Frank Ramirez

Revive Us Again... In Soul Winning Evangelism

Sermon Text

I was trying to figure out if there was a particular scene from Brethren history that I'd like to dramatize someday. There are many interesting people in our shared past. Certainly I've been working on a book and a play about Catharine Hummer, a teenager who lived in Colonial America and fascinated her contemporaries with her accounts of angelic visitations.

But there's another person I've been looking into the past couple years, and his name is P.R. Wrightsman. He was a Brethren minister who lived in Tennessee during the Civil War. Brethren struggled during that conflict to maintain ties across the Mason-Dixon line, but those on the southern side had a harder time of it. They experienced economic persecution and threats that increased as the war dragged on.

By the autumn of 1864 Wrightsman, along with many other Brethren, had experienced great difficulties. Property had been stolen from them, they endured threats, and one of them, John A. Bowman, had been shot and killed by a Confederate soldier who was in the process of stealing a horse from him.

So on the fourth Sunday of September, 1864, when the members of the Limestone church arrived at their meeting house to prepare for their fall Love Feast, they can be excused for their fear when they discovered the building was surrounded by Confederate soldiers, and some wondered if they should just call it all off.

But Wrightsman said, "No, let us go on with the meeting. Perhaps the Lord has sent them to this place to hear the Gospel."

As it turned out, the soldiers watched with interest as the meal and the service was prepared, and watched it all. Some later asked Wrightsman if he wouldn't come and preach to them after the war, and Wrightsman noted that sadly most of them did not survive the conflict.

The point is, when there was trouble, when there were threats and hardships, Wrightsman saw that the only thing we could do was go on being Brethren. Go with what got us here. Don't change the essential and take the consequences.

We have nothing to offer to the world but what makes us Brethren. We have nothing to offer to the world but Jesus. We have nothing to offer but the cross. We have nothing to offering but our brokenness. We will be revived when we go with what got us here.

We wash feet and we do what Jesus said and act as he did, to the best of our ability. That's it. That's enough.

When Paul wrote his letter to the Galatians there were many people concerned over whether Christians needed to be circumcised or not. It was a hot button issue, with strong feelings on both sides. But the apostle knew that circumcision wasn't the issue, no matter what people thought. The cross is the only issue. It's all that matters.

May I never boast of anything but the cross, we might say with the Apostle Paul. For as he notes in his second letter to the Corinthians, "But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies."

Clay jars are ornamented. They're plain. They carry water and food. And in the ancient world, the good news was that even broken clay jars served a purpose. You could write a business receipt or a wedding invitation or a letter or a note on them. And our broken lives are still useful to God's work, if we remain true to our calling.

We have this treasure in broken jars. Our Annual Conference Moderator has chosen the theme Revive Us Again. I think he's serious. If we pray for it, and it really happens, then things could get sticky. So be it. Because the only real thing we have to offer is Jesus' blood. But that's everything. Absolutely everything.

Stop making excuses for why you can't be involved in Soul Winning Evangelism. Stop making excuses why we can't reach out to the nations and our neighbors, with this good news we have. You tell me you have nothing. You have no talent for it.

You've got nothing but Jesus. We have this treasure in clay jars. Let God use our brokenness as our secret weapon and no one can stop us.

As Paul told the Galatians: "So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest-time, if we do not give up. So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith." And then he writes: "See what large letters I make when I am writing in my own hand!"

Paul admits his weaknesses throughout his letters, including his handwriting. I can identify with that affliction. All the guys in our immediate Ramirez family struggle with our handwriting. But we all have our weaknesses and our strengths.

These are God's basic materials. This is what we've got to work with. Your weakness is God's strength.

Or don't you believe God did a good job in creating you!

Because we've a story to tell to the nations. If ever the world needs peacemakers, if ever the world needs to bend the knee and wash feet, if ever the world needs little churches on country roads with white washed walls that time is now.

In the cross, in the cross, be my glory ever
Till my ransomed soul shall find
Rest beyond the river.

There is a place of rest and approval, and if we keep our eyes on the prize we will attain that.

Praise God you are here today. There is something for you to do. You who are broken. You who have been divorced. You who are grieving the loss of a parent, a spouse, a child, you who are disabled, you who are blind, you who can't hear me too well, you who feel alone and friendless, you who wonder what you could possibly offer to the gospel to the kingdom, you who are struggling to breathe, you who are wilting in the heat, you who are afraid,

YOU WHO ARE BROKEN, that is the best you have to offer. You don't need any other training or tools, but the cross, because God has equipped you already for the work of the Gospel.

What are you waiting for?