Neighborly Apologetics

And so here in this passage we’ll look at a few of these words and phrases and draw them out in understanding what God is calling us to do.

My position is that no one is going to ask you for a reason for the hope that is in you if they don’t know you, if we haven’t built a relationship with someone, they are not going to do that, they just won’t.

Shallow relationships won’t bring that about, drive-by Christianity won’t bring that about, relationships will.

We have to be faithful in our walk when things don’t go well that we manifest that hope…​ otherwise we’ll look like anybody else.

But it’s in that deep relationship that people can see that witness of hope that’s in you and begin to ask those questions.

We’ll see this in every verse, that the notion that this is to be done with gentleness and respect which is the great understanding of how we’re going to do neighborly apologetics that it is always going to be done with grace, it’s always going to be done with respect, it will always be done with gentleness.

And all of this, as the scripture says, then "honors Christ", the Lord as holy.

And of course we want to do that.

We are going to spend some time on this verse because it is so important for us in terms of how God is laying out for us how we conduct ourselves toward outsiders.

So let’s talk about this discernment. We will deal with this more as we go forward in these [lessons], but we’ll introduce it here because it’s really important for us.

Why? Because the scriptures are calling us to have wisdom to know how to respond to each person. That’s discernment. We need wise discernment. And the first thing we do need to understand [of] course [is] that humanity is really broken up into two categories when it comes to all of the spiritual realm.

And that is the believer and the non-believer. And what we need to discern when we’re talking with someone is, if our neighbor is a believer or our neighbor is not a believer.

Now we confess that line is a nice little white bright line there, but it’s not always a bright white line. Sometimes it’s not easy to discern. In fact, the scripture tells us that there will be people that are weeds and tares within the body of Christ. There will be those who have done amazing things. You remember the very, very hard verses where people came to Jesus and said, "Did we not cast out demons in you name", and all those kinds of things and then those most terrible words in all the universe: "Depart from me, I never knew you." Those are hard words.

And so, that line [can be] very difficult, hard to discern, but it is important for us to know: are we dealing with a believer or dealing with a non-believer? And that will drive how we will then respond and deal with people.

We also need to discern whether or not this is a believer or a non-believer who is open to God or are they closed to God?

I think reality is still, even in this culture as much as it is slipping away from us, that there are really very, very few people who were totally closed to God.

(I chose to watch a football game last night. In a very, very critical football game in the NFL and so forth.

I spent time doing that and if you have heard the news or you haven’t, there was a very serious injury. In fact, it was so serious that they canceled the game. As a result of an injury in which the ambulance came onto the field and the First Responders were doing some very drastic CPR measures on this player late last night. He was taken to the hospital and was in critical condition.

My understanding today is that he may have improved that he most likely went into cardiac arrest as a result of a blow to the chest. But what was interesting about this was that the players were all down on the knees praying. And the announcers were talking about praying for him and just as we have heard the phrase that when the fox hole is under a deep barrage, there are no atheists in the foxhole, that when people were confronted with a life and death situation, in this case, with a very close friend, that they turned to prayer.)

These are the kinds of things that we will talk about later on as these [lessons] proceed, to talk about these events that are going on in the world around us to make that defense.

And so, a non-believer who’s closed to God is very difficult. We’ll talk about that in a minute, but the non-believer who is open to God might be willing to talk about what happened (last night—​above). They might be willing to talk about what happened last night, maybe to engage them in a question, really praying to, you know, and if he survives and he turns out okay. Are they going to think that prayers did something and if they don’t think they do anything, then why were they praying. In other words, you can see the argument as we proceed forward here with talking to a non-believer.

In the light of the mass of people praying now for someone and the interesting thing is that there was no one in the announcers booth, there was no one in the stands, there was no one on the field that expressed their outrage that people were praying.

That no one in the announcer booth when they were talking about calling people to pray for this young man, which I was so thankful that they were saying that, but no one would dare, at that moment, say: wait a second that offends me that you’re praying or that you’re calling people to pray.

Anyway, these are the every day things that occur in the world around us that as we ask God to help us with these things. These are part of seasoning our speech with salt.

Okay, so the non-believer we have to recognize: are they open to God or are they closed to God. Are they hostile to God or do they have a sense that maybe there is someone out there, so to speak.

We also need to recognize, if your neighbor professes to be a believer, Are they a believer that has a solid Biblical worldview? Or are they a believer which, you may know surveys show 93% of self-identified born again believers do not have a Biblical worldview or it’s a very shallow worldview.

So, do they have a solid Biblical world view or do they NOT have a solid Biblical worldview?

If they have a solid Biblical worldview you may want to invite them to go through the Engagement Project with you so that they can begin to understand the Royal Law. This is what God has called us to do and why you and your family are willing to engage the people that are in your Jerusalem and to call them alongside of you to pray with you as you maybe gauge your neighborhood.

If they do not have a Biblical worldview then I would think and suggest you do everything you can to help them build a Biblical worldview. One of the ways to do that is to invite them to go through the Truth Project with you. And then after that to go through the Engagement Project with you.

Now the important thing in all of this is that our engaging with the world around us with the believers and non-believers is that all of this is going to be done through a deep significant relationship.

And to some extent I guess we could say that is what is going to characterize Neighborly apologetics as opposed to the way I used to do it. That this is going to be done with the context of deep significant relationship(s). And I don’t want to be overly critical here, but quite frankly modern Christianity doesn’t do relationships and most of our programs don’t really do relationships, deep relationships.

But we need to do what the Lord modeled for us. He built very first thing he did was form his small group. He built relationships with them and even drove those relationships deeper with three of those men. And it was over that period of time as he built those deeper relationships with those men that he slowly began to reveal deeper and deeper things with them.

And so, the only way I believe that we’re going to gain an audience and gain an entrance. The only way we’re going to be able to earn the right to be able to speak into people’s lives, especially in today.