The Next Unbeliever

For you, Lord, are the Most High over all the earth;
you are exalted far above all gods.
Psalm 97:9

They sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is across the lake from Galilee. When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from the town. For a long time this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?
Luke 8:26-28

As we start the new year, January 1st is not only a time to reflect on the past but to look to the future. As a pastor, we often pray about and look to the future of our church. Questions arise like, “How will we reach the next generation?” and “What will we do this year to impact those who are unbelievers?” But before we answer those questions, we have to dig a little deeper and examine what we mean by “unbeliever” in the first place. Typically, in the past, “unbeliever” has meant someone who didn’t believe in God or didn’t believe in Jesus. But all of that is changing.

The unbeliever in the next generation is not the atheist but the polytheist or pantheist. Atheism was a blip on the radar screen of history that’s really only existed for the last few hundred years. Atheism is going away and a kind of spiritual buffet is replacing it.

The question is no longer “Do you believe in God?” The question for our future will be more similar to the question Israel faced in the Old Testament when it was surrounded by polytheistic cultures. It’s the question the early Christians faced in the polytheistic Roman world. The question for our future is, “Among all the gods, is your God the Most High god?” In other words, “Among all the spiritualities, is Jesus the one with real authority? Is He the answer? Is Jesus the Way, the Truth, and the Life as He claims to be?”

These questions are not primarily answered with apologetics, though being able to articulate orthodoxy is important. People mired in the dark soup of New Age, occult spirituality, tarot cards, chakra balancing, energy healing, and crystals already believe in the supernatural. Many of them would say they believe in God and even in Jesus. And a surprising number of them go to church. But they also dabble in Buddhism and esoteric meditation. It’s the Golden Corral approach to spirituality. Apologetics won’t help. At least, not at first.

What they really need is an encounter with the One who has real authority. They need to experience the authentic power of God as a contrast to the counterfeit spiritual experiences they’ve had before. Orthodoxy won’t matter until they have an encounter with the living God. Only after they say, “What just happened?” can we talk to them about Jesus in any meaningful way.

The problem is that too many of our churches are designed to answer questions people aren’t asking anymore. In other words, they are designed either to 1) answer the atheist, 2) entertain the consumerist, or 3) give community to the isolationist. But the polytheist and pantheist are having a different conversation.

If our church is only offering talk, or a big show of smoke and lights, or “community”, then the next generation will continue to be disinterested. They have plenty of talk on TikTok. They have plenty smoke and lights on YouTube. They have plenty of community at the climbing gym or playing Fortnite on Xbox. Or, at least, they think they do. Instead, our churches must be re-designed to host the Presence of God. They must be set up to help people have an authentic encounter with His Presence. Jesus must be the primary One that we go out of our way to make welcome among us. He must be the most treasured guest in the room.

An authentic and tangible encounter with the living Jesus is life-changing and can’t be faked. And this is the only thing that can combat a smorgasbord spirituality. Once you taste the goodness and the realness of Jesus, you lose a taste for all the other false spiritualities that are being offered by the world. You hunger for more of Him.

Jesus is the Most High God, but each local church we must be equipped to demonstrate this truth. We must be well practiced at hosting His Presence, flowing with the Spirit, and demonstrating His authority and power. Much of New Age spirituality and witchcraft is simply a counterfeit of the real thing. The next generation doesn’t need psychics; they need a church well equipped with accurate and healthy prophetic gifts and words of knowledge. They don’t need energy healing or Reiki or chakra balancing; they need a church equipped with the power of the Spirit who pray for the sick and see them recover. They don’t need sage smoke, seances, and psychedelics; they need the Body of Christ equipped with the authority of Christ and able to cast out unclean spirits in Jesus’s name!

The culture is shifting, and has already shifted, into a pantheism. Is your church ready to reach this new kind of “unbeliever?” May we be ready to declare in 2024 these words from the book of Daniel:

It is my pleasure to tell you about the miraculous signs and wonders that the Most High God has performed for me.

How great are his signs,
how mighty his wonders!
His kingdom is an eternal kingdom;
his dominion endures from generation to generation.
Daniel 4:2-3

A Different Kind of Evangelism

Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect…
1 Peter 3:15

I drove up to Pennsylvania by myself to go to a conference meant for pastors. On one of the dinner breaks I didn’t have anyone to eat with, so I went to a local pub that had outdoor seating and good online reviews. Sometimes when I am eating alone in a restaurant or sitting alone on an airplane I use it as an opportunity to stretch my wings and take a risk. I try to practice using some of the gifts of the Spirit for the sake of sharing the gospel.

I ordered my food and then asked the Lord for a word for anyone around me or the waitress. I didn’t get anything at first as my mind was distracted by the sports bar environment. Sometimes, if I ask the Lord for a word and don’t get one, I just let it be. But in this case I pressed in and asked again, trying to focus my heart on how God saw my waitress.

