How to Witness

In the book of Romans, we read in chapter 10 and begin in verse 13. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things.

Today, friends, I would like to touch on the subject of how to witness and that is the title of my message today, how to witness. For I fear many of us do not know how to share the gospel as we should. We often begin at the wrong place and do not present the necessary truths to the hearts and conscience of our hearers.

Too often, an evangelist or gospel worker will present an offer of Jesus to folks without first showing them why they need Jesus in the first place. If a person is not sick, they have no need of a physician. But if you meet people where they are and begin there, that is the very best place to start with the gospel witness.

Notice how Jesus dealt with sinners and we can learn much from him. When Jesus spoke with the woman at the well, he did not offer himself to her right away as the source of living waters. Rather, he first met her where she was in her sins.

First, he questioned her to awaken her to her sins. Go call thy husband, he told her in John 4, 16. Jesus confronted her with her sin and her need of forgiveness for sin.

His words thrust her through like a sword. Have no husband, she replied, probably looking down at the ground with a shamed face of guilt. Then Jesus went on to declare who he was and how he could transform her life, which he indeed did.

And she became one of the best evangelists in her town. Many were saved by her witness for Christ. Come see a man which told me all things that I ever did.

Is this not the Christ? And as we look further in the passage, we come to verse 39, which states, and many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman, which testified, he told me all that I ever did. Listen, friends, I have made my share of false converts in my time. I have gone through neighborhoods and knocked on doors and rang doorbells and gotten to living rooms and told folks about it.

Jesus, they were not ready to receive, but I made it easy for them to receive him before they ever saw they were sinners in need of him. I have learned my lessons the hard way. We are not to cast pearls before swine.

My Bible forbids me to do that, but we are commanded to share our faith with the lost. And if we fail to do so, then we sin, the sin of omission in our duty to advance the gospel in our lifetimes. Too many believers sit in church on Sunday morning and soak up a message and leave and keep the truths they learned to themselves until they can come and soak up some more next Sunday and live selfishly unto themselves while sinners perish and go to a place of intense suffering and misery called hell.

How can you call yourself a Christian friend if you're not concerned about the lost and doing something about it? This is our greatest challenge at this hour as the days are dark and society spins morally out of control. People need Jesus. People need Jesus.

And every person on this planet matters. Where would you be friend if someone had not told you about the one who came down here so we can go up there? How we share our faith matters as much as if we share our faith. For if we are actively witnessing for Christ, but using the wrong man-centered methodologies, then we do more harm than good.

In chapter 15 of the Gospel of Luke, we see the beginning of the parables of the lost. We read about the lost sheep, the lost coin, the lost son. Jesus declared he came to seek and save the lost.

A person must first get lost like that Samaritan woman at the well. She had to see her sins to realize her need of a Savior from sin. Listen friends, the gospel is for the hungry, the weary, and the thirsty.

We must present the gospel truths in such a way as to make men feel their hunger for God, recognize their need of rest in being weary of their sins, and see that their thirst can only be quenched by the pearl of great price, the Lord Jesus Christ. I will now take time to share a gospel presentation with you as a model for witnessing. I want you to listen to the way the gospel is presented and not be stuck in just a formula.

You can use any words in any scriptures that you feel led of God to use. This is just a format for witnessing, which I have on iTunes in an app called Evangelism Awakening, and I will share with you today this gospel presentation. I will try to play both persons, the evangelist and the person in need of salvation.

I probably won't do a good job, but bear with me, and hopefully we can learn how to be more effective witnesses for Jesus Christ and our generation. Here now is that presentation. And remember friends, when you present the gospel to speak in love and compassion, you can initiate this conversation with anybody.

It'll work with a Donald Trump or a street beggar. It will work with a university Ph.D. or a day laborer. It will even work with people who are already members of a church and who mistakenly believe they are saved when yet in their sins.

And I want to challenge you today, friends, to go out and ask some stranger or a family member or a neighbor the following question and see if you don't get a conversation started very easily. Here is the opening question that will work on anybody to get them talking about spiritual things. Are you ready? Here we go.

Listen to this golden question. Then listen to the following presentation. Do you think there are good people in the world? Sure, I know some.

Really? Why would you say they are good? Is it because they do good things? Yeah, they do good things. I know a lot of people like that. They are good folks.

I see your point. I agree with you that there are some really good people in the world. But do you know what? I don't think good people go to heaven.

What? Oh, why that's crazy. Why would you say such a thing? Because it's true. It's a fact.

That's what the Bible says. The Bible says that good people don't go to heaven. Did you know that? I don't believe that.

It's true, friend. The Word of God states that only forgiving people go to heaven. God is perfect and he requires perfection to get to his holy heaven.

And no man is perfect. They may be good, but they are not perfect. All men are sinners by nature.

You see, I once thought I was good enough to go to heaven because I never did anything really bad like people in prison do. I was pretty good in comparison with others. But one day God showed me that I was not good enough to go to heaven.

In fact, I realized to my horror I was on my way to hell. And not only that, but I deserve to go there. Do you think I was scared? Do you? Yeah, I guess that would scare you if it was true.

Well, I had to find out the hard way that a lot of the preaching done today is false teaching. You see, all I ever heard preachers say was that God was a God of love and he loved everybody. God loves you.

Do you know what I'm talking about, friend? Sure, I've heard that before. Listen, friend, God is love, but he hates sin and God is angry with people. Did you know that? No, I don't know if I agree with you on that one.

You don't have to agree with me, friend, but let's agree with what the Bible has to say about it. In the Bible it says God is angry with the wicked every day. If he turn not, he will wet his sword.

He hath bent his bow and made it ready. And do you know what else I found out, friend? When God mentions the wicked, he's not just talking about murderers and child molesters, bad people like that, but he's describing average folks like you and me. God considers us wicked because we crucified his son.

What? We did it? Now you're talking crazy. No, friend, I'm not crazy. You and I drove the nails into the hands and feet of Jesus.

We placed a crown of thorns on his head. You and me, our sins nailed him to the cross and made him bleed. Did you know that? No, I never thought of it like that.

Listen, you see, because of sin, God looks at us as his enemy and he stands ready to destroy us at any moment because we are on the wrong side of God. Listen to this statement of God because it warns us of how perilous our position is right this very moment. And we stand on a slippery path, friend, ready to fall without warning.

Surely thou did set them in slippery places, thou castest them down into destruction. How are they brought into desolation? As in a moment, they are utterly consumed with terrors. Listen, friend, sudden death is all around us today.

We can be gunned down by a madman anytime in this violent society. Just pick up a newspaper. It happens just about every day.

Or an accident can occur and remove us from this world quite suddenly. And we would enter another world quite unprepared for it. Have you ever thought about that before? No, I guess not.

Well, one day I found out I was on the wrong side of God and I was gripped with fear. I knew he could remove my life at any moment and without warning. Listen to what I read in my Bible.

Let me share it with you because it startled me. For man also knoweth not his time as the fishes that are taken in an evil net and as the birds that are caught in the snare. So are the sons of man snared in an evil time when it falleth suddenly upon them.

Let me ask you, friend, do you believe we are living in an evil time? Are you afraid of the crazy world in which we live today? Yeah, it's pretty frightening. Well, it sure is. But I found something else out which may make a difference in how you think about your life in this world.

I found out that God is continually giving us opportunities to turn to him and get right with him. But we often ignore those opportunities and to ignore them is both foolish and dangerous. Listen to what God declares.

He, that being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy. Do you know what a reproof is? No? Well, kinda. Let me tell you what God means by reproof.

Every time you hear a gospel message, it is a reproof. Every time somebody hands you a gospel tract, that is a reproof. Every billboard with a Bible verse on it is a reproof.

Every time you channel surf on the TV or the radio and come across a gospel program, that is a reproof. To put these things off, friend, is to flirt with sudden death. Does that concern you? Sure, that concerns me.

Well, let me explain it to you this way, friend, because you must understand this urgent matter I'm bringing before you today. The big thing is that God is angry with us because of sin. He is holy and just, and he must punish sin.

Where we miss all this is our understanding of sin. We think sin is doing really bad things, but sin is best to find in the Bible, where it compares you and me to sheep. It says, all we, like sheep, have gone astray.

We've turned everyone to his own way. You see, friend, sin is going our way when we know it isn't God's way, and God requires perfection to get into his heaven, and we are not perfect. Yes, we can be good people and help others, but still we are not perfect.

You don't know any perfect people, do you? Not really. Listen to me, friend, very carefully. God will hold us up against the strictness and severity of his law, and we will fail that test if we ever told a lie or had a lustful thought or stole something, took God's name and used it as a curse word.

All of these break his law. God views all sin as treason, and he will judge all men at a coming day of judgment. He will review our works against his holy law, and there's no one good enough to go to heaven.

