Make Us Dangerous
From the Series: One Prayer
Speaker: Mark Batterson
Date: June 29, 2008
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Transcript
It’s great to be together this weekend, I want to welcome everybody at all four of our locations as we continue our ‘One Prayer’ series. This series revolves around one question, if you could ask God for one thing for the church at large, what would you pray for? Very difficult to give one answer, thus, a series. So far we have prayed, Make Us Prayerful, Make Us One, Make Us Generous. Here is this week’s prayer, Make Us Dangerous. If you have a Bible, I want you to turn over to II Corinthians, Chapter 11, verse 21; we’ll get there in a few moments.
Like most Washingtonians, I tend to visit the tourist stops when I have out of town company. This week, my brother and niece from Chicago were here and we took a tour of the Capitol. One of my favorite parts of the tour is Statuary Hall. In 1864, Congress invited every state to contribute two statues of prominent citizens for permanent display in the Hall. Some of the statues are to Americans that all of us know who they are but others are these kind of obscure people that most of us have never even heard of, and on this particular visit, one of them caught my attention. Let me show you a picture of Marcus Whitman. I thought it was a really cool statue. Coonskin hat, carrying a Bible, and one the description, he was described as a pioneer, and doctor and a missionary. Marcus was born in 1802. As a child, he dreamed of being a minister but seminary was too expensive so he became a doctor! I guess it was a little different back then. He ended up getting his medical degree from Fairfield Medical College. In 1834, he applied to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions but he was turned down because they only accepted married candidates. So he got married in 1836, re-applied, got accepted, and he and his wife helped blaze the Oregon Trail. They helped blaze the trail for those who came behind them as there was this westward movement, and along the way they set up missions and eventually settled in Walla Walla, in the Walla Walla Valley, and a decade later, in 1847, there was an influx of white settlers that brought new diseases along with an epidemic of measles. The native Americans who the Whitmans went to minister to, lacked the immunity to new diseases and their mortality rate was extremely high, including most of the children. Whitman tried to care for them but was largely unsuccessful. There was a tradition of holding medicine men personally responsible for the patients’ recovery and it eventually resulted in violence. In what became known as the Whitman massacre, Marcus Whitman and his family were killed on November 29,1847. 106 years later Washington State contributed his statue to Statuary Hall. So here’s the deal, all of us want our statue in Statuary Hall. I was walking around wondering how I am going to be remembered. It was one of those moments like, how do you get a statue in a place like this? How are you one of those 100 people that leaves a legacy or makes a difference or does something of significance? Generally speaking, here’s the deal, do something dangerous and then get killed doing it and you’ve got a shot at Statuary Hall.
This week we celebrate Independence Day. It started with 56 signers putting their names on a document that declared independence from England. The last sentence says they pledged their lives, fortunes and sacred honor, and they did. Five signers were captured and tortured during the war; twelve signers had their homes ransacked and burned; two signers lost their sons to the war they declared; two signers had sons become prisoners of war; and nine signers fought in the war and died from wounds or the hardships of war. We celebrate them, and I think the fundamental reason is this – they were willing to do something dangerous, to do something that they believed in. That is what made them heroic. Here’s my concern for those of us that live in a first world country in the 21st century, I think it is very easy to forget that the word ‘disciple’ was synonymous with danger. We live a long way from there and I think what I want to try to accomplish this weekend is, number 1, help us appreciate a little bit of our history, and at the same time, try to challenge us to try to live with that same spirit that allows us to live the lives that we enjoy.
See, Marcus Whitman’s family was murdered. The last moments of their lives were filled with terror and fear and pain, and I’m sure he was imperfect like the rest of us. In fact, they could have done a much better job of incarnating the gospel and the language that the people they were trying to reach could understand. But one thing can be said of Marcus Whitman, he lived dangerously for the cause of Christ. Now I’m not telling anybody here that you need to go out and get yourself killed, but I think we need to find a way to translate what that means in our lives, because I am convinced of this – the will of God is not an insurance plan, it is a daring plan. It doesn’t lead to safety, it leads to danger. I think the Apostle Paul is Exhibit A.
