Sermon: The Gospel According to You Is 12:1-6, I Peter 3:15 Feb 13, 2005
(Part of the series Putting the pieces together)
Theme: Our mission demands that we always be prepared to tell others what we believe and the difference knowing it has made in our lives.
In case you haven’t noticed our puzzle is beginning to take shape. You can begin to make up the picture. You can see some of the objects setting on the shelf. We are almost finished with Putting the Pieces Together. Next week will be the last sermon in this series as we put the finishing touches on God’s picture for us. I hope you will bring back your puzzle piece and find it’s place in our puzzle. And I hope as we conclude this series that you will have begun to understand your spiritual shape and how you fit in the big picture of the kingdom of God and Harmony United Methodist Church.
In Decision magazine, Peggy DesNoyers wrote: My job as a psychiatric home health nurse brought me in touch with many people who were hurt or angry and who were searching for answers to problems in their lives. I knew that Jesus was the answer, but I couldn’t bring myself to talk to them about him. I was the master of excuses. [Until] one patient changed my life.
Wanda was a 56 year old widow in chronic depression. All of her family had died, some of them tragically, within a span of 16 years. The loss and her grief overwhelmed her until life for her became a burden she was unable to bear. One day she quit her job, went home, pulled the curtains, and refused to leave her house. Eventually she stopped eating, and even the smallest of tasks became too difficult for her to do.
An observant neighbor had noticed the change in Wanda’s behavior, and that neighbor made arrangements for her to be taken to a hospital where she was admitted to the psychiatric ward. At the end of her hospital stay, when she went home, I was assigned to be her home health nurse. I visited her weekly to make sure she was taking her medication and was eating and taking care of herself.
Over the course of six months Wanda continued to recover. Although I knew she needed to meet Jesus as her Savior, I reasoned that she would soon be able to get out and go to a church somewhere herself and then she would hear about him there.
One day I went to Wanda’s house for my regular visit, and I was surprised to find the door ajar. I knocked and when there was no response, I pushed the door open and stepped inside. The living room was vacant, so I went to her bedroom and found her lifeless body on the bed. There were several empty medication bottles beside her and in her hand she held a note addressed to me.
I sat on the bed beside her and took the note: I read: Dear Peggy, I’m so sorry I tried it your way, but I got tired. Please forgive me. I tried. I just couldn’t do it. I got tired. On my knees beside Wanda’s lifeless body I promised God that I would never pass by another opportunity to tell someone about him. (Decision magazine, July/August 2000. “Silent No More” by Peggy DesNoyers)
None of us want to experience regret like that. None of us want to feel responsible for the death of someone who doesn’t know about Jesus. We know the Great Commission, we know we are commanded to “Therefore, go into all the world and make disciples of all men.” In fact many of you after last weeks sermon made a point of telling me that you invite everyone you meet to church. But when Jesus said “go into all the world and make disciples of all men” he wasn’t talking about inviting people to church, he was talking about telling them the Gospel and converting them to Christianity. He was talking about witnessing, evangelizing, and testifying (the three scariest words in the Christian faith). He was talking about telling the world about what God has done for you.
You see most people are not converted to faith by a preacher. They see us as professional salesmen doing our job. Most are not “saved” during an “Evangelistic crusade” or during a visitation time in the community. Seventy nine percent of people come to knowledge and belief in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior through a friend or relative. (According to Institute for American Church Growth, 1997) And it isn’t while they are in the church with.
Jesus understood that. “According to one count, the gospels record 132 contacts that Jesus had with people. Six were in the temple; four in the synagogues and 122 were out with the people in the mainstream of life. (J.K. Johnston-Sermon Central). People are converted, saved by faith, when they understand how God meets them in the real life and the best way for them to understand that is through your gospel, your story. “Stories build a relational bridge that Jesus can walk across from your heart to theirs.” (The Purpose Driven Life, by Rick Warren page 290).
Gospel means the good news and the good news of Jesus is evident in your life. It is your unique story. You are the authority on your life and how God has changed it. Only you can tell your story. It is an essential part of your mission on earth. And if you don’t share it, it will be lost forever.
Now I can hear the wheels in your brains cranking away. You are like the neighbor whose friend came over to borrow a lawnmower. The neighbor told his friend he could not let him use the lawnmower because all the flights had been cancelled from New York to Los Angeles. Perplexed the friend asked him what cancelled flights from New Your to Los Angeles had to do with borrowing his lawnmower. To which the neighbor replied. “it doesn’t have anyting to do with it, but if if I don’t want to let you use my lawnmower, one excuse is as good as another 9Excuses: Any Will do, Zig Ziglar, Something Else to Smile About-Thomas Nelson, 1999)
The Great Commission doesn’t allow for excuses. It doesn’t even allow us the excuse that we don’t know how to witness or testify about God because the Bible tells us exactly how to tell our story. In fact it is the same in the Old and New Testament Isaiah 12 says “Sing of the glorious things God as done, how he has strengthen you, how you trust him, the joy he has have brought in your life. Now I don’t think Isaiah is telling us literally we need to sing our stories – thank goodness – as I have said before I have heard some of you sing and I am afraid if you tried to sing your story people might never come to church. But Isaiah is saying what 1 Peter says “give the reasons for the hope you have.” And I believe you have the hope because you have already seen that hope in your life.
