Burden4Souls

“do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord” (2 Timothy 1:8).

The reason why people don’t share their faith is because they are afraid of the shame that comes with it. As I witnessed in the train I was shamed once in front of many people and the train still had more than 10 minutes to go. I wanted to jump off the train so I can run away from the shame, then I remembered that Jesus was shamed a…s well in the presence of all of Jerusalem. I wanted to save this man from hell and instead he shamed me. My ego was bruised for a moment. But I’m glad I was shamed out of love for him and God. I wanted to tell this man of eternal life, yet he considered himself not worthy of it. He is the one who should be ashamed and he will be.

Let us be shamed for the love of brothers and sisters. Let us be considered idiots so we can save some from hell. Let us share in the suffering of Christ, so we can also share in his glory.

Every Christian is capable of doing the work of a missionary, and they should. God will never allow you to live in a place where mission work is unnecessary. We have misguided view that a missionary is a person who has to leave his home and go to a far place so he can evangelise those far-away heathens. But haven’t you realised that there are also heathens where you live who have never heard the Gospel, and deserve to hear it? When we read about Missionaries we get very impressed, but we fail to realise that they are going house-to-house evangelising and doing open-air preaching, just as we can do. The difference between them and us is that they have committed their lives to that place and those people until the work of God is done. We have a commitment problem! We are willing to do open-air preaching anywhere, but we don’t care if the work is done or not, just as long as we dispersed our responsibility to preach. Missionaries care if the heathens are saved or not, because they live amongst them. We preach and go back to our homes as though nothing has happened, that’s why we see no fruit in our labours, and we don’t care either way.

Commit yourself to a place. Commit yourself to a people. Commit yourself to preach to them until God shows them grace. Commit yourself to preaching to each and every one of them. Commit your prayers to them. Commit your life to ensuring their safety from hell. Die amongst them if need be. But by all means, don’t find your life uncommitted to a heathen.

“I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you will have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ” (Philemon 6).

A Christian who doesn’t share his faith is a baby Christian, if we can call him a Christian at all. He doesn’t know the good things that we have in Christ. He may read about the power of the Holy Spirit to convict men of sin but he doesn’t know personally what that means. He might master the word of God but he has never seen the word of God at work. He may read about Christ’s sufferings but he has no idea what that is. He might have Paul as his favourite biblical figure but he has never walked in the shoes of Paul. He thinks he is pleasing to God because he has a Christian badge on him, yet he doesn’t know that God is pleased by a life sacrificed to Him.

Until you step out in faith and share that same faith, then you will forever remain a baby Christian, who thinks the boldest thing you can do is wear a Christian t-shirt, attend church or write a Christian status on your wall/timeline.

 There are two categories of jobs acceptable for a Christian: 1) a secular job. i.e doctor, lawyer, clerk, garden boy, maid, etc
2) full-time church-planting job.

People who have a theology degree/diploma and sit in their offices monday to friday reading books and chatting on facebook and only have two sermons on sunday to preach should not think that they fall in the second category. That is called idling, and Paul warns against it in the book of Thessalonians and Galatians. If you don’t have a secular job, then you better make sure that you preach at every chance that you get, and you should make sure that you create preaching chances almost every day, otherwise you are idling. We need to stop taking offerings that belong to the poor and give them to lazy people just because they are called Pastors/Reverend while people who plant churches are starving. If you have a secular job then you better work as though working for the Lord, otherwise you are idling.

Ask yourself one question: Do I have a secular job? If no, then go out and preach!

When has “go, stand, preach” (Acts 5:20), “go into all the world” (Mark 16:15), “stand in the courtyard and speak” (Jeremiah 26:2), “enter the house” (Matthew 10:11-15), turned into “log in and update your status”?

If “updating you status” counted as preaching the Gospel then all Mission groups should recall all their missionaries and give them iPads so they can update their statutes and win souls. If “updating you status” counted as preaching the Gospel then your unbelieving friends are preaching more than you do. Aren’t they posting bible verses in their walls/timelines?

Go out and preach the Gospel, and stop hiding behind “facebook ministry”.