Have you ever tried to witness to somebody and felt like your words were falling flat? You knew all the answers to their questions, but you didn’t feel like you were able to answer them in a way that caused them to want to actually listen. You weren’t able to relay the wonder and excitement through your words. Perhaps, you have a different problem; you feel led to witness to somebody but you are scared to death you won’t have the answers to their questions. You are worried you will make things worse due to your lack of knowledge and understanding.
Witnessing to others can be a somewhat scary thought, but it is also a necessary part of being a Christian. We are called to share the Gospel and bring people to Christ. Honestly, I don’t understand how you can truly believe in God and not want to bring as many people to Him as possible. So, it is imperative to understand what tools we need. I’m sure you could find whole books on this subject, but I am going to focus on two things. Just two things you absolutely must have in order to be a witness for Jesus. If you have them, you will always be prepared to witness to anybody.
It doesn’t matter what the world has to say until we know what God has to say.
The first is knowledge of the Bible. It may seem a little too obvious, but yet so many people leave this part out. They will talk about how they love Jesus and how He has changed their lives, but the only scripture they know is what is mentioned on Sunday morning. They don’t take the time to study scripture and get familiar with God’s word, but this is integral to bringing others to know Christ. You can’t possibly help others come to know Christ until you truly know Him. I realize just recently I wrote about using secular reasoning and studies to disprove or cast doubt on the myths and beliefs that stand in contrast to the Bible. I still believe that this is important, but as Christians we should know the Bible first. It doesn’t matter what the world has to say until we know what God has to say. He is the one that we worship and follow and so we should most certainly be listening to Him first. Many biblical figures even Jesus quoted the Old Testament several times when speaking to others.
If you want to witness to others there is absolutely no substitute for Biblical knowledge.
Biblical knowledge is essential to bringing people to Christ as well as helping believers live a life that is more Christ like. It may be to point out something that they have never known before or pointing to scripture to dispel misunderstandings. If nothing else it will mean you are rooted in the truth and can stand firm in your beliefs no matter what questions are thrown at you. If you want to witness to others there is absolutely no substitute for Biblical knowledge.
I understand that reading the Bible can seem like a daunting task, but it is also a very fulfilling task.
The great thing about Biblical knowledge is we have it all available; it is just a matter of choosing to learn it. I understand that reading the Bible can seem like a daunting task, but it is also a very fulfilling task. Don’t psyche yourself out worrying about how much you will be able to understand or how big of a book it is. Don’t think about how deep some Biblical studies can get. Just simply open the Bible and start reading. It doesn’t have to be Genesis; you can start with any book you want. You can find a “Bible in a year” plan and follow that. You can find a friend or mentor that will read through the Bible with you and help you stay on task. It doesn’t need to be an overwhelming task and once you start doing it and start allowing God to speak to you through the scriptures, I think you will find that it is actually a joyful task instead of a painful one. Once you have started reading the Bible, you will likely find the Holy Spirit helps you understand certain things and even uses the scriptures that you read to guide you through your day, which leads me to the second thing you need, The Holy Spirit.
How much more effective can you be than God’s words coming from your mouth?
The Holy Spirit is absolutely indispensable when it comes to teaching others about God. I mean, how much more effective can you be than God’s words coming from your mouth? Before Jesus returned to be with the Father, He gave his disciples what is known as the Great Commission, but He also told them to wait for the Holy Spirit before they started their ministry (Luke 24:49). They waited 10 days before the Holy Spirit descended on them and once it did, they went out to spread the word. Paul talks about the Holy Spirit being with Him (Acts 9:17). We see a massive growth in the church in those early days. We see the disciples and Paul bringing thousands of people to know Christ and it was because the Holy Spirit was with them giving them the right words at the right time.
In fact, even Jesus waited for the Holy Spirit to begin His ministry. Jesus Christ, meaning God himself, waited for the Holy Spirit before He began His earthly ministry. We know he already had the knowledge because we are told that the men at the temple were amazed at His knowledge when He was left at the temple (Luke 2:41-46). We know he already knew and understood His need to teach people about God because when his parents find Him at the temple He responds by saying “You should have known I would be about my Father’s work” (Luke 2:49). Yet, he still waited for the Holy Spirit. Jesus’ baptism marks the beginning of His ministry and as He is baptized, the Bible says that God’s voice spoke out saying, “This is my son of whom I am well pleased,” and the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus as a dove. I think if Jesus told His disciples to wait for the Holy Spirit, we can rest assured that it must be important, but if Jesus Himself waited then how much more important is it for us to wait?
I tend to rely on my on intelligence and quick wit when I am involved in any type of discussion, but when the conversations changes to a topic as important as eternal salvation, I need to stop myself and instead on God to speak through me.
Here we have another one that is readily available to us if we only seek it out. Jesus said the Holy Spirit was sent to dwell within the people that believed in Him. I think the biggest issue here is that we aren’t sensitive to the Holy Spirit and therefore we often miss what He is saying. On top of that, we have a tendency to choose to try to do things on our own instead of relying on God’s assistance. I am guilty of this one myself. I tend to rely on my on intelligence and quick wit when I am involved in any type of discussion. If I’m talking about my favorite baseball team that’s fine, but when the conversations changes to a topic as important as eternal salvation, I need to stop myself from allowing my brain to run the show and instead rely on God to speak through me. If I allow God to do that, I don’t have to worry about my lack of knowledge or understanding and I will never walk away feeling like I should have said more, because I said exactly what God wanted said.
Biblical knowledge and the Holy Spirit: if you have the first and learn to rely on the second you really can’t go wrong when trying to lead others to Christ. Understand I put them in the order that I did because I believe that typically God’s voice follows us reading His word. Meaning that if you want the Holy Spirit to guide you through conversations you need to be obedient and read the Bible first. I have had moments where the Holy Spirit reminded me of things I had read, that I honestly didn’t even remember, because it hadn’t stuck out to me at the time, but now I was being reminded of it and shown why it was important. I have had times where I suddenly came to understand a biblical principle in the middle of the conversation and was able to relay that information to the people whom I was talking. I know that this was the Holy Spirit guiding me and speaking to me, but had I never read the Bible, if I had never read those passages I may have never had the chance to experience that.
On the other hand, I don’t want you to walk away from this thinking that if you haven’t read the Bible you have an excuse to never witness to anybody, because that isn’t the case either. I do believe that reading the Bible is absolutely important if you expect to be able to effectively speak to people about Jesus Christ. However, if you feel God leading you to speak to somebody than you can trust that He will provide you with the words to say regardless of how many Bible Verses you have memorized. So, I suppose what I am trying to say is that while reading the Bible should be the first step, the Holy Spirit is the most important element to witnessing to other people.
we are leaving people wandering in the wilderness and that are ready to come to Christ.
The Bible tells us that the harvest is large but there aren’t enough workers in the field (Mathew 9:37). Due to our lack of willingness to witness to the people around us and our lack of understanding of biblical truths, we are leaving people wandering in the wilderness and that are ready to come to Christ. They just need somebody to talk to them and guide them through those final steps. The problem is we don’t have enough people in the fields to possibly reach all the people who could be saved. We need more workers. We need more people speaking the truth of the Cross. We need more Christians showing and telling people what it means to be a Christian. We need to be out changing people’s hearts and minds for God. Are you ready to join me? Are you ready to dig into the word and arm yourself with the knowledge that is necessary? Are you prepared to call on the Holy Spirit and ask for guidance and pray this it is His voice that is heard and not your own? Are you ready to share the love that you have experienced with the world? What are you waiting for?
