Communicating the Gospel in a Pagan Culture

Respect.

• Pray before you teach.

• Complement your audience.

• Never ridicule beliefs.

Build bridges.

• Religious nature (v 22).

• Desire to worship (v 23).

• Belief that God must be greater (v 24).

• God is not dependent on our gifts (v 25).

• We are God’s creation (v 28-29).

• God is essentially a spiritual being (v 29).

Understand Audience.

• It promotes empathy.

• It builds trust.

• It provides bridges for the gospel.

• It demonstrates love.

Understand Audience.

• Ask questions.

• Do your research.

• Continue to listen.

Lay a foundation.

• He presented God as the Creator, Sustainer, Ruler, Father, and Judge.

• He presented Jesus as the God-ordained Judge of all because of His resurrection.

Stay in Scripture.

• “You are the LORD, you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; and you preserve all of them…” Neh 9:6

Stay in Scripture.

• “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you; how much less this house that I have built!” 1 Kings 8:27

Stay in Scripture.

• Thus says God, the LORD, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk in it… Isa 42:5

Stay in Scripture.

• Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us? Mal 2:10

• When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God. Deut 32:8

Stay in Scripture.

• “Am I a God at hand, declares the LORD, and not a God far away?” Jer 23:23

• “And you have praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood, and stone, which do not see or hear or know, but the God in whose hand is your breath, and whose are all your ways, you have not honored.” Dan 5:23

Stay in Scripture.

• And he judges the world with righteousness; he judges the peoples with uprightness. Psalm 9:8

Stay in Scripture.

• Spend more time in scripture than in books written by men.

• Use cultural references judicially and only as they agree with scripture.

• Make sure every word you say can be backed with the Word of God.

Convict and Challenge.

• Money.• Freedom.• Self.• Tolerance.

Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. But others said,

“We will hear you again about this.”

But some men joined him and believed, among whom also were Dionysius the

Areopagite and a woman named Damaris and others with them.