Abounding Grace

Guest (Male): Today on Abounding Grace, see how you can be a tool in the hands of God to help the wanderer come back to the Lord.

Guest (Male): It is true that Christians stray, but it's also true God wants to restore them, and he can use you in the process. Maybe as you think about someone in your life that's wandered away, you wonder what, if anything, can you do to help. Well, keep listening. Pastor Ed Taylor will offer us five very practical things we can do to help them get back on track. The bulk of our time together will be spent in James chapter five, so let's find our place there now.

Pastor Ed Taylor: Now come back with James as we wind down, James chapter five. I want you to keep this in mind: the truth that people stray and the truth that God wants them to be restored. Notice again what James says: "Brethren, if anyone among you wanders from the truth." We've already learned all of us are anyone. Anyone can wander away.

But there are particular anyones that are connected to your life. There are people that God has put very close to you. You were born in a family. You have neighbors. You have coworkers. You have people that you see when you go shopping regularly. There are always people around us.

There are people that were in this church that are no longer in this church, that you used to break bread with and you used to fellowship with. Anytime I teach on this topic, I can't help but think in my own life. Longevity in a church is a very good thing. It's a very beautiful thing because you watch the lifecycle of a church all the way through the ups and the downs, the easy times and the hard times.

One of the hardest times that I've experienced in our church life here, now coming up on 26 years... so I've been here for 26 years, I was here from the very first day of this church all the way on until the Lord takes me home. One of the things I've noticed in the 26 years is how many people are not here anymore. I notice it.

I have a list of people that I pray for. I wish I could say daily; it's not daily, but at least weekly, I think of those... I mean, these are people that I did ministry with. These are people that I was on mission trips with. These are people I'd be downstairs on a Thanksgiving meal hearing their testimony. These are people that I would walk through and pray as they battle and defeat cancer, or we do their memorial, or I officiated their wedding. Real people, people who were part of their lives, part of the life of the church, that are no longer walking with the Lord.

I remember not too many years ago, I pulled that list out like I did regularly, and I was just so discouraged. I probably was already discouraged and it just put me over the edge. I'm looking at the names and I'm thinking of some of the stories, and I'm thinking of some of these guys are like full-blown atheists now, they say. They're just anti-God and anti-church and anti-Calvary and anti-everything that represents the love of God through the life of this church.

I was just so bummed out and I just so hurt over it all. It's just wrong, Lord. You pour your life into people and they just turn their back. I kind of felt like Elijah, "Everybody's against me," and God just says, "No, just slow your roll a little bit, Ed. I have a lot of people reserved. You're not alone. This is normal. This is the same mindset that put Jesus on a cross."

But at the same time, I was reading... I don't remember if it was a book or a sermon, because I like to read sermons from Pastor Greg Laurie. Pastor Greg Laurie was a part of the last big revival. As we wait for a new revival, this last big revival that started with the hippies, with the Jesus revolution.

He was writing either in the sermon or in the book about how long he's got double the time I have in ministry. So he has double the amount in serving far more people than I've ever served. He was writing just a little paragraph of how discouraging it was for him to think of all the people he started out with that are no longer walking with the Lord. At least you're not alone.

This is very serious stuff because these are the people that are close to you, far closer to you than they are to me. These are your family, these are your friends. You think of the person you invited to church, then they got saved and then look at what happened. They were doing Bible study with you and singing, and then all of a sudden they're right back in the world again. Don't overlook... you read something really quickly in verse 19, "if anyone among you"... don't read over the word "anyone," because you and I are anyones, and it can happen to any of us.

However, he says, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his ways will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins. That's encouraging. But what I also want you to see: not only can we all be anyone, but all of us can also be someone.

Some of you today will, as a result of God using this Bible study, some of you today will send that text message finally. You'll reach out. Some of you will make the phone call. Some of you may have to go back to that back bedroom in your house and knock on the door where your son or daughter lives and just try to open up the avenue for discussion again.

As God changes your heart, some of you are going to speak to your unbelieving spouse or your backslidden spouse. It's important that you become someone where we're agents of grace in our community, not hyper-judgmental. "Look at you. Look at what you did. Look at how you hurt our family." But just ask the Lord to soften your heart so you can have a heart to help in the restoration process.

I also want you to notice that if someone wanders away from the truth, what we typically would call backsliding, I want you to notice it's a sin. Backsliding is nothing to wear as a badge and to be happy about. Wandering away from the truth... when you turn someone that wanders away from the truth, you're turning a sinner back.

