Reporting The Good News IV, To Change Their Minds, Let's Change Ours

Our scripture this morning will be in Luke's Gospel, Gospel of Luke. By the way, while you're turning there, I'm going to have Paul and Nancy put up that Saturday evening service list of things that we're going to ask you to help us come together in these five areas. Just put them all up there at once, would you? Would you consider helping us today as we take a major step of faith as a church? We need people to help us in each of these areas on Saturday evening. You can help us with just helping to set up the room and clean it up a little bit afterwards. We need some folks who'd be willing to stay over for about 45 minutes, just a little reception for those who might want to just stay around and talk about what they've experienced. We need some folks in the parking lot to get people in and out quickly. Certainly need some help in children's ministry. You say, well, I've never done that. Well, you can do any of these things. We'll train you. And we need some folks to help in ushering. We already have 20 who've signed up since Wednesday for this, and I'm excited about that. That's a good sign to me. Many of you would say, well, you know, I can't do this on Sunday because I work some Sundays and so on, but I'm free every Saturday night. Well, this would be a wonderful way for you to express your service to us. Here's what I'd like you to do. Right after the service today, Sherry Iff will be over here at this overhead. Sherry, would you stand? See Sherry, give her your name, and we'll get back to you. Whatever you feel like you might be interested in, see Sherry, and that will help us a great deal. All right, Luke chapter 5. I didn't tell you that, did I? I'll keep you hopping a little bit. Let me just skip down to verse 4. Jesus has been teaching from the boat. And when he finished speaking, he said to Simon, Put out into the deep water and let down the nets for a catch. And Simon answered, Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets. And when they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. And so they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink. When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees and said, Go away from me, Lord. I'm a sinful man. For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken. And so James and John and the sons of Zebedee, Simon's partners, they were all blown away by the power of God. Then Jesus said to Simon, Don't be afraid. From now on, you will catch men. So they pulled their boats up on shore and left everything and followed him. On Thursday, Carol and I went to Oakland to visit two seriously ill members of our church. Walking between two of the major hospitals there in Oakland, my eyes were opened to see some things that have been really touching my heart over the last several months. There's been no shortage of insight from the Lord as I've watched people in a way I've never seen them before. Right there in Oakland, you see, is a whole lot different than right here in the North Hills. And when you walk down Fifth Avenue in Oakland, you see some things. I left the hospital. I had seen a number of sick and really hurting people, some given terminal reports. We walked out the door and headed down toward Montefiore Hospital. And one of the little bus stops, one of those little clear glass sheds, there was this old lady. Her skin was shriveled up. She was kind of, you know, going like that with her jaws and had a whole ton of rouge on each cheek. And she was obviously seasoned. I mean, she'd been out there a long time. She had a wig on and a headband and a few bags on either arm. It was quite a sight. I nudged Carol and said, see what I've saved you from or something like that. She didn't think that was funny. Went on down the street. And, of course, over there you have several universities, and I saw some unusually attired people in their late teens or early 20s. One girl had just a driving-type black outfit on with a white belt, and then her face was kind of white, I mean, with makeup. You know, like the mime looks? But that wasn't what she was doing. She was just walking on the street with some of her friends. A little unusual. I nudged my wife again. Then we were about to walk in the hospital, and we had to stop right in the middle of the street because coming in from one side is this golden Porsche with the top down and a doctor. It must have been. It wasn't a patient, that's for sure. It was on the phone, you know, right in the parking lot and went down to the thing that said physicians only. And all these figures went just streaming through my mind, all these people, different kinds of people, all right there in that little 15 or 20 minute, I mean, it just like bombarded my senses. The Lord reminded me of some things He's been telling me over the last several months, that He loves people. You know that? The Lord loves little bag ladies. He loves wealthy physicians. He loves sick people. He even loves young punk rockers. And He reminded me that He came to seek and to save the lost. Beautiful people, hurting people, rich people, poor people, sick people, young people, old people. And I recognized something about myself in those moments. You know what I