Why We Need to Be More Than Nice
They Don't Need Nice, They Need Jesus
I had an interaction with a woman once who was trying her best to be a very nice neighbor and love the people around her, and as she told me about her neighborhood and the brokenness in it, she said that they were loving people, welcoming people, doing all the great stuff that we want to do to be a picture of what Jesus is like to the world. And one of her neighbors came to her and said, "I just don't get it. Why do you keep loving people the way you do? Why do you keep treating people the way you do?" And she said, "You know what, the reason why we do it is because we're nice. It's not hard to be nice."
And I remember talking to her as she said that, and I said, "God's not calling you to be a nice person only—he's calling you to be a Gospel-proclaiming person. If you tell your neighbor that you're doing this because you're nice, she's going to be convinced that she doesn't need Jesus just to be different. She can live a nice life without Jesus.
Gospel Fluency
Jeff Vanderstelt
Teaching believers what it looks like for the gospel to become a natural part of our everyday conversations, Vanderstelt shows that the good news about Jesus impacts every facet of our lives.
"You need to tell them that the reason you're doing this is because Jesus loved you when you weren't nice. Jesus loved you when you were far from God. Jesus loved you when you were a bad neighbor. And you can now love neighbors who don't treat you well because Jesus loved you when you didn't treat him well. They don't need nice. They need Jesus. If you just give them nice, you're going to ask them to try harder to be different people without giving them the source that changed you. It was Jesus that changed you."
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