Northside Church - Sydney
Five x 5 Week 3: Five Things To Say To Someone Who Claims Not To Believe
You're listening to another great message from Northside Community Church. A short while back, I was reading an article that said despite the facts, despite the evidence, anywhere between 6-20% of Americans believe that the moon landing was faked. Despite the fact that spaceships had been down there and taken photographs of the footprints that were there years earlier, they believed that the moon landing is faked and in Russia that moves to 30% of people in that sense. That means one in three people think it didn't happen. Now it's interesting because when it comes to Christianity and the fact and the evidence, according to Paul here, that God took one giant leap for mankind across the universe, became a man, suffered at the hands of humanity, was killed and was raised again and showed himself to people and proclaimed that there is a hope other than this life. Despite all of that evidence, there is far way far more than the world than 30% that believes that's a fake. My question when I said these two different stories is like, "What is at stake here?" I mean, for one set of people, it's the history of their nation. For another set of people, it's the future of the world. And yet what do we say? What do we say to someone who says, "I can't believe," not someone who says, "I can't believe in the moon landing," someone who says, "I can't believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ." Well, today we're going to have a look into that as we go through this series five times five, five things that you might be able to say to someone who says, "I can't believe." In fact, maybe you're hearing this this morning and you're saying that to yourself. What things could we say to them? There's going to be a hidden message in all of this. So have the pens and paper at the ready you'll see it at the end, but the first one is got to do with doubt. Your doubts is the first thing you could say to that person and what's really important is that it's okay to have doubts, the Great Apostle Paul had doubts in the beginning. He says from this scripture that we heard from, before that he said in verse nine of Acts chapter 26, "I too was convinced that I ought to do all that was possible to oppose the name of Jesus of Nazareth." And then in a big turn of events as he explains his life story, how he sees the resurrected Jesus on the road to Damascus, he says in verse 19, "So then King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the vision from heaven, first to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem and all Judea and to the Gentiles, I preached that they should repent, means think about their life strategy in light of this truth and turn to God and to prove the change in their life strategy by their deeds." Paul himself had doubts, right? It's okay to have doubts in that sense because doubts are like vaccinations. I should know that all too well because I had my flu shot this week. I'm wondering if it's why I'm sounding a bit croaky this morning. And then you see, I was sitting in the chair of the doctor's surgery this week and I thought, "This has got to be the most stupid invention ever. I mean, who in their right mind on the surface of it goes to the doctor, gets a painful needle to inject something into you that could kill you?" And yet we all know, come on, because we're modern people, that all sorts of funny scientific stuff happens inside you and you develop things called antibodies. The very thing that could kill you, your body, builds up an immunity or a resistance to, so you won't succumb to it later on when it hits you all that harder. You know, how is it that we could be like that? You see, faith without doubts is like a body without anti-hypoties in it, that unless there are doubts in our faith when we come to a more stringent attack of anti-Christianity type A during the winter time, you're able to resist that and overcome that because you have recognized even as a Christian, it's okay to have doubts, are you with me? And more importantly, what you need to do in that is doubt your doubts. That's what you need to say to someone there. Doubt your doubts. Like if you ever heard, had someone say to you, "I can't believe in a Christianity stuff like you because I'm not gullible like you." I say nonsense, we've all got faith, like for example, why are you all looking so wonderfully comfortable in your chair right now? It's because you've got faith that the thing's not going to collapse on you. You're just living a life of faith right there in front of me as I look out here into our congregation. You've got a fierce faith of chairs, they do their job, you know they're going to do their job. So you're a person of faith already this morning, that's a good news, straight up. And so in that sense, the presence of doubt in your life is not a lack of faith, it's just faith in an alternate belief. So it's doubt in belief A is actually faith in alternate belief B. I mean I love the phrase Paul uses verse 8, "Why should any of you consider it incredible that God raises people from the dead?" I'm sure you say that to your workmates all the time. Now some people, you know, look at that and think that's ridiculous, a gripper thought that was ridiculous. He's having a laugh with Vesta about all of this and that's because for a gripper he's belief in Paul's insanity. His belief that Paul was having some tripped out hallucination on the road to Damascus, that belief was