Learning Evangelism from Jesus

So long time no post. So much to talk about but don't really have the time to right now. I will try to be better about posting on here but we all know the saying, "Best laid plans of mice and men...."

So very rarely (as in never) do I post stuff that I have written for classes but I wanted to post this short review I wrote for the book Learning Evangelism from Jesus. It is a wonderful book written by one of Covenant's professors, Dr. Jerram Barrs. If you have the opportunity you should definitely read it. But this essay just really expresses what God has been doing in my life while here in St Louis and just continuously revealing to me how my life should reflect the grace that He has given me. I am very much still in process, and the process is often harsh and painful, but ultimately it is good because He is good and He is faithful.

As I read through Dr. Jerram Barrs Learning Evangelism from Jesus I came to an understanding of a harsh reality in my life: I think more of myself than I do of Jesus. I trust more in my own self-righteousness than I do in Christ. I puff myself up with knowledge rather than letting the truth and grace of Christ be my witness. During my time in St. Louis what has struck me hardest is that I do not live a life that reflects the grace that we are called and created to show. I have come to the realization that I am not reflecting God’s glory in the way that I interact with others. This comes down to a complete lack of understanding of what Christ has done for me. If I truly understood God’s grace I would not act the way that I do towards non-Christians. Barrs writes, “The fundamental issue is to remember the undeserved kindness of God for oneself and to therefore be generous to anyone in need, for at the heart of these laws is to imitate the character of God and to remember his mercy in redeeming people” (240.)

Most of my life as a Christian could be categorized as that of a Pharisee. I care more about being seen as right and moral, often not based on the desire to obey God because of what He has done for me. Pharisees desired to serve God and deeply pursued righteousness, but unfortunately their hearts were not impacted with an understanding of God’s mercy towards sinners, nor did they realize they also needed God’s grace. They thought “Bad company corrupts good morals,” and therefore stayed as far away from sinners as possible. As I think back on my 8 years of being a Christian, I am ashamed to admit that I have been that way for the majority of the time. I rarely formed relationships with those who were outside of the church, fearing that they would rub off on me rather than trusting that God would be able to use me to show them the grace of Christ. When I did keep the company of non-Christians, I would often shower them with condemnation rather than with grace and mercy. My words were not seasoned with salt but rather with bitterness and judgment.

It is clear from Dr. Barrs’ book that Jesus cared deeply for people rather than keeping with social norms or cultural mandates. I often find myself making the excuse that He was able to care for people because He was God and I am not. But if I truly believed the Gospel, truly owned it, I too would care about people, rejoicing in who God has made them to be rather than merely seeing them as a sort of evangelistic project. The most important thing that I am taking away from this book, and also my time at Covenant so far, is how my life must change if I truly believed the Gospel. If I truly believed and owned the Gospel of grace how would my life be different? The greatest struggle I have as a Believer is being able to take what I know in my head, then owning it with my heart, and finally translating it into action and how I relate with people. Being able to see how Jesus interacted with everyone he came in contact with has shown me tangible ways of how I am to relate to people.

Jumping Ahead

So I am suppose to be reading for Intro to Counseling but instead I am here writing this blog. Alas procrastination, we meet again.

So I have discovered something about myself in that I really enjoy planning out my life before it happens. And not just that but before I know all the facts. If something, or someone, seems as though they may be perfect or ideal I run with it. I plan out my entire life around these one or two interactions without actually knowing anything about them. That is not to say that they are negative or wrong but rather that I don’t know enough about them to make any sort of conscious decisions.

The frequently happens to be in 2 ways, the first and foremost being with the opposite sex. I care not mention the number of times I have met a guy and within a week or two of knowing him I have convinced myself that he’s definitely someone I could date, or maybe even marry. Again it’s not to say that these guys are bad or anything. They are all Believers, all love the Lord and are interested in serving the Church, etc. But obviously there needs to be more. God created us to be individuals, meaning that each of us needs and desires something different from the people we are in relationship with, especially within such an intimate relationship as marriage. But alas time and time again I find myself doing the same thing as before, planning out my life with “guy of the moment.” And time and time again I find myself disappointed when it doesn’t work out or the guy turns out to not be who I expect or want him to be.

The second way that this manifests itself in my life is my ministry choices. I appear to jump from ministry opportunity to ministry opportunity, never settling down at one particular one. I remember the year after graduation wanting to be involved in so many ministries and each time I found one that at all interested me I just dove right in and had convinced myself it was the one for me. But again as it is with guys, I don’t know enough about them. I don’t know the role I would play within their work. At times I may not even know where they stand on certain theological issues. But that initial interaction with them is so good and stirs up something in me that I just want to dive in and start running full-force. One of the main reasons that I came to Seminary is so that I could slow down and hone my discerning skills. I came here with a small idea of the type of ministry I want to do after school but mainly with an open heart. I pray that during this process the Lord will reveal to me the ways and the means by which He wants to use me to glorify Him and ministry to the Church.

So I am learning how to better handle my ministry opportunities but I still struggle mightily with the first way. I understand that this is another way in which the Lord wants me to rest in Him but there is still a block in my heart that He’s not getting through. I understand it mentally and I understand that this is bad for me and is detrimental in many ways and yet it still occurs. So I guess my prayer is that I would let go of this one aspect of my life and that I would stop planning out my life before it happens.

Thanks for reading. Have a wonderful day (or evening if you are reading this later)

In Christ,
Jessica

Edit: Caedmon's Call's song "Mistake of My Life" came on my iTunes today and I thought the opening lines were a funny, yet accurate, description of my thought process many times.

