Good evening. I'm glad you're here tonight. You love the Lord tonight? Boy, we got so much good news to offer people.
I want to invite you to stand with me. We're going to open our bodies. We're going to look at a lot of Scripture tonight. And I just want to help this group, those of us who are here tonight, to really get on the same page about some responsibilities that we have.
We first want to talk about the condition of man. So if you have your Bibles, turn with me to Revelation 20 verse 11. Revelation 20, it's going to be up on the screens. But if you have a Bible, you can mark it in your Bible.
John the Revelation says, then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it from his presence, earth and sky, fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne. And books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the Book of Life.
And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done.
Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the Book of Life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. If anybody ever tells you the Bible doesn't talk about hell, take them right to this spot right here.
This is what the revelator is talking about. Anyone whose name was not found written in the Book of Life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. Thank you for your word. And I pray you would help us to catch the vision and the purpose of our lives on this earth today and encourage us and strengthen us and fill us with boldness in Jesus' name.
Amen. Take a minute and say hello to a bunch of people around you. If you don't know somebody, go meet him right now. Think about this for a moment.
Get this picture. Every person that ever lives will stand before God in judgment someday. Every person. Think about this for a minute.
Every person you drive by on the road. Every person. Every person you walk past at the store. Every person.
Everyone who ever waits on you at a table of the restaurant. Everyone. Every person you've ever seen in a stadium on TV. Everyone.
Every friend you have. Every co-worker. Every relative. Every child.
Every son. Every daughter. Every grandson. Every granddaughter.
All the people you love. Everyone is going to come and stand before God someday. And the key to that moment is not that they were nice to other people. The key to that moment isn't going to be, did your mom or your daddy love you.
The key to that moment to grandma and grandpa care about you. My grandchildren, my children are going to stand before God, not on my desires for them. None of that will matter. My friends will stand there.
The people of our community will stand before God. They may have been nice people, kind people in many, many ways. But the only thing that's going to matter is what their names were written in the Lamb's book of life. If their name was not written in the Lamb's book of life, they will face the second death.
Death doesn't mean an end. Death simply means separation. When we talk about this body dying, when Stephen died, he looked up into heaven and he commended his spirit to the Lord. The body stopped the function.
The spirit that was in it went and stood before God. Goes before God in a moment, in an instant. That's the first death. And Jesus tells us we don't need to fear that one.
The one we need to fear is the second one. The second separation is when man is separated from God, when the spirit and soul of man is separated from God for all eternity and cast in the lake of fire, the second death. And everyone that we meet, everyone that we know, their name will either be found in the Lamb's book of life or it won't be. This is a past failed test at this point in the judgment.
And you'll either go and be with God because your name was in the Lamb's book of life. Are you, your friend, your relative, your loved ones, your children will be separated from him for all eternity. I can't think of any more important decision for me to make or any more important decision for me to help others make than to make a decision about what they're going to do with Jesus. It is the one decision that impacts all of eternity.
John 3 16 tells us, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. Do people who are Christians who believe in Jesus do they die the first time? That's not what Jesus was talking about here was he? He was saying that those who put their belief in him will not die the second time.
They'll not perish because God so loved the world he sent his son and if we put our belief in him we're going to, we'll have eternal life. He goes on and John 3 17 says for God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him. Listen, the world's not going to be saved through the Prophet Muhammad, the prophets that people are not going to be saved because they're Hindu or because they're Buddhist. They're not going to be saved because they're good people better than somebody else.
There's only one way to be saved and that is through Jesus. Whoever believes in him is not condemned. Whoever does not believe is condemned already because he's not believed in the name of the only Son of God. Listen, some of you may have a son, a grandson, you may have a daughter, you may have somebody that you love dearly in your life, maybe a husband, maybe a wife, maybe a friend at work that you love dearly in life.
But they've not put their belief in Jesus. And I want to call to us today, if their belief isn't in Jesus, they're lost. No matter how much I love them. What matters about how much I love them is how much am I willing to pray for them.
How much am I willing to challenge them? How much am I willing to stand in the gap for them? How much am I willing to work to see them come to salvation? We hold these little children in our arms that grow into being teenagers and adults and we love them with all of our heart.
