[0:02]
LifeWay Leadership Podcast Network. G'day, I'm Scott Sanders. And I'm Derek Hanna. Welcome to The One Thing, a podcast designed to give you one solid practical tip for gospel center ministry every week. Now, Easter is still on, Derek. COVID seems to shut down everything, but Easter is still on next week.

[0:32]
But not the ECCA up here. Not the ECCA. Okay, so there are some things you're going to be missing out on. I hated the ECCA anyway, so I'm okay with that actually. It's fine. So the ECCA is short for? I don't know. I think it's the exhibition. It's the Easter show in Sydney, but it's the ECCA up here. I don't know what it's short for. It's a good question. So for those listening overseas, we have a thing at Easter called the Easter show. We're the farm. We're the city. Well, the farms come to the city. And in Sydney, it's called the Easter show. In Queensland, in Brisbane, it's called the ECCA.

[1:05]
Well, The One Thing is brought to you thanks to Geneva Push, the Australian Church Planning Network. And we're also proudly part of the Lifeway Leadership Podcast Network. So check out our new network page on iTunes to see a bunch of quality Christian podcasts. But for now, you press play on Preaching Easter Online. Now, let me introduce you to Al Stewart. He actually needs no introduction. I think he's one of our most regular guests. So Al Stewart, welcome to The One Thing. Thank you, Scott.

[1:36]
Derek, nice to be here. Now, you've just recently taken on a new role as the National Director of the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches across Australia. What a first few weeks to be introduced to this new role. Yes, I started the role the week that churches were not allowed to meet. It feels a little like turning up to be the swim coach and being told we've drained the pool. So you've preached at a lot of Easter's. As Scott said, Easter hasn't been cancelled. You've preached at a lot of Easter's. Normally, how do you approach Easter?

[2:06]
How do you think about preaching at that point? It's still a time when people who aren't Christian are more likely to be in churches. But you're preaching to audiences, to the believer and the unbeliever, as you should every week. But particularly, I think, to those who don't yet understand the gospel. On Good Friday, I would prefer usually to preach from the gospels. I mean, you can preach the cross from the epistles as well, where the apostles talk about the implications of the death of Jesus.

[2:40]
But to preach from the gospels, you have the crucifixion narratives. The death of Jesus is right there. Kind of you're confronted with that. Personally, I think I would… Luke's gospel, the thief on the cross. I think that is my favourite and also the most confronting, I think, of all of the stories. And then I think there should be a marked difference in the way you preach on Good Friday versus on Easter Sunday.

[3:13]
The difference between the cross and the resurrection. So, thinking about the implications of COVID, what do you think that's done to sort of change how you preach at Easter, you know? In some ways, it's changed everything and nothing. One of the things about preaching online is you don't know who you're preaching to. But if you're in a public meeting, generally, you don't know who you're preparing or preaching to either. And you should be ready for someone who's not a believer to have walked in.

[3:44]
As I've said again and again, as I've said on this podcast, you've got to preach even to people who aren't there. Preach to the unbelievers who haven't come so that your congregation will have confidence to invite people. But online, I'll tell you what else has hit me. And as I've rung around different pastors and talked to where I go to church at Vine Church in Surrey Hills, it's the easiest time to invite someone to come to church. I mean, they're prisoners at home. You can flick them a link and say, hey, push a button and join us on Sunday.

[4:19]
And so, each of the churches I've spoken to have had visitors online. So, there's great opportunities with the online space. You know, it's easier for our members to invite. But as a preacher, particularly, you get a lot from the actual congregation responding back as you're looking out to them. You're not going to have that. So, when you throw out a hard phrase or a hard saying, how do you do that in the online space? Okay. Carl Faze has a – and I think there'll be a resource on this podcast.

[4:53]
Carl Faze has got a very good little for a four-minute video on some of the nuances of speaking to camera. One of the obvious things is you're speaking to someone's lounge room or someone's office. You're speaking one-to-one or perhaps one-to-two people. You're not preaching to the back of a big room. So, if you still speak to camera as if you're speaking to 200 people, it'll come across as weird. So, you want to – it's almost the intimate conversation.