It's a gross sin. I know a lot of sins get attention: gossip and lying, those are obvious ones, but so is backsliding. Backsliding is living in a perpetual state of sin, and we should care about that. We should truly care about those that have chosen to live such a difficult, hard life.

Now again, I don't want to develop this, but I do need to mention it in the context of this passage. I can't develop it in full; I've done it in different Bible studies. But people will argue about and make a big deal about whether a believer can backslide or not. We learn in Hebrews that backsliding is real; it's a Bible word. But people still like to argue about it.

They also like to argue about whether a person's saved or not saved, and if a believer backslides, do they lose their salvation? I've taught you guys and I'll continue to teach you: pay attention to what nonsensical things Christians argue about, because there's usually a very important truth behind the argument. Because it's much easier to argue instead of go talk to a person that's backslidden. Why don't we just argue about them?

We'll just post everything online and we'll just write it all out, and we can be really good posters on Facebook and never reach a person that's lost. You have to choose how you want to live your life. So people are arguing about this, and if you want to argue about those things, I don't really have time to do that. I don't know how you have time to do that.

But I do want to give you the truth behind the argument. You ready? There is a person that needs to be in a right relationship with Jesus. Whether they're unsaved, saved, I don't know. I'm going to treat them the same way, like Jesus loves them and wants to see them in a right relationship. I realize I may not be the vessel. I may not be the vessel, but I'm going to pray that the Lord will do a work in their lives, and if He wants to use me, I'm willing to be used.

And so as you look at this, I just think James is being more practical here than theological. You see somebody wandering away? Go after them. Reach out to them. Certainly, if you're still unconvinced, certainly followers of God wander away from the truth. That is not debatable. Anybody who wants to argue about that, I have zero time for that because it's obvious.

I'll give you a few examples. Abraham was a passionate lover of God, but he made some serious, serious sinful mistakes in his life. One being how he oversaw his home and how he loved his wife. We have at least two episodes recorded for us in the Bible of a very unloving way he treated his wife. But he recovered.

Moses, a very passionate God-follower, but Moses took things into his own hands and killed a guy. I would say that's wandering from the truth, wouldn't you? He wandered away. So many errors in Moses' life. He runs away from God, resists the call of God on his life, and what does God do? Re-commissions him, brings him back.

I think of David. David committed adultery. I would say that adultery is a backslidden state. For anyone listening today, adultery is not from the Lord. Any sexual sin, not from the Lord. Adultery, fornication, pornography... none of that is from God. Nobody can say that's from God. That was not inspired by God. You weren't led by the Spirit to do that. That is not from God at all.

David was in a season where he wasn't following God. He also murdered and lied, and yet as far from God he was, he still came back. At this point, you think, "Well, Ed, if I can still come back, then what's the big deal? Who cares? I might as well just sin if I can come back." Then you just misunderstand the heart of God.

Do you really think it's okay to hurt the heart of God? I mean, do you really think that's fine? Because there's always consequences with sin. Paul asks that question, "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" in Romans. And what does he say? "Certainly not!"

So learning from the failures of people's lives is not permission; it's warning. It's not a permission to sin; it's God's intent to prevent you from sin and all the consequences. I could tell you as a pastor, I wish sometimes I could help people with their consequences. I really wish. I really think I'm more compassionate than God that I can just jump in and help them with the consequences of their sin, but I can't.

I can just help heal and I can help you get your eyes back on the Lord, but I can't undo. When I was raising my kids as a young age, I was telling... I would always tell them, "Don't do something you can't undo. Make wise choices." And I tell that to you as just a brother in the Lord. Don't do something you can't undo.

It's like, "Well, it's grace, it's grace." No, it's foolishness. And even today, you're on the other side, you go, "Well, Ed, it's too late for me. I did do something I can't undo." Oh, no, no, it's not too late for you. You have certainly made things harder, for sure. But you can come back to the Lord. You can come back with all the baggage and all the burdens, and the Lord, He'll help you.

I think of Peter. Peter walked away from Jesus. He didn't just walk away. He denied Jesus not once, not twice, but three times. I don't want you to get in your mind a denial kind of like what you and I might experience from time to time where somebody asks if we're a Christian or something and we're just embarrassed or we don't have enough boldness in the moment, and we just pass on the opportunity. That's a form of denial, but that's not what Peter was doing here.

