Study the Word

Guest (Male): On the Holy Spirit's unique role in the life of another, here's pastor Tom Keller.

Guest (Male): He knows those things are destructive and are taking you away from the life he wants you to live. And see, that's not our role. No one ever cleaned you up. There may be people that took you to Jesus, and when you got there, he cleaned you up. That is always a role of the Holy Spirit. Don't get that role confused. Don't be the Holy Spirit. Be someone that takes someone to Jesus, explain what that conviction process is, but don't be the Holy Spirit. Someone as well said that too many in the church seek to be judges or prosecuting attorneys when they're called to be witnesses.

And as we continue in our study of Colossians on today's study the word, we'll get some practical help in how to share with an unbeliever rather than judge them. You're now with today's lesson from Colossians chapter 4 beginning with a couple of key questions to ask. Our teacher once again, pastor Tom Keller.

Pastor Thom Keller: The two key questions, and you need to remember these. These are the key questions. You ask these questions. Do you know for sure that if you died tonight, you'd go to heaven? Do you know for sure that if you died tonight, you'd go to heaven? I told you this before, but when I first heard that question, I thought when I asked that, people are going to throw things at me, they're going to swear at me, they're going to get up and leave the room. They're going to say you're an idiot. What are you talking about?

That's really what I thought would happen. That isn't what happens. It is extremely rare that people react in any negative way to that question. I've never had any say what are you talking never because eternity is written in the hearts of men. People really do care about their souls. They do. And when you ask that question, you're getting deep deep deep deep deep deep inside of their soul. Do you know for sure that if you died tonight, you'd go to heaven? And you get all the answers. Oh, I'd go to hell. I know it. Uh, I don't believe there's a heaven.

I don't believe there's a hell. I know I'd go to heaven. I'm sure. Doesn't matter what they say. Don't worry about that. You're thinking oh my god, what do I say? It doesn't matter. Doesn't What matters is the next question. You go right to the next question. You don't address that. Right to the next question. Don't get sucked in. Go right to the next question. God forbid that that would happen that you would die, but if you did die and you stood before God and he said why shall I turn to heaven? What would you say?

If you did die and you stood before God and he said why shall I turn to heaven? What would you say? The reason that question is so important is you want to find out what they're leaning on for their salvation. What what on what cause will God let them into heaven? And the majority of the time, it's works because I'm not that bad a person. I shared Christ with a fellow Kabota dealer when I was when we were Kabota dealers on a on a trip. And he was a valedictorian of his Catholic school. 12 years Catholic school.

I said to him, I said if you stood before God and he said to you why shall I turn His name was Sammy. Sammy, why shall I turn to heaven? What would you say? Valedictorians we said well, I figure it's a 50/50 deal. I'm no walking angel, and I knew he wasn't. He was from New New Iberia, Louisiana. He was a Cajun, hard partier. They started Friday at 5:00 and drank until Monday morning. Hard partying community. He said I'm no walking angel, but I know I'm not in the bottom 50%. And on the basis of that, he was going to heaven.

Well, you'll get different variations of that same idea over and over and over. But the reason you want to ask that question is now you know what they're leaning on. And so that's an important question. God forbid that you would die today, but if you did and you stood before God and he said why shall I turn to heaven? What would you say? Boy, people will think about that. They'll say I don't know. I don't know. And if they lean in, keep going. If they lean away, there's no interest. You may want to consider backing away from them.

You may want to just be sensitive to that. Again, if you find yourself trying to force locked doors open, you may be ahead of God in this. You know, they say an average of 16 times a person has a interaction with someone about Jesus before they come to Christ. I've heard different numbers, but let's say 16. You may be number 15, you may number 14, you may be number two. You don't have to be the person to close that deal. You just have to leave a good impression of the gospel. You don't have to figure all that out.

