The New Romans
The New Romans
By Ron Wood
Over forty years ago, I began preaching. My first sermons were in front of an open-air bus stop on the sunny streets of Lakeland, Florida. In High School at the time, I staged my Saturday morning sermons behind a banner with an American flag. My pastor was Karl Strader, who went with us and encouraged us by his example. My outdoor congregation had about a ten minute turn-over as various buses came through to pick up and drop off passengers. I felt like a fool, but I was a happy, anointed fool.
With some friends, we took handfuls of gospel tracts and distributed them through car windows as vehicles circled the parking lot of Burger King on Saturday nights. It was the thing to do for teenagers at the time, so I went where the most unsaved kids could be found. I burned with zeal for my peers to be saved.
At school, I carried a thin New Testament on top of my books. I would read it between classes or in study hall. I underlined verses that spoke to me. I learned the secret to memorizing Scripture was to read it aloud repeatedly until it was written on your heart and you could quote it without effort. Other students may have laughed at me, and I could certainly hear accusing spirits mocking me, but I was respected for my stand. I found out that the bolder you are for Christ, the easier it is to stand.
My early sermons weren’t polished masterpieces. I struggled greatly. In fact, I wasn’t a good preacher at all. But I was saved. I had a testimony of knowing Jesus. That’s all it takes to be a witness: to have experienced something and be able to truthfully tell what you’ve seen or heard. I could testify about meeting Jesus. Later, after being filled with the Holy Spirit again, a strong prophetic anointing came upon me that enabled me to open my mouth and preach God’s Word without fear, a gift that remains in me to this day.
I’ve had a prophetic dream lately, well, actually two of them, that involve bold public proclamations. In the first, I’m in an airport and I see Muslims bowing down in the waiting area, praying toward Mecca. As they make their ritual incantations, “There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet,” I immediately stand behind them and loudly declare, “There is no God but Jehovah and Jesus Christ is His Son!” There is a war over whose words will fill the air over our land.
In the next dream, I am in the Dickson Street Theater in Fayetteville where I had gone to hear my daughter’s folk music group perform to a packed house of mingling, drinking, singing, laughing, loudly talking University of Arkansas college-age-and-beyond kids. (Believe me, Razorback country is definitely a non-religious environment!) In this dream, I stood and declared aloud, “Does anyone here want to be saved?” And of course, no one responded because no one knows what being saved is anymore. Or if they do know, they mock the idea of needing it themselves since for post-modern kids the concept of sin is missing from their understanding. They have no religious vocabulary.
But they do have a conscience and the Holy Spirit is unstoppable! Prayer knows no limits. There is no barrier devised by man or devils that can prevent prayer from finding its mark. There is no law against love and no way to halt love’s motivation. My wife and I have proved this over the years as we have targeted neighbors or family or friends with persistent intercessory prayers on their behalf, that they might be saved. Prayer works, as long as you don’t give up. With prayer, it’s always too soon to quit. The tears of intercessors are like liquid gold briefly stored in the bank of heaven. God loves to cash these prayers in: suddenly, surprisingly, with stunning grace.
Just last week, one of the 25 year old girls in the singing group came to me at the VA Hospital where we had gone to watch them perform. “Would you baptize me?” she asked. She chose me because she thought I had “good vibrations.”
“I would be proud to,” I replied. We arranged to meet later. I explained to her that I would first help her understand from the Bible what baptism meant. “Great!” she said. “I want my mother and all my friends to be there and I want to do it outside in a river!”
That’s a pretty powerful request from someone who wasn’t yet saved. But we had been praying for all the young adults in this singing group for some time and we knew that God was at work. Among the dozen members, sin had already done its work. There were already divorcees, a homosexual, childhood abuse cases, and freewheeling discussions of new age spirituality mixed with wonderful talent and sincere loyalty. They are not far from the kingdom of God; yet they are still lost without Christ. We love them.
It has become obvious to us as we have delivered spaghetti dinners and sat listening to their rehearsals that these kids have no defense against the gospel of grace. They are ripe for the testimony of Jesus, yet they are resistant to the notion of attending church. They have no barriers to the message of the kingdom of God; they’ve just never heard it. They have no prejudice against Christians; they’ve just not been around genuine, saved, sincere non-judgmental believers. I believe the witness of a risen Jesus and the truth of God, delivered with honesty and humility, can penetrate their irreligious walls like a hot knife through butter.
But, in order to have opportunity to speak to lost people, two things must happen. One- you have to be around them; and two- you have to win the right to be heard by being a friend. Unlike the drive-by preaching I did at the bus depot to strangers years ago, true friendship evangelism requires an investment of time. Often it also necessitates an investment of money, compassion, being personally inconvenienced, and patience. Jesus stopped in his busy journey and stooped down to help hurting people. He heard their cry, listened to their heart, and by grace brought heaven’s power to bear to meet their need and to heal their soul.