Peter purposely abandoned his best friend in the worst time of his life. "I don't know the man. I don't know him. I don't have anything to do with him." And what happens with Peter? Jesus meets him, has a heart for him, re-enlists him in ministry. "Go take care of my sheep, Peter. Go, I'm glad you're back."

So let's agree. Let's agree that the Lord is calling us to be a tool in His hands to help those that have strayed. Let's agree that God is calling us to be a tool to help those that have fallen, those that are backslidden. Just take the arguments you may have in your mind right now, just set them aside so you can be a human being reaching another human being and asking them to get right with the Lord, checking in on their life, seeing if perhaps God might use you in their lives.

Seeing if that chair next to you might be filled with a backslidden Christian that came home to his Father. That's what happened with the prodigal son, right? What happened with the prodigal son is all these circumstances happened in his life and he finally came to his senses.

So in our final moments today, I want to give you five things that will help you, five practical things. Because if I have convinced you, and I hope I have, that not only do people stray away but that God wants to use you, then the question remains how. How?

So let me give you five things. There's probably 150 things, but let me give you five of them just so you can start thinking about them and seeing how God might use you. Number one: we pray for them. We pray for them. Let's not minimize, let's not just look over a very powerful weapon, a powerful weapon of prayer. We should be praying for those that are struggling and praying for those that are straying.

We need to ask God to move upon their hearts to get behind the sin, to get behind the rebellion, to do what only God can do. Like we can talk to the person, but God can deal with their hearts, and we need to pray for God to do what only He can do. And we also need to pray that God can do through us what He wants to do. We need to ask God to speak to them and to order, like the prodigal son, to order things in their life to cause them to cry out.

Remember, there was a famine. He lost all his money. His friends abandoned him, and then there was a famine. Then he got a job feeding pigs, and it brought him to the end of himself. Pray. Create a list. Bring it out every week or so and just start praying for people by name, and just let the Spirit of God lead you. It might discourage you, but you'll get through it.

Like, "Oh, Lord." But then it'll lead to hope. It's like, "Okay, Lord, I know it's bad, but you can work." And you'll be encouraged. Ask for them by name. Request them by name, specifically, persistently.

Number two: not only do we pray for them, but number two, as you're thinking about the lost, this is what I want you to remember: watch yourself. Don't forget yourself. So include yourself in the prayer, if you will, so that as you're praying for those that are fallen, you don't become judgmental, condemning, hypocritical.

Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 7? "Judge not, lest ye be judged." He wasn't forbidding judgments; we make judgments all the time. What he was teaching us is not to be hypercritical and hypocritical. So watch yourself, because we're just a step or a decision away from a really bad day, a really bad month, and perhaps walking away.

Don't look down on anyone else because they've been trapped by the enemy. "Oh, I can't believe... look at what he did. Did you hear what he did?" And kind of using prayer meetings as gossip sessions. "Did you hear about so-and-so? Did you read this in the news?" No, stop it. Stop. As you're praying, consider yourself. The world loves to kick those that are down. That's not to be in the body of Christ. We're to help them.

We're not to be like Noah's son who sees him drunk and in sin and acting strange and weird in the tent, and he comes in and what does he do? He immediately exposes his dad's sin to his brothers. But what do his brothers do? His brother said, "I don't know what's going on with Dad, but now's not the right time to talk to him." And they get a blanket and they walk in backwards, not even seeing it. They don't even want it in their minds, covering Dad until the appropriate time.

We don't look down at people. We learn in our study last time, the Bible teaches us not to be happy and rejoice when others fall. And it's easy to do, especially with those you might disagree with, or those that might believe differently than you. Or some of them might have... when a pastor falls, you're like, "Yeah, I'm glad. Look at what's happening to the church. So many bad pastors."

It's actually not as bad as it seems. It's just a few people that got trapped, and it's horrible and it's a black eye, but they're still people. When a pastor falls, he has a wife and kids and a church and influence, and it's just so bad for the body of Christ. And the last thing we need to do is be all finger-pointing. At the very least you can pray, but number two, you can also watch yourself.

Because the truth is that I could stray and you could stray at any moment. First Corinthians chapter 10, verse 12 says, "Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall." When others fall around us, it should send us to our knees, not just for them but also for ourselves. And we come and say, "Lord, I'm so weak."

Because you look at someone that falls to a particular sin and it pricks your pride, "I would never do that." And you're probably right; that sin wasn't a temptation to you. But I'm telling you, there is a temptation for you that could wipe you out. It may not be the one you're seeing, and so you're like, "Well, I would never have... I would never do that."