recognized? Is all these things were happening on the streets, and I saw these, and I didn't even tell you all the people that I saw, by any means. But something happened to me that I think happens to you. I found myself just wanting to get on out of there and get on back to my safe territory, right out here in the North Hills. You know, right back to my old neighborhood where most everyone around me is normal. And I didn't have to confront how I felt about some of these people that were a little less than what I would consider to be normal. You see, I'm a pastor, and I like my little... This is my pasture, and I like it here. You're a salesman, or a machinist, or a bricklayer, or an accountant, or an interior designer, or an attorney, or whatever you might be, and you're real comfortable in that little zone, and you just do real well there. Maybe you're a mom, and you just like your neighborhood and your little family, and that's all you like. And don't talk to me about sick people, and bag ladies, and hurting people, and rich people that are different than I am. You see, if we want to please God and make a difference with our lives, dear ones, we need to change our minds about a few things. This fourth and final message on evangelism is something I can't begin to tell you how strongly I feel that if we don't hear this today, then the last weeks of talking about making a difference and all that, they're not going to matter. Our minds have to be changed by God to believe that He has some things to say about people. You know, Peter in this story is much like we are. He was big into fishing. I have a sense that Peter was like top dog in the fishing business right there in the old lake of Gennesaret area. I mean, he was probably on the cover of today's fishermen. More fish, bigger fish, all kinds of fish. Any way he could get more productive, that's what Peter wanted to do. Jesus came to this little group of which Peter was the head and said to them something like this, Peter, Andrew, and all the rest of you, I'm here to make you an offer today that will change your life. I'm here to completely reorient your system of thinking. Peter, I'm here to challenge everything that you think is really important. And I'm going to use some words and some symbols that are very familiar to you so you know exactly what I'm saying. Peter, if you follow me, if you commit to be one of my disciples, I mean, if you're serious about this business of following after me and my purposes, then I'm going to take you from being a fisherman to being a fisher of men. And I have no doubt that those words stung Peter just like a brick hitting him on the side of the head. A fisher of men. You see, he knew what Jesus was getting at. Those words were like dynamite. Peter was like all of you. He was trying to figure out ways to do his job the best he could, to make the most he could of it. You know, they talked in the morning about where they were catching things yesterday. They talked how they had adjusted the way that they put the nets out and cleaned them a certain way and all these different kinds of things. Jesus comes along and says, to follow me, you're going to use the same kinds of things, the same kinds of intensity to catch men that you were using to catch fish. And Peter, that is far more important than catching fish. It's far more important to catch men than to catch fish. Now, everything that we do here, all of your work is necessary. I'm going to talk next week and for the following several weeks about why work is important and what God intends for us in the marketplace. You're going to want to be here to hear that. More people than I can begin to recount have told me of their dissatisfaction with work. And I'm going to talk to you about why God wants us to work and what it's all about. But far more important than any work that we do out there is what Jesus says to Peter. He says, I'm going to make you a fisher of men. But this requires a whole new mindset, dear ones, that many of us have yet to encounter or take to ourselves. The first thing we have to change our minds about, if we're to see this happen, is we have to see that people are the most important thing in the world. Ever heard the phrase, we should use things and love people? Ever hear that? But what do we often do? Yeah, we use people and love things. God's Word tells us in no uncertain terms that the purpose of Jesus' coming was because of people. He didn't come to put together the world's greatest carpentry company. How many think Jesus probably could have put together a pretty sharp company? I'd like to see the things He made, wouldn't you? But He didn't come to do that. He didn't come to be a top dog, you know, in the construction business in Bethlehem or Jerusalem. He came for people. John 3, 16, For God so loved the world that He sent His only Son. And I could go on and on. Luke 19, 10, And for the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost. You know, far too easily we allow careers and comforts and preferences and tasks and stuff to get in the way of people, people, people that matter to God. Many of us have grown up with a mindset that people are a means to an end. I mean, people work for me, so they're in my employment and they do what I ask