How Private Is Faith Supposed to Be?

Laurel D. Buckingham · Tidal Church Moncton · September 28, 2025 · The Way of Jesus series

Laurel D. Buckingham looks at the four friends who lowered a paralyzed man through a roof to Jesus in Luke 5. Following Jesus fully means going after what matters most to God: inviting others and helping them come to know Him.

More from Laurel D. Buckingham · The The Way of Jesus series

Topics: Faith, Mission & Outreach, Discipleship

Transcript

[0:00] Well, it's great to be here. Great to see this tremendous crowd this morning. And I have been here, I was here two weeks ago when there was that great service. So many people baptized, hundreds of children in here. What a day that was. Wasn't that tremendous? Well, when I drove in, a very nice man in the parking lot, a parking lot attendant, he stopped me in my car and he said, "Are you new here?" So, but that was wonderful 'cause he was fairly new himself and he was involved already and he had a special place. But Pastor Jim, when he first became the senior pastor here, he wanted all the team to park at the other side of the parking lot.

[0:51] And here he doesn't have any mercy, 86 or whatever it might be. And so I have had 62 years of doing what I'm told, married to the same woman. And so I park on the other side of the parking lot. Anyway, it is so good to see you all, and I want to talk today about: you get what you go after, and we all need, as God's children, to go after what is most important to God. Or you wouldn't have sent Jesus to the cross for that purpose. It had to be the most important thing. And He preached us throughout the Scripture over and over again. In Matthew 4:19, we read these words: "Follow Me and I will make you fishers of men."

[1:45] Now, I don't think it's a great stretch to say, if I am going to be a real follower of Jesus, then I'm going to want to have some part in helping somebody else that doesn't know Jesus get to know Him. I think there's some followers that know Jesus. There are faithful followers. They're here every Sunday and all that. But in order to be truly a full follower, then we have to go a further step and have some part in helping people to come to Jesus. We have these chairs up here and this third chair represents getting to that place where that is a way of life for all of us. And that is so critical for our spiritual development and our spiritual growth and establishment and having it influences as most important to God of anything and everything.

[2:42] It's always been my goal as a pastor to help people in their journey. I didn't, wasn't one to put people down, make people feel guilty, but some way to help. Listen, if we are going to get to that third chair, it is one of the most important places in our spiritual development to be helped. Because if we can get in on what is most important to God and have some little part in somebody's life being transformed, then that is going to give us strength. It's going to give us joy and it's going to do something for our spiritual lives in a great way. Jesus, we all know, was the loving, living, liberating, life-giving Savior and of Jesus has done all of that for each one of us.

[3:38] It just stands to reason. We want other people to get in on that experience, to be able to experience the best that God has for us. Jesus Himself said in John 4:34, when His disciples came to Him as He was ministering to the woman at the well and wanting her to have a relationship with God. And then He talked about the fields, the great fields being widened, the harvest, tremendous harvest field. Think of the harvest field that's out there right now. And Jesus said when His disciples came to Him, concerned that He have some nourishment, some food because they thought He must be hungry, Jesus said this, "My meat is to do to do the will of the Father," as it related to helping somebody in a relationship with God.

[4:32] Now let me say this, clear as crystal. It's wonderful to pray. I believe in that. It's wonderful to be in the Word of God. I believe it's wonderful to be in church. But if we have not taken a further step to do the will of God as it relates to helping somebody get to Jesus, we are missing a critical element in our spiritual diet and our spiritual growth and development. Jesus needed it, did it. If Jesus is important to Him to get that kind of meat, then where does that leave us? And so this is such a necessary part of getting where we need to be and having the abundant life.

[5:20] He came to give life. He came to give it more abundantly. He wants us to have the best. And that's the reason that He entreats us to do what He has said by fishing for men and having a part in all of this. Now, one thing I do wanna emphasize, I'm not talking about you being the person to win somebody to Christ. Now many have done that and it's the most wonderful thing when you see a life transform. But all I am saying, and this is what Jesus expects of all of us, is to have some direct part in knowing that we're doing something that's going to help somebody in their spiritual journey. I remember I used to, as pastor, I would meet with two or three people every week to talk to 'em about their relationship with the Lord.