II Corinthians 11:21, a long passage but stick with me. In a sense, this is Paul’s resume, an off resume, but here’s what it says:
What anyone else dares to boast about, I am speaking as a fool, I also dare to boast about. Are they Hebrew? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they Abraham’s descendents? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? (I’m out of my mind to talk like this.) I am more. I have worked much harder, been imprisoned more frequently, been flogged more severely and been exposed to death again and again. Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked. I spent a night and a day in the open sea. I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles, in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea, and in danger from false brothers. I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep. I’ve known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food. I’ve been cold and naked. Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak and I do not feel weak? Who is lead into sin and I do not inwardly burn? If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness, the God and Father of the Lord Jesus, who is to be praised forever, knows that I am not lying. In Damascus, the governor under King Aretas had the city of the Damascenes guarded in order to arrest me. But I was lowered in a basket from a window in the wall and slipped through his hands.
I love this last little piece, because it is so easy for us to just read, but Paul is sharing one of the defining, most memorable moments of his life. Quite a passage isn’t it! Here’s the deal, lets be honest, this isn’t the picture that we give people. If you follow Christ, you too might end up poor and naked and dead! You can have all this and more! And it’s not really that we teach false doctrine, it is that we give a false picture. We end up short-changing God, we end up short-changing ourselves, and what we end up with, I think, is a faith that doesn’t get us very excited because we take all the danger out of it. We treat the will of God like an insurance plan instead of a daring plan. I want to tell you, Jesus did not die to keep you safe. Jesus died to make us dangerous.
It was dangerous 2,000 years ago to be a disciple, and we forget this, but how did most of their lives end? John the Baptist – head on a platter! Peter – crucified, upside down. Hebrews 11 says others were chained in dungeons, some died by stoning and some were sawed in half, others were killed with the sword. Is this message uplifting yet? See, we forget this, it wasn’t safe to get baptized. In a few weeks, we are going to have a baptism. Now I want to challenge you, if you have crossed the line of faith but have not gone public with your faith by water baptism, I want to encourage you to step out in obedience, step out in faith, it is our rite of passage, it is how we identify with Christ and it is a beautiful thing. It is what connects us with believers over the last 2,000 years. Now you can do it in safety but the truth is, to get baptized 2,000 years ago was to put your life in jeopardy and it is that way in some places around the world. I was just at this baptism in Ethiopia just a couple weeks ago. 20,000 baptized in that lake in the last seven years, many of them Muslims, many of them putting their lives on the line to identify with Christ. You know, it is safe to go to church isn’t it? Listen, let’s celebrate our religious freedom. Let’s celebrate the fact that we can worship God and our lives aren’t in jeopardy. It was about a year ago I was in Rome, went to the church of San Clemente and went down a lot of steps into a lower area, very damp and dark, but it was supposedly a place where in the second century believers worshipped God in these catacombs. Why? Because if they worshipped God publicly, they would be killed. It wasn’t until 313 A.D. that Constantine made Christianity legal. It was dangerous to go to church. What does all that mean to us? First of all, we better celebrate where we come from. We better appreciate it. Pick up a copy of Foxes Book of Martyrs. It is depressing but it will give you some perspective of where we come from. This movement that was originally called The Way was an incredibly dangerous movement, and that’s what you and I are part of.