But if they don't surrender their life to Jesus, their name's not written in the Lamb's book of life, it doesn't matter how many good times we had with them, it doesn't matter how much we loved them, it doesn't matter what kind of athlete they were, we get caught up in the wrong, it doesn't matter if they got straight A's or straight F's. None of that matters at that moment. They either have their name written in the Lamb's book of life or they don't. That's all that matters.
I don't know why Christians get this confused. We chase after things like they're important. When there's only one thing that's important. Our children knowing God.
It's nice to do some of the other stuff, sure. But I'm not going to let any of the other stuff get in the way of me pointing them to Jesus. And Jesus being the most important thing in life. The most important thing.
John 3 36 says, whoever believes in the Son has eternal, I love that. Whoever, whoever. Who does that include? Whoever.
This is great news for us. That we don't have to be born with some pedigree, some background, some religious history, some other talent or gift, it's whoever believes in Him has eternal life. Whoever does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on Him. The wrath of God.
Why the wrath? Why the wrath of God is holy because we are sinners. And all that's left for us is the judgment of God. The wrath of God remains on those who reject Jesus.
So what does that leave us? What is the calling of people who know this? Who understand it? Who know that we're all going to stand before God someday and there's no guarantee of tomorrow?
What is our calling? What is our responsibility? In Luke chapter 19 it says this, for the Son of man came to seek and save the lost. Jesus knew His one main purpose on this life.
And that's chapter 1 verse 6. It says, so when they had come together they asked Him, Lord will you at this time restore the kingdom of Israel. They still were confused after his resurrection. They thought he was now, they're asking, are you now going to set up reign in Israel?
You've died, you've proven you're powerful over the death. Are you now going to make Israel and set up an earthly kingdom? Still confused. He said to them, it is not for you to know the times or the seasons the Father is fixed by his own authority.
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. And I always kind of stop here because I realize they still didn't hear the whole message. They still thought the end of the earth just meant to other Jews. They were still going to have to struggle and the Holy Spirit was still going to have to do things for them to understand everyone, whoever, anybody who wants to come can get saved.
They sent it to them over and over and over again and they still didn't get it. So we ask ourselves, why was the Holy Spirit sent us? I come from a very traditional Pentecostal background and if you talk to a lot of traditional Pentecostal people, they're immediately responsible so we can speak in tongues. That'd be their immediate response.
So we can have gifts of the Spirit happen in church service. That'd be their immediate response. And I want to tell you, I believe in speaking in tongues. I pray in tongues.
I thank God for the gift of tongues. I thank God for the way it builds our lives. It is a, we pray from our mind and we can pray from our spirit being led by the Spirit of God. You don't have that gift.
I'd encourage you to seek it. But that is not what Jesus said here was the primary reason Holy Spirit sent. I've heard a message. You heard a Neville last week talk about this young boy who was living in an abused home and comes home and his mom's been beaten by the by the dad and he prays over and the dad hears this prayer in his native language that the boy doesn't know how it shakes up that guy's like, well, that's God.
That's a whole other gift thing that God does. I believe in all of that. But listen, when somebody looks at me and says, I'm baptized in the Holy Spirit. I don't want to ask them if they speak in tongues.
I want to ask them who you would listen to. Who you're wanting to God. Well, you know, I don't have that gift. No, you're filled with the Spirit.
That's why the Spirit came. That's why he came. He came to give us power to be his witnesses. So thank God if you do those other things, but don't forget this is the primary reason that Jesus said he was going to come.
It's so that we would be empowered. What does that mean? That means that when we begin to speak, not only will we be able to speak with some boldness, but we will be able to speak in a way that penetrates the darkness. There will be power in the words, not our power, not the persuasiveness of our argument, but the anointing of the Spirit to pierce darkness and people's lives that you can sit there and lovingly look at them and share a word and connect with their spirit.
Isn't that how you got saved? Somebody was up preaching or teaching or you were reading something and it penetrated into your heart and you went, wow, that's true. I need to give my heart to God. I need to accept Jesus.
