Tag: endsoftheearth

Diversity and the Ends of the Earth

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I recently watched a video1 in which the speaker described diversity as something harmful—likening it to poison or cancer. His argument was that diversity “doesn’t work” in contexts like marriage or business because communication breaks down. But what he ultimately described wasn’t a failure of diversity; it was a failure of communication.

Yes, some kinds of diversity—such as speaking different languages—can create significant challenges. But that’s not what most conversations about diversity are actually addressing. Instead, they focus on differences of race, culture, citizenship, religion, and more. And while language can play a role, these issues must be understood within the broader context of human relationships and how we choose to engage one another.

The speaker in the video also appealed to Christian identity as if Christian sameness should be the foundation of unity—yet he offered no Scriptural grounding for this view. No teachings of Jesus. No reference to the overarching story of God’s people. Only personal opinion.

That disconnect made me curious to revisit what the Bible actually shows us about diversity.

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Beyond Antioch

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Recently, I’ve been part of some conversations where Acts 16:5 has been used as an encouragement for pursuing church growth. Here’s the verse:

“So the churches were strengthened in the faith, and they increased in numbers daily.”  Acts 16:5 (ESV)

It is indeed an uplifting passage, describing churches that were flourishing both spiritually and numerically. But the natural question is: what was happening that led to this kind of growth—and what might it teach us about how the Spirit can still work among us today?

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Pronouns Through the Lens of Evangelism

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Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is a topic that sparks significant debate, especially among Christians who grapple with its implications on personal freedoms and faith-based convictions. Many believers feel that the push for DEI policies, particularly regarding language and identity, can infringe on their rights to express their faith and beliefs freely. For example, the use of preferred pronouns is often viewed as a moral dilemma—some Christians see it as an endorsement of behaviors they consider sinful, leading to discomfort and concerns about conscience and religious liberty.

These encounters typically occur outside the church – in workplaces, schools, and public spaces. They represent moments where Christians are called to engage with the broader culture, much like Paul did during his time in Athens. His experience offers valuable insights into how believers might navigate contemporary discussions on identity and inclusion while remaining faithful to the Gospel.

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Effective Evangelism: Spiritual Insights from Acts

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The phrase “ends of the Earth” as it appears in the book of Acts pertains to those who are far from God. Acts chronicles a great deal of evangelistic activity, yet it offers only a few instances where we are provided with detailed accounts of the messages shared with people who are in this category. These examples warrant closer examination to uncover insights about the methods used and their outcomes.

In one such example, Paul and Barnabas visit the city of Lystra (Acts 14:8-18). Here, Paul performs a miraculous healing of a lame beggar, which evokes a dramatic response from the townspeople. Believing that Paul and Barnabas are manifestations of their gods, Hermes and Zeus, the people prepare to offer them worship. This reaction is linked to a regional myth about the gods previously visiting in disguise and being overlooked, leading the people of Lystra to vow not to repeat the mistake. Paul and Barnabas reject this misplaced veneration, redirecting the crowd’s attention to the one true God. Interestingly, Acts does not record Paul explicitly mentioning Jesus in this instance. The outcome? There is no mention of conversions, and Paul and Barnabas eventually move on to the next city, seemingly leaving behind a community unchanged by their message.

Athens presents a starkly different scenario (Acts 17:16-34). Paul engages with the local populace in the agora, or marketplace, which leads to his invitation to address the learned elite on Mars Hill. His speech here stands out for its cultural resonance: Paul begins with the Athenians’ own worldview, referencing their religious practices and even quoting Greek poets to introduce them to the concept of the one true God. From this foundation, he moves on to the subject of Jesus and the resurrection. The results in Athens were more mixed: some listeners believed, while others expressed a desire to hear more, and still others dismissed him outright. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that Paul tailored his approach to align with the intellectual and cultural framework of his audience, resulting in tangible spiritual fruit.