[6:08] And there's this one man that was a manager of a bank here in the city and he wanted to talk about evolution, all kinds of things that really didn't matter. And I kept talking about the relationship. Finally, I invited him to go to a Promise Keepers rally where there were thousands of people. Billy Graham's son was preaching at that rally. And after he finished his message, he gave an invitation. This guy that I'm talking about was there with me and with others. And all at once, he bolted, ran down the aisle, we were in the bleachers. He ran down the aisle, jumped over a four foot wall and headed for the altar and received Jesus Christ as Savior. Now, I was not the one to lead him, but do you think I wasn't excited, I was just as excited as if I had been the one to lead him to Christ.

[6:57] And so this helped me in my own spiritual life. So you get what you go after and I'm gonna talk to you today about four guys that got what they went after. And it's a kind of thing that every person in this place who names a name of Jesus needs to go after and make it deliberate, intentional and keep it in our conscience and on our hearts all the time to be going after what God wants us to go after. This Scripture is found in Luke 5, beginning at verse 17. One day as He was teaching, Jesus, that is, Pharisees and teachers of the law who came from every village of Galilee and from Judea and Jerusalem were sitting there. Now that must have been quite a crowd.

[7:54] The power of the Lord was present to, for Him to heal the sick. Then we read in the 18th verse, some men came carrying a paralytic on a mat and tried to take him into the house to lay him before Jesus when they could not find a way because of the crowd. They went on the roof, if you can imagine, and lowered him on his mat through the tiles into the middle of the crowd, right in front of Jesus. Now here's the thing, and this is what Jesus will honor. When He saw their faith, He said, "Friend, your sins are forgiven."

[8:42] And then we read in the 25th verse, immediately he stood up in front of them, took what he had been lying on, and went home praising God. There's nothing that would cause anybody any more praise than to have their sins forgiven, to pass from death into life. That's the greatest healing of all healings. And then the 26th verse, everyone was amazed and gave praise to God, and they were filled with awe and said, "We have seen remarkable things this day." And I'm just so glad to be in a church where we receive, we see remarkable things. I'm glad for the vision of a pastor who's established this site church and all the remarkable things that are happening, and that causes great praise within all of us.

[9:31] Now I think these men were full followers, at least one of them was a full follower. He probably had an enormous transformation. And so if the others weren't full followers, he convinced them to have a part in what was the most important thing they could ever be doing, is helping somebody come to Christ. And they went after this man, he might have been reluctant, but I have a, if the state he was in, I have an idea he was ready. Now let me say this, and this is one of the important statements I hope you can hear in this message. The people out there that need Christ are often far more ready for an invitation than the people in here are.

[10:16] To give them an invitation. Let me say it again: the people out there that need the Lord, sometimes it's a case where they are far more ready to respond to the invitation than we are ready to give them an invitation. You're kind of quiet now. No, it's all right. So it is our great joy and responsibility to be inviting every which way like these men. But they put some effort into it. In fact, they got there and there was this crowd. Now this is a crowd of religious people, and oftentimes the religious people are the deadest crowd in the world.

[11:06] Now, I want to point out, first of all, the power of the Lord was present. And I tell you, when the power of God is present, like we had here two weeks ago, when there was that great service, the power of the Lord is present. You can feel something, something excites you, something stirs you, something fires you up. But to be fired up for a purpose, and that purpose is for us to reach out to others. I remember sometime ago, pastor of a church here that would hold about 1300 people was very critical of what we're trying to do, 'cause we're just trying to do everything under the sun to reach people for Jesus. We had a, I had a mission statement for myself as well as for the church.

[11:54] We must use every available means at every available time. This is so important to reach every available person with a message of the gospel. And that statement would come back to bite us every once in a while, 'cause we realize maybe we're not doing everything that we could and should be doing, and we would try something else. But this pastor said in response to what was going on here, he said, "I happen to believe in a very dignified service." Well, our service weren't always dignified. And I, so I visited the church in a series of meetings, and he gets up in front of his people and says, now, just like I'm saying it now, remember, "If you bring one more tomorrow night, that will double the attendance."

[12:49] I thought, man alive. Doesn't that put the excitement in you, the fire in you to spur you to get out there and double that attendance? Man, I can just hardly wait to get outta this place and invite somebody for the service that next night. However, here's the sad part. A church that sees 1300, I was there not very long ago. They had less than 60 people. And but when there is an excitement, there's a beautiful lady in this church that invited somebody to come that was of a entirely different faith. And as a result of that person coming here, they got involved in a ministry. And now they moved away from this city and they've incorporated that ministry in the church they're attending now. They're traveling the worldwide, the world over.

