Larry Moyer’s Free and Clear

2003-04-26

This is a great and necessary book for the one aspiring to evangelistic ministry. There are many things that are integral to reaching the lost. Moyer first explains that it is necessary to get the person lost before you can save them. They need to know they are a sinner. In a world that does not know what sin is, and justify the wrong doings to be right, we need to show them their sin. We need to be conscious of our sin. We need to tell them that faith in Jesus is trusting Jesus only for salvation. Trusting Him, and what He did by dying and being raised from the dead. This new trust that they have is what repentance is, as he says in chapter 6. We need to put the gospel in their language so that that it is clear and understandable to the person who has not been Bible schools their whole lives. Words like belief are not clear in our language, because we could say, ‘I believe it is going to rain’. This is the three-point message that must be explained, as it is on page 50: The sinfulness of men, the substitutionary atonement, and the resurrection.

The promise is for certain. Though there may be some passages that might seem otherwise, no one can lose their salvation. Yet at the same time, maturity is the goal.

The model for evangelism is built on three theories; that is proclamation, presence, and persuasion evangelism. The third is the New Testament model. Though there are many ways to evangelize, either by group, or individual, or whatever clothing one puts on it to reach whatever person, people, culture, etc., this persuasion is the same. Though there is such a thing as having a gift for evangelism, it is commanded for all Christians. As many who want to be obedient to Jesus and be His disciples, that many ought to evangelize. Prayer is integral as we go and preach the gospel. Praying for boldness is something that is integral as well. There is something about evangelism that is scary for many people, so praying for boldness is very important. Following up with such people takes work, but it is what we are commanded to do: evangelize and meet them where they are.

There are many great things in this book to take away. The gospel must be clear. Learning from what the other books and professors have said so far, people live in a very different world. It is a postmodern, ‘post-Christian’ world. By the latter, I mean that Christian ideology has been removed from our society, if it were ever there to begin with. People do not know what God you are talking about sometimes if you begin ‘religious’ conversations. So the message of this book I agree with at every point. We need to reach them and speak with them and communicate with them, not to them.

This is the last entry before I write on the fourth weekend, and I must say there have been some common themes through the first three weekends and six books, which all deal with evangelism and apologetics. We live in a broken world. Without stating the obvious, or if we never knew this before, these issues and discussions truly show it. Frankly, I have been in school for three years and have not been in any ministry except the internship over the past year. There never has been an urgent need to share the gospel! I knew it with my mind, and it is the reason why I ever went to Bible college in the first place. This class has brought me back to that necessity. My church does not emphasize this, and in my cozy group of Christian friends, we do not know what life is like in the real world, which is thoroughly non-Christian.

It is not enough to do presence evangelism. It is not enough to let opportunities pass by to tell people about Jesus and what He did. This is the reason why I believe we are all still here on the planet. There is a window of time where God is allowing the message to go out to the ends of the earth, and this has not happened yet. So when we neglect this thought, then why are we here wasting time? There is a sense of unbelief in my heart. This is the issue. I have been on the Christian island way too long, and I need to get out. This is the challenge I have met with this book and in this course. Some people do not want to hear about it, like the scientist in Dumbeski and Sarfati. Some are so set in their ways, that their knowledge barriers the gospel from their ears. They cannot even believe in intelligent design, even though it has been spelled out with irreducible complexity by authors such as Behe. There needs to be a spiritual coup de tat in the world...how will this start???