Later in Acts, Paul finds himself arrested in Jerusalem, leading to an audience with King Agrippa (Acts 26:1-32). Given this opportunity, Paul shares his personal testimony, recounting his dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus. Rather than addressing Agrippa’s specific concerns or context, Paul focuses on his own story. The outcome is clear: Agrippa is unmoved, dismissing Paul’s appeal and showing no interest in embracing Christianity.

It is worth noting that the examples above are the primary instances in Acts where messages are delivered to those far outside the Jewish faith or the category of “God-fearers”—non-Jews who already believed in the God of Israel and needed to be introduced to Jesus. Among these three encounters, Paul’s only apparent success was with the intellectuals at Mars Hill. A possible reason for this lies in his method. Unlike in Lystra or before Agrippa, Paul at Mars Hill made deliberate use of the listeners’ cultural context and knowledge to frame his message.

In contrast, Paul’s approach in Lystra seems detached from the people’s preoccupations. The townspeople’s focus on their local myth appears to be ignored or unacknowledged in Paul’s exhortation. His message is a generalized appeal to accept the God of Israel, devoid of specific references to Jesus. Similarly, with Agrippa, Paul relies solely on recounting his personal spiritual journey, without any evident attempt to connect with the king’s unique perspective or concerns.

This leads to a broader reflection on the effectiveness of Paul’s strategies. Could it be that these accounts reveal the importance of speaking not just from personal conviction but in a manner that resonates with the audience? Paul is often assumed to have always spoken under the direct guidance of the Holy Spirit, yet Acts does not explicitly affirm this in every instance. The varying outcomes—particularly the apparent lack of conversions in Lystra and with Agrippa—might suggest that even Paul had to navigate the challenges of effective communication and cultural engagement.

Indeed, Paul later requests prayer for boldness and clarity in proclaiming the Gospel (eg, Eph. 6:19 and Col. 4:4), an acknowledgment that effective evangelism requires divine empowerment as well as thoughtful preparation. This is what I’ve termed “speaking in power” in this blog, and highlights a significant tension in Christian witness: the balance between faithfulness to the message and adaptability to the audience’s needs. The examples in Acts remind us that successful communication of the Gospel often requires humility, contextual sensitivity, and reliance on the Holy Spirit.

Exploring Antioch and Laodicea

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As discussed in earlier posts, I think that evangelism – proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God – is a key aspect of the Christian faith. It’s a vital part of the way we should live in this world, which is why Jesus pointed to it many times, trained and sent out disciples, focused the disciples on it in the beginning of Acts, and perhaps even why God has given us the book of Acts as the main picture of the early church.

Given the clear directive and the amount of effort put into evangelism, one would expect continual growth of the kingdom. However, this clearly isn’t happening, and it seems to many people that the world is getting spiritually darker every day. Whatever tactics are being used today to grow the kingdom, it’s clearly not working.

Trying to understand this led me to the letter to the Laodiceans in Revelations. In that letter, Jesus rebukes the church in Laodicea as being lukewarm, which in the context of the letter, likely meant that the church was ineffective and not fulfilling its purpose, just like both cool refreshing water and hot healing water became unpleasant, even useless, when piped from their sources to Laodicea, because the water was lukewarm.

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Praying for Boldness

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Reaching out to unbelievers to talk about God, especially in today’s non-spiritual environment, is hard for all of us. The key to improving in this is not to depend on our own power, but as in everything else, to focus first on God.

“And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness. Acts 4:29-21

To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, Ephesians 6:18b-19

The boldness needed here is not something that we can drum up within ourselves; we need the Spirit to give us boldness in speaking.

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About Exploring Antioch

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This blog is my personal journey to understand how to share the gospel with the growing number of people who don’t seem to be reached through common evangelism techniques, especially those who are far from faith, who have no interest in the Bible, in our spiritual perspectives, or even visiting a church.

