Reaching the world

Let’s be honest. God knows whether or not we are interested in reaching the world. He knows how many times we share our faith with someone. He knows how many opportunities He gives us to do it. He knows our obedience and our disobedience in being witnesses for Him wherever we may be.

If we truly believe hell is a place like that described in the bible, then why are we content to let others continue on their path to spend eternity in it? If we truly believe only God can give us purpose in life, then why are we content to watch people struggle to find it elsewhere? If we truly believe Jesus is the Way, and the Truth, and the Life for this world, then why are we content to keep Him to ourselves?

When a new retail store opens, many will shop at it and then tell their family, friends, co-workers and acquaintances about the great deals they can get. However, most of us are unwilling to tell the same people about the greatest gift they can receive – eternal life.

In Acts, we know that the born again believers were able to share the gospel when the Holy Spirit empowered them. Even in the face of severe persecution, they still told people about Jesus. It was their desire to be obedient to God, no matter the risk, which enabled them to be used by Him as witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

We want to think that we must be a Peter, Paul, or Mary to be witnesses for Christ. This is a deception that only results in our failing to allow God to work through us to reach others. It was not the countable few who took the gospel to the uttermost parts of the earth. It was the innumerable number of individual believers transformed by the saving grace of Jesus Christ, living a life of obedience to the commands of their Savior and Lord that God used then and that He will use now.

God commissions us to be His ambassadors with the Good News. It is our choice to be obedient.

We tithe, sometimes. We attend church, sometimes. We go to Bibles study, sometimes. We claim Jesus is Lord of our life, but in His words, "Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say?” Each one of us must answer this question for ourselves. If your answer brings upon you the conviction of the Holy Spirit, as my answer does me, let’s not go one more day without doing what our Lord has told us to do.

Reaching the world is our being obedient to share Jesus with the next person God brings across our path.