LEVEL 1

LESSON 1: BASIC STEPS FOR THE EVERYDAY CHRISTIAN

You will learn enough in this lesson to be able to share your faith with friends and family.  Future lessons will help you have more confidence and be more effective.  Each new lesson builds on the prior one teaching you more and more tools. Stop wherever you believe you have learned enough for now.  You can always continue later.

 Learning to share with others is very similar to learning most anything else. Most of us learned to bounce a ball when we were young. If we only bounced it 3-4 times, we may very well find that when we tried later, we may not bounce it straight enough and it would not come right back up. Even something simple like that takes repetition and once done often enough, it is second nature.  Your effectiveness and confidence will have a lot to do with how much work you put into memorizing simple parts of your presentation.

DIRECTIONS FOR ALL THE LESSONS: Read through the first section. Dig Deeper links are helpful and optional. (Use the back button to navigate back). When you reach the Step by Step section, print it and fill it out.

Opening the Door to Sharing Christ

God is love.  

All love and all good comes from God.  When we are abiding with Christ, His love overflows into the lives of others. One of the ways we love others is by meeting their needsBeloved, let us love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.  I Jn 4:7-8   

 

As we share God's love with others, 

Living godly lives, they will be drawn to us because they are being drawn by their creator. Our lives must be lived in front of them, not for the purpose of bringing them to Christ but out of response to God's love in our lives. As we have opportunity, we pray that the Holy Spirit will guide us in understanding, ability and obedience to meet the real needs in their lives. Those needs can be emotional or physical.  It may be a listening ear, giving advice, or helping with a chore.

 

We also pray for the opportunity and pathway to bridge to a spiritual conversation. Many times we will shoot up an arrow prayer like this one, "God, show me how I can bring you up in this conversation."

WHY share?
  • Jesus's first command: Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men."  Mark 1:17

  • Jesus's last command:  Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Matt 28:19

  • We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. 2 Corinthians 5:20

  • But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, I Peter 3:15

You are God's child.  Therefore you are also an ambassador, a representative of Christ and God's messenger to others. No one else on this earth can share God's love with your close friend or family member like you can. It is your calling to be prepared.

WHO can you share Jesus with?

A friend or family member.  

o    Start out by praying for them and for God to show you the best way to approach them. After all, you never know how much time you will have with this person.

o    We are so to speak, carriers of God's love. Christ's second commandment directs us to love others. (Matt 22:34-40) Pray that God shows you how this person would best receive God's love by just being there or doing something for them. They will be more open to discussing spiritual things and hearing the gospel message if they have been first touched by God's love through you.

o    Change the conversation to a spiritual one. You will find ideas in this lesson on how to do just that.

An acquaintance or maybe even a stranger.

o    This may be something that you do not ever think you could do. You may not have a gift for evangelism. You may not know what to say or be afraid you would say the wrong thing. So what? It is not your responsibility; it is God's. If God puts you in the place to share that Jesus died to pay the price for that person's sins, God will give you the words.

o    You will learn a lot here to give you confidence but it is not about your confidence or saying the right words. People with the gift of evangelism LOOK for these opportunities. After this lesson, if one falls into your lap, you will have some basic tools to help you respond.

WHAT IS INSIDE the person you are talking to?

  • They do not have a solid spiritual foundation, and/or no foundation at all for their belief system. They either "just believe it," they rely on someone else's teaching, or a book that is full of flaws. Because of this, it is often very effective to center your conversation about why they believe what they believe about God and how they are going to be able to enter a perfect Heaven.

 

HOW do you connect then share?

The best way to initiate a connection is by meeting a need. Then, asking questions is effective to connect/bridge to sharing the gospel message. The great thing about asking questions is that you do not need to know anything about what they believe to do so. You are learning about what they believe.

(NOTE:  Throughout this website, steps for you to follow will be in Green. Questions to ask will be in Blue)

A)     Show God's love sincerely out of obedience to God and in response to God's love for you. Dig Deeper

B)     Bridge to Spiritual talk. Bring up something about someone or an activity at church, prayer or God. Dig Deeper

C)     Bridge to the Gospel messageAn effective method is to ask Questions. Follow up "unusual" answers with something like, That is interesting, Why do you think that? Dig Deeper

The following questions are very effective for several reasons. Since most people have never thought about how they become perfect after they die, they are caught off guard and much more apt to listen to a solution. Much of the time, asking these questions allows the gospel to be shared without any prior discussion of someone being good enough or the validity of the Bible.

1)  What do you think will happen to you when you die?

2)  Do you think Heaven is a perfect place?

3)  Do you think in doing good things, you are perfect?

4)  I am curious, when you die, how does the imperfect change into the perfect so you can enter a perfect heaven?

5)  May I share with you how I believe that happens?  

Lesson 2 will include more questions and what you can say when you hear different responses. Dig Deeper for a complete set of these questions.

Sharing the Gospel message

  • Choose a Common method: (People gifted at evangelism have come up with many different methods for sharing the gospel. You will find a common method here that will work well for you.

  • Include the gospel within your testimony. This is really the best method, sharing the gospel message as part of your story. People seldom feel preached at when one is telling their own story.

STEP BY STEP  

(Select the below section using your mouse, right click, print, print selection)

  1. WHY SHARE?: Read the verses in the WHY section above, giving thought to what they mean.  Picture yourself as God's representative to those around you.
  2. SHOW GOD'S LOVE: Think about one or two people close to you that do not have a relationship with God.  How do they show love to others?  That is normally how they most feel loved. Show them God's love.  Dig Deeper

Name

How do they show love?  

How can you love them?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  1. Bridge to Spiritual talk: Write down 2-3 things you can use to bring up a spiritual conversation. Scroll to the bottom of the page for ideas.

 

 

 

  1. Bridge to the Gospel message. Memorize the 5 questions in #3) above.  Start by memorizing the key words with larger type. Then fill in with the rest of the words. You can do it.  If you would prefer to use different wording that does not change the meaning, go ahead!  They are easy!  Read them 10 times in a row. WHY?

Mark it memorized

 

  1. Choose one of the common methods or write out your short story that includes how Jesus died for your sins and how receiving His gift results in you having eternal life.  One of the common methods is an easy one verse presentation. Memorize either the method you plan to use or your story.

Method I chose

 

Mark it memorized

 

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Supplement:

Bridges to Spiritual Talk  

 

Three ways 

 

1. You have just completed an act of love by meeting an emotional or physical need of another.

    a. They thank you.

    b. Response Example:  "It is the least I can do.  God has shown me so much love by sending Jesus to die for all that I have done wrong."

    c. If they respond about spiritual things, ask them about their beliefs.

2. You are testing the waters to find out how much the person is ready to hear.

    a. Consider using a conversation starter. Here are some guidelines for starting conversations

    b. Say something about your involvement at church, about God, about prayer..

        i. Mention someone at church.
        ii. Mention some activity you are going to or have recently attended.

        iii.  Bring up prayer.

        iv. Examples:  "my friend at church..., after church I..., I know God is looking out for me, My friend prayed, etc."

    c. Ask them about their beliefs.

 

3. You are led by the Holy Spirit to share spiritual things. . 

    a. Try the above in #2.  If they do not respond with spiritual discussion, use next step.

    b. Use questions.