rock bottom, you think, Hey, that person who cared about me enough to tell me about Jesus, maybe I'm ready to listen now. And then they know who to go to. So I think that the discouragement shouldn't lead to disconnection from the person. It should lead to or that it it should be something where I say, Okay, you don't want me to push this with you, so I'm not gonna push it, but I will live in such a way and I will relate to you in such a way that should the day ever come where you are open to hearing it, I'm the first person you come to. And I think that that will keep you motivated Reflect Christ and that will keep you from being discouraged to where you don't then go and tell the people who are ready to hear it. Yeah, sure. Because there are people who don't want to hear it, there are people who are ready. And if I s and if I get discouraged and I stop, well then I'm never gonna be able to tell the people who are ready. So the discouragement should not lead to disengaging from the mission. Yeah, that's so practical and helpful. Expect and accept that you will be rejected when sharing the gospel, even Christ was. maintain in a loving relationship when possible. And then being motivated by magnifying Christ is what I'm hearing. Continue to live like Christ and continue to tell other people about Christ and then be ready to give an answer should that person come back to you and ask about the hope that's in you. So it's really practical. And for this person, I mean I I appreciate the way that you phrase that because You basically just use the language of First Peter three. When you revile, don't revile in return. Mhm. b but bless. And who is there to harm you for doing good? But even if you are, even if you do suffer for doing good, Honor Christ the Lord as holy and be ready to give an a reason for the hope that is in you. It's it he first Peter three essentially just walks through those three steps of accept how people are going to respond to you, honor Christ, and be ready to give an answer when they're ready to ask about it. That's so good. I love interacting with our church family in this way. and I'm so glad that this person in our church family submitted a question and we can chat about it today. I think it'll be helpful to many people and hopefully encourage you as listeners when you're listening to a sermon on a Sunday or one of our podcast episodes or just encountering something in your everyday life and you have further questions or there's things that you would appreciate that we addressed on a podcast episode or maybe by answering a question in a bonus episode like this one, there is a form where you can submit those. thoughts, that those feedbacks, and that any potential questions that you might have. And we look forward to hearing more from you. Thanks for joining us for the Harvest After Sunday podcast, where we help you grow into the image of Christ by applying the truths of his word for his mission. We'll see you Sunday.