This week I got a letter from the National Park Service. I had applied for a backcountry permit to hike into the Grand Canyon. There are about 40,000 applications, only about 13,000 accepted, but this week I got a letter with my backcountry permit, and in about a week, Parker and I will be hiking down the North Kaibab Trail from the Grand Canyon Lodge on the north rim down to Phantom Ranch. It’s about 14 miles, about a 6,000 foot drop. I’m extremely excited about it. Here’s the deal, I got the permit and then I started reading, and I noticed warnings all over the place and sometimes you’ve got to put two and two together. 14 miles is a long way and I realized that permits are sold out 13 months in advance typically, because no one hikes it in July, because the average temperature is 106 degrees. And the books I’m reading are saying it’s as physically challenging as running a marathon, and it talked about how many people are evacuated out of the Canyon every year, and eventually, basically what I’m trying to say is that there is a good chance we’re going to die! And that what makes it awesome! If it wasn’t challenging, if it wasn’t death defying, it wouldn’t be nearly as fun or nearly as worthwhile. So Parker is having a conversation with his grandma, she called about two weeks ago and she asks him about the trip and he says, “Yeah, it’ll be one of those ‘we almost died’ deals.” Listen, you know why Parker and I are excited about this? Because I need some danger in my life. Gotta have it! Why do we pay good money to go to a theme park? Have you ever thought about this? Let me give you $50 bucks, $100 bucks to scare the living daylights out of me. Get me on a roller coaster where I could die. We need danger. We need it. Here’s what I’m convinced of, most of us just find it in the wrong place. Now you know one of my definitions of sin is - sin is meeting a legitimate need in an illegitimate way. We need that adrenaline rush, we need, there is something about a near death experience that brings us to life, and I’m convinced that the way we were ultimately destined to find that is by living dangerously for the cause of Christ. Being a part of something that is bigger than us, more important than us.
I want to make an observation about this passage. I almost just want to keep it as painfully simple as possible. I read the passage about Paul and eight times it says ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ ‘in danger’ was that eight? Simple, simple observation, God does not want to take us out of danger, He leads us into it. I think there is a false assumption that as we become more mature spiritually that the will of God will become easier or safer. But I’m convinced that God wants to give you more difficult, daring and dangerous things to do, and He prepares us for that. And I think sometimes we just need someone to get up in our grill and remind us that God’s primary goal is not our comfort. God wants to glorify Himself. If we really put our prayers under the x-ray machine, I just wonder how many would revolve around our safety and comfort. Come on, I’m the same way. Sometimes I pray as if God’s supreme cosmic plan is my comfort. We live as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death.
Here’s the deal, if we trust Christ, when we die, we go to a place called heaven where there will be no more mourning or crying or death or pain. But in the meantime, something might happen. I think death has a way of, we’re so afraid of it. I have no idea how I’m going to die, but I would love to die somehow, someway, living dangerously for Christ. What does this look like? Let me give you a couple of pictures to put a little bit of skin on it, and then I really want to try to bring it home in a simple way tell us what it means to live dangerously for the cause of Christ.
I’ve always been inspired by a group of early 20th century missionaries. They became known as One-Way Missionaries because they packed all of their earthly belongings into coffins and purchased one-way tickets when they departed for the mission field. They knew they would be buried wherever they went. One of them was a guy named A.W. Milne. He felt called to a tribe of headhunters in the New Hebrides. All the other missionaries to that tribe had been martyred, but that didn’t keep Milne from stepping out in faith and going. He lived among the tribe for 35 years, never returned home. When the tribe buried him, they wrote this epitaph on his tombstone, “When he came, there was no light, when he left, there was no darkness.” When did we start believing that God wants to send us to safe places to do easy things? He wants to send us to dangerous places to do difficult things. And if you follow Christ, I am convinced He will lead you into the Shadowland where light and darkness clash.
I have a friend named Mike Foster. A few years ago, he was in the shower and had an idea. He said he saw these letters and this name, xxxchurch.com. He was concerned about the effect of pornography on American culture and he decided to start something called www.xxxchurch.com and infiltrate the adult film industry with the love of Christ and hand out Jesus loves porn stars Bibles at porn conventions. That’s a daring plan. I remember hearing Mike talk about the first porn show where he set up a xxxchurch.com booth, and he said this thought ran through his head - what am I doing here? Can you imagine? If we are going to fulfill our commission, we need to get out of the comfortable confines of our Christian ghettos and invade some hellholes with the light and love of Christ. Mike did that. Thousands of porn addicts have found freedom and forgiveness as a result. I think that is living dangerously for the cause of Christ.