That's what we pray for and what we look for. Now, Matthew 2818, it says, this is just before Jesus left the earth. He said, Jesus came to them and said, all authority in heaven on earth has been given to me. So now he's about to tell them to do something.
Because he has authority, he says, go therefore make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you and behold, I am with you always in the end of the age. He says, I have authority, I'm giving you a commandment and a direction. Go into the world and make disciples. I'm going to be with you while you go.
I'm going to be right there with you to the very end of the age. So here's the condition of man. All men are going to stand before God someday. Unless that person's name is written in the Lamb's book of life, they're going to be lost.
We are called as believers to tell them the message and to count on the Holy Spirit to do a work in their life to draw them to salvation. Last week we talked to, we talked about this need to pray for boldness. Let's talk about a couple of things we need to know, the good news. So what first question is this, what is the center?
Well, all people born under the law are sinners and everybody's born under the law. This is why you've got to be born again, under grace. You're born under the law. You're born separated from God.
The second part of this is what's the center? It's people who are not connected to God. It's people who are not being, who are not in communion and relationship with God. That's all of us.
We're all born in this condition because of sin and our nature. We are separated from God. A sinner are people who by nature live their way instead of God's way. That's what we are.
That is the sin nature. That's the sin nature. So if you get this picture, I've shared this with you a couple of times, but I want to say it's a couple of times. If you look at your heart and your nature as a poisoned field, that anything that grows in it is going to be affected by the poison in the field.
That's our nature. And what grows out of that field is going to naturally be destructive. So in our lives, for one person that might be selfishness, for another person it might be lust, for another person it might be an addictive nature, for another person it might be prejudice or hatred or some combination of all of the things, a murderous spirit or a covetous spirit or all the things, a homosexual spirit or an immoral spirit. All of those things naturally grow out of what is in our heart separated from God.
And they don't look the same. What comes from what grows in your field that won't necessarily look the same as what grows in my field, but all of them are of the sin nature. They all come from the sin nature, discord, all these things come out of the sin nature. And so we sit there and we take some sins and we say, oh those are really bad sins.
And they do this. But all they do is they come out of the sin nature. I'm not as bad as them because my sin isn't as bad. No, your sin is just different.
Your sin is just different. And maybe you control a little bit more, but it still comes out of the sin nature and what has to be transformed is the sin nature. I've got to get a spirit nature in me. I've got to get transformed by the power of the spirit because I'm separated from God.
So we look at this and we realize that people are sinners. Now here's a passage of the scripture Romans 3. It says, what then? Are we Jews any better off?
He's asking them the question. Are we Jews better because we were born Jewish? And he says, no, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks are under sin.
All, as it is written, none is righteous, no, not one. Now here's the gospel or good news. We find it in Romans 3.21. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law.
How did that happen? How was the righteousness of God manifested apart from the law? Jesus. Good answer, Jesus.
Although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the law and the prophets point to Jesus. They point to Him. The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe for there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
That's the bad news. Every person has sinned. Every person has a sin nature. Every person is this person who's done it their own way.
All have sinned. We've all fallen short of the glory of God. What we were meant to be, we are not. We've sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
Because we live in this nature of sin, we don't reflect the wisdom, the power, the glory of God the way we should be falling short of it. And then he goes on with the good news. And are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. This is why we owe everything to Jesus.
We owe everything to him. Because we are redeemed through him. When God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over our former sins.
What he's saying there is that in this last line is this. God's been patient. God's been patient. He's born with our sin or passed sin until Jesus could come so that we could be saved.
Because if we got in what we deserved, we had gotten judgment. And that's the case where everyone was before we said we got what we deserved. We'd have got instantaneous judgment. But he was patient for Jesus to come into our lives.
So here we have it. There's a righteousness apart from the law. We can't be righteous to the law. We're broken.
There's a righteousness apart from the law. We get that applied to our life through faith in Jesus. That comes to all who believe because all of sin. But we can be justified by his grace.
We look at sin. We have a sin nature. The heart's poisoned. And that heart needs to be healed.
What does this mean to all people? What this means is this in Romans 623, it says for the wages of sin is death but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. The wages of sin, the cost of sin is death. Which death is it?