Just don't force it because if you do force it, you could make it more difficult for the next person. You know why I think more people don't really witness for Christ? Because so many people have had such a bad experience at an earlier time in their life where someone hammered them so hard with the Bible that they now have this aversion to anyone that does that cuz their experience was so bad. It is a brilliant strategy of the enemy. Let you encounter someone that was so obnoxious that when you first start to think of doing you go oh man, I'm not going there.

I remember what that was like. It's brilliant. Don't let that stop you. You know I have a Jewish friend owned owns a business. I love this guy, and I shared with him one time I had a long conversation, a nice exchange back and forth, very casual. And at the end of it, he didn't pray to receive Christ, but at the end of it, he said this is what he said. He said Tom, I really enjoyed talking with you about this. He said every other time I've talking to Christians, I felt like they're trying to put a notch in their belt.

Do you get that? See, we don't want to be that. We don't want to be that person to be our project, our conquest. We want to love them, care about them. You know, and verse five makes a a point that everyone of these encounters should be considered as God ordained, God choreographed moments. Colossians 4:5 Amplified Bible conduct yourself with wisdom in your interactions with outsiders, non-believers. Make the most of each opportunity treating it as something precious. You know, your daily happenings are like the inside gears of a clock. As they turn and gear upon gear meshes, every one of those are different encounters you encountering a person intentionally by God.

So remember the work that you do, your employment, whatever you do for work is incidental to the greater work God wants to do through you in that place. You think your job is what it's all about. It's not. It's a means to an end. Yes, it's how you pay your bills. Yes, it's how you live, but it 's not the primary call in your life in that place. It's secondary. Primary is to allow God to use you in that setting because he has intentionally choreographed you, woven you into the lives of those people. And folks, this is why so many people don't find fulfillment in their employment because when your job becomes only about selling widgets or repairing widgets, you will live an unfulfilled boring life.

You will. The lure of shiny things only lasts so long. But when you use your employment, when you use your time in school with your fellow students to share Christ with others, it all changes. It changes from being boring to fulfilling. I remember when I was in the car business before I get into the ministry, my really really bad weeks, the weeks that I wanted to just toss it all and go away, stop working were the weeks that I didn't do anything for Christ, where I didn't share with anyone or pray with anyone because now it's just it's just spinning the thing.

It's just spinning the knob to make all the all the gears go around. Well, that doesn't last long. You want find fulfillment in your workplace, share Christ. And in the context of evangelism, Paul says that we are to live wisely. Look at verse five. Live wisely among those who are not believers and make the most of every opportunity. Live wisely. In Greek, the word for wise as many of you know is Sophia. It means wisdom, broad and full intelligence, but both components. It means the wisdom which belongs to man and the wisdom which belongs to God.

And wisdom is absolutely critical in obtaining the graces you need, I need in order to witness to people like the grace to listen attentively to others as they talk. It's been said wisdom is a reward you get for a lifetime of listening when you would have preferred to have talked. Wisdom is a reward you get for a lifetime of listening when you would have preferred to have talked. There is so much truth to that. That's a deep statement. So much of the willingness of others to listen to you listen so much of the willingness of others to listen to you hinges upon how much time you have listened to them.

I've often said some of my experiences of my experience I say just because something is my experience doesn't make it true. It just means it's been my experience. But my experience has been in very rough, unscientific, untested numbers. My guess is that for every 10 minutes you listen to someone attentively, you get a credit to speak one minute in return. Let me make an extreme case. If there's somebody that is really hardened against the gospel and I listen to them attentively for an hour straight and I 'm engaging in the conversation, I 'm asking questions and and and I'm all there.

At the end of that hour, if I start to share they're going to listen. It's very rare that they don't understand there's kind of a deal here, unspoken deal. You listen to me now I I really in fairness I need to listen to you, and it works that way. It's been said no one cares about how much you know until they know how much you care. And then Paul tells us what we are to do when we begin witnessing, how to do it. Verse six. Let your conversation be gracious and attractive so you will have the right response for everyone.

