Often, I will be with my wife driving through a neighborhood and hear her say,
“Oh, I love that house.” She loves wrap-around porches, old fashion frame houses or log cabins. We all look at houses and form our opinions about the house. Frequently, we
make observations about what we see. We comment,
“I’d do this differently,” or
“I’d change that” about a particular house.
Usually, we state our opinions about the house but never engage the persons residing in the house. Although, we always draw conclusions about the residents based on the house in which they live. We will comment or think,
“They must be rich or poor and so forth.”As Christians, we do the same thing when it comes to reaching our culture and the cultures that live all around us. We make observations about them and often discuss what we don’t like about
“those people.” All the while not learning enough about them to reach them with the message of Jesus Christ. Ed Stetzer once said,
"Preaching against culture is like preaching against a house … it’s just where the people live."That is why we must be Christians and
“Churches Linked Together to Communicate Christ!” We must again ask ourselves where we are in our commitment to reach people for Jesus? Where is your church in its commitment to a Biblical process of evangelism for reaching the cultures at home and abroad?
Remember the four aspects to this process:
PRAYING: Every church praying for every lost person.
ENGAGING: Every believer sharing as a trained witness.
SOWING: Every lost person receiving a complete witness.
HARVESTING: Every church harvesting and celebrating every salvation experience.
Again, I ask, how important is it to know the culture in our community, state, county and world? I believe it is critical because understanding culture matters when you are trying to reach people for Christ.
It matters because the place where we do ministry impacts how we do it. In other words, the "how" of ministry must often be determined by the "who, when, and where" of culture.
The churches of our association must understand the people we are called to reach. We must be diligent students of our world. As we observe and study the culture around us, we gain a better understanding of how the people we are called to reach think and behave. We learn of their struggles, challenges, and opportunities. We understand their real needs, felt needs and their perceived needs.
At Psidian Antioch, the Apostle Paul proclaimed Christ in the midst of a Jewish cultural environment; and spoke from their history and the Hebrew Prophets. When Paul preached the gospel he always understood the culture around him. When he spoke at the Athenian Aereopogus, he quoted Stoic and Epicurean philosophers and began his message by acknowledging their religiousness.
We must learn from the example of the Apostle Paul. He knew the culture he was reaching and that should challenge us to do the same. Once he understood the culture he was reaching, he proclaimed a Biblically faithful gospel to those living in that culture.
What is your commitment to sharing the gospel? Are you comfortable reaching only those that walk and talk like you? Do they have to look and smell like you? Do they have to speak like you? Or are you willing to make a personal commitment to share Christ as you go to cultures that are not like you because of your great desire to fulfill the Great Commission?
Assist your church in making this commitment, that it will spend more time and resources and be more intentional about evangelizing your community, your county, your state, and North America.
How can we engage our culture?
We do it by using the same message that has transformed people, communities and cultures for more than 2,000 years. The message of an unchanging God who loved us so much that He sacrificed His only son to pay the debt for our sin.
Methods need to be different to effectively build the bridge to different people groups, but the message remains the same.
We must be
“Churches Linked Together to . . . ENGAGE the CULTURE” What would happen if every Christian in our churches were engaging our culture by sharing their faith as a trained witness? Could revival break out?
2 Cor. 5:18, 20 states,
“Now everything is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation… Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ; certain that God is appealing through us, we plead on Christ’s behalf, ‘Be reconciled to God.’” (HCSB)
We must be challenging our people to be ready to engage personally in sharing their faith
“as they go” about their daily business. We are commissioned to p
repare and engage lost people with the gospel and network for evangelism. Christ-followers must take personal responsibility for sharing Christ in their Jerusalem—across the street, around the block, to their friends, coworkers, and family if they are to fulfill the Great Commission.
Can you imagine the churches of Southeastern Association equipped with a force of trained Christ-followers effectively sharing the gospel as they go?
Imagine starting small groups to intentionally present the gospel to lost people. Imagine starting new churches. Imagine believers living with a passion for lost people that comes out of the overflow of an intimate walk with God.
Let us not find ourselves guilty of preaching against the “house” and forgetting about the residents as lost souls. I challenge you to
“Engage the Culture” daily, sharing your faith in relevant ways with those in your world.
Imagine the thousands of people who could receive Christ as Savior and Lord if we are faithful to this challenge. We’ll see a record number of baptisms in our churches and in ministries around the world. We will see people changed for eternity; families and communities transformed. Imagine how many of our churches will be revitalized. As a result of so many lost people coming to know Christ, our churches will be planting new churches like never before in our history.
Partners in God’s Harvest, 
Printed Report of Director of Missions Challenge
ANNUAL MEETING
Southeastern Baptist Association, Monroe, MI
October 2, 2009
Any church can afford to support a church plant. Most churches can afford to be the sole sponsor of a church plant if they will engage their member’s hearts into church planting and use a strategy that is proven to work. Of course, there will be members who will see sponsorship as an impossible venture because “the church is barely meeting budget, and there is the debt to pay off, plus we already give so much.” However, a pastor-leader who is a true visionary with a heart for planting churches can have major success through a stewardship emphasis we call 5/52.
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