stronger than his belief, unlike Paul, that God can raise people from the dead. Paul hadn't had an experience that said this stuff is true, so why is it so unreasonable that God could raise people from the dead? Now people say I doubt Christianity because there's moral absolutes and it's restrictive and more importantly they just can't be a God. My question to that is can you prove that? Can you really prove 100% that there is no God in this world? Like even the poster boy of atheism, Richard Dawkins himself and his book The God Delusion, I think it's page 48, he says this, he says, "I don't know for certain but I think God is very improbable and I live my life on the assumption that he's not there." You guys hear that, live my life on the assumption, what is that, faith? Richard Dawkins got faith, doubt is actually to take a leap of faith, doubts are not a lack of belief, they're just inherited sometimes, unproven beliefs in that sense. Richard Dawkins could have inherited his atheism from his mom and his dad, I don't know what his life story is, and so on that hand not only must we as Christians acknowledge that we could have inherited our faith from our parents, we need to build it on something stronger than just that inheritance, but on the other hand those that don't believe in Jesus Christ, those that don't believe in Christianity have also got a check that they haven't inherited their beliefs either. So, look, if anyone's out there saying I love to believe in Jesus, but I'm skeptical, I'm suspicious, I'm doubtful, let me ask you this, this is what you can say to them, have you doubted your doubts? It's the first thing you could say D, doubt, oh, it's the object of your faith accounts, I call this the Flugtag principle, if you're German, apparently that means air show, but what I saw at the Red Bull Flugtag looks nothing like an air show, the Red Bull Flugtag is a sponsored event where people go and build these homemade flying machines and they go up onto a platform that's about 30 metres above a body of water and they dress up in all sorts of chicken suits and they have these big homemade wing things and they grab onto them and then they stare at the edge of that platform there and they run as hard as they can and some of them get to the edge and chicken out, maybe it's because we're in a chicken suit, others go and take a massive leap of faith and then everyone laughs because they just fall to the water and drop like stones and yet there's a ray of hope in the whole situation, as one person lines himself off, they go through, they gracefully take the step off the 30 metre platform and they glide gracefully down, down, down and into the water. Now when I look back on those guys there, I came to understand something about faith, it's not the size of their faith that mattered, some people jumped off that bridge with a great big jump in that platform and they threw themselves into it, others hesitantly just slipped off the edge and fell into the water, some flew, some didn't because it's not the size of your faith that matters here this morning, it's the object of your faith, it's what they put their trust in and some people put their trust in a dodgy, homemade flying machine, others that had an engineering background understood the laws of aerodynamics and they glided gracefully and so in that sense, what are you placing your trust in, are you placing your faith in lots of things today and you are, whether it's chairs or cars but I don't know, if you've got a friend or a family member or maybe it's even you this morning saying, I can't believe in Jesus, the reason that we can't believe in Jesus is not that we don't have belief or faith or that we're incapable of it is because we're already locked into something else, we've already got a belief into something else and our circumstances and our achievements and our own independence and in that way, look faith is always a transfer of belief, it's never a creation of belief, we don't drum up faith, we've already got faith in things, so here's the thing, you can't avoid betting your life this morning on some sort of belief about God and the universe, you know, faith acts are actually inevitable, you can't walk out of this place this morning either and either actively or indifferently, you can't walk out of this place without having made your mind up about a faith decision, so the question is, is what you're placing your faith in this morning going to fly, what's the object of your faith, is it trustworthy and so therefore it's not the size of your faith accounts but it's the object of your faith that counts, that's what you could say to someone as well, D, have you doubted your doubts, O, the object of your faith, the U is who are you under, Bob Dylan said you're going to serve somebody, you may be an ambassador in England or France, you may like to gamble, you might like to dance, but you may be the heavyweight champion of the world, you may be a socialite with a long string of pearls, but you're going to have to serve somebody, yes indeed, you're going to have to serve somebody, well it may be the devil or maybe the lord but you're going to have to serve somebody, see what's the most, what's one of the great objections to Christianity, oh it's, I'm not free, so restrictive, there's so many rules, it's so limiting on my life, you know, my response to that is look outside of Christianity, how free are you really, I mean if we dare to admit it to ourselves this morning we're all spiritually enthralled to something, whether