them to do, so we can make money together. People are competitors. You know? When's the last time you looked at a fellow salesman and saw him as a person and not a competitor? In the business world, in real estate, people are called producers. Million dollar producer. You don't produce, you don't really want to. Stop producing and you'll get the door real quick. Jesus comes along and teaches that every person we encounter is of incredible worth to him. And because he's incredibly concerned about them, we should be as well. People are no longer just a means to a financial end for us to get to the top of the heap in our particular business. They're not just a job description that someone's filling. But they matter to God and they need to matter to us in the same way that they matter to him. Let me ask you, what would be different if you looked at people and treated people as though they were the most important thing to you? And I mean the ones that you don't even like. About eight years ago, a man who owns a local automobile dealership right up here was talking to me and he was saying, you know, I feel like I should be doing more than I am as a Christian. And I do good things for the people around me, but so do other dealership owners. And I try to treat my employees with fairness, but so do other dealership owners. And so on and so on and so on he went. I said, well, have you ever thought about giving them an opportunity to discuss what really is important to you? He said, what do you mean? He said, well, have you ever thought about having a time when your employees could come and discover something about your faith? And he said, well, I haven't thought about that. And we worked together and got started right up there in the dealership, right before work began, a little Bible study. And he, the owner of the company, invited his employees to come to the Bible study and to talk about what was really important to him. And they got the message that he cared not just about the business and about producing but he cared about them as people. We need that kind of a mindset, church, that people are the most important thing in all the world. Let me give you another reason why I believe that. 2 Peter 3, verse 10. We have it on an overhead. Just look at it up here. It'll save you from flipping through your scriptures. You see, in this scripture we read why we need to see people as the most important thing in all the world. It says, the day of the Lord will come as a thief and then the heavens will pass away with a loud voice and the elements will be dissolved with fire and the earth and the works that are upon it will be, let's all say it, burned up. Just grab that chair you're sitting on right now. Grab the side of it. That's going. That's going to melt down. You know that car you drove in out there? That brand new one? That's history. Somebody said that'd be the greatest thing that ever happened to me. I'd get my insurance claim. But in all seriousness, folks, the Bible tells us that in the end what we've accumulated is going to be gone. Now, you may die before that and there's no U-Hauls behind hearses, so none of you are taking it with you anyhow. But if you happen to be around when this happens, guess what's going to remain at the end? People. Just people. People are the only thing that make it into eternity. You ever thought about that? All the stuff that we have and we feel so good about, it's not going to make it. It's not going to make it. I remember several years ago, I returned home to Beaver where I grew up, in Beaver County. And I'd been gone for years. Have you ever done that? It's a strange experience. And I'd been living in Los Angeles, which is a little bit bigger than Beaver. And I remember driving down the streets of Beaver and saying to Carol, Honey, they shrunk the streets. I mean, everything was so small. And then I turned a corner and I went down this one street where there had been a garage that I had gone to many, many times. In fact, I'd bought a car there and had my repair work done. And it was gone. All it was was this big lot. It was like a half a block. It was a big lot. And I said, My gosh, they've destroyed Stout's garage. They'd leveled it. And I remember the image going through my mind. That's what's going to happen to everything. Gone. Everything but people. We were moving here just Wednesday and Thursday. Many of you knew that and helped us. And we appreciated your help. And we had to tag things. Things that went on the third floor of the offices got a yellow tag. And things that went on the second floor got a purple tag. Put the wrong tag in the wrong thing and end up in the wrong place. And I thought to myself on Friday, You know, that's what we ought to do with people and with stuff. We ought to put a tag on people saying, Eternal. Put a yellow tag on people. It's eternal. And put a black tag on stuff. Because it's temporal. How many times have you or I gotten really upset when someone messed with our stuff, as Sandy said a month ago? And we've destroyed a relationship over stuff. Dear ones, people matter more than anything. They're the only thing that's going to last. And that's the only reason I can think why some very capable people who could make it big out there give up