Lately I’ve found myself re-reading the Book of Romans in the New Testament. It is one of Paul’s great epistles. It starts off with the grand truth of who God is and how, as the Creator, he relates to the world and to mankind. It lays out wonderful doctrine, the foundational truth of our justification by faith. Then it proceeds to the turning point, chapter twelve, where the great apostle to the non-Jewish world makes practical applications for how the truth he just presented should be applied to our lives. In all of Paul’s letters he follows this same pattern: divine revelation then practical application.
I studied Rome’s language, Latin, for four years and have read some Roman history in its original language. The Book of Romans speaks to me today. Why? Because our post-modern western culture has become like the old Roman culture. Irreligious, worshipping many gods, indulging in all the vanities of life and all the pleasures of the flesh, we are now just like them: self-absorbed technologically-advanced world-dominating pagans who worship power and pleasure.
In the midst of this society, the harvest is ripe yet the workers are few. For this challenge, the same God who transformed Rome’s wicked values by Christian martyrs and anointed apostles is now raising up a new generation of Christ-like workers who will also embrace the first sentence in the Book of Romans as their new mandate from God, so that we also in our day may “…receive grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith…” among the Gentiles. (Romans 1:1-6)
May God open our eyes so that we can see what is around us. God’s glory is destined to be poured out on all flesh! God is calling us to feel this lost generation’s pain, to understand their rejection and have mercy on their alienation, to see their fatherlessness and sympathize with their wounded souls, to get connected with their world, and to rescue them by any and all means.
Getting saved is more than having a ticket to heaven. We have to bring them to faith in Christ and also bring them into the culture of Christ’s apostolic and prophetic community, the Body of Christ. (Acts 2:38-47)
This will require of us offering up our lives in the service of love. It is easy to remain safe inside the church’s walls. It is easy to leave the work to the salaried church professionals. (How’s that been working for you?) The risk of love requires spending time with people outside our comfort zones, using our cars, our home, and our good works as tools to bless others. Will you go where Jesus went? Will you love like He loves? Will you represent His hands? Will you help recruit candidates for our Lord’s army?
The New Romans © 2007 by Ron Wood. Visit us at www.touchedbygrace.org, or write to us at ron@touchedbygrace.org. Permission to reprint granted. Mail: P. O. Box 8650, Springdale, AR 72766. Donations by check or online Paypal enable us to send resources to the poor around the world. We are touched by grace to touch the world! Thank you!
By Ron Wood
Over forty years ago, I began preaching. My first sermons were in front of an open-air bus stop on the sunny streets of Lakeland, Florida. In High School at the time, I staged my Saturday morning sermons behind a banner with an American flag. My pastor was Karl Strader, who went with us and encouraged us by his example. My outdoor congregation had about a ten minute turn-over as various buses came through to pick up and drop off passengers. I felt like a fool, but I was a happy, anointed fool.
With some friends, we took handfuls of gospel tracts and distributed them through car windows as vehicles circled the parking lot of Burger King on Saturday nights. It was the thing to do for teenagers at the time, so I went where the most unsaved kids could be found. I burned with zeal for my peers to be saved.
At school, I carried a thin New Testament on top of my books. I would read it between classes or in study hall. I underlined verses that spoke to me. I learned the secret to memorizing Scripture was to read it aloud repeatedly until it was written on your heart and you could quote it without effort. Other students may have laughed at me, and I could certainly hear accusing spirits mocking me, but I was respected for my stand. I found out that the bolder you are for Christ, the easier it is to stand.
My early sermons weren’t polished masterpieces. I struggled greatly. In fact, I wasn’t a good preacher at all. But I was saved. I had a testimony of knowing Jesus. That’s all it takes to be a witness: to have experienced something and be able to truthfully tell what you’ve seen or heard. I could testify about meeting Jesus. Later, after being filled with the Holy Spirit again, a strong prophetic anointing came upon me that enabled me to open my mouth and preach God’s Word without fear, a gift that remains in me to this day.
I’ve had a prophetic dream lately, well, actually two of them, that involve bold public proclamations. In the first, I’m in an airport and I see Muslims bowing down in the waiting area, praying toward Mecca. As they make their ritual incantations, “There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet,” I immediately stand behind them and loudly declare, “There is no God but Jehovah and Jesus Christ is His Son!” There is a war over whose words will fill the air over our land.
In the next dream, I am in the Dickson Street Theater in Fayetteville where I had gone to hear my daughter’s folk music group perform to a packed house of mingling, drinking, singing, laughing, loudly talking University of Arkansas college-age-and-beyond kids. (Believe me, Razorback country is definitely a non-religious environment!) In this dream, I stood and declared aloud, “Does anyone here want to be saved?” And of course, no one responded because no one knows what being saved is anymore. Or if they do know, they mock the idea of needing it themselves since for post-modern kids the concept of sin is missing from their understanding. They have no religious vocabulary.