Inspired by those in Acts who sought out unbelievers far from Jerusalem, I’m seeking new ways to share Jesus with those far from the faith. Those believers, even though not leaders, recognized the urgency of the mission when persecution started and they accelerated growth toward the ends of the Earth. They eventually reached the first purely Gentile audience in Antioch:

And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. … Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. … Now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except Jews. But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellenists also, preaching the Lord Jesus. Acts 8:1b, 4, 11:19-20

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God’s Heart of Love

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John 3:16 is the most commonly quoted New Testament verse, for it speaks of God’s heart for reaching those who are far from Him.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16 (ESV)

This passage describes the great sacrifice that God made for our benefit. However, note that this does not say that the sacrifice was for God’s people, or for the church, but for the world. That is, it was for those who, without this sacrifice, are alienated from Him. At the right time, Christ died for the ungodly, demonstrating God’s love (Rom. 5:6-8).

In other words, God loves those who are alienated from Him.

This must be His motivation for sending us out as Jesus described, and must also demonstrate Jesus’s heart.

So then, if we are to be His disciples, we should seek for it to describe our hearts, too. This is a great place to start praying for our role in God’s plan to reach into the darkness with His light.

Father, I am in awe of the unbounded love that would move you to save people who are naturally hostile to you. I ask You to give me Your heart of love for those who don’t know You.

Leaders and the Ends of the Earth

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There is a spiritual darkness, a spiritual hunger, growing in our culture today and our religious institutions seem unable to address it. The reasons for this are various and only partly known, but we clearly need a new effort to go into the darkness and declare the light.

Unfortunately, it often seems that our religious organizations are even holding us back. The effort needed to keep organizations running smoothly keeps leaders focused inward, which is natural. The leaders, in turn, keep the lay believers focused inward. Unfortunately, this all works in opposition to the “go” mindset. Even when churches reach out, they do so from an organizational perspective.

For example, a lot of outreach consists of inviting people into church. Such invitations may be to religious services or largely secular activities designed to be welcoming and attractive to non-Christians. This is not the same as sending people from church into the darkness, however. Consider that the ways spiritual truths are shared almost always use Christian terminology and often even Scripture, which is not the way people share ideas in the darkness.

As we’ve seen elsewhere, there is a need to reach those who are spiritually furthest from church. They probably will not respond to invitations, have little interest in learning about Christianity (the religion), and so on. They may well need to be brought into a relationship with God before finding a church, and the best church for them may not be the one associated with whoever led them to God.

Thus, those furthest from God (at the spiritual ends of the Earth) are not good targets for typical organizational outreach efforts. In addition, leaders are so focused on the organizations that they seem not to recognize the need to send their people out. Rather than encourage individual seeking, they encourage passive listening to in-church teachings that continue to focus internally.

In a sense, I think something similar is pictured in Acts. When the persecution started after Stephen’s death, the apostles stayed in Jerusalem while the other believers scattered, preaching the word as they went. In other words, in the face of persecution, they redoubled their efforts to spread the gospel (Acts 8:1-4).

This continued until these believers reached areas that were far from Judea, both physically and spiritually. The final breakthrough to people completely separate from God occurred in Antioch, through the ministry of these unknown believers (Acts 11:19).

So, the picture seems to be of the leaders focusing on keeping the church healthy, while the lay believers focus on witnessing of Jesus.

Some of the things I’ve read about the early church also seem to echo this. Writings of the church fathers seem often to do with organizational matters, doctrine, liturgy, and so on. Things that are (rightly and necessarily) focused on keeping the church healthy, but not necessarily growing the kingdom.

On the other hand, one of the earliest clear apologetic writings is by an unknown author (The Letter to Diognetus), apparently a lay believer who simply felt the need to share the gospel clearly with someone who needed to hear it.

To be sure, there are numerous stories of the apostles spreading the gospel in different regions, but these extra-Biblical accounts seem to be exceptions, rather than the rule.

Whether these observations of the early church are correct or not, it does seem that the reality today is that current organizations, and the people who lead them, are not interested in reaching far into the darkness. This leaves an opportunity for lay believers to make that journey, just as happened in Acts.