A few months ago, I received a message on WhatsApp
urging me to do a short test. The test was simple, or so I thought. Four
questions were to be answered within the shortest time possible with a bonus
question thrown into the mix. Since I have never been one to shy away from an
opportunity to prove my genius, I gave it a go. Suffice to say, after scoring
a measly 1 out of 5 questions, I arrived at the humbling conclusion,
that it was God’s infinite grace that got me through Secondary school and
granted me a first class honours at university. Imela, Papa!!! As misery loves
company though, and being desperate for my ineptness to be matched or even outdone,
I forwarded the test to as many of my contacts as possible. I didn’t even wait
for the prompting at the end of the message to share it, I just forwarded it
because like most forwarded messages on WhatsApp
are, it was creative, insightful, and a very good laugh.
I don’t always get funny messages though but also
messages about Jesus and ironically, my reaction to them has been lukewarm or
worse, cold. They start off with some nice story. Gradually the underlying
message is revealed as you begin to put two and two together. The analogy
between the characters in the story and God is often quite precise; so precise,
that your heart is deeply moved, appreciative of how gracious, loving and
merciful, God has been to you. Suddenly,
the tone becomes highly persuasive. “Please, send this message to 9 people on
your contact list in 10 minutes, you will be blessed, your blessing will be
received soon! This very night!”
It’s all downhill from there as I feel the message
has been watered down by those ‘imminent’ blessings. What if I just wanted to
forward the message out of appreciation of God’s grace or to spread God’s love,
or for Him to get the glory instead of just desiring to be blessed materially?”
As if reading my thoughts, the tone becomes Ultra-persuasive. “Don’t break this
chain, if you love Jesus, you will forward this message!” “Off-course I love
Jesus. I just don’t like the idea of sending a message solely for blessings
rather than God getting glory!” I reason. Meanwhile, my conscience is being
battered into submission. “Prove you love Jesus, Prove it!!! Boy, don’t you
walk away from that forward button, I see you boy, hit that forward button, hit
it NOW!!!” Inevitably out of guilt, remorse, shame that I hesitated so long I
hit forward and the message is sent. Outside social media, I have been faced
with the same choice, talk about Jesus or keep mum and tightly lock my faith in
a box; sadly I have chosen the latter. Frequently, I have passed up the chance
to profess my love for Jesus. After, I end up thinking that I could have shared
the gospel, would have shared the gospel, should have shared the gospel but I
didn’t.
In African culture and many other cultures, we
greatly appreciate the words of a dying man. They are important, obliged to be
carried out. How strange it is then, that Jesus’ words of instruction, after
dying then RESURRECTING and finally ASCENDING are treated with indifference.
Matthew 28:16-19 speaks of the great commission. The command that Jesus gave to
his disciples which was to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them
in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching
them to obey everything He commanded them. It’s explained further in Acts 1:8-
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be
my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of
earth.”..... That’s his command, that is the Great commission we were charged
with. Unfortunately, I have taken the great commission to be the great
suggestion.
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| Image courtesy of www.wmu.com |
Too many times, I’m content with just going through
the motions in the body of Christ. It’s been the sad case of just playing
church rather than helping grow church as He desires. After all his love in
forsaking all those Godly privileges just to be among men, all his love
enduring great pain, ridicule on the cross and triumphing over death so that I
may live, why then the silence. Shouldn’t I be eager to tell of his great love
for me and others? Why don’t I?
Fear. Fear
that if I speak I will be ostracized by my friends. Fear that I will be beaten
hands down by an atheist in a verbal match. Fear that I will give the faith a
bad name if I don’t have the answers to their questions. Fear that I will look
out of place and alone in a world that believes less and less. Fear that I will
be deemed a hypocrite for my many past sins.
Fear that I will be reminded of the many spiritual
leaders who swindle God’s people, leaders who have no qualms engaging in
adultery, who steal, who have false prophesies. Fear that I will be reminded of the ‘good’ state of
affairs in war-ravaged Israel, the chosen people of God. Fear that I will be
reminded of the empty churches in Europe, the very same continent that gave us
the gospel.
Fear that I will be asked if God is present and
loves us so much, where was he as Al-Shaabab stormed Westgate and claimed
innocent lives, where was He as Boko
Haram kidnap girls and cause havoc in Nigeria, where is he as ISIS continue to
decapitate people with relish.
