10-5-2016

Good Morning All!!

          Luke 21:13; “This will be your opportunity to bear witness.”

    There are many ways to clear a roomful of people. You can announce that donuts and coffee are now available in the lounge.  You can tell them that free tickets to the Super Bowl are at the front office.  You can tell them that a naked person just ran down the hallway.  You can tell them that there is a fire truck and an ambulance in the next parking lot.  Of course the absolute best way to clear a room is to announce that the next item on the agenda is to discuss the upcoming evangelism program and that we will assign lists to those present.  This will definitely clear the room and leave a deafening silence.  Hopefully, no one gets hurt in the mad rush for the door.  I think most people would rather have a root canal without anesthesia than be part of an evangelism program.

    I know a lot of Christians who feel guilty over this.  In all truth, we shouldn’t.  Evangelism was never meant to be a “program.”  It was never meant to be a “Hello, Mrs. Fill in the blank.  May I take this opportunity to discuss the many blessings that Our Church of Perpetual Motion has to offer?”  Everyone hates these and there is a far better way.

    Our faith is built on our relationship with God.  The Apostle Paul tells us that “God was in Christ reconciling us to himself.”  Here we see where God reconnected the brokenness of our relationship with him by forgiving our sins on account of Christ.  It is a relationship.  This reconciliation places us in a relationship with our fellow believers because we are in a relationship with Jesus and they are in a relationship with Jesus.  We were designed to be a creature of relationships.  The reason many evangelism programs suffer and people despise being part of them is because, often times, there is no relationship between the “evangelizer” and the “evangelize”.

   Jesus tells us that our life, our whole life is a witness.  Our best and most effective witnesses are to our families, our neighbors, our co-workers, the people we know and see every day.  This is our opportunity to bear witness.  We can offer comfort to the sad, rest to the weary, hope for the hopeless.  We can offer them the same hope, comfort and joy that we know because of Jesus.  Many times you don’t have to have a plan; just listen and answer as best you can.  Invite them to your church, to meet and talk with your pastor.  You don’t have to answer all the intricacies of systematic theology; you simply tell them how you get comfort and hope from knowing that your sins have been forgiven and that by having this righteousness you are a child of God.  This is your opportunity to bear witness; take hold and trust God’s guidance.

Father, lead me to be your witness.  Lead me to those in my life who are in need of your mercy.  Lead me to those who are hurting and in need of your comfort.  Open my heart to the needs of my neighbor.  Lead me to my opportunity to witness.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret