Evangelistic | Release the A.P.E.

How quickly can God change a life?

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September 26, 2012

Jesus talking to Zacchaeus in the tree

How quickly can God change a life?

I’m just finishing up a powerful couple of days studying the gospel of Luke with a group of campus missionaries from around the world. And Jesus is going APE all over the place!

I was struck by Jesus the Apostle, who is sent by the Spirit of the Lord to proclaim freedom (Luke 4:18) and who sends his followers out with authority to take the message of his Kingdom to new towns (Luke 10:1).

I was by met by Jesus the Prophet who issues a prophetic proclamation that the Kingdom of God has come near (Luke 10:9) and a prophetic warning of judgment to cities that reject His messengers (Luke 4:24, Luke 10:12-15).

But I was especially challenged by Jesus the Evangelist who proclaims good news (Luke 4:18) and highlights his mission to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10).

Zacchaeus

The most challenging moment came last night when we dug into the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus in Luke 19. Jesus is 23 miles from finishing his journey to the cross, he has just one afternoon to pass through the city of Jericho and in that one afternoon he turns the city upside down. How did he do it?

He invited himself into the life of an influential but corrupt leader, he transformed his life, and he watched his repentance initiate a massive redistribution of financial resources in Jericho!

Here’s where I felt convicted: Jesus spent a few hours with Zacchaeus and he went from being a corrupt, isolated traitor, to sacrificially giving half of his wealth to the poor and probably giving the rest away to everyone he had previously extorted money from.

In a few hours.

How long does it take for God to change a life?

How long do I expect it to take?

I recognized that I often have embarrassingly low expectations for what Jesus can do in the lives of people I’ve just met.

Two Students Come to Christ

Free Book Give Away: “Creating a Missional Culture”

27 responses
September 23, 2012

Who doesn’t like a free book???

Well I am happy to announce that I have 5 copies of “Creating a Missional Culture” by JR Woodward to give away to you this week!

Big Thanks to InterVarsity Press for giving me these books for you! They are helping us get the word out about JR (one of our writers!!) and our blog!!

This is a great book that really helps you lean into and get familiar with the Five-Fold Ministry laid out for us in Ephesians 4.

JR calls them “Equippers” and he urges us to assemble our churches around the five equippers and shows us how to do this inside the book!

It is a great read!

Here is how to enter yourself for the drawing…

The Best Way to Wake Up

one response
September 21, 2012

Geoff (left) and his fraternity brothers

[Hint: it’s not with Folgers in your cup!! make sure to read the testimony at the bottom!]

Jesus says in John 4,

34“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. 35Do you not say, ‘Four months more and then the harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. 36Even now the reaper draws his wages, even now he harvests the crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. 37Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. 38I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”

There is no greater joy for any believer in my opinion than seeing someone accept Christ. Jesus talks about the food of the harvest and that is what sustains Him.

As an evangelist, this is the kind of thing I live on too. It is what motivates me and gets me up and out of bed every day.

This week was a hard week for me. I just felt a bit more lonely and down than usual and even doubtful about my call at times.

But then I woke up to this email yesterday!

Coming to terms … James Choung’s story

5 responses
September 18, 2012

[This is a series designed to bring you into the the unique A.P.E stories of each writer on this blog. We hope each one of you can find a little of your A.P.E story inside of one of us. Read the other stories]

I’m supposed to tell a coming-of-age story. Not about becoming a man, though. (There’s actually not too much to tell there, anyway.) Or even about becoming an apprentice of Jesus. (I do have a little more to tell on that one.) But instead, I’m supposed to write about when I knew I was an Apostle, Prophet or Evangelist.

It’s not an easy assignment.

First of all, any story I might write will sound self-congratulatory. Imagine me in an ornate robe, curved pipe in hand, slinking back into a velvet armchair, and I start to speak in a slow, cultivated accent: “In a time when boys sought to be men, and men dared to dream, I looked down at my already gnarled hands, pondering the futility of life. That is, until a voice from heaven cracked through my thoughts like a thunderclap: ‘James, from this day forward, you shall be called … Apostle!’” It assails against my Korean upbringing to crown myself like that. Even Lebron received much derision for tattooing “Chosen1” on his back, even though, whether you like him or not, he can play ball. How much less have I accomplished?

