Share Jesus Without Fear
2nd Timothy 1:5-9a
For the last month we have been talking about the topic of fear… Both on Sundays and on Wednesday nights. We have talked about the fear of commitment, failure of, loneliness, this Wednesday, the fear of death.
These are fairly common fears for many of us. Most of us probably experience one of these fears. Today I want us to look at a specific fear that every believer, every Christian has experienced at one time or another and that is the fear of sharing our faith with another person.
A survey was given to a group of adults who attended a training session on how to share their faith. The training was conducted by the Billy Graham association. One of the questions that they asked was this… What is the main thing that keeps you from sharing your faith? 9 % said they were too busy… 28 % said they really don’t know how 12 % said their personal life was not in order. But by far the largest group 51 % whose biggest problem was… You guessed it…fear. What were they afraid of?... Afraid they would not know what to say… Some were afraid they might do more harm than good… Others were afraid they might fail.
Paul wrote this particular letter and he wrote these verses with a particular purpose in mind. He is writing to a young man by the name of Timothy. Paul was older than Timothy and he was his mentor. Paul wanted to teach Timothy as much as possible about the Christian faith. As a young pastor, Timothy was afraid of being inadequate. He was afraid people would look down on him because he was so young. So Paul is writing to Timothy here to encourage young men to say you did not need to be afraid because God has not given you a spirit of fear…Instead He has actually given you a spirit of power and of self control.
Now before we talk about how we can move from fear to confidence in sharing our faith I was to again understand where fear comes from. We have already said that God does not give us a spirit of fear so we know that this fear comes directly from Satan. And Satan has a purpose for these fears. You see Satan has at least two goals for your life and for mine. His first goal is to do everything possible to keep you out of the kingdom of God. He wants to do everything possible to keep you from being saved. However, in case his first goal fails, he then goes to his second goal which is to stop you from growing spiritually. And one way we always grow spiritually is through sharing our faith. And the way he does that is by convincing us that we are inadequate and incapable of sharing our faith and he will pose questions to us like these…
. What will people think of you if you share your faith everywhere you go?
. What will happen if you offend them? They may never listen to the gospel again! What if you get in the middle of sharing with them and
suddenly don’t know what to say?. What if they ask you question about the Bible and you don’t know how to answer it? And so as he poses these questions to us, one after another, we become afraid and we draw back from sharing our faith.
I want us to do a word study here for a moment to make this clearer so that we can really understand what Paul is saying. In the New Testament there are actually seven different Greek words that are translated as fear in the English language. But in the English language we sometimes take one word and make it mean a dozen different things.
Here is an example… Look at the word fast. It is a simple word, but
it has a lot of meanings.. If you want to make a boat fast-make it quicker or you tie it up… . If you say a certain color was fast it would mean that it wouldn’t run. If I said my son Ross is fast… it means he does run. But if I said he was fast asleep… He wouldn’t be moving at all. . Also there is fast food. Your watch can be fast. Get the idea?
Let me give you three of the ones that we are used in the Greek here… The first one is the word * phobeo-a healthy kind of fear, unnatural fear. This is the kind of fear that teach you from stepping off a 12 story building.
Word phobos –we get our word phobia from this word. This would be an unnatural fear. This is the kind of fear that seems to paralyze us. There are over 500 fears that had been labeled and fall into this category…Claustrophobic and so forth.
Now the difference… The first one phobeo would be the kind of fear that keep you from driving your car on a back road at 200 mph… You realize that’s dangerous… The second one phobos. This fear would keep you from driving a car.. While the first one could make you nervous about being on an airplane… The second one could keep you from flying at all.
When Paul wrote to Timothy and said God has not given a spirit of fear… He actually did not use either one of these words. Instead the word Paul used was the word * deilia and it means to be a coward and an as a result we are afraid to do things they can actually make a big difference in someone’s life.
This first type of fear keeps us alive so that we don’t do something that’s
not very smart. This second type actually keeps us from living. At least it keeps us from living a full life.
The 3rd type of fear keeps us from accomplishing anything while we are living. This is the fear that causes us to live ordinary lives …to never take a chance, to never try to change anything.
And so Paul writes to this young preacher who is about to begin this adventure of serving God, he’s saying do not be afraid to attempt great things for God.
1. He was saying do not be afraid that you will fail. For some this morning you don’t try to share your fight because you are afraid that if you do that you want succeed. You are afraid you will fail. Wayne Gretzky, was known as the greatest hockey player ever… he said you’ll always miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take.
Another thing we need to realize is this and please let this sink in...Success is not defined by leading someone to Christ. Success is not defined by simply sharing our faith. We have to trust guide for the results. So do not be afraid that you’re going to fail.
2. Do not be afraid that you will be rejected. Now listen, regarding this topic of rejection the Bible tells us several important things…First of all, people may reject us but Jesus never will. John 6:37 Second, they are not actually rejecting us, they are rejecting Jesus. Mark 8:31 Third, those who reject Christ will be judged other actions. John’s 12: 48
Now Peter gives us excellent advice regarding how to share our faith…
Here’s the verse… 1st Peter 3:15 In your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asked you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect.
In closing I want to give you six things that are necessary for
us to share our faith.
1. As you do, ask God to fill you with his Holy Spirit. In the Scripture the Bible uses about 15 different terms to refer to the Holy Spirit. He is referred to as the spirit of adoption… He is referred to as truth… He is called grace… But then the name that is the most popular is comforter and that’s the word Jesus used when he told the disciples that he would be leaving… They were afraid… They didn’t understand is so if there was anything they needed, it was comfort so he said and I will ask the father and he shall give you another comforter, and he will be with you forever.
2. Pray about your fear. God has a solution for your fear. The psalmist said I I sought the Lord and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears.
3. Go with the right attitude. The words that you speak are very important… even more than that your attitude is important.
Peter said, do this with gentleness and respect… Not a holier than thou attitude, not get right or get left! or turn or burn!
4. I said this already but I want to say again… Do not be afraid of making
a mistake…
I was visiting a man at the hospital. Upon leaving I wanted to make another visit to a man in his home. I had never met him. He as on our church records but he did not attend. Someone in our office had told me he was sick. So I looked it up quickly in the phone book, got the address and went there. I introduced myself to his wife when she answered the door. I asked to pray with her husband. She said sure. The more I talked with him I realized I was at the wrong house. This man did not attend our church however he had the same name as the man I had intended to visit. The amazing thing though was that this man was also sick! In fact he had the shingles and wanted someone to pray with him. God will take situations where we make mistakes and still use them! Do not be afraid of making a mistake.
5. Memorize several scriptures to help you or just mark your Bible. Beginning Wednesday March 2nd, we’ll offer a new course called Share Jesus without fear. In that course you’ll learn:
… Five questions you can ask people to help you get started
… Seven Scripture verses you can use
… Five questions you can ask to seal that decision… Today-you can commit!
6. Finally, claim God’s presence and go in his power.
A little boy walked into his dad’s den just as he finished reading a book. The son asked, what were you reading? The father replied, “ I was reading the book of revelation….it is the last book of the Bible. The boy was kind of curious and he asked his dad, what is it about? His dad replied it’s about God’s final battle against evil.
The little boy was excited and he asked his daddy, well who won? The father stooped down to the boys eye level and he said, God … God won.
And He did and so did we. Because He won, we now have His power!