all those career options and go out in the mission field. I just prayed with Ken and Lisa Starkey who are serving the Lord in China. They're going out there. They're laying it all down. I mean, they could accumulate. Ken's got a lot of brains. Smart cookie. He could do real well. But what matters to them are those Chinese people. Because they matter to God. The second thing we need to change our mind about are the possibilities. The possibilities that are latent within each of us. We can make a difference. Dear God, how many of us give up even before we start? Even before we start to think about catching men, catching women, we give up. We don't even give it a shot. We feel inadequate, unsure. I'm not Billy Graham, you know. I can't do evangelism. Dear ones, there's all kinds of ways to catch fish. Is that true? I mean, talking about fish fish now. There's all kinds of ways. And just in case you need reminded, I've prepared some things to remind you this morning. I hope you're still back here. All right. All right? Now this, for those of you who are not into this sport, I mean, this is just a sampling of one man's repertoire. Several very light and flexible graphite-type reels. This is one of my favorite pieces here, Pastor Scott. Would you hold that for just a second for me? I'd like to put this on just to make a point here, if that's okay. You see? Yeah. This reminds me, and it should remind you, when we get serious about fishing, folks, we get serious about fishing. Okay? This is all the gear. Here's the license. I'm not sure what that is. There's stuff in these pockets. I mean, there's, I mean, it would take close to a PhD to know what, whoops, what was that? Oh, that was the knife. There's a knife there. This is a tackle box. If you could see in here, I'm just going to hold up just very delicately. I mean, look at this stuff. All right? Look at this stuff. Can you see that at all? Can you see there's got to be about 150 different colors of things, you know? Look at this. Here's a, what is that, a hot and tot, Scott? Hot and tot. See, this is one way to catch fish. Dumb fish for this one. Okay, and there's a worm. There's all kinds of ways to catch fish. Now, I want to tell you something I learned with my elders. I never liked the fish because I never caught anything when I was a kid. I used to go to these little ponds and sit there for four hours and say, this is dumb, you know? Plus, I was type A. That's right. Just give me an M-80 and I'll drop it in the pond and they'll surface up here. But, you know, what I marvel at is God's given us all these wonderful means to catch men and we don't use them. We don't even think about it. We figure, well, someone else, you know, is a little, someone else will do it on the television. Someone else will do it at Three River Stadium. Folks, the fish are out there. They're all around us. I'm talking now about men and women who don't know God. They matter to Him. And I want you to know something I have a conviction about. I believe that God wants you to be the one that's going to catch a particular fish. I.e., there's a fish out there with your name on it. Ever have someone tell you that? There are some people that will only be won to Christ by you because you're the type of person, you're the type of fisherman that God's prepared to catch them. There are all kinds of ways to fish. I just, you know, jotted down four or five ways. Number one, there's the confrontational way to fish. That's, I mean, that's the direct assault approach. This is for the kinds of people that, you know, don't have any problem talking. Many of you are great talkers. I can verify that. Men and women. And you're real comfortable just going right up to somebody and standing in their face and saying, well, you ought to do this. And, you know, you need to consider that. Very good at that. Our own Kent Adams, he's great. I mean, Kent runs a garage, you know, and does repair work on cars. If he senses someone doesn't know the Lord, you know, he just, he finds one little thing, you know. He says, you know, your life's like the den in the side of this car. And God wants to patch it, you know. I mean, he just goes right after it. And it's amazing how many people. I mean, he's comfortable that way. You know, and Vicki's there. I mean, she's, you know, I'm going to do this with her. But some of you would not be comfortable. All some of you would, I mean, it would be horrible for you to think that you'd have to talk to someone directly about their relationship to God. Others of you are much more comfortable with another approach. And by the way, I don't have time today, but I could go right through the Bible and show you these. Peter was this kind of a person. He was a confrontation. The second kind of person was the intellectual or more reasonable, reasonable kind of approach. Someone who likes to talk through the different issues. I mean, just, you know, isn't real great about confronting, but boy, when you get down to separating the issues, they'll talk it right to. You know, Josh McDowell is one of the best I've ever seen at just reasoning things through. Our own Amy Schering at the CPC. I mean, she can give a person 16 reasons why today is the day. You saw that? She's really good at that. And