Eternal separation from God. The person who dies without coming to Jesus, no matter how much we love them or care for them, the wages of sin is eternal separation from Jesus. Eternal separation from God. Remember the lake of fire?
Their destiny is the lake of fire. So why didn't God do something about that? He did. He sent his son.
Why did he do something about it? He did. He sends us. The church is called.
We have the great commission that we've been given to go into all the world and make disciples. That's why we support missionaries around the world that we talked about last week. That's why we make faith promises and gifts. So because we're so passionate about seeing people saved, we want to invest in those who are going.
That's why some sign up and go on mission strips so they can go and help see people get saved and encourage people. That's why we do all the things that we do is because we want people to come to salvation. Because everybody is going to stand before God. Whether they were born in a Christian nation or non-Christian nation.
They're going to stand before God someday. Now what's the good news in all of this? Romans 5, 6 says this. For while we were still weak, some verses say, for while we were still sinners at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps we're a good person, one would dare to die. But God shows his love for us and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Hey friends, this is this understanding. We were lost, totally lost.
No way to fix ourselves and Jesus came and died for us so that we could be born again. And if you call on his name and put your faith in Jesus, you're saved. You're saved. And he is with you.
John 3, 36 says that, said it very clearly. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. Hear it? Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.
Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. But the capture of the first part of this again. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. 90 times in the Gospel of John alone, we are told to believe.
Believe. So here's the summary of this. We're all going to spend eternity someplace. Every person you know is going to spend eternity someplace.
Every person you love is going to spend eternity someplace. Every person you care about is going to spend eternity someplace. Your grandchildren, your children, your friends, your relatives. We are all sinners and the wrath of God is on us because we do not reflect His glory.
We are broken and in rebellion. And Jesus came at just the right time and paid our price so that if we put our faith in Him instead of receiving the judgment of God, we can receive the grace of God. For that we should be thankful every day. For that we should come into this place every Sunday morning and sing with vigor and sing with joy, sing with our hands lifted up, sing and shout because Jesus saved us.
Amen. Sometimes I think we get lost in this. We kind of get dulled by the activity of the day. We need to draw our minds and our hearts right back to this fact.
I need it saved and I am saved because of Jesus. Amen. So now that I know this, now that I understand this, now that we've restated this one more time. I have to understand, I have a responsibility.
Jesus told us to go into the world and make disciples. Jesus didn't say, listen, all you folks who are following me, I am going to raise up some full-time ministers and I am going to send them out and you guys just hope they do well. Somebody says, God in His love, this is just really bottoming. I would sit at Him all and sometimes in bixies thousands of people walking by a drive through a city and see hundreds and thousands of cars driving by and I think, God, what about all these people?
One day, the Lord finds the questions, don't you think I love them? I planted somebody in all their lives. Plant somebody. That may be you in a home full of people who don't know God at all.
That may be you in an office building, in a workplace where most of the people don't love God. And here's the sad thing. Many, many times we as Christians come out of those settings going, oh pray for me, I'm getting so hard, it's so tough and sit as saying, thank God, He's put me right. He's entrusted me enough to put me right in the middle of a tough place to be His witness.
God, thank you for trusting me enough to put me here. Now, tell me with your boldness. Let me live in a way that's righteous. Let me be able to speak the truth and love.
So here's the question, how do I share with people who are close to me? Now, there's a lot of things we can talk about evangelism. But over the next four weeks, we want to really talk about how do we talk to the people who are close to us? Sometimes I find it easier to talk to people who are just kind of casually me.
Say, you want to come to church or something like this? But what about the people who are close to us? How do you talk to a relative? How do you talk to a coworker that's a friend?
How do you talk to a buddy that doesn't understand what you go to church all the time? How do you talk to them and not just wreck the relationship? How do we do it? That's what we're going to talk about.
My first question though for is what keeps you from being a witness in the first place? What keeps you from witnessing to those that you don't know? Now, if you're sitting there and you say, I do, then praise God, then can pray for continued boldness. Amen?
And pray for wisdom. If you don't, if you don't, what keeps you from it? Maybe it's fear, maybe insecurity, maybe you're afraid to be in too pushing, coming across judgment, judgmental. Whatever that is, you've got to put this thing in the balances here and say, wait a second.