As I prayed I heard the phrase, “hurting sister” in my mind. I pressed in again and asked for another word. In my mind I heard the word, “genuine.” Things were flowing now so I asked again for anything else the Lord wanted to share with me. Finally, I heard the word, “diploma.”

That’s it! Now I was left to prayerfully interpret what I heard. I’m not an expert at this, but here’s what I did. When the waitress (her name was Caroline) came back to check on me, I engaged in a conversation that went something like this:

Me: Hey, can I ask you a question? Do you have a sister?

Caroline: Um, yeah.

Me: Okay, let me tell you why I asked. Sometimes the Lord will give me a word for people and, while I was sitting here, He gave me some words for you. I basically asked Him how He saw you. Do you want to hear what He said to me?

Caroline: (looking a little confused and unsure) Um, I guess so.

Me: Well, first I heard the phrase “hurting sister.” Is your sister going through something hard right now?

Caroline: No. Not that I know of. I mean, she’s a mom with two little kids at home so maybe that’s something hard.

Me: Oh okay. Well, maybe she’s going through something or maybe I just missed it. Sometimes I just miss it and mishear what God is telling me. The other thing I heard was the word, “genuine.” I feel like God is saying that you are a very genuine person, you don’t like to be fake with people. Is that something you’d say is true of you?

Caroline: (a bit more surprised and open now) Yes, actually. That describes me really well. My friends are always saying that about me. I just like to be real with people, and I don’t like it when people are fake.

Me: Okay, yeah. I think God loves that about you. (Caroline smiles) And the last word I got was the word “diploma.” Are you thinking about getting a degree or something in school?

Caroline: Oh, man. Well, I probably have enough degrees, but I have been thinking about getting this certificate that would help me change jobs. I’m an elementary school teacher in Harrisburg. I teach the third grade. But I want to be a resource specialist that helps schools with technology. To do that I need to go back to school to get this certificate. And I’ve been debating whether I should do that.

Me: Awesome. I think you should go for it! My wife was a high school teacher for years and now teaches in a university setting.

Caroline: Yeah, these kids in the city have it rough. Teaching there is really hard.

Me: Yeah, as a blond hair, blue-eyed girl my wife was the minority in both schools she taught in. I remember her talking about some of her students getting recruited into gangs.

Caroline: Yeah, it even starts in elementary school. It’s so hard to watch it happen.

Me: Well, I think God loves your heart for those kids and loves your desire to make things better in those schools.

Caroline: (with a big smile) Well, thanks so much! I have to go help that table over there, but thank you for saying that.

Me: Absolutely!

You can probably notice the progression in this conversation. My goal was not to get her to “pray a prayer” or “accept Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior” right there at work. My goal was to let her know, through a few prophetic words, that she is known, seen, and loved by God. That’s it. Seeds were planted that will potentially cause her to doubt her doubts. And while she was hesitant to engage with me at first, the more accurate the words got, the more she opened up.

The final thing I did to make sure I left her feeling the love of God was to tip her the amount of my meal. So rather than doing a 20% tip, I did 100%. I did this because Christians have gotten a bad reputation for leaving gospel tracts with waiters with very little tip. I wanted to do the opposite. I wanted to bless her not only with prophetic words but also financially. Again, my goal was to reflect the love of God and leave an impression that would be hard to forget.

As I drove away from the pub that night, I prayed that Caroline would contact her sister and ask if she was okay. And if I heard the Lord correctly, maybe her sister would open up about a current struggle she’s going through. And if she did, Caroline would remember the prophetic word she got at work. Maybe she would be hit with how much God knows and loves her. That was my prayer.

This is something you can do too if you are willing to take a risk, practice the prophetic, and be willing to admit when you get it wrong. It’s not easy, but the payoff is worth it. Jesus is worth it.

An Ancient & Rediscovered Evangelism

…the people went out to see what had happened. When they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone out, sitting at Jesus’ feet, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. Those who had seen it told the people how the demonized man had been cured. Then all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear. So he got into the boat and left.
The man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” So the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him.
Luke 8:35-39

No one could help this man. Scripture says that “for a long time” he hadn’t worn proper clothes or even lived in a house. The locals had tried to contain this man full of demons with shackles and chains but his demonization gave him supernatural strength. Nothing seemed to help.

No one needed to convince this man that the spirit realm was real. No one needed to convince him that there were supernatural things that happened in the natural world. He was living this reality; he was being tormented by these demons daily.

When Jesus shows up, the response by the demons living inside this man is telling. They cause the man to shout at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, don’t torture me!” (Luke 8:28)

A couple things to notice here. First, the very thing that they were doing to this man, torturing him, is what they were afraid that Jesus would do to them. In other words, just as the man had no power over the demons, the demons had no power over Jesus.

Secondly, they call Jesus the Son of the Most High God. There were other “gods”––we might call them demonically-backed idols (read 1 Corinthians 8:4-6; 10:19-21 & Revelation 9:20)––but the demons knew that there was only one Most High God.

What I find so fascinating about this encounter with Jesus is that this demonized man gets totally delivered and completely restored to his right mind, and the result is that he essentially becomes an evangelist to his hometown.

