A Monthly Reflection
“Winners of souls are first weepers for souls.”
- Someone
This month we dipped our toe in the proverbial sea of apologetical vastness. Of course before you take any first step, you need to have a desire (unless you are dragged) and the opportunity and hopefully thereafter the ability. This is what my pastor friend calls D.O.A. I won’t share about ability because not only am I not a theologian or a Biblical scholar as I am a long off from any sort of real way to defend the faith – and thus my faith – unless it is truly a Holy Spirit-inspired opportunity.
Yet the journey continues toward a greater desire and more opportunities.
I might have mentioned that my mother was a good, perhaps great (at least from what I know), evangelist and she loved others to church by invitation and sincerity.
My challenge is to live out my life, whatever time is left, to yield to this calling and to share the Gospel and love of Jesus with others.
Regarding desire – this should be innate. Why? If you have something so good, so tasty, so wonderful – you want to share as you need others to have what you have. “Hey friend come taste this….” And then this fuels your friend to try it and then both of you can marvel at the goodness and want even more. Desire breeds desire. Truth is that it can be used the wrong way and you can desire evil or things of this world, yet the Bible talks about focusing on doing good, to be holy as He is holy. The Bible talks about itself as being sweet as honey and it is nourishing to the soul, yet you can never probe its depths nor exhaust its lessons.
Both the Tactics book by Greg Koukl, and the Randy Newman’s, Questioning Evangelism just started to whet my appetite for more. I know we are going to continue with both of these next month and I am looking forward to reviewing each as I think both will fuel and equip myself and the group with more foundational faith-building and sharing basis, along with the challenge to try some of these concepts and approaches with others.
We need to first want to share – this desire – and the logical next step then is to pray about opportunities to share His love to others.
Opportunities are everywhere from road trips in an automobile to the zillions of little encounters we have at grocery stores, doctor’s offices, work meetings, phone calls to Person X, etc. We should never really run out of these little moments as someone once called the “Jabez Moments”. Whatever you want to call them – they are special opportunities to be a part of something truly out-of-this-world special. Sure you may not get to see the result or get the glory (because it is His alone) – yet just like an athlete that sits on the bench for the championship that his team wins – he gets to celebrate and be a part of the action. The party.
Isn’t that cool?
We all stand for something. We all put out an image. We all share what’s on our minds. For all of these it might as well be, “Hey look at this Jesus fellow. He is totally awesome and here is why you should listen to him.”
Of course, some people don’t want to. Some people are hurt. Some people blame G-d for their problems and issues. Some enjoy the lifestyle they are living and don’t want to change. We may not be able to affect everyone. Yet why lose the 1 for the 99. Jesus loves the 1 just as there is not a 99 there are 99 individual ones. Each soul matters to Him. And thus each soul should matter to us.
In fact, we all should take a lesson here.
We need to look at the soul of a person, especially when we want to judge, hate, get revenge, or just don’t like the way a person is. The quote that I started this paper. Do you remember what it says? If not go re-read it. In fact, I used it last month. It is so relevant. To win a soul you need to care for a soul. It is not a trophy, a checkbox, a pat on the back. Sure these can be considered but at the end of the day or end of their life – what matters is the destination for that soul. And we should yearn for all to love G-d and for all to be with Him in Heaven.
We should pour out our hearts for a harvest, for a revival, for Him to reveal to us how we can be a weeper so He can be a reaper. The harvest is plenty, but the workers are few.
And He was saying to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few;
therefore plead with the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.
(Luke 10:2,3 NASB)
We ought not to forget that we were the result of a reaping. For those of us in Christ, I would venture to say that someone poured out prayers, conversations, and perhaps risked insults for you and for me.
To me this is intercessory prayer at its foundation – for anyone to surrender to Christ and have a new life and future. When someone upsets us, we turn on the nightly news, or read a devastating headline – we should be praying for that person’s salvation, for surrender.
Oswald Chambers stated there is a difference between giving a testimony and preaching.
A preacher is someone who has received the call of God and is determined to use all his energy to proclaim God’s truth. God takes us beyond our own aspirations and ideas for our lives, and molds and shapes us for His purpose, just as He worked in the disciples’ lives after Pentecost. The purpose of Pentecost was not to teach the disciples something, but to make them the incarnation of what they preached so that they would literally become God’s message in the flesh. “…you shall be witnesses to Me…” (Acts 1:8).
This is a challenge for me. Jesus had such a heart for the hurting, for the marginalized, for the sick, for the poor, for the lost sheep. He poured out His heart more than anyone. He dedicated His life in service to the hurting via His Father.
He cared. He cares.
We did not care. We need to care.
Thus the challenge is, and it is pointing at me as well, is to try:
- Learn more about how to defend the faith and Bible via study, research, and lots of prayer.
- I need to pray for opportunities to share this love of G-d’s.
- How to love Him through it all even if it costs me insults, loss of friendship, or more.
- Listen and care more like Jesus.
- From Oswald again:
Allow God to have complete liberty in your life when you speak. Before God’s message can liberate other people, His liberation must first be real in you. Gather your material carefully, and then allow God to “set your words on fire” for His glory.
I’ll end this paper just like the last time….
And remember:
We love because He first loved us…. 1 John 4:19 (ESV)
Parting thought:
Let me look on the crowd as my Savior did,
Till my eyes with tears grow dim.
Let me view with pity the wandering sheep
And love them for love of Him.
—Author unknown