I don't want anybody in this room off the way to second. I am called to be his witness. I'm called. I'm placed there to be his witness.
So how do I deal with whatever's keeping me from doing it? Because I'm going to stand before God and listen, the great white-thrown judgment is the first judgment. When we're down to great white-thrown judgment, the day comes when we stand at the judgment seat of Christ. At the judgment seat of Christ, we are judged by everything we didn't do.
We either receive reward or we have things taken from us. The Bible describes that moment that some will go into heaven with nothing and others will go in with crowns because they were obedient. This is why we say to you, listen, about five seconds after the rapture, you will thank every pastor and every missionary who challenged you to give the missions and you'll beg. So good.
Whoo! Glad I did that. Glad I did that. You'll thank God for every tithe dollar you put in.
Pastor, thank me for calling me to tithe because you're going to discover treasures in heaven. You'll be thankful for every ministry. You've got it. The mission's trip you went on no matter how hard it was.
You'll be thankful for all the times you witnessed it because there's a reward for that obedience and you'll regret every time you didn't. You'll wish you had. You'll wish you had. Now think about this, I hear people say this all the time.
Oh, you know, there won't be anything else. There's no tears in heaven. Listen, there's no tears in heaven until after the millennium. There's plenty of tears from the time that we die and the time that Jesus comes until the millennium's over.
There's regrets. There's a sense of loss. There's an awareness of friends and loved ones who aren't there. There's regret for things we didn't do.
It's not until the end of the book of Revelation that God wipes away every tear. So we need to deal with this stuff. So what are ways that we can reach out to people that we know or even that we casually know? I'm going to ask the ushers to come down right now and we're going to give you all a card.
This is an invite card for Good Friday and for Easter. And we're going to give you one every week when you come to church for the next several weeks. And after a next week or so, we'll have a bunch of them out there for you if you want to get more. Guys, it's Pass Mouse, Pass, you can't everybody that's here.
And just give them one. They only get one. Don't worry, you'll get more later. Tonight, this week you're just getting one.
And I want to encourage you to, we're going to pray tonight before we go, to give this specifically to somebody this week. Now under invite people, let's put up A on the notes. Is there a phone number there? There's supposed to be a phone number right next to that or not a phone number, email address.
Is email address there? No. Calvary Church. Boy, I can't remember the exact email address.
I'm supposed to be up there for you. Calvary Church at Calvary Springfield.org is our church. Calvary Church at Calvary Springfield.org. So Calvary Church at Calvary Springfield.org is on your notes.
Calvary Springfield.org is on the card. But the email address, Calvary Church at Calvary Springfield. I don't see that on the card. Calvary Church at Calvary Springfield.org.
Here's what we'd like for you to do. Invite somebody and email us and tell us about it. Invite somebody, email us and tell us about it. Calvary Church at Calvary Springfield.org.
Hey, I invited my co-worker. They tore it up in my face and threw it on the ground. I invited my friend and they said they're going to come. And today Renee and I went out to a restaurant and a lady waited on us, who's waited on us at that restaurant many, many times.
And I've handed her a few of these cards over the years. But today she came back and says, well, you're on us again. And I had one of my cards with me. And I said, Kim, I want to give this to you.
This is about our Easter stuff. You've waited on us so many times. We would love to be able to serve you at Easter. And she took us and said, thank you.
Maybe I'll come. Maybe I'll come. I said, well, if you come, make sure you look for me. And come and say hi to me.
Now I'm going to see her again because I eat that restaurant all the time. And every time I see her, I'm going to keep asking her, Kim, you got my Easter card. Come out at Easter. Listen, if you do this in a really non-threatening way, if you do it, I just want to give you this.
I'd love for you to come. This is just an invite to a couple of really big things. Easter's coming. It's a big celebration.
If you want to know about the crossing, come on Friday night, just come. We'd love for you to come. Tell me what service you're coming to. What's one of the four?
If you decide to come. Let me know which one you're coming to. I'll meet you there. And hopefully that means you have to come three times or four times.
