Steps to Peace with God (Billy Graham Evangelistic Association)
Step 1 - RECOGNIZE God’s Plan for Your Life
God’s Purpose: Peace and Life
God loves you and wants you to experience peace and life -- abundant and eternal.
The Bible says ...
"We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." --Romans 5:1 (NIV) Only those who have been made the decision to accept Christ’s substitutionary payment for the forgiveness our one’s sins can experience Christ’s justification.
"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." --John 3:16 (NIV)
"I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly." --John 10:10 (NIV)
Why don’t most people have this peace and abundant life that God planned for us to have?
Step 2 - REALIZE our problem
The Problem: Our Separation
God created us in His own image to have an abundant life. He did not make us as robots to automatically love and obey Him. God gave us a will and a freedom of choice.
We chose to disobey God and go our own willful way. We still make this choice today. This results in separation from God.
The Bible says ...
"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." --Romans 3:23 (NIV)
"For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." --Romans 6:23 (NIV)
Our Attempts to Reach God
People have tried in many ways to bridge this gap between themselves and God ...
The Bible says ...
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death." --Proverbs 14:12 (NIV)
"But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear." --Isaiah 59:2 (NIV)
No bridge reaches God ... except one.
Step 3 RESPOND to God’s remedy found in the cross of Christ
God’s Bridge: The Cross
Jesus Christ died on the Cross and rose from the grave. He paid the penalty for our sin and bridged the gap between God and people.
The Bible says ...
"For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ." --1 Timothy 2:5 (NIV)
"For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God." --1 Peter 3:18 (NIV)
"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." --Romans 5:8 (NIV)
God has provided the only way. Each person must make a choice.
Step 4 - RECEIVE God’s Son as our personal Savior and Lord
Our Response: Receive Christ
We must trust Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior and receive Him by personal invitation.
The Bible says ...
"Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me." --Revelation 3:20 (NIV)
"Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God." --John 1:12 (NIV)
"That if you confess with your mouth, ’Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." --Romans 10:9 (NIV)
Where are you?
Will you receive Jesus Christ right now?
Here is how you can receive Christ:
1. Admit your need (I am a sinner).
2. Be willing to turn from your sins (repent).
3. Believe that Jesus Christ died for you on the Cross and rose from the grave.
4. Through prayer, invite Jesus Christ to come in and control your life through the Holy Spirit. (Receive Him as Lord and Savior.)
Step 5 -
Prayer to Personally receive Christ as your Savior and Lord.
How to Pray:
Dear Lord Jesus, I know that I am a sinner and need Your forgiveness. I believe that You died for my sins. I want to turn from my sins. I now invite You to come into my heart and life. I want to trust and follow You as Lord and Savior. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
God’s Assurance: His Word
If you prayed this prayer,
The Bible says ...
"Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." --Romans 10:13 (NIV)
Did you sincerely ask Jesus Christ to come into your life? Where is He right now? What has He given you?
"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith -- and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God -- not by works, so that no one can boast." --Ephesians 2:8,9 (NIV)
Receiving Christ, we are born into God’s family through the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit who indwells every believer. This is called regeneration, or the "new birth."
This is just the beginning of a wonderful new life in Christ. To deepen this relationship you should:
1. Read your Bible everyday to know Christ better.
2. Talk to God in prayer every day.
3. Tell others about Christ.
4. Worship, fellowship, and serve with other Christians in a church where Christ is preached.
5. As Christ’s representative in a needy world, demonstrate your new life by your love and concern for others.
Illustrations and quotes
Evangelism Quotes and Illustrations
1. Paul Harvey said, "Too many Christians are no longer fishers of men but keepers of the aquarium."
2. Paul Little in his book "How to Give Away Your Faith" defines witnessing: "Witnessing is that deep-seated conviction that the greatest favor I can do for others is to introduce them to Jesus Christ."
3. Elton Trueblood, the Quaker scholar, once compared evangelism to fire. Evangelism occurs, he said, when Christians are so ignited by their contact with Christ that they in turn set other fires. It is easy to determine when something is aflame. It ignites other material. Any fire that does not spread will eventually go out. A church without evangelism is a contradiction in terms, just as fire that does not burn is a contradiction.
4. Evangelism is not what we tell people, unless what we tell is totally consistent with who we are. It is who we are that is going to make the difference. If we do not truly enjoy our faith, nobody is going to catch the fire of enjoyment from us. If our lives are not totally centered on Christ, we will not be Christ-bearers for others, no matter how pious our words. [Show and Tell, Citation: Madeleine L’Engle, quoted in Christian Reader (May/June 1998, p. 50)]
5. Recently, I saw a letter written by a relatively new Christian to the person whose life had influenced hers so greatly. She actually lists about a dozen qualities she found contagious in the life of this older Christian. Listen to some of what she wrote: You know when we met; I began to discover a new vulnerability, a warmth, and a lack of pretence that impressed me. I saw in you a thriving spirit - no signs of internal stagnation anywhere. I could tell you were a growing person and I liked that. I saw you had strong self-esteem, not based on the fluff of self-help books, but on something a whole lot deeper. I saw that you lived by convictions and priorities and not just by convenience, selfish pleasure, and financial gain. And I had never met anyone like that before. I felt a depth of love and concern as you listened to me and didn’t judge me. You tried to understand me, you sympathized and you celebrated with me, you demonstrated kindness and generosity - and not just to me, but to other people, as well. And you stood for something. You were willing to go against the grain of society and follow what you believed to be true, no matter what people said, and no matter how much it cost you. And for those reasons and a whole host of others, I found myself really wanting what you had. Now that I’ve become a Christian, I wanted to write to tell you I’m grateful beyond words for how you lived out your Christian life in front of me.
