"When you enter a house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you. Stay in that house, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to house."
Luke 10: 5-7 (NIV)
Luke 10: 5-7 (NIV)
We now come to the fourth component of Jesus' Missionary Strategy. The first three are: Work in teams; know where you're going; and develop a powerful prayer emphasis. Now we are approaching where the rubber hits the road and where we begin to engage the targeted community to form a beachhead for missional operations. A new term is being introduced, Man of Peace, to describe the targeted audience. Understanding this targeted audience is of the utmost strategic importance for the powerful penetration and the rapid spreading of the gospel throughout a mission field.
Finding the Man of Peace is the answer to the prayers that were offered up to the Lord of the Harvest to send more laborers into the field. First one prays for more help in the harvest field and then one begins to search for the answer to that prayer. Finding the Man of Peace and establishing a beachhead for kingdom operations within his home is how the team is to prepare the community for Jesus' arrival or in the case of the book of Acts for the Holy Spirit's arrival. The home of the Man of Peace is to be the place where Jesus would base his ministry and operations within that town. This home would be the place where Jesus would teach, preach, heal and fellowship with his disciples and the residents of the community. This Man of Peace and his home would become the epicenter of Jesus' missional movement within that community that would naturally spread through his web of influence. This Man of Peace would be the key to opening the hearts of large numbers of people to receive Christ. Finding this man is critical to the success of saturating Christ's kingdom in that community.
But how does one recognize the Man of Peace and How does one find him? According to Thom Wolfe, former pastor of Church on Brady Street in East LA and mission professor at Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary, there are three characteristics that will identify the Person of Peace.
- First, The Person of Peace has been prepared to received Christ by the working of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said,
"When you enter a house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' If a man of peace is
there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you."
there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you."
Jesus is clearly indicating that the man of peace is one who is ready to receive the message of salvation. He is that fruit that is ripe for the picking. Every person who can be identified as a Person of Peace in the Gospels or the Book of Acts has been a person ready and eager to receive Christ. That doesn't mean that there are not others who are ready to receive Christ. There are. But remember the Person of Peace is a strategic tool, that Christ uses, to unlock the doors to large groups of people. Now while we are ready and willing to lead any and all people to Christ we must also be looking for that strategic Person of Peace whom God will use to open up large numbers of other hearts for his glory. Therefore, understanding the other two characteristics is vital.
- The second characteristic is that they are people with a reputation. This reputation may be positive or negative. It doesn't really matter. The point is that large numbers of people know who they are. They have a familiar face or name within that targeted mission field. Hearing of this person has come to faith in Christ would cause the ears of many to perk up. People might even be shocked at the news that this particular person has become a believer in Christ.
- The third characteristic is that the Person of Peace is highly influential. They are natural leaders. When they speak people, in their mission field listen and follow. The Person of Peace has a web of influence that can be very large. When he speaks about his conversion experience he has instant credibility the people. Because of their credibility people believe the validity of their testimony.
When all three characteristics are present there is the potential for an explosion of people coming to faith in Christ. But we have to learn how to recognize them and how to capitalize on it. To many missed opportunities of large numbers of people coming to faith in Christ happen simply because we have not learned how to capitalize on this strategic missional principle. But that is a discussion for another post.
How do you find such people? Jesus instructed the 72 to go door to door until they found the person who match the description of the Person of Peace. Once that person was identified they were to stop their search and stay with that person. I will share more about that later but for now just understand the way you find the Person of Peace is the same way you look for a needle in a haystack, one house at a time.
If we are going to be effective in the rapid spreading of the Kingdom of God and the gospel, we must be determined to find the Persons of Peace that God has prepared. Being able to identify the Man of Peace is the skill that effective missionaries need to develop. It is important to understand that we are unable to create or even develop people to become a Person of Peace. This is the work of the God. It is God, the Lord of the Harvest, who is responsible for calling out the workers (Man of Peace) into the fields but it is our job to find this person, walk alongside them with encouragement, equip them and then unleash them into the harvest fields.
LET'S DO IT!
WOW,
ReplyDeleteWhile I have agreed with the precepts presented thus far in the series, and can agree to a certain point with this one, I haven’t agreed with all the arguments made to support them.
This is definitely the case with the one presented here. This is a clear case of eisegesis (reading into the passage). My intent is not to be divisive but to come to a clear
understanding of Biblical doctrine (I know this word is anathema in the modern church, but it simply means teaching), and to be as a Berean (Acts 17:11) receiving the Word of God from a preacher, but searching the scripture to see whether these things are so.
I am confused and troubled by many points in this meditation. Help me, I just don’t get it. Target audience, isn’t the target audience every city and place, whither he himself would come? (Lk 10:1) Shouldn’t our “target audience” be un-repentant sinners? I am not following this Man of peace emphasis. In the Greek, man of peace comes from the words, huios eirene, or literally, a son of peace or prosperity. In the passage the “man of peace” seems to be more incidental than an emphasis. It is interesting that the scripture does not record Jesus following the 70 (the majority text) or the 12 for that matter and establishing a base of ministry in the house of “the man of peace”, rather they returned with joy and told Jesus their stories.
Point 1- The man of peace has been prepared to receive Christ by the working of the Holy Spirit. True, but scripture clearly teaches that that man or woman is one who has been convicted of the sin in their life, repented from that sin and has received salvation through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. Those who reject it are the children of wrath.
Point 2- They are people with a reputation, I’m confused doesn’t everyone have a reputation? No point in expounding.
Point 3- The man of peace is highly influential, this is contrary to scripture. In fact most of the influential people in the world are the children of wrath. 1Cor.1:26-30 NIV, states, Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things-and the things that are not-to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God-that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.
How do we find such people? Going door to door? Jesus did not direct his followers to go door to door, he sent them to cities (we would say villages). Then if a man of peace (a repentant sinner) invited them to stay at their house they should stay at that residence until they went to another village. That was the emphasis of the passage. If I am to follow your logic if I go door to door should I pronounce the wrath of God on every house that rejects the message that they should repent from their sin? (Mk 6:12) I expect that part 5 of Jesus’ missionary strategy will emphasize the wrath of God on those who reject God’s salvation seeing as how Jesus gave it so much emphasis in this passage and on all three accounts of sending out the 12 in Mt 10, Mk 6 and Lk 9. I say this with my tongue in my cheek, but who knows if we warn sinners about the wrath of God, they may feel contrition for their sin, repent and become Men of peace.
I agree with the conclusion of this meditation. We cannot make men of peace only God can. Acts 2:47b And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved. It is our calling to make disciples of these men of peace once they are recognized. And who knows but God what fruit may come from this work?
This is meant as a loving critique and encouragement. Thank you for your ministry and for this blog.
Et85224
E. Thank you for your thoughts and critique. It is always a good thing for people, including myself, to look over their understanding of scripture through the eyes of a fellow believer and reexamine them.
ReplyDeleteIf my blog causes a brother or sister in Christ to grab their Bible and check for themselves these things and then come to a conviction by the Holy Spirit of what is right, and if it then propels them to be a more faithful follower and intentional pursuer of God's mission then I have fulfilled my purpose for writing these posts. Jay