First of all, be careful with the word "never." Just be careful with that, because you don't know what you would do in given the right circumstances or the wrong circumstances. But we can't look down at people because they failed. We have all fallen short of the glory of God, all of us have sinned, and it's important that we step in prayerfully and carefully into someone's life.

Number three: it's going to be necessary as you're praying and watching that you engage the erring person. You engage them. I changed the word. I've taught this study before and I used the word "confront," and confront just has all these connotations like you're going to go get them. And I don't want to build that in you. So "engaging" is a better word, like you're going to have to connect.

Like if you're going to turn a sinner from the error of his ways, you're going to have to be in their life. You have to be close enough to have a voice in their life. It's going to require your engaging with them again, sending a text message and sending an email, a phone call, whatever it might be. But in order to turn a sinner from the error of their ways, you have to be in their life, available, ready to be used to the Lord.

Guest (Male): Well, there you have a few very practical things you can do to help the person who has wandered away. Pray for them and as you do, watch yourself and then engage them. Stick around, Pastor Ed Taylor will share a couple more helpful tips as Abounding Grace continues. Today's message, "The Heart That Seeks the Broken," can be heard again at aboundinggraceradio.com or at oneplace.com.

Here in the month of July, we've picked out an excellent book from David Wilkerson, The Jesus Person Promise Book. It contains over 800 promises from the word of God, helping you discover hope, grace, and healing for almost every spiritual and personal problem encountered today. It would make a meaningful gift for that special someone or a purse companion for you, and we'll send it to you when you support Abounding Grace with a gift of $25 or more today.

Reach us toll-free at 877-30-GRACE or go online to calvaryco.store. And thank you for your support. It helps us get the word out on stations like this one all across the nation. Large or small, God is using your gifts in great ways. I wish I could share all the emails and phone calls that come in as evidence of that. To make a donation, just visit aboundinggraceradio.com or call 877-30-GRACE. That's aboundinggraceradio.com or 877-30-GRACE.

All right, let's return to our Bible study. Again, Pastor Ed is sharing some things we can do to help those that have strayed.

Pastor Ed Taylor: Number four: how do we, when we're ministering to those that have fallen away or wandered from the truth, what do we need? We need to forgive the repentant. Please listen, don't miss this. This is so important. Forgiveness brings peace. Forgiveness brings peace to the turmoil.

You might be afraid that if forgiveness happens, you won't have peace. It's almost like you're excusing someone's behavior, but you're not. Forgiveness requires you and me to acknowledge something wrong happened to me, and I release you from the wrong that you've done. You forgive the repentant. We don't shoot the wounded or kick people while they're down. We accept them in Jesus and help them rebuild what the enemy has tried to destroy. This is the church of Jesus, and Jesus loves to restore and rebuild.

Which leads us to number five: not only do we forgive, but we speak words of kindness and love to them. Imagine what this person has had to deal with all these years. Imagine the condemnation. "Oh, I could never go back to church," or "I could never... God would never receive me."

When we stray away, the devil's always there to lie to you. And the key is if he can just get you and me to believe a lie, we'll do the rest in wrecking our lives. Any lie we believe takes us away from God. "Well, God will never forgive me." That's a lie. He proved His love for you on the cross. "Well, you know, that church, they'll all condemn me." You know, there might be a few bad apples that were praying for that they will stop, but not everybody's going to condemn you.

"Well, you know, and I'll never be able to live with the consequences." No, you'll learn to live with the consequences. The Lord will be there with you. He'll restore you. You might even find that the difficulty in your life that you live will be used as a tool to help other people before they even fall away. God wants to use your life. He wants even to use your failures.

We read today and we were so encouraged by Psalm 51. Psalm 51 is a psalm of David. It's often referred to as a psalm of repentance, and most scholars put Psalm 51 being written after Nathan confronted him. And through his egregious sin and all the pain that he brought to so many lives, God still used his repentant heart to bless you and me now thousands of years later. God's not done with you.

He hasn't cast you aside. And I would say this: if you've wandered away from the Lord, both here in the room or listening online or on the radio, if you've wandered away from the Lord, you're welcome here at Calvary. We want to see your life restored. You're welcome to come back to the Father through the life of this church family.

Guest (Male): Forgive them and speak words of kindness and love to them. What a good word there for us as we close. Be sure to return next time for Abounding Grace when Pastor Ed will talk more about helping each other along the way.

Guest (Male): Abounding Grace is brought to you by Calvary Church Colorado, here in Aurora.