Basically, she was saying, "Thanks for being a Contagious Christian." Reading a letter like that motivates me to live as a contagious Christian too. How about you? I’ll bet you want your life to count for a whole lot more than trinkets and toys and zeros on a pay check, too. From: Becoming A Contagious Christian
6. Recently I heard Dieter Zander, the pastor of the first GenX church in America speak at a conference about reaching people in the age of relativism. He cited a Barna study that asked people to use single words to describe Jesus. They responded, "wise, accepting, compassionate, gracious, humble." Then he asked them to use single words to describe Christians, they said, "critical, exclusive, self righteous, narrow and repressive."
"There is a difference between knowing the good news and being the good news," Zander said. "We are the evidence! How we live our lives are the evidence. Everything counts--all the time."
"With previous generations, a strong preacher could give a good message, even if the church was hypocritical and critical and people would still get saved," Zander continued, "but not any more. I’m seeing a change in what seekers are looking for. Not something they can relate to. They are looking for a transcendent God. They don’t want to be entertained they want to be transformed."
7. There is something wrong when people are leaving the church to find God
8. "It is our privilege to have world evangelism as a passion, not our responsibility to have as a burden." Mary Nordstrom
9. Jim Wallis writes in The Call to Conversion (HarperCollins, 1992, p.
108) his testimony: "When I was a university student, I was unsuccessfully evangelized by almost every Christian group on campus. My basic response to their preaching was, "How can I believe when I look at the way the church lives?" They answered, "Don’t look at the church, look at Jesus." I now believe that statement is one of the saddest in the history of the church. ...People should be able to look at the way we live and begin to understand what the gospel is about."
10. "Our English word witness comes from an Old English word we do no use very much anymore but we used it in Elizabethan times and afterwards. It is the word wit. ’To wit’ means ’to know’ A ’wit’ is ’a knowledgeable person.’ So a ’witness’ of some who knows something and testifies to it."
11. A free flowing river purifies itself and is alive with life. So also is the Christian who becomes involved with others in sharing the Gospel. That Christian will discover the reason for his or her existence. Being involved in the ministry of a witness is essential to finding the fulfillment we desire as humans.
12. Richard Baxter, the Puritan preacher of the 17th century conveys the urgency, the zeal of Christian witness when he said, "I preached as never sure to preach again, and as a dying man to dying men!"
13. Jesus issues the same call to all, but to different tasks. Someone put it rather quaintly: "to some, Christ calls ’leave boat and bay, and white-haired Zebedee.’" To some, the call is harder - "stay and mend the nets for me."
14. CT STUDD: "wealthy, nationally famous athlete put it all aside to disappear into the mission field: China, India, and then Africa. Lost from sight for 13 yrs without contact. WHY? ’Some people love to dwell near church with choir and steeple bell. But I want to run a rescue station a yard from the gates of hell.’"
15. Alexander Whyte said, " It would change your whole heart and life this very (day) if you would take Peter and Cornelius home with you and lay them both to heart. If you would take a four cornered napkin when you get home, and a.. Pen and ink and write the names of the nations, and the churches, and the denominations, and the congregations, and the ministers, and the public figures (men), and the private citizens, and the neighbors, and the fellow-worshippers - all the people you dislike, and despise and do not, cannot, and will not, love. Heap all their names into your unclean napkin, and then look up and say, ’Not so, Lord, I neither can speak well, nor think well, of these people. I cannot do it and I will not try. If your acted out and spake out all the evil things that are in your heart in some such way as that, you would thus get such a sight of yourselves that you would never forget it." [As quoted in (R. Kent Hughes. Acts: The Church Afire. Wheaton, ILL: Crossway Books, 1996) pp. 147-148]
16. Dr. Ellin Greene, of the University of Chicago, has said, "We get so quickly sidetracked from the simple story nature of our faith. We begin to think that theology saves us, that truth is somehow embodied in our theology of the Atonement, or our mastery of eschatological charts. But when Jesus wanted to communicate the truth of God’s kingdom, he left out the polysyllables and told a story about a woman who lost a coin or a man who dug for treasure. The kingdom of heaven is like this . he said. Dare we ask for more scholarly explanation from the Son of God?"
17. David Brainerd, the famous missionary to the American Indians, proclaimed this truth throughout his ministry. He said, "I never got away from Jesus and Him crucified in my preaching. I found that once these people were gripped by the great evangelical meaning of Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf, I did not have to give them many instructions about changing their behavior."
18. Howard Hendricks said, "In the midst of a generation screaming for answers, Christians are stuttering."
19. "Jesus . . . wants us to see that the neighbor next door or the people sitting next to us on a plane or in a classroom are not interruptions to our schedule. They are there by divine appointment. Jesus wants us to see their needs, their loneliness, their longings, and he wants to give us the courage to reach out to them" (REBECCA MANLEY PIPPERT, Draper’s).
20. "When it comes to community ministry, we finally put our program where our mouth is. Instead of expecting the community to come to church, we decided to take the church to the community." Mark Krenz
21. Michael S. Hamilton, Assistant Professor of History at Seattle Pacific University wrote, "In the 1930’s, most missionary agencies emphasized evangelism, church-planting, and discipleship. In 1998, however, four of the five largest overseas ministries specialized in relief, development, and education work. For many of these agencies, evangelism is a secondary concern."
Assembled by Paul Fritz
