zach pippin

This week’s guest blogger is my best friend Josh Johnson. He’s a senior at Bob Jones University studying missions. I asked him to write this specific article after hearing him preach it in church one day. I knew he could bring it to you better than I could ever summarize it.

Doing Evangelism, the Way Christ Did It.
When many of you read that sentence, you’re already starting to turn your Bibles to John 4 where Christ shares the Gospel with the woman at the well. It is a fair assumption, seeing as most people use this to talk about Christ’s form of evangelism, but this isn’t what I want to focus on. John 4 is great for one time evangelism, but we want to focus more on Christ’s long term goal with evangelism, discipleship. Through this study, we will see how Christ’s long term goal through His evangelism was discipleship with the twelve, and ultimately, teaching them to evangelize and disciple other people.
When we talk about Christ’s disciples and Christ pouring his life into them, I really want to focus on the “inner three”. This term is used to describe Christ’s closest disciples: James, John, and Peter. The best two references to this are Matt 17:1 (Christ’s Transfiguration) and Matt 26:37 (Garden of Gethsemane). Towards the end of His earthly ministry to his disciples in Matt 28:16-20, He charged them to go unto all the world and do what? “Make disciples”.
Now, Christ began his formal ministry at the age of thirty. He was crucified at the age of thirty-three, so we know that he ministered and taught his disciples for roughly three years. The disciples that he ministered to the most were three, so for posterity’s sake, let’s average that out to about one disciple a year that Christ would pour his life into.
Since we know that Christ calls us all to share the gospel, let me create a scenario for you. Let’s say that you are an amazing preacher. You have all the attributes of the best preachers, plus you’re constantly filled with the convicting power of the Holy Spirit. Because of all this you are able to lead one-thousand people to the Lord every day. If the population of the world were to freeze where it stands today, it would take over seventeen-thousand years for you would lead the entire world to Christ. That’s longer than the world has been around!
Since the Bible calls men to “make disciples”, let me pose another example to you doing evangelism Christ’s way. Pretend that you take one person a year and you witness to this person, and eventually he gets saved. Now for the rest of the year you teach him how to do the same thing with other people. At the end of that year, you both go out and each make a separate disciple and do the same with him. After one year there would be two of you. After two years, there would be four of you. After three years, there would be eight of you, and so on. Following this scenario, the entire world would be saved in thirty-three years!
Let me remind you that the thirty-three years starts out with just one person. Most estimates say that one-billion people claim to be Christians. I highly disagree that all those people in the surveys are saved, so let’s give ourselves a more realistic number and say that it’s half of that. Of the thirty-three years, we are already 27 years into the process. This means that if we each follow Christ’s example by taking one person, leading that person to the Lord and teaching him to do the same (according to the scenario) the whole world could be saved in 6 years. We must remember that the Holy Spirit is our chief means to leading someone to Christ through conviction, but we also have to remember that God has given us a charge, and by following His example, seeing billions of people saved in the next few years is not impractical at all. If you’re trying to be Christlike in most things in your life, be Christlike in your evangelism as well.

-Josh

Today’s guest blogger is a missionary I met online (oh the wonders of modern tech). She’s from South America, and does missions in Africa. It’s crazy to realize sometimes that we’ve never actually met in person. Due to the nature of her work, I will simply introduce her to you as @misspicture. You can follow her on twitter @misspicture, and read her own blog at misspicture.wordpress.com

“Discipleship: Change the world. One life at a time!”

When I think about Jesus. I don’t always think about the cross and the miracles. Often times I think about him as the perfect picture of a relational God.

Jesus not only preached to thousands but he also took the time to submerge himself in the life of a few. And those few changed the world. Not the thousand.

What if we followed Jesus’ example and started a revolution. What if we decided to change this world one life at a time? What if we started small? (Matthew 10:40-42)

Disciples. That’s what we are called to do. (Matthew 28:19)
Make disciples. Not just converts.

I am a missionary. God knows what I think about missions. I am 100% supportive of mission trips. Both Long term and short term. I believe we need to tell others about Jesus. But.. What happens next? What do we do after they believe?

We so often let them go on their own. Instead of taking the time to help them grow and become the men and women God created them to be. We play a key part . And I am guilty of this. I actually have two names popping up in my head as I write this…. I need to make some phone calls.

This is a word of encouragement for you to step up and start this year investing your life in the life of someone else who is standing at the door of the path you’ve already walked. Build some one up! Buy them a cup of coffee and study God’s word together. Help someone not to make the same mistakes you made. Start a new friendship and love them like you mean it. Live your life in front of them. Be vulnerable before them. Let them see you just as you are. Invite them into your world. And be amazed at what God can do.

Jesus was friends with his disciples! And He changed the way they looked at life.

Would you be willing to do the same?

@misspicture

Let me know what you think!

Today’s guest is one of my best friends, Misti Bailey. She is a graduate of Columbia College. She serves at the BCM in Columbia, SC working with international students, as well as working for The State newspaper. This is an article she wrote for Focus Magazine on international missions.

We’ve heard it a million times—“Go and make disciples of all nations,” and “go be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Go. But what do you do when the people of Judea, Samaria and the ends of the earth are now in Jerusalem? What do you do when the nations are all here?

Nearly 600,000 international students are studying in American colleges and universities. In South Carolina, 3,500 students from countries across the globe study at one of our colleges or universities.  1,000 of those students from over 100 different countries are students in our state’s capital at the University of South Carolina, while another 1,000 international students from 88 different countries attend Clemson University.

We are still commanded to go. And we are still commanded to share. The beautiful thing is that we don’t have to go quite as far to encounter the nations.

So, how do we minister to international students? I think that we can learn a lot from Jesus’ words when he said, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me”. There are very practical things that we can do to be good neighbors to these students. Jesus tells the crowd here in Matthew 25 that being a good neighbor includes provision of food, hospitality, necessities and friendship. So that’s what we need to do. Take in the stranger. Provide.

· Provide food. First off, it’s rather expensive for international students to come to America to begin with. So providing food is a huge help financially. Also, great conversations happen over meals. Take them out to a typical American restaurant. Or make a home cooked meal of food that they haven’t tried yet. Honestly, you know that you’re gung-ho about anything that involves food anyways. So it’s a win-win!

· Provide entertainment. Museums, zoos, movies, amusement parks, and sporting events are all things that you would want to experience when in another country; so do international students here.

· Provide knowledge. Public transportation, ordering food, speaking English, operating laundry machines, and even driving are all things that we inherently take for granted. Sometimes international students need a little help understanding these though. Share about our culture—holidays, traditions, laws, etc.

· Provide acceptance. Pure acceptance. Be friends. Love them without an agenda. Love them because we are commanded to. Share the Gospel with them because you genuinely care about them, not because you want to rack up conversion points.

· Reciprocate. Learn about where they come from. Listen to their stories. I know that when I’ve been overseas, it’s always comforting when locals ask me about America, my family and life. So give them the chance to share about their culture and family, the things they love and miss.

Like St. Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary use words.” You should share the Gospel through action all the time and with words when needed. So, share your lives with these ‘strangers’. Take them in. Care for them. Love them. No matter if they’re from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, or the ends of the earth, God craves a relationship with his creation.