Acts 4:20 says “We cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” Acts 22:11 says “You will be his witness to all men of what you have seen and heard. When the blind man was questioned about who Jesus healed him he said, “Whether he was a sinner or not I can not say but what I can say is Now I see.” The demonic man when he was healed went around telling everyone what happened to him and people believed. The Samaritan Women met Jesus at the well and realized he was the Messiah and she went about telling everyone what happened to her. Abraham, Job, The Psalmist, Peter, John and Paul went around telling people what they had seen and heard. They didn’t go around discussing theology and the doctrine of the church. They told people about what they had experienced.
2 Timothy 1:8 says do not be ashamed to testify. You will be surprised at who listens and responds. Jonah was positive nobody in Ninevah would listen to him. In fact he didn’t want to tell the Ninevites. But when he did the King was saved, everyone in the court was saved, every Ninevite was saved. If you begin telling your story I believe you will be surprised at who will listen and how many will be saved.
So 1 Peter says always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reasons for the hope you have. The old Boy Scout motto is the Christian motto. Be prepared. Be prepared to share your story. If I asked most of you today to give your testimony you would probably shake your head no at me or stutter and start over again and again or argue that you don’t have a story.
You would be amazed at the things that happened to you, the number of things God has given you to share if you only stop to think about it. (Hand out The Gospel According to You Worksheet.)
This is a simple work sheet adapted from The Purpose Driven Life. It is a guide to help you write out your story so that you are always prepared to answer. Look at it with me if you will. All you have to do is answer this simple questions in simple language and you will have your story, the Gospel According to You. It isn’t about making your story dynamic or dramatic. Or, writing like you were competing to be on the Best Sellers list at the book store. It is about your story, about what God has done in your life. And as I said, only you can tell it. Different people will relate to different stories, different events. I can not relate to someone who has struggled with drugs, or whose loved has died, or who has suffered with a horrible illness. But maybe you can.
I would like to publish for our church use only a compilation of our stories. I challenge you to write out your story and give to me so that I can type it up and format it into a booklet of the Stories of Harmony for Easter. I challenge you to write out your story so you will be able to share it in a concise manner with other people. Your testimony should not be any longer than 3-5 minutes in length. I’m not asking you to write a novel, just your story so that you can tell it to those around you.
Then be prepared to answer people about what you believe. Now that may share you, you might even argue you don’t know what you really believe. But most people are looking for you have to all the answer, they are looking for a long dissertation about the Christian faith. They just want to know the basics. I have shared with you that I went through a process of a couple of months writing down and elimating and adding to a document I call My Uncompromising faith. It is a list of about 12 statements about what I believe about God/ Christ. I have it taped inside the front of my Bible. I have tried to memorize it but then I realized I already have memorized the basic tenets of our faith. In faith most of you already have it memorized too.
“I believe in God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth. And in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord…” Take your church bulletin and look with me a our Confession of Faith – the Apostles’ Creed. (READ THE CREED) That is the basic tenets of our faith. It is a very real and concise statement about what we as a church, the universal church, believe. Grant it it is in somewhat flowery speech but that is it. And if you can remember it you can tell anyone about what we believe. But be sure to do it in simple language.
In a 1995 survey by Barna Research Group, it was discovered that non Christians have no clue what Christians mean when they use the phrases that are basic to our faith, 63% of non Christians don’t know what Christians mean when they talk about the Gospel, 75% of non Christians don’t know John 3:16. They don’t know what we mean when we talk about the word,, I about being convicted by Christ. In fact 40% of Christians don’t know what the gospel means and 53% don’t know John 3:16. It isn’t about using fancy words, but it is about telling the story so other people can understand it and relate to it. And the best way to do that is through your story.
And, lastly, as you begin to formulate and write your story, remember to let it always point to Christ. After all, this isn’t about you. It is about Him
One Sunday a little girl and her mother were driving home from church. The little girl turned to her mother and said “Mommy, there’s something, about the preacher’s message this morning that I don’t understand.” The mother said, “Oh, what is it?” The little girl replied. Well, he said that God is bigger than we are. He said Good is so big that he could hold the world in his hand. Is that true. The mother replied, yes, that’s true hone. But Mommy he also said that God comes to live inside of us when we believe in Jesus as our Savior. Is that true, too? Again, the mother assured the little girl that what the pastor had said was true. With a puzzled look on her face the little girl then asked, If God is bigger than us and he lives in us, wouldn’t he show through us.
Tell your story, let God show through, and you will never have reason to regret. Amen and Amen.
