Jesus knew what was important to build the Kingdom of God.
Jesus knew what was important to build the Kingdom of God.
He consistently demonstrated the importance of prayer, the scriptures and what in the not-too-distant-past was known as “soul-winning.” That’s a concise synopsis of Robert Coleman’s chapter on “Demonstration” in The Master Plan of Evangelism.
For previous articles in this series, please see www.baptistmessage.com and search for “evangelism.”
To paraphrase Coleman’s words, Jesus recognized it wasn’t enough just to get people – starting with His disciples – into church. They needed to acquire spiritual discipline; they needed to learn to live like Christians.
Jesus demonstrated to His disciples His communication with His Father. “They could see the strength which it [prayer] gave to His life, and though they could not understand fully what it was all about, they must have realized that this was part of his secret of life,” Coleman wrote. He called it an “indispensable part of the training.”
“One thing is certain:” Coleman wrote. “Unless they grasped the meaning of prayer, and learned how to practice it with consistency, not much would ever come from their lives.”
Jesus used the Old Testament scriptures as recorded 66 times with his disciples, and more than 90 times with others. “[I]t was made abundantly clear that the word written in the Scriptures and the word spoken by Christ … complemented each other,” Coleman wrote. “… [I]t was made clear to them that if they were to continue in his fellowship by the Spirit after he was gone from them in the flesh, they would have to abide in his Word (John 15:7).”
Soul-winning, or “leading people to the Lord” – the term in use today – was the undercurrent to all Jesus did, Coleman asserted.
“Practically everything Jesus said and did had some relevance to their work of evangelism, either by explaining a spiritual truth or revealing to them how they should deal with people,” Coleman wrote.
Rather than working up a “lesson for the day,” Jesus took advantage of what was going on around him.
Bottom line, “People are looking for a demonstration, not an explanation,” Coleman wrote. “Our weaknesses need not impair discipleship when shining through them is a transparent sincerity to follow Christ. … [When] they knew enough to get started, he saw to it that they did something about it.”
Next week: Delegation.