[13:39] And I haven't got time to go into the details of this. It's an unbelievable story. But anyway, there's going to be, bottom line, no question about it whatsoever. If I had, you would be convinced if I had time to tell the story, but there's going to be tens of thousands, probably hundreds of thousands of people come to know Jesus as a result of Julie's one invitation to come to this place. You just never know, do you, what an invitation could do. So this guy wrote a book about all this, and he wanted me to come for the launch of the book. And he kept saying to everybody, it was because of me. And I remember one time talking to him, he said, "You know, when I was first asked to go to your church, I said, why would I go to that church?

[14:25] I'm not of that faith." But he said, "Julie was so sweet you couldn't help but love her. And I couldn't say no to her." We could all be a little sweeter, couldn't we? And so he came and the rest is history. But one day I was preparing a message and I just thought of this. And I called Julie on the phone. I said, "Julie, Ron keeps trying to give me all the credit for coming here and getting exposed to a ministry that's now having a worldwide effect. I had nothing whatsoever to do with me. It was all because you invited him." And she just in a second said, "Pastor," she said, "I wouldn't have invited him if there wasn't something exciting to invite him to."

[15:16] And isn't it wonderful when you can be in a church where there is excitement, where there's anticipation, where people are serving and loving the Lord and bringing others to see Him and be a part of His family? And so these guys, they went after, they must have been greatly motivated and were finding somebody that was ready. I remember being in a church doing a consultation, great church, Main Street in Fredericton. And there was a lady on the board. And this lady said, she said, "You know, I thought you couldn't go to the church unless somebody invited you." And so she said, finally somebody. And now she was on the church board serving the Lord and excited about His church just because somebody gave her an invitation.

[16:10] Now that may not be the person that won her to the Lord, but thank God somebody had a conscience, and it was on their minds and they kept it on their minds. And they're willing to do what? Some people, it's unbelievable that we're so scared of rejection. I mean, what's it gonna do to you if somebody says no? Is it gonna kill you? Is it gonna hurt you? Cause you to have to go to the hospital or something? Nothing's gonna harm us if a little bit of rejection. I've heard people talking about knocking on doors and people slamming the door in their face in the early days because of the way we did things. I've knocked on thousands and thousands of doors.

[16:57] I can tell you I have never had a door slammed in my face once. And I'll tell you what, it's hard to slam a door in a smiling face when you're just smiling as you go up there to the door. But, and, and so there's no necessary fear of rejection. Now these guys got there and all these religious people are in the way. And that's usually the way it is. Problem imaginating, trouble predicting failure, visualizing obstacle, envisioning Pharisees that just wanna criticize. A lady in one of my churches, she had no filter. And, by the way, the happiest people that I know are people who are having a part in seeing people come to Jesus. But she had no filter. And so I asked her about an involvement in the church.

[17:43] She said, "No," just like that. "I'm not gonna do that. Then I wouldn't be able to criticize." Well, it's usually the people are sitting on the sidelines not having a power in seeing people's lives transform. That's all they got to do is stand back like these Pharisees and criticize. Can you imagine how these critics must have been when the tile began to come off of that roof, and all that, the commotion that would go with it, and Jesus trying to teach didn't bother Him any 'cause He knew what was going on. But there would be all kinds of criticism. And listen, if we're going to see the church of Jesus Christ become the church that God meant for His church to be, this should be. And I believe it is the most creative, innovative place that you could ever imagine.

[18:29] Because what we are doing is so critical and important. Why wouldn't it be the most creative place in the world in order to get people to Jesus? And so these guys, that was the way they were creative. And I can expect, when they first started talking about going through the man's roof, one of 'em said, "Man, I don't think that's a good idea." And probably someone else said, "Look, I didn't like coming here in the first place. Let's take him back home." But no, there was one person, like a lead pastor, we have here who had a vision. And he wasn't going to take no for an answer. And he was going to somehow make sure this man got to Jesus. So it takes determination, perseverance, creativity, innovation and work.

