90 Days or 90 Seconds of the Gospel?... Yes!

As we studied Acts 22 yesterday, we saw Paul give his testimony to a few hundred Jews that God hushed (as they were trying to kill him just a few minutes before) so that he could speak.  He was bloodied and bruised, but had courage.  Now, I think that most effective evangelism is done in long-term relationships where we are constantly loving folks with the news of the Gospel, but does that mean that we are never to declare it unless we have been in relationship with folks for a long time?  While it may be effective, long term relational sharing is not really what we see in the book of Acts.  In there, you see somebody quiet long enough to listen; you see the Gospel proclaimed; you see people repent and believe.  They are cut to the heart and saved.  I believe that then as they were baptized, they were reminded what Jesus said about if we want to follow Him, we must take up our instrument of death (a cross), deny ourselves, and follow Him.  His dead, but breathing, followers then spent all day every day looking for opportunities to talk about their loving Savior.  Therefore, the Holy Spirit saved more and more and more.  I know that Lance has cracked out the 90 second testimony the last couple of week in Bangkok, so I thought I would remind you what it is.

I once was __________________.  
But, Jesus.....................    
Now I ________________________.  
But, I still struggle ...........................

You need to develop this ahead of time.  Practice it.  Shave it down to a conversation you could have with a grocery clerk or as you pay for gas. 90 seconds.  And, ask the Spirit to give you courage.  Between now and Christmas is a great time to share Christ.  We cannot claim to love people if we remain mute.

More good news.  We are not used car salesmen!  God does not say, "Go sell my Son!"  He says proclaim the Good News - the Gospel.  Our job is to observe with folks that we are mess and hopelessly in need of a Savior, that the Savior Jesus came and lived sinless, that He died sacrificially to repair the damage and dysfunction, to forgive the wrongs against a Holy God, and was raised again to conquer sin and death and show that we can trust that HE is God.  If we get a second or a third audience with folks because we have relationship with them, it is good to start with the fact that God created all things GOOD - perfect!  But, we messed it up, AND there is a day coming when ALL things will be restored to PERFECT - to GOOD!  Gives them the whole story - that things did not start with sin and death, and things will not end with sin and death.  The Holy Spirit goes to work and reveals that proclamation as truth and does the saving.  We are but a conduit. A messenger. A herald of Good News!

Stayed tuned because we are going to be discussing and asking the Holy Spirit to train us to be able to contextualize the Gospel to this Post-Christian culture that we live in.  You may have noticed that the conversations have changed out there.  It is time to start giving Gospel answers to the questions that people have today, not the questions we want to answer. Stay tuned, lots of discussion coming.

But for now, over 3 million believers have come to faith in China using the 90 second testimony in just the last few years.  Why not here?  Why not now?