An Empty House

“And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.” (Lu 14:23 AV)

The greek word for ‘compel’ means to necessitate.  It means to drive to or to constrain.  Webster’s 1828 dictionary defines the word as, “To drive or urge with force, or irresistibly; to constrain; to oblige; to necessitate, either by physical or moral force.”  When one looks up the meaning of the word ‘compel’ he or she realizes our efforts to reach the lost are not as strenuous as they should be.  The result of proper compelling is that the house of God is full.  We have substituted compelling with enticement.  We offer different services coached as ministries.  We have lured the lost with different forms of entertainment.  We used to compel.  We allowed the scoffers to temper our efforts by embarrassing us into passivity.  We used to street preach.  We used to knock on doors and persist in conversation until we were dismissed.  Now, we simply act polite so that no one reacts adversely to our message.  This is not compelling.  This is not stating the need for forgiveness and redemption as a matter of urgency.  The gospel is no longer treated as the most important truth anyone would ever hear.  We present it as a choice that can be rejected with little to no consequences.  Our houses of worship are empty because a generation ago, we ceased to compel.  Now, we merely invite.

One of the events we like to attend is our State Fair.  In fact, we work a booth in an attempt to share the gospel with all who might pass by.  There are rules regarding how we comport ourselves while at our booth.  We have a corner booth, which is wonderful.  That means we only have one neighbor.  She is an eyelash salesperson.  Our ‘space’ is very well defined.  The rules that apply to us apply to all.  There are lines that we are not permitted to cross.  Literally.  Lines on the floor tell us we cannot go out into the crowd to compel them to come to our booth.  We cannot walk the building with advertisements to our booth.   We have to stay in our designated area and merely offer literature as a pretext of starting a conversation.  Some vendors have figured out a workaround.  There was one vendor which my father-in-law fell for.  This vendor was selling steel cookware.  He had a microphone on.  Like a Sham-Wow salesman.  He had the volume a bit louder than it needed to be.  You could hear him an aisle or two away.  There were seats spaced so we could sit and watch the demonstration.  To get an audience, he would work to make eye contact and address someone as they were passing by.  Actually, it was brilliant.  Once the conversation was started, it is hard to walk away.  He was selling this overpriced cookware as if the entire future of the planet depended on it.

We are required to restrain ourselves while working the State Fair in order to have a presence there.  But we are not if we are out in the general public.  We are failing to make the case for Jesus Christ.  We are not compelling.  We are asking. We are inviting.  We are enticing.  But we are not compelling.  We are not selling a product, mind you.  That is not what the LORD is asking us to do.  He is not asking us to be a high-pressure salesman in search of new customers.  Rather, we are physicians who can see with the naked eye that people are perishing all around us and we have the cure.  There needs to be urgency.  There needs to be more of an effort here.  There needs to be some kind of zeal that leaves the recipient of the gospel message in such a way as to know that God came down and begged them to repent.  There needs to be interaction is though we may never get another chance.  We need to compel.  This is why our houses are empty.  We are not compelling.  Not until we compel will we ever see that trend reversed.  Time to compel.