there are many people out there, by the way, who you rub shoulders with who would be put out by a confrontational approach but would listen to someone who could reason a bit with them and talk through their objections. Another kind of approach is the relational approach. Just to be a friend. You know, you don't have to always be slipping them the four spiritual laws. You can just care about them. And a time will come when they'll ask you, you know, hey, what is... there's something in your life that I really appreciate or tell me a little bit about this church you go to. They'll say it in some way that's real safe, but they'll notice something. You can be a friend to somebody, but in the name of Christ. Another very significant way to catch men is what I call the invitational approach. Now, if you're not good at talking and you're not good at, you know, explaining all this, folks, you can begin to catch fish by just simply bringing them. You say, well, you know, I don't have time. Yes, you do. You have time to do what you want to do. There's one gal that says, she says, I'm not real good at talking about the gospel and those things, but I can bring people to stuff. She's a real, you know, real friendly kind of a person, real outgoing. And she said, and I never come to church alone. Now, what a neat commitment that was. I never come alone. I always bring someone. Our Saturday evening services begin. You can always just invite someone to come along with you. Just give them an invitation. Our special events, the reason why we have those concerts and have those picnics and have those boat rides is so you can invite people. And there are many people who will never come unless you invite them, but you don't even know that they won't come until you do. You say, well, I've already tried. And they said, no, I'm not interested. Well, just wait. Something will happen in their life and they'll get interested. Another way is the testimonial way. How many of you know that something good happened in your life? Can you talk about that? I mean, maybe you can't explain the biblical basis for justification by faith, but you can say, hey, I was a mess and now I'm in pretty good shape. How'd that happen? Because God did it in my life. You can tell your story. There's all kinds of ways to catch fish. None of these will work for all of us, but every one of us can find one of these. And I'm sure there's others I haven't even had time to develop that you can do. My point is this, folks, let's change our minds about the possibilities. Let's believe that God wants to use you. You say, well, I'm really timid. Well, maybe you could just be a servant in the name of Christ. You know, just offer to babysit the neighbor's kids. And at some point they're going to say, you know, boy, you're unusual. And there are people who won't be reached until you reach them. They won't ever come until you reach them. The final way and quickly that we need to change our minds is about our priorities. And this thing is starting to clang a little bit. I'm going to put my coat back on temporarily here. Our priorities. You see, we need to make choices, dear ones, because if there's something that concerns me, and it sounds like part of a fishing story, I'm going to use this word. It's drift. Now, you can get out in a fishing boat and just drift. Just drift along. That does drive me crazy. Just to sit there. You know what? When you drift even in like a pretty quiet lake, guess what happens when you drift? What are you more likely to have happen to you? You get a little sick. Yeah, really. When the boat's going someplace, you know, you're holding steady. When you're just kind of riding those waves around. Well, you see, the problem I see with so many of our lives is this issue of drifting. We don't make the choices. And dear ones, here's what I've discovered. In every arena of life, if you don't make the choice, it does not happen. How many of you have ever known that you needed to start exercising? I mean, and you can buy videotapes. You know, get this little library of videotapes. 48 ways to get hard bodies and get in shape and all those kinds of things. Or you can go out and join four health clubs. I'm getting serious now. Well, the only exercise you end up getting is writing the check. You see, if we don't make the choice to get out and do it, to get out and exercise, to get out and get involved, it won't happen in our lives. It just does not happen. We all tend to just load out. And I want to challenge you today. You know, it's very possible if you've not exercised some expression of evangelism, some concern for the people that really matter to God. In the last three months, during the course of the summer, if you've not talked to one person about their relationship to God, I want to say something. You're drifting. Because I guarantee that God's brought people by your path. You just weren't listening. If you've not had some kind of a quickening in your own heart toward a person that you're praying for, to see come to Christ, then you're drifting. And drifting does not produce fruit. It doesn't lead to catching men. Every other thing you get involved in will just absorb you. It will consume you. And dear ones, we all love to do well. You know, we want