Avoiding the World Means Abandoning the Lost

A few years ago, I heard about a youth pastor who purposely took his students to Gay Day at Disney World.

Every year, he would find out when Gay Day would be at the Magic Kingdom.  Then, he would plan a youth group trip to Disney World specifically for that day.  He would take the students to the park, expose them to something extremely counter-culture to their faith, and afterwards, he debriefed them about their experience.

His rationale was this:  He wanted to expose them to worldly behavior so he could walk through what they had seen from a scriptural point of view.  He reasoned that it was best to expose them to lewd behavior now, while he and other parents and adults could talk through the process, than to wait for them to get to college or the real world and experience it with no Biblical context whatsoever.  He didn't want college professors and fellow students to be their only point of reference for sorting it out.

I was never that bold, but I admire what he did.  He wanted to give students an opportunity to experience something the world deems OK, but that scripture calls out as sin.  He wanted that to happen while he could correct what they viewed and give them a scriptural view.  He didn't want college friends and professors to be the major influence on their point of view and theology.

Too often, as churches, we try to shelter our families from reality.  We don't want them to experience anything sinful or lewd or non-Christian.  We place them in this bubble.  We send them exclusively to Christian schools, Christian clubs, Christian sports leagues and Christian youth groups.  We make sure they only hear Christian music, watch Christian movies, read Christian books and attend Christian events.  It is entirely possible to live a completely sheltered life.

However, Christ never expected us to hide from the world.  Just the opposite.  He expects us to interact with it in order to share the truth of his Gospel.

In Revelation 2:1-7, Christ accuses the church at Ephesus of losing their first love.  They had lost their passion for sharing the Gospel.  They were great at rooting out evil, keeping morals, finding sound Biblical leaders and shutting out the pagan influences in their church.  Yet, somewhere along the line, all of that became more important than sharing Christ with the lost people just outside their church doors.

We can get so caught up in the "Christian life" that we ignore a world that is dying and going to Hell.  I'm not saying we should purposely go to Gay Day at Disney World (I chose to avoid it two years ago because my daughter was too young to understand), but we shouldn't be afraid of being among the world and explaining things from a Biblical perspective.  How are we to win the lost if we never encounter them or form a relationship with them?

If you look around and only see Christian friends, whom will you tell about Jesus?  We are commanded to go to a lost world and share the truth of Jesus Christ.  If not, then he is indicting us.