[5:24]
So, you can still say hard things. You've just got to say it in a way that you'd say it across a dinner table or across a lounge room rather than in a big public meeting. So, that's one of the things you've got to work on. So, Al, there's some of the blockages that, you know, the current kind of weird context of speaking to a camera presents. But what are the opportunities? Because we are seeing people ask different questions at the moment. We are seeing people pop their heads into online streaming and listen to stuff. So, what opportunities does COVID create for preaching at Easter?

[5:58]
Yeah. Well, it's the simple you're trapped at home and it's an easy invite. But as well as that, I think there's a lot of people who are very anxious about our world. And so, there's anxiety about our world at a physical, medical level and also anxiety about what will happen in terms of the economy and people losing jobs, etc. And if I could quote my dear wife, she says, pain opens ears. I think some people may well be open. Many people may well be open to consider or think about things now.

[6:30]
And so, we need to be preaching the sovereignty of God, the opportunity of forgiveness, etc. So, the gospel, expect the gospel to have real traction with so many people during this crisis. Yeah, it's hard not to believe the world's broken at the moment, isn't it? For people who are exploring, what would you be saying? What are the next steps you'd be hoping a not yet Christian would be taking after it?

[7:03]
Where do you go from there? At a time like Easter, I would actually be prepared to pray a prayer with people. A prayer of repentance or a prayer of response in trust to a gospel message. After years and years of doing that, I think it's not a bad idea to tell people at the very beginning. So, we're going to look at a part of the Bible. We're going to look at the promise that God makes to us or promise that Jesus made. And at the end of this, I'm going to invite you to pray with me.

[7:33]
And so, I tell you that so you don't feel like I've snuck up on you. And you get to the end and say, now, as I said, I'm going to invite you to pray. And you can do that. One of the big things about gospel preaching and calling people to make a step is you need a clear step after that. So, I've been to lots of meetings and itinerant stuff where people say, I just talked to the person who bought you. Which, forgive me, but in reality, that's code for don't do anything.

[8:07]
You want to make a very clear offer of people what is the next step. And so, to offer people, you know, online, there's a link here that you can find out more or register your name about Christianity Explored or a Zoom conversation with someone or to read the word one-to-one, etc. So, the church I'm going to is starting an online Christianity Explored group after Easter. Great thing to ask people to register for that.

[8:39]
Do you want just something clear and concrete? And you don't want eight different options. You might have two, but if you have eight, that's just way too many. There's something clear and concrete that you're asking people to do as a result of hearing the gospel preached. And you need to expect that people will respond. I mean, my old dad says, if you go to church to pray for rain and you don't take your umbrella, you're not fair dinkum.

[9:09]
Well, you know, if you go fishing and you don't take a landing net, you're not fair. Well, if you're preaching the gospel, you ought to have some clear way of people responding to take the next step. Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it? Because the things you're saying, and I know you said this before, this is nothing different than we would normally do or ask to do if COVID wasn't around. You want, when you preach, to call people to repentance, you want them to have a clear next step of how it is they explore what that looks like.

[9:40]
But I suppose in the stress and in the hurry to get everything done and pivot to online, some of probably the things which we would normally do are falling into the background, which, you know, some of it is understandable. But, you know, this is just about us working on how to be deliberate about this as well. Yeah. I reckon every week as you preach the Bible, you're calling the believer and the unbeliever to respond in trust and repentance. That is, to act on belief or trust in the promises of God.

[10:16]
You're not doing John 3.16 every week, and it's not the same issue every week, but you're calling people to, I guess you could say, to walk towards Jesus. I would think at Easter time, and then every now and then, intermittently, I think you give people the opportunity to pray the prayer, to cross the line into a commitment of faith and trust to the Lord Jesus. And so I would have thought Easter is a good time to do that.