Let me give you a very simple story picture. This week I spent two hours with some NCCers blessing their house. This is a couple that I love, I admire them, I respect them so much spiritually. Their home is an incredible place of ministry. They host so many NCC events. Really, their home is a sanctuary. They have turned it into a place of ministry and a couple of weeks ago, they touched base with me and just said, “Man we are coming under some serious attack.” I won’t go into the details but some things were happening in their house that was very spiritual and very unexplainable and not good, and really discerned that their house was coming under some kind of attack, call it demonic, call it satanic, call it what you will. Listen, I know there is a part of us that says – oh here we go over spiritualizing. Listen, our battle is not against flesh and blood, it is against powers and principalities. The bottom line is this – Satan hates you as much as God loves you. I told them this, I sat there and prayed for a spirit of discernment, how do we pray, how do we approach this? And as we sat there, I had this sense that the enemy dislikes you as much as we, the friends who had gathered to pray with them, like you. I’m not saying this for any shock value or to scare anybody, just think about it logically. Like if you step up and start living dangerously, start living out God’s plans and really just begin to live in obedience and faith, don’t you think that there’s a little bit bigger target on your back? Isn’t it obvious that the enemy is probably going to come against you somehow, someway. So we went around room to room, we spent two hours praying over their house, acknowledging the fact that we are under the blood of Christ. The blood of Christ isn’t just our means of forgiveness. Ya know, we take the cup and it is a reminder of the covenant that we have with God but it is also a symbol of our protection. It is the Passover. The Israelites put the blood over the doorposts and the death angel passed over and didn’t touch those homes. Again, this isn’t over spiritual, this is just biblical, it’s just that sometimes we don’t think in these terms. And we just prayed and we did a little bit of spiritual warfare and we believe that God is going to continue to use them and use their house for his purposed. And I love these guys cause they are living dangerously for the cause of Christ, and we are called to do the same.
So here’s my question – what does that look like? How does it start? I think most of us are motivated when we hear stories about sacrifices that other people have made or people who have lived dangerously, but what does that look like for us and how does it start? Well, lets get down to the brass tax, it probably is going to start with a dangerous decision that you make. I think it starts with putting our faith in Christ, making a decision to follow Christ and put our faith in Him, and when we do, He leads us into this dangerous life. For Marcus Whitman, it was applying to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. For Mike Foster, it was buying a domain name. For the One-Way missionaries, it was buying a one-way ticket. I don’t know exactly what it is for you but it could be going public with your faith and getting baptized, it might be admitting an addiction, it might be ending a dating relationship or beginning one, it might mean making a phone call or applying for a position. But it is generally some kind of dangerous decision that we make. Let me just try to really hit the bulls eye here. I don’t think it starts with God asking us to do something big. It always starts with God asking us to do something small. He is the one who is able to do immeasurably more than all we can ask or imagine. He is not asking us to do anything big, He is just asking us to do something small. And He doesn’t ask us to finish the job, He just asks us to get started because He is the One who carries it to completion. So what is living a dangerous life? I’ll tell you what it is, living in obedience. I think it is that simple. It is living a spirit led life, it is making your life revolve around the purposes of God.
A couple of weeks ago, I was having a conversation with someone and they turned a phrase that I’d never heard before and it challenged me. They said that they were concerned that too many people were living in what they called artificial harmony. For the last two weeks, I’ve been thinking about this, it’s the weirdest thing, I keep turning it around in my mind, artificial harmony. I just wonder how easy is it for us to live in that place of artificial harmony. How comfortable are we? How comfortable are we? At some point, we have to get uncomfortable with how comfortable we are and just do something about it. I’m so excited, next year, one of our bold initiatives, one of our dreams is for NCC to go on ten mission trips. We want to go to ten places around the world. And I’ll tell you what, you want to interrupt the artificial harmony in your life, just go on a mission trip. It begins by taking that step and doing something about it.