[19:16] There's some people who are very scared of a four-letter word. And that word is work. Scares the life out of them. But this man, these men were willing to do a little work, put forth some effort into what was most important. And it paid off. Jesus saw their faith and He said, "Man, your sins are forgiven you." I remember we had a great preacher in this church years ago, and he was on television, seen all over North America, really because of me participating in this television program. And he told about preaching in southern Alabama and had to be in Indianapolis the next morning, which would be a Monday morning, 'cause he was on the radio. And he said, "I preached five times and I was beat.

[20:09] I was so tired, my bones were aching. I went to my hotel room, got my luggage, and going down the elevator," he said, "there was this beautiful black girl on the elevator. And she said to me, 'Sir, I'm a sinful girl. Would you please pray for me?' And so," he said, "I prayed for her. She turned her life over to Christ. And then I headed from my car, was put in the luggage in my car, turned around and saw this black girl glowing, her facial expression. And she had another person with her. She said, 'My friend here is a sinful girl too. Would you please pray for her?' And," he said, "I prayed for her right there on the sidewalk and she received Christ as Savior. I get in my car, had to drive, was driving through the night." And he said, "The devil climbed up on the seat alongside of me.

[20:58] And the devil said to me, 'You're a big fool.' He said, I was so tired. He said, the devil said, 'You are a big fool preaching five times, driving all night long.'" And he said, "You know something, the devil was just about to get the best of me." And he said, "All at once I saw that beautiful black girl say, 'Friend, pastor, I'm a sinful girl. Would you please pray for me?' And," he said, "when I saw those girls and saw their glowing faces, I said, 'Mr. Devil, you go back to hell where you came from.' And," he said, "I went down the highway singing, 'We'll rejoice till Jesus comes. We'll work till Jesus comes.'" And I'm telling you, I wonder how many of us are kept from doing what is most important to Jesus.

[21:53] Because the devil climbs up on the seat alongside of us and shuts us up when there is such a desperate, desperate need. And there's so many people who are so ready and willing and wanting to respond when we reach out to them. But we have to go where the fish are if we're gonna be fishers of men as Jesus and a full follower of Christ. And be intentional. A number of years ago, I was invited to go fishing. I'm not a fisherman. I couldn't stand this. I don't have the patience for it. Just put bottom line. And, but they wanted me to go fishing, fisherman. They'd already been fishing.

[22:38] And they came into the wharf to put, asked me to get on the boat to pick me up. I got on the boat and we were mackerel fishing. And so I threw up my line. And the minute I, and they hadn't been catching anything, by the way, they hadn't caught a thing. I threw up my line and, man, a whole bunch of mackerel, I don't know, I must have probably jigged them. I don't know how that all works. But anyway, got a whole bunch of mackerel and put them in the boat, threw my line out again. Same thing happened again. They were looking like me. Like I was the expert. I was a fisherman of the world, but what was happening, they were putting their hooks down too deep or not deep enough. And just so happened, even though I didn't have a clue what I was doing, that I was just putting it where the mackerel were.

[23:25] Listen, I don't know too many times when we go out fishing that the fish jump in the boat. That might have happened in some cases, but that's very rare. We have to reach out. We have, if we're going to see the results that God would have us to see, and we're going to put forth the effort and be willing to work like our life depended on it, it's amazing how that we have the time to do the things we really wanna do. If you ever knew that. But we don't have the time to do the things that we pretend we want to do. We may want other people to think we want to, but we really don't want to.

[24:13] And of course, sometimes we have to do what we don't necessarily want to do. A long time ago, we were asked to, I was asked to find four ladies from our church of college age that would be on a television program that would be seen here all over Atlantic Canada. And they just wanted these ladies to be there to take phone calls that would be coming in. It was a spiritual program. And so I thought, I'll have a little bit of fun. So I went to each one that I had picked out to invite to be a part. I went to one and she said, well, pastor, I just can't, I'm just not available to do anything, because I didn't tell them what it was about, because she said, that's the day I do my grocery shopping and all that kind of thing.

[25:06] And then I went to another and she said, oh, sorry, I can't, I, they were, act like they were sincere. You know, that's when I have to clean my apartment and so on. And I can't remember all the excuses now, but they were really excuses. I said, that's too bad. World Literature Crusade wanted you to be on their television program. They'll be seen all over Atlantic Canada and now you won't be able to do it. Oh, pastor, I can change things around. That's not a problem. And they, every one of them were able to change things around so they could participate. We have the time to do what we really wanna do, but we don't have the time that we pretend we want to do.

