Service started, and everything happened as usual… music, announcements, and even a video. A few folks turned their chairs on an angle… still, though, just looking over their shoulder. Then I got up to teach – one man out of the whole crowd turned his chair around to take notes, but everyone else didn’t.

I started my message in Acts 2 where the people who hear the message about Jesus are “cut to the heart” and respond to the disciples by wanting to step over the line of salvation. I then asked the people to talk with each other about someone they know who is far from God – really, really far from God – and if they could ever conceive of that person coming to faith. 95% responded no… which was when I hit them with the punchline.

“I’m curious,” I began, “why your chairs are still facing that direction.” Everyone laughed… finally it was acknowledged. I then read from John 14 where Jesus said that His disciples would do “greater things” than He did on earth… and I asked if they believed that.

This would require them doing more than accepting the way things are… they would have to make the effort to see things forward instead of backward. At this point I invited them to turn their chairs around if they were willing to start the journey of believing this. And then from the there the rest of the teaching continued.

We did an experiment… a church within a church… a youth church under the governance of the main church… We are winding down that ministry to simply become a “service” again after 6 months… It didn’t quite fit into the current cultural state… perhaps we were too edgy… however I think the edge is just getting sharpened as we prepare for what is coming up…

But that is beside the point… interesting illustrations, huh? Well, I don’t know how interesting or whatnot these are, but here are a few:

Well… In January we decided to shock the audience… first… I preached entirely in the Russian Language (a first for me) and we started with a explicit (not bad, just detailed) commercial for Tampons.

We we doing a series called “??????? ?????????” (The scandal of Grace) and we were looking in Isaiah 64… We wanted to prove that the point, which I stated: “Giving our best to God is like us offering a dirty, bloody, used tampon to God and saying: here is my gift to you, I bring you the glory that is this tampon.Take it in your hands.”

The point was that we are ALL under sin, and therefore all under grace and there is no difference (Romans 8) other than Christ.”

We had visiting pastors from other former Soviet States in the Audience. Our Senior pastor is the most influential (non-orthodox) religious leader in the Country. I wasn’t in trouble, but now, I run my Illustrations by people first.

When asked by the other pastors, if such things were allowed in His church; he simply responded: “It is the Word of God.”

The other idea, was to show a produced video of a man cleaning the bathrooms of a school with his t-shirt and then wearing that T-shirt around the school proclaiming how “clean” he was! There were no takers for the main role! But, basically we wanted to portray how many of us walk with our own righteousness, proclaiming ourselves clean and dirty-ing up all around us. Only when we have donned the white robes of Christ’s righteousness are we clean, and it is nothing we can claim of ourselves.

Doing a series called “?????: ????, ??????, ???” (Flame: Sex, Love, GOD) we chose to interview students at universities on their thoughts of Sex and God, and show the results. The interviewers were shown in bed together, until between them the preacher sat up and said: “Tonight we’re gonna talk about sex!” The montage ends with the question: is God in the middle of your bed?

In doing a series on what it means to be a disciple and to “grow up” in Christ we did a video where, I as the faithful pastor played the part of Satan: whispering in the protagonist’s ear. The guy goes through various temptations,littering drinking, etc. and always “dos what it right”. he eventually is tempted and goes to “be with” a girl he meets on the street and the next day he survives the “litter” temptation yet again. We were trying to show what the Christian life was for many: only that which is seen and in secret we sin greatly. I preached in my Satan outfit: pointing out that in many of our hearts we already listen to the words of the devil, so maybe they would hear me and move beyond mere visible actions.

I have more, but I have already written much at the moment… if you want more just ask…

as for now… we are gearing up to be risky… like make other church-goers hate us risky… Once classes start in September we are going to promote a Q&A forum on some of the campuses in the city…. the name loosely translated, means: Interrogate the pastor” (But in Russian its way better because its the word that the KGB used to use so using the entire phrase actually conjures up curiosity… as it actually was done) and… we want to hold the event in an empty strip club! Think about it: if your a humanist university student in a former Soviet country and you get a rave card advertising a KGB style interrogation of a pastor whose name everyone recognizes and it was at a strip club, would you go? I would! The kicker is this: any question of life and faith can be asked, and unless specifically about scripture the answers cannot come from there. They must only back up our other arguments and reason. We want to show that Yeas, as Peter said in John 6: HE alone has the words of life! …and his answers are the most wise and the most intelligent and we can prove it outside of the text! Should be fun!

Watch the link.
http://snipurl.com/28kgn

Very powerful teaching moment for our church. But the really cool thing was I talked about how little things could mess up the race, small sins, stuff we dont think of as important – but they can cause us to get off the line (path) because we arent following God’s word. I dont recommend this – it happened quite by accident – but when I was driving the Dale Jarrett Racing Experience – I blew a tire coming out of turn 4 at talledega at over 140 MPH. I probably picked up a screw or small bolt or other piece of debris – and it shredded the right rear tire. It took me off the line and messed up my race.

You can see the video from inside the car here

The illustration was even more powerful because of what happened. (although maybe not something you can duplicate. )

Note: the musical choice in the second video is because Chris Elrod calls me “Pastor Magoo” because I am accident prone.