All of us deserve hell. Only those who are forgiven of their sins will go to heaven. Those who've been washed in the blood of a saving faith in Jesus Christ.

Does this make sense? Yes, I guess it does. Let me ask an important question, friend. Would you like to know how to get right with God by repenting of your sins and be saved by believing in his son Jesus? No, I don't think so.

Not right now. I will stop here, friends. Do not proceed with the gospel if the person says no.

This would be to cast pearls before a swine, thank him for his time. Say a short prayer for him if he will let you. Don't try to force him to accept Jesus just because he agrees with what you've said.

There must be conviction of sin by the Holy Spirit in his heart. You've planted a seed of reproof, presented the gospel somewhat, and shown him his duty of repentance. Perhaps another person will come along and water that seed, and God will use that next person to lead this lost one to Christ.

But if he says yes, he would like to repent and know how to be saved, then proceed with the pearl a great price. Let us now get back to our presentation of the gospel to this lost sinner. Listen, friend, to this familiar Bible verse, which I'm sure you may have heard.

It's John 3.16, which states, For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. The two big things you need to see are, first, God's love, and secondly, God's wrath. The two words, loved and perish, speak of each of these things because God is both a God of mercy and justice.

God loved you enough to send his son, Jesus, to die on your place as a substitute so you could be saved. That word perish speaks of a burning hell. Where the lost go who die outside of Christ, God must punish sin.

But in his great love, he sent his son, Jesus, to suffer and die on a cross to pay your sin debt. Does this make sense to you? You see, if you die without Jesus, you will have to stand on your own merit. And when your life is held up against God's perfect law, you will fail that test and be sent to hell because the sentence under the law must be carried out by a just judge.

Jesus is your sin substitute, friend. He took your place, taking God's wrath on him on the cross so you wouldn't have to. Now listen carefully, friend, to these next three major things that point you to Jesus.

First, because you are a sinner, you deserve to go to hell. You're not a sinner because you sin, but rather you sin because you're a big sinner. But Jesus Christ took your place and died on a cross for your sins.

Look at him there in your mind's eye now. See him hanging there on that bloody cross for you. See the nails in his hands and feet.

Your sins are those nails. Now hear this next major thing. Now picture yourself at the foot of the cross, looking up at him, hanging there with his arms outstretched, held by the nails.

Now turn with all your might into his arms held out at their full length to receive you. Now listen to his words to you, friend, to come to him, to receive him by faith. Listen, look unto me and be ye saved.

All the ends of the earth for I am God and there is none else. Seek ye the Lord while he may be found. Call ye upon him while he is near.

Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. And let him return unto the Lord and he will have mercy upon him. And to our God for he will abundantly pardon.

Trust Jesus to save you, friend. Receive him into your heart as he invites you to come to him. Listen to his invitations to come to him.

Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden. And I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me.

For I am meek and lowly in heart. And ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

And the Spirit and the bride say, come. And let him that heareth say, come. And let him that is a thirst, come.

And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely. Friend, God's grace is free. You can't work for it or earn it.

All you can do is receive it. Believe on Jesus Christ with all your heart. And come to him in complete surrender.

He is a sovereign Lord. Jesus sits on a heavenly throne. And he got there by way of a bloody cross.

All you can do, friend, as a sinner, is bow to him. Throw down your shotgun or rebellion. And cast yourself entirely on his mercy.

Become a beggar seeking mercy. And as you become a seeker of him, you have this promise from him, friend. For Jesus says, all that the Father giveth me, shall come to me.

And him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. Let me ask you, friend, would you like to go to him now in prayer and repent of your sins? I will stop there in the presentation of our gospel today, friends. Never lead a person into sinner's prayer.

Rather, let the sinner say his own prayer to God. Let him talk to God. You just pray silently for him to come to Christ safely.

And remember this, dear fellow evangelist or gospel worker. Never tell a person he's now saved. Only the Holy Spirit can give him that assurance.

Give him a gospel of John if you have one to give. What you've done is presented the full counsel of God to this person. God is the one who saves.

A man cannot save himself. And the divine operations of the Holy Spirit in bringing a person to saving faith are awakening, conviction, compunction, repentance, and regeneration. The soul winner must be scriptural.

And, Terry, in telling dude with power from on high, our task is to be active witnesses for Christ to our generation of lost sinners. Well, I hope this message has helped you, friend, in becoming a better witness for Christ Jesus to the lost who desperately need to hear about the one who came down here so we can go up there. Let us pray.