Pastor's Post

Dear People

For the last several months, as Elders, we have been reading and discussing the book, Nine Marks Of A Healthy Church, by pastor and author, Mark Dever.  In writing about the third mark, “A Biblical Understanding Of Conversion And Evangelism,” Dever makes this point, “Evangelism is not an imposition of our beliefs on others.”  What a great truth to emphasize.  As Dever states, what we believe in as Christians are facts, and are not just beliefs or opinions.  He then goes on to say, “You can no more ‘impose’ the gospel on someone than you can ‘impose’ the law of gravity on someone.”  The gospel like gravity is objectively true.  No one ever denies the truth of gravity.

In my former church, for many years we would take our youth down to Six Flags Elitch Gardens in Denver.  My nemesis ride there was “The Tower of Doom,” a 200 foot free fall ride.  You get strapped into the seat with three other passengers, slowly ascend to the top, and then plunge to the ground at 60 mph.  Fun!  Fun!  Fun!  Yeah . . . not so much.  That free fall absolutely terrified me!   It was two plus seconds of complete panic!  Besides the flying free fall, there were two other aspects of the ride that scared me.  First of all, I had this irrational fear that the steel bar which strapped you into the seat was going to somehow pop open.  Maybe I felt that way because of my size.  The bar was pressed tightly against my chest, and I feared the pressure would release it, and there I would be without anything holding me in.  Irrational?  Maybe.  But you can probably understand why I felt that way.  The other scary thing about the ride (again, besides the flying free fall) was not having any floor for your feet.  They were just left dangling.  It created, at least for me, insecurity.  So, you ask, if this ride scared you that much, why did you go on it?  And the answer is . . . pride.  I didn’t want one of my middle schoolers to make fun of me for not going (talk about insecurity). 

But let’s just say that I got on this ride with some of my middle school girls.  And when we got to the top, 200 feet in the air, I somehow got the bar holding me in to release, and I told the girls I was going to jump off the ride.  At that point the girls started screaming, “No Pastor Randy, No!  Don’t jump, you’ll die!”  And I would say to them, “Don’t worry about it.  I’ll be fine.  I sincerely believe that when I jump off of this I’m going to float to the ground.  You’ll see, it’ll be great.”  And the girls continue to scream, “No Pastor Randy, no, don’t jump!!!”  We all know what would happen.  I would be a giant splat on the ground!  Because regardless of whether or not you believe in gravity, it’s not up for debate, it’s the truth.  It’s reality.

And the same is true of Christianity.  It’s not just one of many competing religions or philosophies out there.  You know, go ahead and believe in that Christianity thing, and I’ll believe in what I want to believe.  Either Christianity isn’t real and true, and therefore, it needs to be disregarded, or it is real and true, and we must implement it into our lives.  And . . . the facts are, Christianity is objectively true, not based upon subjective perceptions, but based upon the truth of the Bible which has never been proven wrong, but always holds up under scrutiny. 

So, as believers in Christ, never must we feel, when sharing the gospel with someone, that we are imposing our beliefs upon them.  No, we are giving them truth.  Truth that will save people’s lives from eternal death.  Imagine, we were on a road, and knew that there was a bridge out ahead.  But we didn’t want to warn anybody because . . . we didn’t want to impose our beliefs on them.  We wouldn’t be imposing our beliefs on them, opinions on them.  We would be warning them of the imminent danger ahead.  The reality of it, the truth of it is, if they continued on the road, they would plunge to their deaths.  Even more drastically, how awful if we fail to warn people the wide road they’re on is leading to eternal death because we don’t want to “impose” our beliefs or opinions.  How important it is we understand that we are not imposing our views, but we are declaring the truth of the gospel. 

As of last Sunday, we are done with The Gospel Of John – That You May Believe series until after the new year.  Tomorrow however, we will still be talking about Jesus in a message entitled, “The Heart Of Christ In Action.”  With Matthew 11:28-30 as our foundation, we’ll study some of the “gentle and lowly” actions of Jesus.  As we’ve been learning about in John’s Gospel, through this study, we will find just how compassionate and caring and wonderful our Savior is.  Hopefully, it will be a great encouragement to us.  And then also during the Worship Service, some of our kids who went to our Bible camps this summer will be sharing.  It’s going to be a great morning.  I’m looking forward to it.

And then one last note, there will be a New Members Class on Sunday, October 25 from 4:00 to 7:00 pm in the M1 Classroom right next to my office.  Supper is included!  If you are not a member of Holcomb Church, here is your chance to get started on that process.  Because of needing a number for supper, please RSVP me with your attendance, (307) 331-2243, by next Sunday, October 18.

So Glad For A Gentle And Lowly Savior

Randy