I have a friend Craig Groeschel, I love the way he put this, he said, “The difference between where you are and where God may want you to be is the painful decision you refuse to make.” What is that decision that can help us step out in faith? What does it mean to live dangerously? I think it comes down to this. It is someone whose primary objective is to glorify God at any expense. Someone who doesn’t pray, “Lord keep me safe” but “God glorify Yourself in these circumstances.” When you live for God’s glory, what it does is redeem everything including what we may perceive as pain or tragedy. It redeems those things and they come together for his purposed. Let’s not live our lives in artificial harmony.
It was years ago that we made a dangerous decision to buy a piece of property and open a coffeehouse called Ebenezers. It was dangerous because it was zoned residential and if we didn’t get it rezoned, we’d have a piece of property on our hands that we couldn’t do anything with. It was dangerous but we took that bold step of faith, built a coffeehouse, it was a beautiful thing. But here’s the danger, we can live in artificial harmony now. Good enough, it is safe having one coffeehouse. Same with four locations, God is doing some wonderful things. Ebenezers, Union Station, Ballston Common Mall, Georgetown, good enough. We have a core value at NCC, playing it safe is risky. We corporately as a church cannot afford to be safe, we need to continue to live dangerously for the purposes of God. That’s why the multi-site vision is beautiful, because we never become too content with where we are. We have to keep stepping out, keep living dangerously.
I want to challenge you personally. If you become comfortable, I can’t tell you what it is going to take, but if you stay sensitive to the Spirit of God, God will speak into your life, and I want to challenge you with this. I think it really comes down to us being sensitive to the Holy Spirit. This week, driving down the street, I saw a woman going through a garbage can. It was weird, she was nicely dressed, it was bizarre, and I got about 20 yards off and I got this prompting to go back and see if she was alright. I want to tell you that probably more times than not, I miss it. How many are guilty of just saying, no, that’s not a God idea, that’s a bad idea. Like what am I thinking? But I did it, I did a u-turn and I went back and I said, “Are you alright?” And she wasn’t alright. I said, “Sometimes I feel like God prompts me to do that and I felt prompted to do a u-turn to come back see if you’re ok and I was wondering if you’d let me help you get something to eat?” And she said, “Yes.” Then she went on her way, and I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again, but I want to tell you that one of the lessons I’ve learned in my life is that when you experience a prompting from the Holy Spirit, you have two choices, you can ignore it or obey it. If you ignore it, your heart becomes a little bit harder and you drift a little bit further from the purposes of God and you get a little bit more comfortable until finally you are living in a place called artificial harmony. Or you try to keep your heart soft, tell God you don’t want to get too comfortable, help me keep living dangerously for your purposes. So I think my prayer for us is Make Us Dangerous but also make us sensitive to the Spirit of God that leads us in the ways that He has called us to. I would like to think that when I pronounce the benediction at the end of our services, or our campus pastors pronounce that benediction, that we are sending dangerous people back into their natural habitats to wreak havoc on the enemy. I would like to think that each of us is a threat to the enemy. How? By simply living for God’s glory, obeying his Word and being sensitive to the promptings of his Spirit. May the Lord help us live dangerously for the cause of Christ. Let’s pray.
God I pray that your Holy Spirit would do in us what only your Spirit can do. I thank You for the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Lord in my own life, I see and sense those parts of me that could so easily become so comfortable. God it is shocking sometimes how comfortable I can be with the person next to me, just living far away from You and not really caring about it. God I pray that You would soften our hearts to a place where we are sensitive to You and do what You’ve called us to do. Lord thank You that You have an amazing calling, a commission for our lives, and I don’t know what this looks like for each one of us but God I pray that You would shake us out of that place of artificial harmony and that we would step into a place of living dangerously for your purposes. God may our lives not be about our comfort, but may our lives be about your glory. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Ministry Transcription
Margaret Salyers
404-775-4197
margaretsalyers@bellsouth.net