[25:53] And there's nothing more important for us to do than what these men did so that we can get what we go after and see lives transformed by the message of the gospel and people come to know Christ as Savior. We gotta go where the fish are. Not too long ago, I went into this place of business and went into the agent's office. I never met this person before in my life, never saw him before. Sat down and took a look at this lady who looked like death warmed over. It was very obvious that something terrible was going on.

[26:42] And so I just spontaneously was prompted to ask, is everything okay? And she just burst out crying and said, no, it's not okay. And she went on to talk about a terrible thing that had happened the day before in her family. And she was just totally broken. I prayed for her and often went to visit a couple of times the place and then we emailed back and forth and finally I invited her here for a church service. She came and brought her whole family. And as time went on, she was totally transformed by the power of the gospel. And she was baptized and she's here. I'm happy.

[27:28] I can't help but see her. She's here this morning. Why don't you just stand up and turn around and wave at the people? God has done a wonderful work in her life and she is serving the Lord because of His and from a totally different background than what we're seeing, from a totally different country. But what's that got to do with anything? Everybody has a need and Jesus is ready, willing and wanting to meet that need. And so it's just our part to introduce them to Christ and take the time to do what needs to be done. So then we see there was the praise that was produced to honor Him, to honor Jesus because of what Jesus had done.

[28:21] And what I can't get over is these Pharisees and these dead people that had no enthusiasm to get anybody else to Christ. It sounds like they all rejoiced and they were all in awe. And there's nothing that can convince people like seeing a transformed life. And there's nothing that's going to cause us to rejoice more and excite us more than if we've had a part in that transformed life. We had a worship leader in our church that was personality. Plus he had 10 times more personality than I ever thought about having. And we were out visiting and we saw this couple turn their lives over to Christ, visiting him in their home and being changed by the power of the gospel.

[29:12] Well, I was as fired up as I get, but he was over the top. I mean, he was just so energized. That's what it does. He was so energized, he could hardly stand it. And as we're traveling back here to the church, he said, pastor, why don't we stop at the liquor store and witness to people at the liquor store? I wanted to do that like a hole in the head. And the liquor store was the Kodiak Cafe down here at the time. And there's a big platform out in front of the liquor store. I went into where the doors were. And people would go by me and I would say, now I pass them a tract. And I'd say, if you read this and do what it says, you may never wanna have, never wanna come back here again.

[30:00] And I remember one guy looked at me and he said, really? I sure hope you're right, 'cause he said, I never do want to come back here again. But my buddy, the worship leader, he was at the other side of the platform standing right out on the edge, so to speak. I'm not gonna step over here. Don't worry about it. And he was witnessing to this taxi driver. The taxi driver was a short, stocky guy. He was kind of tall. And as he's witnessing to the taxi driver, he asked a question. It's a great question because it helps us to see where people are in their spiritual journey, just in case we don't know. But I think he had a pretty good idea. But he asked the question anyhow. And the question was this, if you were to stand before Jesus, what reason would you give Him as to why Jesus should let you into His heaven?

[30:50] And this taxi driver, stocky kind, I, he might have had a little inspiration maybe from some other source. But he looked up at my friend. He said, what reason would I give Him? He said, I'll tell you what reason I'd give Him. He said, I've been driving taxi in this city for 35 years and I've scared the bleep out of more people than all the preachers put together. Well regardless, we may run into some challenges and that's not gonna harm us. And my friend looked down and with a big smile and said, that's good, that's good. But we kept on and we saw other people come to know Christ as Savior. John 15:16, and I'm gonna leave you with this.

[31:38] Jesus said, I appointed you, talking to people who had received Him as Savior. I appointed you to be fruit bearers that will last. Now we all like making an investment that we're going to get a return on the investment, but that investment that we make in this life is very temporary. But when we make an investment in helping people in their journey to come to know Jesus, a Savior that is bearing fruit to the glory of God, and as a result, we will see transformed lives, and that, my friend, is going to last for all of eternity. That's quite the investment that can have that lasting effect.

[32:29] And so, if you'll go after it to the glory of God, you will get what you go after. Let's do it.