to be successful. We want all these things to happen in our career and all that. And God's not... Listen, God's for that stuff. I'm going to talk about it next week. But nothing is more important than catching people. Because they're all that's really going to make it into eternity. We need to re-educate our minds at the highest priority. Listen, I wonder how many people just thought, you know, I could use this weekend when people are off. I could use this weekend for evangelism. I wonder how many people even just gave God an opportunity to talk about their schedule. I venture to say most people say, hey, we're going out. We're going. We need to change our minds and say, Lord, what's your will? What do you want? I'm here to serve you. You're not here to be my God, God of my bidding. But I'm here to be at your bidding. Because people matter to Him. People do what they want to do. I want you to know there'll be people that will watch every Steelers game from start to finish even though they have all kinds of other things that are saying, get me done. There'll be people that will be on the golf course four times a week even though they know they need to tend to things at home or take care of some other affairs. It's a priority. Let me conclude with this, would you? Remember those four people I saw in Oakland? I couldn't help but be reminded that their people, like we see all the time, but they're also people that Jesus described in Scripture. They're like the people that Jesus referred to in Luke 4, 16. It's on your little banner flyer here where it says in Luke 4, it talks about, the Lord has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind and to set at liberty those who are oppressed. Jesus came for the hurting like the people in the hospital I visited. Jesus said later on in Luke chapter 14 to set a banquet for the poor. Don't set it for the ones who have, but the ones who have not. Like the lady in the bus stop. Jesus said, I came for the wayward like the prodigal son. I came for that one that's rebelling and hateful and just trying to get attention. I came for that one. And Jesus said, in Luke 19, when he approached Zacchaeus, a wealthy tax collector, he said, I came to you, Zacchaeus, because I care as much about the up and outer as I do the down and outer. I came for the rich. My last question to you is, are you available to God? Are you available to be used by God to be a fisher of men? You know, the same Peter that Jesus confronted here in Luke 5 appears again in John 21. Don't turn. I'll just tell you this story. Jesus is raised from the dead. The disciples, they're in a state of disarray. Peter had denied Christ. He was in great sorrow and depressed in fear. And Jesus makes him confronted. Jesus walks up to him. Peter said, I'm going to go back to fishing again. Remember that? I'm going back to the fishing business because I didn't make it as a fisher of men. And Jesus looks at Peter and he said, Peter, do you love me? Remember those words? They're so personal, so intimate. And Peter said, Lord, you know I love you. And what did Jesus say? Feed my sheep. Or if you'll allow it, take care of people. Take care of people. Three times he said that and then Peter said, well, Lord, what about this one right here? What about John? What about him? What did God say to Peter then? What is that to you? What is that to you what I have this person doing? You follow me. And whatever the one next to you decides to do in response to these four messages, if they don't do a thing different, if they just say, well, praise God, pretty banners, let's go back out. And they don't do anything. What is that to you? You. You go out. And you become a fisher of men. Ask God, what style should you use? What approach is best for who you are? And commit yourself to making a difference. I'm talking here to people who've known Christ for 30 or 40 years and you haven't led someone to Christ in that long. Be a fisher of men. I'm talking to people who've just known the Lord for a few weeks and your pool is stocked with fish. Be a fisher of men. And I believe God is going to change our minds because He's touching our hearts. Let's pray together. Shall we? Let's stand. Father, I ask you in Jesus' name to do far more than just inspire us, Lord, but to change us. Enable us to be truly fishers of men. For we hear the sounds all around us, God, of the needs of people. People everywhere, God, who need you. May we be sensitive to hear their cry and respond to their need. In Jesus' name. Let's be seated for just a moment as we listen to this concluding song. Well, it's time to fish. We've done the best we know to present to you what I believe God is saying to our church these last four weeks. Starting next Sunday and then the following Saturday, two weeks from last night, we believe God's going to enable us to fish like we've never known. And I hope your line's going to be in the water. I'm sure we're going to be here for you on Wednesday nights, in home groups, and other things that we do. We're going to be building you up the best we know how, edifying you, feeding you. But I want so much to be part of a church that's hearing the cry of people and meeting their needs. Let's stand, shall we, for prayer and we'll be dismissed today.