Plus, these titles represent a new language to me. I’m still not comfortable with any of them. Perhaps my Gen X sensibilities doesn’t want to get labeled. Or sometimes people who carry labels like these are, well, freaky. I imagine people in white suits, cock-strutting on stage, wiping the sweat off their brow with a handkerchief, screaming into their microphones. Or I envision people who wear sandwich boards picturing silhouettes of bodies falling into flames, proclaiming that the end is near. If these titles don’t feel antiquated, they seem to be, at least, on the fringe of religious excess.

So why am I writing for this blog, again?

Get to Know the A.P.E. Writers… JR Woodward

3 responses
September 17, 2012

I never thought of myself as a “frat boy, “ but I became one. My roommate was invited to a fraternity rush party, and he wanted a friend to come with him, so I tagged along. I met some cool guys there, and before I knew it, I was pledging a fraternity and eventually became a full-fledge brother.

Little did I know that it would be in the Fraternity that I would meet two brothers who would cause me to consider the claims of Christ. I was working my way through college and didn’t have the money to go to summer school and pay for an apartment at the same time. Two of my fraternity brothers offered me a place to stay for free, and it was their hospitality and lives as Christ followers that provoked me to read the gospels. Through reading the gospel I fell in love with and surrendered my life to Jesus.

I happened to be the Resident Assistant in my dormitory. It was my responsibility to care for and help the sixty residents that lived on my hall. I didn’t know very much scripture, but I did know that God loved the whole world. I did know that God wanted everyone to be with Him so much so, that He put on flesh and bones, lived among us, died for us, and rose again. I didn’t know much, but I knew that, and that was enough.

Beer Pong, Fraternity, & Jesus

11 responses
September 16, 2012

[This post is part of the “Non Conventional Places A.P.E. Giftings Show Up” series. Read the rest of the posts here!]

A few Thursdays ago as I was prayer walking the Greek system with a student who is helping me to launch Greek InterVarsity on campus at USC. While on the walk, we decided to stop into his fraternity and say hi.

Some of the guys were playing beer pong and invited me back later to play with them at their party late that night. I don’t drink with students, but I did want to play beer pong and incarnate my self into this world of theirs for the purpose of building relationship and hopefully a great spiritual conversation. I also wanted to model for Alex what evangelism looks like. He lives in that house and has the opportunity for ministry every day.

We went back that night and had a blast! The party was bumping and they had 3 tables set up and people were going at it! My biggest takeaway in the first hour was that I surprised the heck out of them with how good I was at this game!

As I was leaving the night, I walked passed one of the guys that was my partner that night. He asked me what year I was and of course I said, “I am not a student, I am friends with Alex and I am a Christian minister on campus”. Like it always happens, he was very surprised and it was a little AWKWARD! But I simply asked him in that moment, “Are you curious about Jesus at all?” (Remember I spent some time with him that night having fun and building trust). He actually responded that he was curious.

So I sat down on that fraternity porch. It was loud, crazy and with many around we talked about his journey with faith and his soul entering college until 12am that night. He told me that he was looking for away to get back with God, and I told him, “I bet you didn’t expect God to send you a minister as a beer pong partner tonight?!”

Canadian A.P.E…Don Bennett

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September 14, 2012

This is a guest post by Don Bennett has spent the past 12 years serving as a Pastor in different roles. Currently he serves as an Associate Pastor at the Meeting House (Oakville – Main Site), a Multi Site Church throughout Southern Ontario. His passion is to invest in people and engage in conversation. Don enjoys meeting with people over a coffee at Starbucks and loves everything about footy (soccer). He cheers loudest for Celtic, Aston Villa and Toronto FC but he’s partial to his home team which includes his wife Karin and three kids Jake, Josh and Ella. He is a graduate of the Arrow Leadership program (24th ELP), has a B.Th from Masters College and Seminary and is nearly completed a M.A in Evangelism and Leadership at Wheaton College.

Our Church tag line is “A Church for people who are not into Church” and a key element to that is the gospel message of Jesus. My main role is being with people who are connecting or are connected into our community and fostering discussions that are centered on Jesus. Evangelism is my heartbeat and alongside being Pastoral this is my gifting.

Here is what I am learning presently:

Bill Hybels recently taught at the Global Leadership Summit that the sowing of seeds (Luke 8) needs to be a top priority. I noted in my notebook that an evangelist should see this in a greater way. His question that seemed directed straight at me was “What does sowing more seeds look like in community and with my friends.” 75% of seeds planted never grow, but 25% if cared for effectively can. What would it take to plant more than ever? What if we as leaders looked at the community and said we will plant more now than we ever have. We will take our time and energy and nourish these seeds and spend as much time as needed to see them grow.

