The Right Tools for the Job

I recently had to do a brake job on my truck. It was long overdue. The rotors were trashed and the pads were almost non-existent (another blog topic I'm sure). In my defense it was a used truck and I had been extremely busy since I bought it and hadn't really noticed any major problems with the brakes. After all they stopped me when I needed them to.

As I prepared to change the brakes and rotors I discovered that I did not have the necessary tools to do the job right. I did some investigating and discovered that I needed a "T45" socket to loosen the caliper pins, so off to Autozone I went. Imagine my dismay when I got back put the socket in the pin only to find out that it was too small! The set it came with didn't work either as the next size up was too big. I thought I was Goldilocks for a moment. I returned to Autozone and picked up the next smallest "assortment" set of sockets I could find and fortunately this time it worked. After about 4 hours of work all was back together, running and stopping smoothly.

The next day I reflect on this and realized there were some implications for spreading the Gospel message here. Too often we attempt to witness with the wrong tools. We bring a knife to a gunfight so to speak. The apostle Paul points out that ALL Scripture is God-Breathed and useful, likewise the book of Hebrews tells us the word of God is alive and active, yet despite these affirmations, frequently we fail to see the truth of these words. I believe this is because of two reasons, one the hardened heard of sinful man (something only the Spirit of God can change), and two the ineffective use of God's word.

The Bible is our toolbox for witnessing to the World, yet we have not trained ourselves with the content. Others don't hear the Gospel message clearly because we have presented it incorrectly, out of context, or without a proper understanding of the culture/background of those to whom we present it. (A missionary friend of mind highlighted this issue by telling of a culture where Judas was actually celebrated as the hero of the Gospel story because in that culture guile and trickery were a respected talent to have.)

I once heard an joke about how not to use the Bible and it went something like this: A preacher was teaching his congregation on how to use the Word and he told them they should open it up and do whatever it said. One member read from the scriptures, "and Judas went and hung himself." This was quickly followed by another voice reading from a different passage, "now go and do likewise!"

So the question becomes what should we do? My answer, go back to Autozone (or the toolbox) and get the right part. We need to become familiar enough with God's word that we can use it effectively and be able to pull out the right "tool" for the right job.

Spare Tires and the Gospel

I was recently reviewing my Internet activity and realized that I hadn't updated my blog in quite some time. "What good's a blog if you're not going to use it?" I said to myself. I discovered that it, like a few other things, had been marked with the distinct signs of inactivity, my waistline for example. My blog had become an old spare tire, hanging around with no useable purpose. This also got me wondering about how I share the Gospel message. Was I letting the Good News turn into an old spare tire? Was I keeping it all to myself like a spare tire tucked away in a trunk or underneath a car? Was my gospel message undersized like those emergency spares you hope you never have to used? Or perhaps was my gospel message too flamboyant and over-the-top like those huge super-swamper spare tires you see hanging from 4x4s that will never see the mud? I don't know the full answer to these questions, but I'll bet that each of them are true to some extent. What should I do? Perhaps the best solution would be to change tires altogether. I need to quit relying on Gospel "spares" and settle in for the long haul with a fresh set of "Godyears," tires that will take me to the people and places I need to share the Gospel with most effectively. Happy Traveling Photo by Agnardan Danielsson found on Flickr