Reaching out - Ideas for Action (Luke 5:30)

Reading Luke 5:30
But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”
What did Jesus Do?
Instead of the question What Would Jesus Do, lets look at the question What Did Jesus Do?
I've made a short simple list of the things Jesus did while he was with his disciples.  I doubt very much it is anything like complete, but I thought it would be good to get your ideas, so how would you answer the question “What did Jesus Do?”
[Get Answers]
Here's my list:
Preaching
Matthew chapters 5,6,7 – Sermon on the mount
Feeding people (5000+)  Luke 9:10-17
Sacrificial love – death end of any gospel
Teaching – disciples and others (woman at the well) - John 4:1-42
Fulfilled prophecy (deliberately) – e.g. donkey Matthew 21
Friendships – Zacchaeus  Luke 19:1-10
Time for people (non-Jews!) Luke 19:1-10  Luke 7:1-10
Prayer (did it and taught it)    Luke 11:1-4
Time with God     Early morning prayer    Mark 1:35
Prophesied    build the temple in three days     John 2:19
Studies / learns scripture    temptation Luke 4:1-13
Healing Luke 7:1-10 – The centurions slave
If we are serious about being more and more like Jesus, surely we should try to do all of these things.
Jesus led a balanced life and used his time wisely. I often think that I don't achieve that. Warner spoke last week about making time for the things in our lives that are really important – the people that we live and associate with.  Today we are going to look at some of the strategies that may be used to make good use of the time that we freed up after last weeks talk.  (OK, I haven't freed up any time yet – but I'm working on it!)
In my first talk in this series on making Jesus better known (September 10, 2011) I looked at what God thought of people, and found out that every person on the planet – every one of the seven billion of them - is important to God.
Guilty by association?Unlike God we can't know all seven billion, but we can get to know those around us.  Many of the people that we associate with are not PLU's.  Some of you may remember Carrie , our first youth worker teasing us in a sermon with the acronym PLU – does anyone remember what it means?
[Ask]
The answer is: “People like us”
The suggestion here is that we should be more involved with non-PLUs – people who are not so like us.  But doesn't the Bible tell us to steer clear of these people.  It certainly seems to:
James 4:4 You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.
What about John, in his letter he says:
1 John 2:15-17
15 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. 16 For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. 17 The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.
John, in his gospel said:
John 17:14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world.
Even Paul warns about contact with the world:
1 Corinthians 5:9-10
9 I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10 not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. 11 But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.
And in his second letter Paul says:
2 Corinthians 6:17 Therefore,
   “Come out from them
   and be separate, says the Lord.
Touch no unclean thing,
   and I will receive you.”
So are we guilty by association, or should we be looking at other scriptures to get a more balanced view?
Let's start with James: He has already said earlier in his letter:
James 1:27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
John in his gospel goes on to say:
John in his letter is speaking about the things of the world and the attitudes of its people.  He is not talking about the people.  I'll talk about this more later.
John 17:15-18
15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.
Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians is talking about Christians -people in the church – PLUs, not people outside in the world.
As an aside, do you know that the Barna group in America found that Christian faith has little or no effect on peoples behaviour.  Only evangelicals stood out – along with those who are atheists or agnostics.  Its clearly always been a problem – so perhaps the non-PLUs are not so different!
In his second letter to the Corinthians Paul is talking about close partnerships, like business partnerships and marriages.  He is not talking about being friendly with the next door neighbour or the guy in the pub.
FriendshipPaul also said, in
1 Corinthians 9:22-23
22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. 23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.
And finally we should look at what Jesus said
Luke 19:10
For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.
Paul was able to pull off being like the people he was trying to reach so that they saw him as a PLU.  That made it easier to befriend them.  He managed that without compromising his faith in any way.
Jesus clearly believes that He is here for those who do not know God, those who are lost in their sins.  So, if we are to engage in His mission, and make friends with those in the outside world we must be sure that it is us who are influencing them and not the other way around.  We must not find ourselves in a position where we want what the world has to offer in preference to what Christ has already given us, neither must we allow behaviour to make us indistinguishable for the people we are friendly with.  To ensure that it is our influence that prevails we must have an approach like St Paul:
2 Corinthians 10:4-5
4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
We can only achieve this when we have a balanced life and a group of people praying for us.  But our perceived lack of knowledge or our  fears that we are too far from God can also be an excuse to do nothing.  There are many possible excuses.  My favourite is that I have no idea what to do.  Perhaps we should just talk about it some more
[Life_Of_Brian_PFJ_meeting_to_take_action]
Ideas for ActionWell, they will never achieve anything, but here are some ideas that might just help.  They're not mine, they come from the Book “Becoming a Contagious Christian”.which our series is based on.
These ideas are not new, even in the book.  The first is based on the verse before the one I read at the start of today's talk.
Luke 5:29. Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them.
1. Mix it up a bit, get everyone you know in a huge hall and let everybody get on with it!  You might have to brief the Christians before hand so that they know not to stand in a little huddle in the corner, or hide in the kitchen.
2. We could start a tradition – hold a party for our neighbours on a bank holiday – let's choose one when it's usually wet and cold (plenty of choice) that should give them less of an excuse not to come.
3. We already hold events and activities for children, but don't let that put us off doing similar things in different places, different ways and at different times.
4. Organise a sports training event and invite people from the local sports club or gym.
5. It might be as simple as holding a barbecue for friends and neighbours
6. or inviting people to our houses to watch some great sporting event.  There will be all sorts of initiatives for the Olympics, but it could be for Wimbledon, or the FA Cup Final, or any other event that catches our interest.
7. Joins a sports club or take a friend and use the time to share something of our beliefs
8. Spend some time with people at work, if that's possible.  Getting to know them better at lunch, or after the work day is over.
9. Make contact with some old school friends, but don't do it on Friends re-united.  Contact them and get together face-to-face
10. Start to make an effort to talk to the people you meet in pubs, supermarkets, or restaurants where you go regularly, or even on the train station or at the bus stop.
ConclusionIt was Jesus' mission, Paul's mission and it is our mission also.  We, like the evangelicals in the Barna survey, recognise that we have a responsibility to personally pass on our faith, after all Christ Church's tag line is “Knowing Jesus better and making Jesus better known”.  If you accept that Jesus died for your sins and opened the way back to God -  If you accept that His resurrection proves that we have eternal life then how can you not try to explain,  convince or otherwise argue your point with anyone willing to listen – as hard as we find it!
I hope that what I have said today may help us find some more willing listeners.