Pros
update
28 March 08
Jesus' Game Plan
‘He called his twelve disciples to him….’
Matthew Chapter 10 verse 1
The new England coach Fabio Capello has a plan for the way he wants
England to play and he felt there was some progress towards it in this
week’s 0-1 defeat to France. “I could see plenty of pluses. So my ideas
are a lot clearer about the future”. Time will be the judge of his
success!
Faced with a massive world to win, Jesus had a plan. He sent twelve
followers out with his message. That was it! It is interesting to ponder
the ways Jesus did not work. He never wrote a book. He did not start a
political movement. If you’re familiar with the rise of Islam, you’ll
know how Muhammad worked: his quite outstanding political achievements
in uniting the Arab peoples, in conquering the Arabian Peninsula, in
beginning the conquest of almost the entire Mediterranean world and the
meteoric rise of Islam in consequence. These twelve men (one of whom was
a traitor) are the modest legacy of Jesus Christ. They were His response
to a lost world.
Has it worked? I think it must have done, mustn’t it? You’re reading
this e mail in 2008 because one person has told another about Jesus down
the centuries and the Gospel has reached and impacted you. This is God’s
strategy and time judges it a successful one and since it works let’s
keep going with it.
The instructions Jesus gave, while they begin with the twelve and their
unique and immediate expedition into Galilee (see Matthew Chapter 10
verses 5 - 6 for example), widen as Matthew’s account develops. The
climax is Jesus' command to ‘go and make disciples of all nations’
(Matthew Chapter 28 verse 19). What began in Galilee is not yet
finished. It’s going on all over the world through sport today. It’s
God’s enterprise, but we are invited to share in it, to play our part.
Jesus’ strategy to change the world requires our active involvement. It
may not be the strategy that you and I would have chosen. Human
evangelism is always desperately seeking size: big crusades, big numbers
and big responses. We love to count the numbers, don’t we? But this is
God’s harvest and this is His way of reaping it that we’re looking at.
It’s a modest way, an unspectacular way; it’s the way that involves you
and me doing what we can easily do: talking to other sports people about
Jesus. It is well within our capabilities.
Go for it!
Graham
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