Witness Your Faith

Good morning, Happy Souls!

Bill Keller wrote a wonderful devotional yesterday
that I highly recommend to you.  He has given
me permission to copy his e-mails, and I'm sure
he would be happy if you would share this with
people you know as well.

Read on.

*********************************************

DAILY DEVOTIONAL   FRIDAY JANUARY 13, 2006
( 1 Peter 3:15 )

Challenging what men and women of God have to say,
challenging what you SAY you believe.  Witnessing
our faith to others is probably the most important
thing we have been COMMANDED to do, not suggested to
do, in which we often fail.  The reason is simple. 
We are afraid of how the person we witness to will
react.  Will they be mad?  Will they be offended? 
Will they get physically violent?  WILL THEY
CHALLENGE WHAT WE TELL THEM?

BINGO!  That my friend, is the number one reason we
don't witness like we should.  We are actually
petrified that we will be challenged and forced to
actually explain why we believe what we say we
believe.  Don't feel bad, because the fact is a
large percentage of pastors, church leaders,
conference speakers, teachers, evangelists and those
who run Christian ministries are equally as timid in
sharing their faith in Christ because they are never
challenged nor forced to defend their faith!

Let me ask you a question.  When was the last time
you were in a church service, the pastor was
preaching, and someone in the congregation stood up
and challenged something he just said?  How about
the last time you were at some conference.  There is
an auditorium full of people and in the middle of
the message, someone stood up and asked the speaker
to explain what they meant.   How about when you
attended a great crusade with tens of thousands
of people.  As the evangelist is going through the
message, someone came to the front and tells the
evangelist he is wrong about what he just said.
Have you EVER seen this happen?

I am not suggesting that people be rude or
disrespectful.   The point I am making, however, is
that pastors, conference speakers, teachers,
evangelists, those you see on TV or hear on radio,
are allowed to speak and say whatever they want
without ever being confronted or challenged.  In
many churches, the pastor shows up on Sunday
morning, enters the building through a special
entrance, goes into his office surrounded only by a
few of his staff, enters the sanctuary through a
special door by the podium, climbs into the pulpit
and delivers his sermon, exits the sanctuary through
that special door, goes back to his office, leaves
the building through the same special entrance he came
in by, and is gone.  Even if there is interaction with
the people, it is rarely not confrontational nor does
anyone question anything he said in his sermon.

When you are dealing with conference speakers,
teachers, evangelists, leaders of Christian ministries,
those who are on TV or the radio, their interaction
with the people is even less.  It is like going to a
rock concert.  The lights are turned off, the stage
lights come on, and all of a sudden the "star" appears
on stage.  They "perform" and then are gone.  No
contact with the people, never challenged regarding
anything they say, they just "appear," "perform," and
"disappear."  Because so many of these people spend
their entire lives in the "Christian trough," having
no real contact with the world outside of the church,
they could go their entire ministry without EVER
being challenged on ANYTHING they say!

One of the reasons pastors, conference speakers,
teachers, evangelists, ministry leaders are satisfied to
stay within the "trough" is because they never have to
be challenged in what they say or in what they believe.
This is also true of most Christians.  The reason most
people don't share their faith with their unsaved
family members, their friends, their neighbors, those
they work with or go to school with is because they
really don't want to be challenged in what they say or
believe.  This is not only a violation of God's Word,
but keeps you from growing in your faith since it is
through having to share your faith, being challenged
in what you believe, that you grow and become 100%
confident in what you SAY you believe in.

I am not talking about being obnoxious and getting
into arguments with everyone you meet.  I am simply
talking about sharing your faith in Christ and being
prepared for people to challenge you, forcing you to
actually articulate what you believe.  In witnessing
to those who deny Christ, deny the Bible, even deny
God, I allow the person to speak.  Rather than argue
with them, I keep asking them questions about their
beliefs, forcing them to have to articulate what they
really believe.  After you get past their "talking
points" on why they don't believe, they are usually
lost when they have to explain why they reject Christ,
the Bible, and even God.  That is the beauty of the
Christian faith.  Our faith makes sense, logical
sense, and is easy for someone to understand even if
they don't accept it.

The Bible tells us to, "Always be prepared to give
an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason
for the hope that you have."  (1 Peter 3:15) Don't
ever be afraid of being challenged regarding your
faith, look forward to it.  When you have to explain
your faith, it forces you to solidify in your own
heart and mind exactly what you believe.  It will
force you to actually dig into the Word of God and
find out what God says, not what you "feel" about
an issue.  The end result is that you begin to have
a new appreciation for God's inspired, inerrant
Word, that represents absolute truth and is our
final authority in all matters.  YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO
REALLY BELIEVE WHAT YOU SAY YOU BELIEVE TO DEFEND IT!!!

I can assure you as someone who writes daily to a
worldwide audience of over 2 million people, over
1/3 of those people not Believers, as someone who 5
nights a week takes phone calls unscreened and
"live" on a TV program broadcast only on secular
stations with an audience that is 90% non-Christian,
you better not only know what you believe but be
able to articulate it and support it with the
authority of God's Word or you will be eaten alive. 
It forces me to stay in God's Word and on my knees
daily seeking His wisdom.  As I sit here typing these
words today, I know, that I know, that I know, that I
know.  Despite the enemy and his lies, there is not
one ounce of doubt in my heart and mind that ALL of
God's Word is true exactly as He wrote it, and JESUS
IS LORD!

I love you and care about you so much.  I will be
praying today for those pastors, as well as
conference speakers, teachers, evangelists, and
those in leadership in Christian ministries to make
it a point to find opportunities to share your faith
with those who are lost, outside of the church,
people who don't know who you are, as a way of not
only fulfilling what God has called all of His children
to do, but to test and sharpen your faith in Christ. 
I will be praying for all of you who know Christ as your
Savior to become more bold in sharing your faith in
Christ with those people God has placed in your life who
are without hope and lost in their sin.  In sharing your
faith with others, in being confronted and challenged,
it will force you to take a real stand for the Lord and
for the Truth of God's Word.

In His love and service,
Your friend and brother in Christ,
Bill Keller

***If I can help you in any way you can contact me
through my personal email at bkeller@liveprayer.com

***ARE YOU 100% CERTAIN WHERE YOU WILL SPEND
ETERNITY?  The fact is you will die one day.  At
that moment, you will either spend eternity with
the Lord or be cast into everlasting darkness
forever separated from God your creator.  To know
for certain you will be forever with Jesus, go to:
http://www.liveprayer.com/bdy_salvatn.html

***GET YOUR FREE LPeMAIL ACCOUNT!  Never miss
receiving your Daily Devotional again.  LPeMail is
an effective email SPAM filtering application
that most ISP's charge $10/mo, for FREE!  Get your
LPeMail account now at: www.lpemail.com.

***I am excited to let you know that the Liveprayer
Daily Devotional is now available via AUDIO each
day.  Simply go to
http://www.liveprayer.com/DailyDevotionalAudio.html
Also, you can now listen to the Daily Devotional by
phone by calling  toll-free,1-888-382-4662, or
access it on your wireless device by going to:
http://wapdd.com

(C) Copyright 2006, Bill Keller Ministries.
All rights reserved

************************************************

May God bless you as you learn from this message!

Donald W. Mitchell, Your Dream Concierge

Copyright 2006 Donald W. Mitchell