it's money or your family or career or your identity or your status in society, you know what if you're finally lucky enough to attain these sorts of things, will it really make you happy, and we see people like that all the time and they've got it all, and the answer is no, I think it's because if we dare to admit it, Bob Dylan's right, we all serve somebody or something, and if you're living for anything finite, if your bottom line is finite, then you're absolutely burdened and enslaved, and here's the reason why, it's because you're really a servant to your circumstances, if your hope is in the finite, you're a servant to the circumstances around you, and in that way if your circumstances are threatened then you're going to be filled with fear, and if your circumstances are blocked then you're going to get angry, if you fail in your circumstances then I don't know, you're going to start feeling guilty like you didn't live up to all that you'd set yourself or what other people expected of you, and so we're always burdened by anger or fear or guilt, if everything we place our trust in is finite, and here's the question, if we dare to say that Bob Dylan is right and that we all serve someone, is it going to be a God, identity, beauty, career, money, or is it going to be the God, because I tell you, if you serve those things and you fail them, they will crush you, but if you serve this God and you fail him, he'll forgive you, and so we have to ask ourselves that question, or the person you're saying this has to ask themselves a question, are you really truly free outside of Christianity, if you feel at that limiting, understand who you're under, because Bob Dylan did, we're all going to serve somebody, so, D, doubt your doubts, oh it's the object of your faith, you, who you wonder, B, that'll be a good letter next, is it really about, is it really about belief, or is it about bossiness, you see my wife and I, Kristen, we come up to all sorts of funny little niggles from time to time at home, because we turn to each other and say I'm the boss, she turns to me and says no I'm the boss, and I say no I'm the boss, and she says no I'm the boss, and then as the husband and she the wife I realize yes she really is the boss, see marriage can be problematic right, because it's a relationship, Christianity is problematic, because it too is a relationship. You know the problems, the questions that arise when people want to try and believe in Christianity are things like oh what about my doubts, and what about the suffering in the world, what about the injustice in the world, how can, how can God be there in all of that, but here's the thing, if you always ask you those sorts of questions, you're approaching Christianity like it's a philosophy, how is God going to provide an answer to the solutions, and look it does provide an answer to that, but here's the thing, if you only approach it that way it's not going to work for you, because in the New Testament Jesus Christ he's always intensely personal, it's so narrow minded, he's always asking people who do you say that I am, it was a person, God was not some abstraction, that's why you know I think we've got to put it to people, maybe to yourself, to yourself this morning, that maybe your problem with Christianity is not with its philosophy, but because it's too personal, Christianity first and foremost is about accepting a person, Jesus Christ, not its principles, not what he teaches, you know and so is the problem really that intellectual, I think it's personal, you know, and people say, people are really saying deep down, I don't like the thought of giving over control of my life to Jesus, I don't like the thought of giving over my life to God, and people really hate the fact that Jesus makes these exclusive claims that like if I'm going to be in your life then can be no half-ways or grey zones and I need all of your life and all commitment, I have to be number one, they hate that, for example they say why should he be the only way to God, why should he be the truth, and why should he demand so much review of me, and you know don't you see it's because he's a person, and any one of you that's been in a relationship and particularly marriage knows that the minute you move into any form of relationship you lose a part of control over your life and that's where the joy is, moving into any type of relationship means an aspect of commitment, leads to a loss of total independent, look I'm just trying to ask you this morning is it a matter of belief because you want to say to God I'm the boss, and he says no I'm the boss, and you're left wondering what you'll do with that decision, D for doubts, oh it's the object of your faith, you you're unsure, B is it about belief or bossiness, do you want to be the boss, let God be the boss of your life, and T what, T for true, what if it's true, what if it is true, yeah postmodern is the biggest oxymora, postmodernism is the biggest oxymora more on the world has ever seen, it's an absolute truth that says there are no absolute truths, you know it's interesting one biblical writer Dallas Willard says that reality is what you run into when you're wrong, and we live in a world full of gravity and all sorts of laws of science that no matter how much we want to believe that there is no gravity and we can fly there's a truth to gravity, and we experience gravity in that sense, and so the question is what if Christianity is true and that's what Paul was simply asking King Agrippa and all those that