[10:47]
Look, if I can say at Easter, I think the great question that people have about the cross is not so much did it happen, but how does Jesus dying have relevance to me? And I think the best way to explain that is to walk them through the steps of the sacrificial process. So the lamb that's innocent, you know, the story of the, you know, the Israelite who sinned is the law of Moses Israelite who sinned was to get a lamb that was innocent to bring it to the temple to put their hand on the head of the lamb.

[11:22]
That meant somehow the innocent one could carry the guilt. The lamb is killed. It dies in the place of the Israelite. In genuine faith, they could be forgiven. All of that pointed to the one sacrifice that truly worked. Jesus called the lamb of God, carries our guilt, dies in our place. That's what I guess God designed that illustration. That's why it's so good. But I think that's the best way that you can explain Jesus' death in our place. So that's, I'm always looking for that wherever possible.

[11:57]
Reach Australia has released a new preaching course by Al Stewart. In 10 short videos, Al explains the science and the art of preaching. How to preach to two audiences, worldview preaching and practical tips and tricks he's picked up from hundreds of hours spent preaching. You can get free access to this resource in the show notes or by going to genevapush.com forward slash COVID-19. So Al, Easter is a great time to be calling people to repentance and faith in Jesus.

[12:32]
You've done, no doubt, many of those, you know, responses live and face to face. How do we do that online? Yeah. Personally, I would tell people at the very beginning that at the end I was going to invite people to make a responsive prayer. And then you can use a set prayer, for example, like at the end of two ways to live, something like that, that is beautifully balanced theologically. Or you can write a prayer of repentance that, or a prayer of faith that, that particularly follows the theme of the Bible passage that you've preached.

[13:10]
And then the beauty of being online is you can, you can put the words on the screen and you want to, what the trap for young players and what John Chapman taught me is often you, you just pray sentence after sentence. And then say, amen. And people don't know, are they repeating after you or are you doing it? So here it is very simply, I'm going to pray this prayer. So we are going to pray this prayer together. I'm going to invite you to pray to God in the silence of your own heart.

[13:44]
He hears you. He knows. I'm going to say a sentence and then I invite you to pray after me sentence by sentence. Yeah, it's good. It's, it can feel awkward doing it in person. It's going to feel even more awkward doing it online. But I think we've just got to lean into that. We've got to, we've got to practice it, do it offline again and again. So we get the timing and pace right. So even though it feels awkward, we can nail it when we do it online. It's important. Yeah. And, and my use is that, that we feel more awkward than people who aren't yet Christian.

[14:20]
They, you, you come to a church or you come to an online thing about church. They're expecting us to pray. You know, like I went to a church and they prayed. How weird is that? It's not, you know, or they are expecting us to invite a response. So just, and you've got, if you're careful and respectful, it'll be fine. In terms of my top three must have resources for preaching Easter online.

[14:50]
Al's already spoken about that Carl Faye's speaking online resource. We'll give you a link to a Vimeo video, but also there's a link as well to a, an article with seven great tips just for presenting to Canberra for church leaders. We'll also provide a link to a virtual church assist resource. I'm noticing a lot of churches just in the whole scramble, haven't had a chance to put up sort of Easter links and resources. VCA have put together a whole bunch of graphics and other things that you can grab and utilize for your church so that you can make much of Easter online.

[15:25]
If you're like the rest of us, you felt overwhelmed and inundated with COVID-19 information. So we've created and pulled together countless resources to access in one spot. GenevaPush.com forward slash COVID-19 offers resources on how to adapt and pivot in this new season. How to lead your church as a calm, non-anxious presence. How to care for the vulnerable and how to keep the main thing, the main thing and ensure evangelism stays front and center.

[15:59]
Well, that brings us to the end of the show. So Al, what is the one thing that you want to be saying to people when it comes to preaching Easter online this year? It's the thing that I need to say to myself as well. And that is expect that God will bless the preaching of the gospel message. And preach it like you believe it and preach it like other people will believe it. Now, if you like what you've heard today on The One Thing, we'd appreciate it if you take just a moment to rate the show on iTunes and even leave a comment. Thanks for joining us for another episode of The One Thing.

[16:32]
I'm Scott Sanders. I'm Derek Hanna. Chat soon. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.