Because you invite four people and four people come at different times. You have to come with them. Would that be okay though? So here's what we want you to do.
Take this card. We're going to pray over in a minute. Ask God who you'd have to give it to. And this week, give it to somebody.
And say, listen, about a month Easter's coming. I want to give you a pre-invite. Look him in the eye. That scares me.
I'm going to take two things about me. The more you do it, the less scared you'll get. The more you do it, the easier it's going to become. But to that fear, that's just the enemy.
That's all. He just assists the enemy. So what if they get mad at you? Would you rather than be mad at you here or at the Great White Throne Judgment?
I'd rather be mad at me here and me at least as the Great White Throne Judgment, no matter what happens, go, man, I told you buddy. That's going to be the biggest I told you so in all the history right there. I told you, man, I warned you. But hopefully, not the Great White Throne Judgment, they'll be throwing their arms around you saying, thank you.
Thank you for sharing with me. Now this is the simplest, easiest thing you can do in being a witness is just invite people to church. And we studied this last year, 70 to 80 percent of the people who get saved get saved because somebody brought them to church. Think about it.
If you get 80 percent of the people who get saved because somebody just said, hey, go to church with me. And somewhere in the middle of all that, God, losing their life. We're going to talk more about this and what these statistics mean and what we can be doing in the next several weeks. But here's the second thing.
If you really want to impact the people that you know, really know well, you have to have a spiritual talk with them. Now we're going to lay out a strategy to do this in the weeks ahead. But we want to start today. We want to just start getting you ready for this today.
I want to encourage you to get very, very comfortable at having a spiritual talk with the people in your life. So here's the deal. I would encourage you even this week, sit down someplace. We have a few minutes and just write down the name of every person you know, maybe hundreds of names, write all their names down and then go through the list and kind of mark off every name of every person that you know is saved.
You got a lot of people that you know are saved. Maybe you don't even put their names on it. You just skip over there. I know he's saying I'm going to think about it.
You want to list of people who you don't know whether they're saved or not. Maybe they are. You just don't know it. Maybe you're pretty sure they're not.
And then as you look at that list, you want to begin to pray for them. This is the most important thing you can do in this process. Let's begin to pray for them. Let's begin to pray for them.
But what we want to learn to do is to have a spiritual talk. What is a spiritual talk? It's simply you being a witness. So let's think about this.
What is a witness? Does this mean I have to know a bunch of scriptures? Does this mean I have to be able to walk them through a bunch of scriptures? No.
If you saw a crime today, you wouldn't have to know all the legalese about talking about the crime. You just say, nope, I was standing in the store. This guy came in. He was about six foot two.
He had dark hair. He was really mean acting. He pulled a gun out and he robbed the guy behind the counter. I was scared to death.
And I think it's my neighbor. I think I recognize him. What would you just do? You were a witness.
You were a witness to what you saw or what happened to you. Why were the disciples called? They were called to be a witness of what they saw. What are we called?
We are called to be a witness of what's happened in our lives. I want to tell you, your testimony, your story is powerful when you share it with the people who know you. You have to learn how to be a witness. Being a witness of what has happened in your life is a powerful tool to touch others.
Being a witness is what Jesus called us to do. And I believe we all need to be able to give. Listen, a clear, let me really stress this, short witness. If it's more than three or four minutes, it's going to come across like you're preaching out of them.
That's when you start to offend people. To clear short witness to our faith. And what we're going to do is we're going to talk about how to develop that story. And you need to have that story down so well that at any moment you can just go right into it.
It's just part, it's naturally part. Hey, let me tell you about how I came to know Christ. Let me tell you what happened to me. And that's going to be a different thing for every one of us.
How did this happen? When we do this, obedience is doable. So here are some key points to think about as you develop your story. What was your life like before Christ?
You may want to include some of these elements. Here's one that's really important. What drew me to Christ? How did I really come to know Christ?
Number three, what is my life like afterwards? Why does it matter? And what is the hope that I now have? So here's what we're going to do.
We're going to take a minute and just a second and give you a chance to take two or three, four minutes and just kind of jot some notes down, maybe in your phone on the back of your notepad about this. And I want to encourage you to talk about these in your small groups this week. Listen, this is simple stuff. You know, I was raised in church.
