Are you a competitive person? Do you play to win? Is there any other way to play? But you can play to win and still enjoy the game if you lose. Have you ever wrestled with me? This is a different sort of engagement than playing a game of ball or cards. Most games are deliberately structured to be contests of equal conditions so the better player may prevail. But wrestling with me is obviously an unequal contest. Yet I’m still eager to engage in it. Are you? What would winning or losing look like in this context? Would you expect to win? Would you want to?

How do you view me? One perspective says that I am a consuming fire. Does this seem far removed from your routine church activities, and your doctrine? Does it seem consistent with a view of me as harsh, exacting, judgmental, and punitive? Does it speak to retributive justice? Your doctrine also declares me to be a God of love and mercy. Do you wrestle with these two concepts to reconcile them? Could they both be true at once? Are you open to enlarging your thinking that it will encompass love as a consuming fire?

How do you view me? This is an important question because it influences everything you do. Do you view me as harsh and exacting? The servant who did hid his talent in the earth and led a life of inaction, paralyzed by fear. The other servants lived lives of full engagement without knowing if their efforts would be successful or not. They rejoiced to present their increase to me. The unprofitable servant accused me of being harsh and unfair. The profitable servants did not express their views of me in words, so you will have to infer them by their actions.

Do you have a methodical approach to evangelism? Does this make it easier to present my message? Do you study the interactions that I had with people, such as the woman at the well, to learn how I approached this task? What do you find? Did I ever use the same approach twice, or did I adapt the presentation to the unique situation in every case? If you agree with this does it make it difficult to develop a methodical approach? I was led by the Spirit to do the work of the Spirit, and you can be too.