Missional 8

HOW OUR “FAITH-WALK” MAKES US MISSIONAL

Apparently the term “faith-walk” is unique to Christian language (Christianese). So I need to explain what I mean by “faith-walk.” My understanding of “faith-walk” is that it refers to living out one’s faith in obedience to God’s commands. Some folks believe or have faith in Jesus but don’t act on what they believe. When someone asks “How’s your faith-walk?” it may sound cliché. What they are asking is whether you are growing in your relationship with Jesus. What I would add is that your “faith-walk” is your Christian life expressed in obedience.

            Why is this important? We have been talking for several weeks about the Missional church in contrast to the Attractional church (If you build it…). A drawback of the Attractional model of doing church is that it tends to drop the standard of discipleship in order to attract seekers to the church. This leads to the “seeker-sensitive” approach. While we desire to welcome seekers to our church (those seeking relationship with God), the grace of God is emphasized to the extent that the demands of discipleship become fuzzy (We don’t want to scare them away).

            The Attractional model also tends to use the “sinners prayer” as victory points, the climax of their vision, rather than a beginning point of the journey with Christ.

            With the Missional approach to being the church, the call to obedience for all believers, including seekers, is paramount. We do not see conversion as the goal but as the first step in a long journey of coming to know Jesus. And we see obedience to the commands of the Bible as a witness of the presence of God.

            Moses emphasizes precisely these truths in Deuteronomy 29. Entering into a covenant with Yahweh, Israel was agreeing to be a people of God. That meant obedience to God’s commands. If the church finds its roots in being a covenantal people in the OT, we will find parallels in this text that call for an obedient “faith-walk” with God.

1. Be aware of your own “faith-walk”

Beginning with verses 19-21 (we will come back to 18), we find that Moses earnestly charges the individual Israelite to be obedient. Deut. 29 as a whole is a reaffirmation of the covenant agreement with God: God will continue to be their God and Israel will honor God by keeping His laws. By doing so, Israel ensures that life in the Promised Land will be prosperous. But, if you read ch. 28, you will also find that if Israel is not obedient to God, they will experience God’s curses.

            Moses addresses the individual Israelite then and warns them: You cannot rest on mere lip-service saying “I agreed to the covenant so God will be with me.” Moses says, “When such a person hears the words of this oath and they invoke a blessing on themselves, thinking, ‘I will be safe, even though I persist in going my own way,’ they will bring disaster on the watered land as well as the dry. The LORD will never forgive them…” (19-20a).

            There is a growing understanding among evangelicals that altars calls are ineffective. Back in the evangelistic crusade heyday it was found that a very small percentage of “conversions” resulted in committed believers. The sinner’s prayer paradigm gave the impression that once this prayer was said, the person was “in” or “safe” or “eternally secure.” So discipleship was optional.

            Jesus echoed the covenantal requirements of Deut. in His Sermon on the Mount. Committing to a relationship with God is a serious venture, which is why Jesus said we must “count the cost.” Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!” (Matt. 7:21-23).

            What’s wrong with these people? They sound like tremendous Christians: they preach, they cast out demons, they do miracles. But Jesus rejects them. Why? The answer rests in the phrase “only he who does the will of my Father.” To be clear, “works” don’t earn you God’s favor. But obedience to God’s commands indicates that you take your relationship with God seriously.

            Consider the daughter whose father tells her to clean her room, do the dishes, and walk the dog. These tasks are a natural part of the responsibility of membership in one’s family. But the father finds the daughter on the couch with her iPod and the TV blaring. “You didn’t do I what asked,” he says. “I love you Daddy. I’m so glad you’re my Dad. You rock,” she replies. Does a profession of love substitute for obedience? Love includes obedience.

            So Moses challenges the individual that if they truly love God, they will be aware of the dangers of disobedience. The curses for Israel were terrible. Jesus’ rejection of the pretender is terrible. Watch your faith-walk. Are you living in obedience to Christ’s commands?

2. Be aware of each other’s faith-walk

It is one thing to examine yourself. In age of egocentrism we are very aware of ourselves and how we are doing. It is quite another thing to challenge each other in matters of faith. Even the preacher must be careful how he exhorts from the pulpit that he does not offend.

            But in a covenantal community, it is imperative that its members are aware of sin and the wandering heart. God wants the whole community to care for itself and to guard against sin.