My parents were pastors. I was never a drug addict or a drunkard or any of the things many people in the church right up the sin. But as I grew up, I witnessed the life changing power of God in other lives. And as I heard the teaching of the Bible, I became aware that I had some things in my life that controlled me.
I was selfish and manipulative at times. It means spirit and was growing more and less in my life. But there came a point that I became aware that even though I was raised in church, I was far from God. I became aware that I was going to stand before God someday and it wasn't going to be good.
But I was also aware that anyone who calls on the name of Jesus will be saved. I did that. In fact, I did it a lot. I now know that God did a work in my life and me them.
Again, a long term in my life that is still going on today. I found the joyous presence and the joyous purpose in him. And I believe that we're all going to stand before our Creator someday for judgment. When I stand there, I will not have my hope in being a preacher's kid.
My hope is not going to be that I was a preacher. The hope is not going to be that I was trying to do what the spirit and the word told me to do. My hope is going to be that my faith is in Jesus. And I want everyone I know and everyone that I love and brother I love you.
You're my friend. I want everyone I know to know that they can find life here and life for eternity in Jesus. And I said, okay, I shared that with you. I hope it's okay.
I shared that with you. You have any questions about it? Hey, I just want to tell you the most important thing you're ever going to do in your life is make a decision about Jesus. Have you ever thought about that?
Hey, as a friend, I'm going to challenge you to think about that. And if you ever have any questions, I'm here. Watch my life. Watch me.
Hey, I'm going to be inviting you to some time to come. I hope you come. I'm doing that because I love you. Now maybe the person looks and I say, I've been born again for a long time.
I'm going to be in the church. I've been wondering if I should ever talk to you. Now you found another brother. Maybe you find someone's not believing in you that stuff.
That's okay. I know a lot of people who didn't but eventually did. If you have questions, if you want to talk about that, I'm glad to talk about why you don't believe. But you take, you want to be so non-threatening.
Let the spirit of God do his work. Don't try to do it for him. Just share your story, whatever it is. Your story may be born in a deep time of need.
I was broken. I was addicted to this stuff. I didn't know how to get out of it. I met Jesus.
He got me free. I was going through this terrible time in a relationship. I didn't know what to do. I was broken and God came in and rescued me and began to fill my heart up with love again.
I didn't think I could ever have. Whatever your story is. I was raised a place far from God didn't know him. This crazy neighbor came into my life and started talking to me about God.
I got to thinking about God. The more I thought about it, the more my spirit got convicted. The more my spirit got convicted. The more I knew I had to do something.
Finally, I went to church with him. This guy got upset. I needed to get saved and said all I had to do was ask Christ in my life. So I did it.
What's your story? What's your story? What's God done in your life since that happened? So it is right now, 7-Till.
And we're going to stop at 8 and come down here. 6-Till. We're going to stop at 6 minutes and come down here and pray. But I want to challenge you.
I want to take a few minutes. You're on your phone on the back of that. And speaking of jot down your story a little bit. What are the key points to it?
You don't have to get it perfect tonight. Just be the jot some things down. So we're just going to let them maybe play some music back in the back and you jot some things down. Father, we hold these cards in our hands.
Father, over the last week I've been praying that you would show me this week who you'd have me invite this week. And Lord, you opened the door for me to invite Kim. And Father, I don't know what her spiritual background is. We taught me times over the years that we've never gotten that deep into things.
But Lord, I just pray that Father, you'd help me to know what's going on in her life. And I just lift her up before you and pray that you'd touch her heart. If she doesn't know you, Father, let this be the first step to her really coming to know you personally. Just Father, let this card just continue to speak to her.
Let your spirit touch her and guide her. I would pray that other Christians would begin to reach out to her and the Father should be drawn to you. I pray for every person in this room, Father, that you would in the next few days give us somebody that you'd have us to hand this card to. Well, maybe that would be somebody you'd tell us to go look for, maybe somebody that we see and go, that's it, that's the person.