It’s easy to cede ground on all this fears. I know I
have. It’s easy to focus on all the negatives but his word is powerful, as
cited in Isaiah 55:9-11- “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my
ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. As the rain and
snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it, without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish so that it will yield seed for the sower and
bread for the eater so is my word that goes out from my mouth, it will not
return to me empty but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose
for which I sent it.” As much as many people ignore his word, the word still
penetrates and is accepted by just as many. Regardless of what is going
on, here are some interesting findings as presented in an article on Crosswalks.com;
- More Muslims in Iran have come to Christ since 1980 to date, than in the previous 1000 years combined
- The government of Papua New Guinea mandated Bible teaching in every school in the country(Vision 2020)
- About 500 Muslims come to faith in Christ every month in Iran- a country ranked among the top ten persecutors of Christians in the world.
- No Christian was officially allowed to live in Nepal until 1960. Now there is a church in every 1 of the 75 districts of Nepal with estimates of over 850,800 believers.
- The Jesus film has been translated into nearly 1271 languages in 220 countries and over 200 million have indicated decisions for Christ as a result of the film.
- In 1900 Korea had no protestant church. Today Korea is 30% Christian with 7000 churches in Seoul alone with several having over 1 million members (Vision 2020)
- Of over 400 million Latin Americans, more than 50 million have become evangelical Christians.
- There are as many as 200 million Christians in China with between 10, 000-25,000 converts a day. Some say there are over 30, 000 conversions per day (Open doors)
Fear is a destructive force but love is more powerful, considering Christ great love for us, it is a privilege I should take to reciprocate his love for me by sharing my testimony of him along with the gospel. The immensity of our God is seen in the intensity of our worship. Worship isn’t just song and dance, it’s a lifestyle of obedience, obedience to His great commission which is to go out and make disciples by sharing the gospel.
I used to think witnessing was just for outreach guys, well it isn’t, it’s for all of us. I used to think that I was ill-prepared, knew too little scripture, and knew too little about God to answer those hard-hitting questions. Well, a lifetime on earth spanning a century will still not give you enough knowledge of God. His thoughts and ways are so much higher than ours. Like Job in Chapter 42:5, just when you think you know him since you HEARD of him, He will turn your world upside down and then you will really SEE him and EXPERIENCE him in a whole different light.
Do you know John 3:16? Yes?!!! That’s all you need. Index 1!!! You have just been conferred a first class PHD in witnessing! Therefore go!! Share the gospel and share your testimony of God in your life!When we have Jesus as our Lord and saviour, we have the Holy Spirit dwell in us. We become changed, transformed. We no-longer desire to conform to the world’s practices. Consequently we become weird to the world because of how we live. They, notice the change, and like any inquisitive human being are eager to know the reason behind it. They will therefore ask. At this point, you may feel a certain voice urging you to talk about Jesus, do what the voice says and share the impact of having Jesus in your life, but do it with gentleness and respect(1 Peter 3:15).
Witnessing is two-fold. It is not an activity but a lifestyle where your life is radically changed and is manifested in you not conforming, living life differently that is seen as weird by the world, a good, unbelievable kind of weird. The other side of witnessing is just explaining your weirdness to others and thankfully this weirdness is diverse in nature.It ranges from being weird because you wake up early in the morning just to pray and read scripture daily so that you know more of God, it could be going to church every Sunday, It could be spending Friday, Saturday nights at home instead of a club, it could be avoiding sexual relations till marriage, It could be paying taxes early and consistently with psyche even when that tax is being wasted by our leaders, it could be visiting orphans, sick children on weekends, it could be putting others before yourself, the range of weirdness is endless.
When you do explain that you do these things because of having Jesus in your life, you may be dismissed or ridiculed but a seed is planted within their hearts. A seed that the Holy Spirit takes and waters using other people’s testimonies and poignant life events until it grows to a conviction and a compelling need to seek Jesus. Remember your job is not to convert a person; it’s just to share your testimony, only the Holy Spirit converts and changes someone’s heart. Jesus is the living water and calls people through His Spirit to drink, ours as Christians, is just to make people thirst after him.
It is when we actively share our faith that we have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ (Philemon 1:6) including His great unfailing love for us, the vast riches of grace we share with him, our lofty position over dark forces, strongholds that we share with Christ and victory over temptation along with so much more. It is when we witness that we fulfill our true purpose as sons and daughters of the most high, considering it food to do God’s will. (John 4:34). It is when we witness that we are able to make people have fellowship with God and show our love for him, which results in yet more love from God as said in John 14:21- Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to Him. Therefore what are you waiting for, heed to the call of Lecrae and For King and Country, as wonderfully sung in the link below
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=ZqH7azFRUYU
Be a Messenger!!!
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