But they do have a conscience and the Holy Spirit is unstoppable! Prayer knows no limits. There is no barrier devised by man or devils that can prevent prayer from finding its mark. There is no law against love and no way to halt love’s motivation. My wife and I have proved this over the years as we have targeted neighbors or family or friends with persistent intercessory prayers on their behalf, that they might be saved. Prayer works, as long as you don’t give up. With prayer, it’s always too soon to quit. The tears of intercessors are like liquid gold briefly stored in the bank of heaven. God loves to cash these prayers in: suddenly, surprisingly, with stunning grace.
Just last week, one of the 25 year old girls in the singing group came to me at the VA Hospital where we had gone to watch them perform. “Would you baptize me?” she asked. She chose me because she thought I had “good vibrations.”
“I would be proud to,” I replied. We arranged to meet later. I explained to her that I would first help her understand from the Bible what baptism meant. “Great!” she said. “I want my mother and all my friends to be there and I want to do it outside in a river!”
That’s a pretty powerful request from someone who wasn’t yet saved. But we had been praying for all the young adults in this singing group for some time and we knew that God was at work. Among the dozen members, sin had already done its work. There were already divorcees, a homosexual, childhood abuse cases, and freewheeling discussions of new age spirituality mixed with wonderful talent and sincere loyalty. They are not far from the kingdom of God; yet they are still lost without Christ. We love them.
It has become obvious to us as we have delivered spaghetti dinners and sat listening to their rehearsals that these kids have no defense against the gospel of grace. They are ripe for the testimony of Jesus, yet they are resistant to the notion of attending church. They have no barriers to the message of the kingdom of God; they’ve just never heard it. They have no prejudice against Christians; they’ve just not been around genuine, saved, sincere non-judgmental believers. I believe the witness of a risen Jesus and the truth of God, delivered with honesty and humility, can penetrate their irreligious walls like a hot knife through butter.
But, in order to have opportunity to speak to lost people, two things must happen. One- you have to be around them; and two- you have to win the right to be heard by being a friend. Unlike the drive-by preaching I did at the bus depot to strangers years ago, true friendship evangelism requires an investment of time. Often it also necessitates an investment of money, compassion, being personally inconvenienced, and patience. Jesus stopped in his busy journey and stooped down to help hurting people. He heard their cry, listened to their heart, and by grace brought heaven’s power to bear to meet their need and to heal their soul.
Lately I’ve found myself re-reading the Book of Romans in the New Testament. It is one of Paul’s great epistles. It starts off with the grand truth of who God is and how, as the Creator, he relates to the world and to mankind. It lays out wonderful doctrine, the foundational truth of our justification by faith. Then it proceeds to the turning point, chapter twelve, where the great apostle to the non-Jewish world makes practical applications for how the truth he just presented should be applied to our lives. In all of Paul’s letters he follows this same pattern: divine revelation then practical application.
I studied Rome’s language, Latin, for four years and have read some Roman history in its original language. The Book of Romans speaks to me today. Why? Because our post-modern western culture has become like the old Roman culture. Irreligious, worshipping many gods, indulging in all the vanities of life and all the pleasures of the flesh, we are now just like them: self-absorbed technologically-advanced world-dominating pagans who worship power and pleasure.
In the midst of this society, the harvest is ripe yet the workers are few. For this challenge, the same God who transformed Rome’s wicked values by Christian martyrs and anointed apostles is now raising up a new generation of Christ-like workers who will also embrace the first sentence in the Book of Romans as their new mandate from God, so that we also in our day may “…receive grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith…” among the Gentiles. (Romans 1:1-6)
May God open our eyes so that we can see what is around us. God’s glory is destined to be poured out on all flesh! God is calling us to feel this lost generation’s pain, to understand their rejection and have mercy on their alienation, to see their fatherlessness and sympathize with their wounded souls, to get connected with their world, and to rescue them by any and all means.
Getting saved is more than having a ticket to heaven. We have to bring them to faith in Christ and also bring them into the culture of Christ’s apostolic and prophetic community, the Body of Christ. (Acts 2:38-47)
This will require of us offering up our lives in the service of love. It is easy to remain safe inside the church’s walls. It is easy to leave the work to the salaried church professionals. (How’s that been working for you?) The risk of love requires spending time with people outside our comfort zones, using our cars, our home, and our good works as tools to bless others. Will you go where Jesus went? Will you love like He loves? Will you represent His hands? Will you help recruit candidates for our Lord’s army?
The New Romans © 2007 by Ron Wood. Visit us at www.touchedbygrace.org, or write to us at ron@touchedbygrace.org. Permission to reprint granted. Mail: P. O. Box 8650, Springdale, AR 72766. Donations by check or online Paypal enable us to send resources to the poor around the world. We are touched by grace to touch the world! Thank you!