So Father, whichever way you'd work it in our lives, whether you'd lay a name on our heart or whether you'd just lead us to that person, let us find that person in the next few days and let us Father, in great comfort and great boldness to say, hey, Easter's coming. We celebrate with us. We pray that Easter Sunday, Easter Saturday night and Sunday resurrection, the days when we celebrate the Father, a multitude of people would come to salvation. A multitude of people would come to salvation and use us in that process, we pray.
In Jesus' name. Amen. You know, when I was in high school, I would bring friends to church with me. Not as often as I should, I'd be able to stretch the imagination, but occasionally I'd get fired up and invite friends to church with me.
And one of the things that I just, I never did get a grip of. It's okay, I got them here. They just experienced the church service. What do I do with them now?
And you'd have this kind of discomfort of, okay, what did they think? Why did they not think? How did we talk to each other? And I want to tell you where that ended for me.
That ended for me when I wanted this aspect of being a witness. Because see, here's what you do. You invite somebody to church at Easter and they come. And you're able to sit with them at the end of the service and say, hey, who I love, I hope you love service today.
Can I tell you why I invited you? Can I tell you why I invited you? And you share your witness. You stand out in the hallway, you walk over to the chair in the cafe.
It's a nice day, you stand out in the parking lot and say, man, can I just tell you why I invited you? And then I just want to make sure you were ready for heaven. I just love you. I just care for you that much.
I want to make sure you're ready for heaven. And you plant them. That's how you talk to them. I care about you.
I'm interested in your eternity. And then when you're ready to accept the crisis, you're ready to accept the crisis. If you are, we can do that right now, right now. And if you're not, I want to encourage you.
Get your questions lined up and ask me. I may not know the answers, but I'll go find somebody who does. And guess what? I'm going to keep inviting you to stuff.
No, I don't need to do that. Yeah, I love you too much, not too. Care about you too much, not too. I'm going to invite you to stuff in time.
Listen, this is an important decision for you. Don't wait too long. Just be loving and sincere. You don't have to say, oh, you're a terrible sinner.
You don't have to say, oh, you're a terrible sinner. You're like, oh, God, do that. We're all sinners. They look so like, oh, you're just judging me.
Hey, listen, I'm judging myself. I know where I am. I need Jesus. And so you just have that talk.
I want to encourage you. If you invite somebody, you invite somebody, you get them in. The altar call doesn't have to be the last thing that's done. Oh, they didn't raise their hand.
Didn't work. Go on the hallway. Maybe they'll get saved in the hallway. Maybe they'll get saved sitting at lunch together.
Just let the Spirit of God guide you in it. But this is why I want to tell you, this is why it's important for you to get your story down. And I want to encourage you to work. We're going to do this over the next several weeks.
We're going to have you share stories with each other and share it with your husband, your wife, or your friends, or your other Christians, or somebody in your small group. Just begin to share it with other people. Why? Because you're the one who flows out of your life.
And if I was talking to somebody I went to high school with today, when I talked to my old high school friends, I look at them and say, listen, you knew in high school. You knew I was going to church. You knew I loved God. You knew I was a Christian.
Man, God done a lot of things on my life since then. He changed me a lot since then. I just want to tell you God's been good to me. Let me tell you why I became a preacher.
I just got this great passion for people who don't know Jesus. Let me tell you. And you're going to your story. As long as somebody who's known has been a preacher all my life, I look at him and say, listen, you know I'm a preacher.
That's what I do. Let me tell you why. Let me tell you why. It's not to get rich.
That's for sure. God's been good to me. But let me tell you why. Just be natural in that.
The more you know your story, the more you have it down, the more you're comfortable. Just popping off you. God will give you. Sometimes he will give you opportunities to suddenly come upon you.
A friend will suddenly say to you, why do you go to church all the time anyway? Why are you about this? Somebody will just ask you that. I've had friends in high school say, why?
Why are you doing? Why? You want to have an answer. An instant.
You want to have an answer. You want to have people who have a message. Then the other time, when you say, God moves you off, look at that list of people you know. God says, then call them.
Take them to lunch. Now if I'm going to do that, I tell them. I tell them. I don't tell them.
Hey, let's just show have fun. I really want to be serious. I tell them. Hey, lets go lunch again and something I want to talk to you about.