            Aware of the temptations and influences of the society into which the Israelites were entering, Moses charged the people to be responsible for each other. He said, “Make sure there is no man or woman, clan or tribe among you today whose heart turns away from the LORD our God to go and worship the gods of those nations; make sure there is no root among you that produces such bitter poison” (18).

            Some translations say “beware” instead of “make sure” showing that there is a real danger with slipping away. The danger is twofold: a) there can be a turning of hearts towards idols or things that detract from a focus on God as the source of all blessing. It may begin with an individual, a man or a woman, who finds satisfaction in some distraction. But then it seeps into whole clans, families, and then the tribe. Before it gets that far, the Israelite must identify it and address it. b) the danger has a root in the community. Perhaps something needs to be eradicated from the village or the nation. In this case, an idol fetish (rabbit’s foot, horoscopes, mediums) that represents a foreign cult needs to be rooted out. If not, it becomes a poison that seeps into the community eventually infecting all.

            Be aware of each other’s faith-walk. Jesus teaches that the believer is responsible for his brother or sister’s walk also. If we see sin in each other’s lives we are obligated by our covenant with God to address it. We do this for the sake of the brother/sister; we do this for our own sakes as well.

            But the problem we face is one of judgment. We are afraid to address sin because we don’t want to judge, nor do we want to be judged. We hold up the shield of protection, “Do not judge, or you too will be judged” (Matt. 7:1) when we fear our actions may be sketchy. I hear this so often. Christians are not supposed to judge. We don’t want to seem holier than thou, or that we are looking down on people. Fair enough.

            We do however ignore then, the rest of what Jesus says in Matthew: “Do not give to dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs” (7:6) and “Watch out for false prophets” (7:15). Do you know that those dogs and pigs Jesus refers to are people? How are we to watch out for false prophets unless we “judge” them?

            No, we are not to judge, that is, condemn those who are still in sin keeping them from Christ’s grace. But we are to judge, that is, discern what sin is and identify it so that it does not take root in our community. Paul taught the Galatians, “Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you may also be tempted” (Gal. 6:1).

3. Be aware of the community’s testimony

Why does it matter? How does the obedience of the one or the whole affect the testimony of the church?

            Moses explains the devastating effects of sin on the entire community in verses 22-24. Calamities, diseases, fields becoming wasteland and utter destruction awaits Israel if they fall away from the LORD. If they rest on their faith without obeying God, they betray their end of the covenant. And God has no choice but to show them the results of unfaithfulness.

            The worst part is that this affects God too. “All the nations will ask: ‘Why has the LORD done this to this land” Why this fierce, burning anger?’ And the answer will be: ‘It is because this people abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the God of their ancestors, the covenant he made with them when he brought them out of Egypt’” (24-25).

            These are the same nations that would be in awe of the success of Israel in 4:6. The nations were watching to see what difference it made to have Yahweh as God. God must show the world then, that disobeying Him testifies that God is just.

            Sin has a devastating affect on a faith community. This could also describe a fruitless church. If there is no obedience, no discipleship training in how to follow Jesus, if the church does not discipline erring members or heretical ideas, it will become a wasteland. For example, if I mention “the United Church of Canada” what comes to mind? Maybe nothing. But I will guess that many of you have a less than complimentary thought in your minds when I mention that denomination. I believe that is due in large part to the lowering of standards to meet social pressures. In short, culture trumped obedience to God’s commands. And the testimony is telling.

            Our community’s testimony needs to be one of obedience to God’s truth. The church thrives and is alive when it is obedient to Scriptural teaching, when it lives what it believes. The world responds when it sees this testimony negatively or positively – but it responds. If it does not respond then we are not doing what God has commanded.

Eugene Peterson in A Long Obedience in the Same Direction writes, “It is not difficult in our world to get a person interested in the message of the Gospel; it is terrifically difficult to sustain the interest. Millions of people in our culture make decisions for Christ, but there is a dreadful attrition rate. Many claim to have been born again, but the evidence for mature Christian discipleship is slim. In our kind of culture anything, even news about God, can be sold if it is packaged freshly; but when it loses its novelty, it goes on the garbage heap. There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue, little inclination to sign up for a long apprenticeship in what earlier Christians called holiness.”

            Jesus said that He did not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it (Matt. 5:17). What we lack in our attempts to be obedient is complete in Christ – that’s grace. How we respond to this amazing grace in our lives is called our faith-walk. Obeying God’s commands tells God we love Him. A vibrant faith-walk tells the world that God can be known.

                                                            AMEN