were listening, what if it's true, he did it by preaching the resurrection, the resurrection of Jesus, and he says to Festus and Agrippa and 1st 25 onwards of Acts chapter 26 he says I'm not insane most excellent Festus, what I'm saying is true and it's reasonable and the king is familiar with these things and I can speak fairly to him about it, you know what's Paul doing, he was preaching the resurrection of Jesus Christ that he'd met this guy on the road to Damascus, that he too himself had his doubts that God could raise people from the dead but he saw it with his own eyes and he spent 20 years in ministry or more preaching that to people and reaping the consequences of what happened to him in that sense, you see Paul is bringing out the objectivity of Christianity in human history, you know what he's saying is to all of his people, he says it to us this morning that he based his truth about Jesus as a historical event, look these boys Festus and Agrippa they're laughing at him and they're having a bit of a chuckle and Paul butts in, he says no Festus ask Agrippa, he was there, he saw all this sort of stuff where it wasn't done in a corner, he asked the Jews who saw me grow up as a faithful young Jewish boy and all my fervent persecution of the Christian church, ask all those people who were listening in here today and got me on trial, they saw the person I was, they see the person that I'm now, ask them it's happened, NT Wright, a modern day theologian says that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is about as ludicrous and crazy to first century Jewish people as it is to us modern people today, it was crazy for them that someone would be raised from the dead and so therefore if someone's going to dismiss Christianity, the thing they're going to have to do if they're going to dismiss it as a human construction of the mind, as some sort of out their spirituality, as some sort of version of Bikram yoga, you know someone has to account for the existence of the church following the resurrection of Jesus, how did this come to be, how is it that a guy who was so opposed became one of the greatest preachers in the world for Christianity, how is it that these twelve ordinary guys gave birth to a movement back then that still sweeps the world today, how is it possible, the gospel's not that intellectual, you've just got to weigh that up, that we have to somehow account for the birth of this church and this movement and the way it swept the world, I mean even a Coney video didn't get that many hits on YouTube, how do you account for what happened, what if it's true, Blaze Pascal, the philosopher, scientist, mathematician asked himself that question in his unbelief initially and then he came up with a thing he calls Pascal's wager or we call Pascal's wager, he says this, God is or he is not, a game is being played where heads or tails will turn up and according to reason you can defend neither of the propositions, you must wager, it's not optional, let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God exists, let us estimate these between these two chances, if you gain you gain everything and yet if you lose you lose nothing, what if it's true, what if it is true, Christianity can be the one resource in your life that can give you an unshakable hope the way that it did for Paul in that sense, what if it's true and so as we see this morning there's the little acrostic, I've never preached to an acrostic before, I swear I would never do it but do you doubt your doubts, what's the object of your faith, you, what are you under, be is it about belief or bossiness and tea, is it true, I hope that I can equip you with those tools to go and have a conversation with someone, five things to say when they say I can't believe and someone asked me this morning, you know, if only they just had to heard your message, you know, they'd believe and I thought no it doesn't work that way because it didn't work that way for Paul either and he was much more of a godly man than I have was or am, see it's not an intellectual exercise this morning guys, Paul was doing something else, you know, he says, one of my favourite verses of the Bible, he says I pray King Agrippa, it's after Agrippa said Paul, are you serious, do you think in this short time you can convince me to be a Christian, I almost sort of says what I think and pray this morning, do you think in this short time twenty minutes of a sermon, you know, you can convince me to be a Christian Sam and Paul says I pray King Agrippa that you become all that I am except for these chains, you know, what's he doing, he's not certainly, he's not preaching point six of six things to say to a king when you're up against it, in the end he was living out the Ronan Keating principle, you say it best when you say nothing at all and in that sense guys if all else fails, if you don't, if you, if you lack the courage and the boldness of Paul had in front of King Agrippa, you know, you lack the words through the Holy Spirit to say to someone, or you just can't remember what Sam said that Sunday morning, you know, well if all else fails, there is nothing better in preaching the gospel than to live a life of a mercy and of grace and of wonder and of hope for everyone to see. Look at Paul's example how the heck did he go through it all, second Corinthians 11, had all the ways and the things that he went through in his life and his ministry, I imagine Paul like some Danny DeVito type figure, short Jewish guy, sitting before King Agrippa scars on