This is re-energizing my life!

Empowering Evangelists…InterVarsity’s Ignite Conference

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September 13, 2012

An ordinary every day student being equipped to go start something new at InterVarsity Southern California’s Ignite Conference

[I love training others in evangelism, and I do it for churches and InterVarsity Chapters all the time. If you would like me to come to your church or ministry and facilitate evangelism training, please email me to set up a time]

This weekend at our Regional Evangelism Conference “Ignite” I watched at least 500 students get vision, training and empowerment around the apostolic, prophetic and evangelistic giftings.

A word was preached imploring us to live by faith and start the new things God is calling us to go do. There were multiple seminars on topics like “Justice and evangelism” “Turning every day conversations into spiritual ones” “Starting new things with God” and “how to start prayer movements that empower evangelistic culture”.

I watched them hear from God, get trained and make plans to do what God asked them to do. I couldn’t help but think of who will be coming to faith on campus this year. I was reminded of this tweet I got last year just days after my seminar I led on spiritual conversations.

This tweet and this conference brought joy to my heart as I knew we were raising up more A.P.E. leaders. We are bringing a more complete and full picture of Jesus to each other, the campus and the world.

It brought together what Paul makes plain in Ephesians 4:1-16

Releasing the five-fold ministry is what shows the full expression of the church, and therefore Jesus. Without all five, we are showing just a shadow of who He is.

Unfortunately what I got to witness this weekend is not the norm in the church as many subscribe to a belief that the A.P.E. is not for today or if it is, it is only for leaders.

Thankfully this ordinary woman didn’t believe that “only a church leader could do this” and she got to experience the best joy in the world…seeing a friend come to faith because of her partnership with God.

**UPDATED at 8:55pm**

I just received this facbook update on our InterVarsity site. This is a report from just this last weekend.

Here’s a praise: a frosh who came to Ignite was physically healed.

During the healing prayer time, God stretched her shortened leg (from a ski accident and birth defect combo) 1-1.5 inches. So her legs are now almost the same length. Her back and hip problems are now clearing up. God also stretched her faith–as you might imagine.

She’s testifying at large group tonight. We’ll see what our community thinks of physical healing miracles. Thank you, Lord, for your mercy!

Interpreting Ephesians 4: The Five-Fold Giftings

19 responses
September 11, 2012

There is such a better view of the Kingdom of God and of the church when we are releasing all five gifts

[This post is part of the A.P.E. Theology series. Read the rest of the posts here!]

When it comes to interpreting Ephesians 4 and the five-fold giftings mentioned in verse 11, it is important to know that two main lines of thinking has crept up over the years.

1. Apostles and Prophets were just for the founders of the church (the 12)

2.The five fold ministry does exist today but only for leaders in the church. Not for everyone.

So if you come from a camp that believes one of those thought lines, or are going to a church with these beliefs, you are not going to hear teaching on the five –fold gifting much at all. If it doesn’t exist today, point one, then why teach on it? If it is only for leaders, then if it is talked about at all, it will be talked about with those leaders. Not with the common man or woman in a common place like Sunday morning worship.

This is just a shame and an inaccurate reading of Ephesians 4. It leaves us at 40% capacity and only empowering shepherds and teachers with a tiny bit of evangelism sprinkled in.

[I will write another article about these beliefs and unpack a bit more where they come from…stay tuned]

But for now, let me present to you an alternative way to read Ephesians.

Facing a trial? What gives you strength?

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September 9, 2012

John Wesley Preaching in Ireland. (c) John Wesleys House & The Museum of Methodism; Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation

[This is part of the A.P.E. Pitfalls series. Check out the other posts here.]

If you are going to be a person who starts new things for God, takes any kind of risk, or wants to prohpetically call the church out into things on the horizon, you will face trials, rejection and at times marginalization.

What will you do at that point?

Well, Here is something that might help you!

John Wesley

Lets take a look into the journal of John Wesley!

He is what I would call the epitome of an Apostolic leader…He started new things, led movements of people and organized mission around the common person as well as anyone… He was the father of Methodism.

Often times we make the apostolic leader the sexy thing, when in fact it is often very hard to be called by God in this way and it comes with great costs. Often times much failure and rejection is part of the resume.

Take a peak at Wesley’s journal…