I believe this connection between deliverance ministry and evangelism will only grow in the coming years in the American church. I’m already seeing it happen. People are dabbling in the spirit realm and then finding themselves bound by darkness and harassed by demons. They don’t need convincing that the spirit realm and the supernatural are real. They are fully convinced that the spirit realm is real because they experience the dark side of it daily.

They have nightmares and night terrors regularly. They are racked by fear and can feel evil presences around them. They feel like they are being haunted or attacked by spirits, but they don’t know what to do about it. They visit mediums and fortune-tellers but they don’t seem to help. These so-called “spirit guides” actually make the problem worse. Even more darkness is hanging around after a visit with them.

What a spiritually harassed person needs is someone with answers as to how to get free. What they need is someone with the kind of authority and power that can break the demonic chains in their life. What they need is the Name that is above every other name, the Son of the Most High God, Jesus. They need followers of Jesus who carry His name, His delegated authority, and the power of the Holy Spirit to come alongside them and show them how to get free from all the darkness.

And when they get free, they will go and tell their story to their friends and family! When they get free, they will go and declare that only Jesus was able to rescue them from the hauntings, from the darkness, from the nightmares and spiritual oppression. When they get free, they will become the next generation of evangelists to a culture that already believes in the supernatural but has only experienced the kingdom of darkness. When they get free, they will become ambassadors of the freedom, power, and love that can only come from the Kingdom of Light and the name of Jesus!

…being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
Colossians 1:11-14

COVID-19 and The Gospel

Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Ephesians 5:15-20

The gospel and being filled with the Holy Spirit were always meant to spread like a virus, not unlike COVID-19. One person can “infect” a whole group of people. Yet, what are the preventative measures that stop the spread? Masks, hand sanitizer, social distancing, and inoculation.

Masks = when people hide their face, when they are afraid to be transparent about their life

Hand sanitizer = when people refuse to get their hands dirty, when they want their Christianity tidy and neat and don’t want the mess that comes with the Holy Spirit and a servant-life of following Jesus

Social distancing = lack of connection, lack of community, relational distance

Inoculation = vaccines work by exposing the immune system to part of the virus without being exposed to the whole thing. People get inoculated from the gospel and the Holy Spirit when they get a partial exposure but don’t experience the whole thing. This leads them to believe they have experienced the whole thing, and they are not impressed when it is offered again. They’ve built up a hardness of heart, an immunity.

By far the strongest preventive measure against a virus is a vaccine. Likewise, the strongest preventive measure the enemy can enact against the gospel and the filling of the Holy Spirit is partial exposure without full exposure.

I see this with the gospel when people say, “Oh yeah, I grew up in church.” What they often mean is, “I already know all about Jesus and the church and I don’t want any part of it.” But of course, that isn’t true. They were exposed only partially to the Kingdom and all that comes with following Jesus. If they knew the whole thing, they’d want all of it.

I also see this with the filling of the Spirit, mostly from those who have some experience (usually bad experience) with the charismatic tradition. People saw a charismatic televangelist or went to a charismatic. church for a time in their life and had horrible experiences with that. They now believe they are an expert on the Holy Spirit and being filled with the Spirit. They reject so much of the Spirit’s work in the world because “they already know.” But if they really knew the fullness of the Spirit, they would be running around telling everyone about it. They’ve become inoculated with just enough exposure to leave a bad taste in their mouth but not enough exposure to see what all the fuss is about.

This is why it is vital for churches and Christians to be “all in.” When we give people a partial exposure to the gospel or a partial exposure to the gifts of the Spirit, we run the risk of eventual inoculation. We must be all in ourselves, sold out for Christ, and invite people to an uncompromised experience of the Kingdom and the Spirit.

The Reason For The Hope

But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.
1 Peter 3:15-16

We are called to be ready to give the reason for the hope that we have. If someone asks about our good life, our good attitude, our good marriage or our good parenting, we are to use this as an opportunity to point people to the grace and love of God in Christ Jesus. And, using all the emotional intelligence we can muster, we are to do this with gentleness and respect.

The question for us is why would anyone ask? Are our lives marked with blessing, kindness, generosity, love and hope such that people would be curious about it?

Here are some practical ways to display the love of Christ:

pay for the groceries of the person in front of you in the “20 items or less” checkout line
leave a tip that is 50% or 100% of your bill
help someone pick up their stuff after they’ve dropped it and made an embarrassing scene in a store
encourage a parent who is struggling with the behavior of their child in public
be the person who is immune to the cries of the baby on the flight and offer to help
let someone else go first
let someone use your umbrella in the rain
tell someone that they are good at their job (especially in service industries)

If they ask why you are doing these things, be ready to give a reason for the hope that you have. Tell them that you’ve been changed by the love of Jesus and want others to know that they are loved by God. Keep it simple. Keep it personal. Don’t preach. Don’t sell the gospel. Simply live it and then speak it. Let God do the rest.