I'm in love, never been so sure of anything
Then again, could be a tumor in my brain
Tricking me into thinking that we were meant to be

1st Week at Covenant

So I have decided to resurrect this blog while I am here at Seminary. Not only so that people can know what is going on here in St Louis, but also just as a way for me to process everything that is going on in my life and what the Lord is doing in it.

I have been in St Louis for 2 weeks now and for the most part it’s been really good. The only misfortune happened only 4 days after I moved. I was on campus when I received a call from the police telling me that mine and 3 other apartments in my complex had been broken into. Needless to say that was pretty stressful and scary but the Lord has really blessed me despite of all of that. The only thing that was taken from my apartment was my digital camera (thus why I have not posted any pics on FB of my new place.) The first couple of nights after the break-in happened were a bit nerve-wracking but the Lord has been giving me comfort and is definitely letting me feel safe while here.

I have met some great people since being here. I am truly blessed in that there are 6 women who are entering into their first year as M.Div students (or as someone told me there are 6 M.Divas.) It’s so great to have other women to walk alongside as we go through this long and arduous process. Being a woman and being MDiv is a rarity here at Covenant, so I am really looking forward to getting to know these women and their ministries.

In my short stint here at Covenant, the Lord has just continually shown me that I am meant to be here. There have been several times when I have questioned why I came here and even started to wonder if I should have gone to a more “prominent” or “well-known” seminary like Trinity. But each time I would doubt, the Lord would show me once more that No, I was meant to be here in St Louis and Covenant. The most surprising, if you will, revelation came in my Intro to Counseling class on Thursday. Intro to Counseling is the one class that going into it I did NOT want to take. It was merely a requirement that I had to get through my 1st Year and then I would be done with it, never to return to it again. I want to study theology and history and languages, not feelings and emotional crap like that I thought. I know, it’s a horrible way to think. I also feared it because it will require me to confront some of the fears and anxieties in my life that I don’t want to. I am a very prideful person, a very private person, and I like keeping my crap to myself. But as class started, Dr Winters read from a letter that a pastor had written to his professors at the seminary he had attended. Though I cannot remember the exact wording of the letter it essentially said “You taught me exegesis and homiletics, Greek and Hebrew, how to prepare sermons, but what do I do with the teenager who comes to me telling me he is considering suicide? You didn’t prepare me for family whose marriage is in shambles because of allegations of adultery” etc.

It was in this moment that I realized once again why I am here at Covenant. Well yes I am hear to learn theology, exegesis, church history, etc I am primarily here to learn how to do ministry and to learn how to minister to people in the mist of life. Here is what I wrote in my notebook after he read the letter: “Life isn’t always about how much theology you know or the exegetical skills you may possess. Life is much more than that- much deeper, much fuller, full of pain and despair. Life happens in the brokenness of this world.” So in the mist of the pain and struggle of this world, we as believers and ministers of the Gospel, need to know how to approach these situations. I pray that Intro to Counseling will begin to show me how to deal with the crappiness of life.

Alright that’s all I have for right now, as I feel like I’ve already rambled enough. I hope to keep up with this more that when I first started this blog a year and a half ago, and hopefully it will be edifying and glorifying to the Lord.

In Christ,
Jessica

First Entry

Okay so here goes for my very first Blogger entry. Woo-hoo aren’t you excited? Okay don’t answer that, but in all honesty I don’t have a lot of deep and insightful theology to share with you guys. I wish that I did but all I have is what the Lord has taught me and what He continues to teach me. I hope to be open and vulnerable with you, so that we might keep each other accountable and to spur one another on towards Christ in love.

In our house for about the past week and a half to two weeks the Lord has been pressing on many of our hearts the necessity to love people…ALWAYS. No matter what the situation, no matter how much the other person has wronged you or made you mad- it is imperative that we love them with the love of Christ. Okay now what we have also learned is that this is HARD. Not like learning how to ride a bike when you are young hard, but the kind of hard that many times doesn’t seem to get easier. The kind of hard that we cannot change on our own. Christ must change our attitudes and our selfish nature. It is good for me to remember that in this process known as life that we are constantly being formed into the image of Christ- we are being sanctified. I struggle so much with loving people that I wonder if the Lord is going to give up on me and just turn and walk away. But His Word promises that He will not do that. “I will never leave you nor forsake you” is His promise to us.

I think/know that we each deal with anger in our own way. For me I rarely will blow up at someone when they have offended me or pissed me off (though I definitely have and it usually surprises people when I do.) Rather I say nothing, acting as though everything is perfectly fine, while in reality there is anger that is just creeping up inside of me. I sit on that anger and let it control my relationship with that person, allowing it to grow and fester. Ephesians 4:26 says “Do not let the sun go down on your anger.” I have the tendency to do the exact opposite of what Paul tells us to do. So while on the surface and to the blind eye it may seem like I have my anger under control, I don’t. I just don’t like confrontation so I don’t confront the person but rather allow the anger and frustration to build up inside of me. Neither way is Biblical.

Lord You are gracious
You are slow to anger
Abounding in love
You are good to all
~Shane & Shane “Psalm 145”

The Lord is slow to anger. He is patient. Abounding in steadfast love. Love that does not fail. Love that cannot be defeated. “Love always wins.” Go and read 1 Corinthians 13. Now. I know that many of us have heard/read these verses many times but really meditate on what Paul is saying. Without love, we are nothing. How can we claim Christ, if we are acting towards one another just as the world acts? “What are you man if you don’t learn love?” Spirit change me! Conform me to image of Christ that I would love people with His love. A supernatural love that I cannot understand or match. A love that carries the burdens of one another, and so fulfills the love of Christ.

Verses in this entry:
Galatians 6:2
1 Corinthians 13
Psalm 145
Ephesians 4:25-27