his face, broken nose, bowed legs, limping as he gets there in chains, how the heck did he go through it, how did he go through being put in a prison over and over, how did he go through getting flogged, through facing death, through receiving 39 lashes from the Jews, through being beaten with rods, stone, shipwrecked, spending a night and day at sea in continual danger, danger in the city, danger in the country, danger at sea, he was weary and in pain often, he was hungry and he was thirsting, how the heck did he go through it all, why did he go through it all, I don't know, was he, did he want some form of inner peace, I mean come on, seriously, you could sniff a smelly sock long enough and think good thoughts and you're going to have inner peace, how why did he go through it all, it's because he had the hope and the truth of a resurrected Jesus Christ, God who came back to life and showed us that there is more than just this life and for the person this morning that struggling with suffering in their life, you know he added up, he swallowed his own medicine, for the person that's struggling with the philosophical questions of injustice, yeah he suffered that too, the person who's being twisted by unforgiveness in their life, he came so he could unlock that for you, for the person who's lost loved ones, he can't make sense of this world, the resurrected Jesus comes and says it's okay there's more to this life and the life of Paul, the guy in change, shows us that that's the resource and the nuclear fuel rods that allowed him to move through his ministry with hope and perseverance every day of his life, it's not about just an intellectual argument about whether or not you can believe but it might be you this morning and if you're saying that, you want to say that to someone who can't believe I need to say to you this morning that it's not a matter of faith, I'm not asking you to conjure up your faith or increase your faith, put a little bit of stuff together to create some faith because it's always a transfer of trust, not a creation of trust and so let me leave you with this that see look in the next few minutes we're going to go to a time of prayer, and you need to imagine this is like the ramp on the fluke tag, and you see whether you like it or not either actively or indifferently you're going to make a faith decision, my question is well what you're trusting this morning is it going to fly, is it going to fly, and I'm not asking you to get the faith stuff together, I'm just asking what are you holding onto that is dear to you in life, if it's God, that's fantastic and may it continue to be the nuclear fuel rod of your life and your ministry the way that it was for Paul, may it give you both the sense of boldness in Paul knowing that God's got everything in control but the sense of compassion that he had at the same time because he realized he was a sinner saved by grace, if you believe it's God if you're holding on to God may you have both boldness and compassion but it's if it's something else, I'm just saying you've just got to transfer it across this morning, it doesn't take a lot, in fact Jesus designed it that way it's almost like the moon landing quote in reverse, it was one giant leap for one man so it could simply be one small step of faith for all mankind, that's a gospel according to the moon landing, you don't need to have a lot of faith to trust in Jesus Christ this morning, you can, we want to help you in that come and pray with us, talk it through but why it's why he lived, he was born, he taught, he died and he rose again so we didn't have to go through all the rigmarole to get there, may we stop, reflect on what it is that Jesus Christ has done and the truth, the Paul swore in chains that he would live his life by in proclaim, may it be a true of our lives too this morning, let's pray. Heavenly Father, as we come to this time of prayer and ministry, Father we know that there are going to be family members and close friends and loved ones to us that in some ways we just have been praying desperately pray for Father that they would see this incredible light that Paul was preaching to the Gentiles and Father that we in this place, this small church on Oxley Street and Paul Lane take up that task and seek to do today that God you've broken into this world through Jesus Christ, he's given us a hope that there's going to resources for the rest of our earthly lives for that matter. So Father, we stand upon the truth of your word that it says that it's the Holy Spirit that does this work, so we commit those people to you now, we lift them up in prayer, Father you might bring them across the line that even for the great apostle Paul this is not paint by numbers, we're not here to twist people's arms behind their backs into the faith because it's your work Father, but Lord if there's anyone here this morning listening to this message here and now listening to this on a podcast down the track, may they understand they've already got plenty of faith, but may they trust in the one that's taken a giant leap for all of humankind so they can take that small step this morning, open up new life and your hope through faith in Jesus Christ. Father be with us this week, help us, empower us by the Holy Spirit, open up new opportunities to preach and declare this life and this light not just through words but through actions. It's all in your hands and we trust it now to you in the mighty name of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. Amen. (guitar music)