ESV says it this way. Let your speech when you're witnessing let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. Let your speech be gracious. In Greek, the word for gracious is and it here it means speech that involves joy, pleasure, delight, sweetness, charm, loveliness, goodwill, loving kindness, favor. Speech that involves listen to unsafe people joy, pleasure, delight, sweetness, charm, loveliness, goodwill, loving kindness, and favor. Now again, this is how we're to talk to whom? Unsaved people. Listen again to verse five and six. Live wisely among those who are not believers.

That's who we're talking about. And make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be gracious and attractive so you will have the right response for everyone. You see, Paul says that when you're speaking to the unsaved, you're to speak to them with joy, with delight, with sweetness, with charm, with goodwill, with loving kindness, with favor. Goodwill, loving kindness, and favor as though they have found favor in your eyes. As though they have found favor in your eyes. And folks, in witnessing this is so important. We as Christians so many times get sideways on this.

As an example, at work or at school, do you have a coworker or a fellow student who is really coarse? I mean, they tell dirty stories. They cuss like a sailor. They mock religion. They brag about how all the alcohol they can hold and so on and so on. Now fix that person in your mind, really. And let me ask you a question. Fix that person in your mind. When you speak with them, do your words reflect joy, sweetness, charm, goodwill, loving kindness? With that person in your mind, would you say that that person feels as though they have found favor in your eyes?

Do you know why we don't do a better job of speaking graciously to them? Because we internally have judged them for their behavior. How many of you would say you've done this, judged an unbeliever internally? You said nothing to them, but internally you judged them. Would you raise your hand? Thank you. Those didn't raise your hand, we're judging you for not raising your hand. Yeah, I've done that too, of course. But Jesus gives us the solution to that. Remember the woman caught in adultery? After Jesus turns away the crowd who came to stone her, he says this to the woman in John 8.

Jesus stood up again and said to the woman where are your accusers? Didn't even one of them condemn you? No, Lord, she said. And Jesus said neither do I go and sin no more. And then speaking to the Pharisees about this three verses later, he says this in verse 15. He says you judge me by human standards, but I do not judge anyone. Oh, there will come a time of judgment, the great white throne judgment. But until that time, Jesus doesn't judge anyone. Can you imagine you getting ahead of Jesus on the timing of that?

The key word here is judge. We covered this before, but there are two Greek words for judge. This is where we get sideways on this. Anna Carino and Carino. In Greek, judge Anna Carino it means to examine, to investigate, to question, to scrutinize. That's good. Anna Carino is good. We should be doing that all the time. But Carino is a whole different word. Carino means to determine and so to judge and pronounce judgment. It includes you assuming the office of the judge, you undergoing a trial in your mind, you passing sentence in your mind, you condemning in judgment in your mind, and you executing judgment.

It covers the full gamut. You take on the role of the prosecuting attorney, the role of the judge, the jury, and the executioner. We are to Anna Carino everything, all things, always. 1 Corinthians 2:15 says that. We're to Anna Carino, but the spiritual person judges all things. Anna Carino discerns. But he himself is judged by no one. And then even more to the point in 1 Corinthians chapter 4 verse five, we read this. Therefore, do not pronounce judgment before the time. Do not Carino before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart.

Then each one will receive his commendation from God. And so that person at work who lives like the devil, we should Anna Carino them. We should discern but not Carino them. Not act as judge, jury, and executioner. So when we rightly Anna Carino them, what does that tell us? It tells us that they're lost and they don't have the Holy Spirit in them. And so they have no conviction for their sin. They have a need for the Holy Spirit to bring that conviction to them. So what's our role in all of that? You know, I picture people with a big wall mounted switch on the back of their head.

And with unbelievers, that switch is in the off position, and it has been from the day of their birth. It has always been off. It's never been on. But when that switch is turned on, when that person prays to receive Christ as his or her savior, that is when the Holy Spirit's power begins to flow into their lives. That is when they begin to feel conviction for the sin in their life. That is when they have a desire to clean up their lives. I've shared this before, but many years ago before we planted this church, Sue and I were part of a Bible study in a kind of rough section 11 Monday nights.

And there was a woman in that Bible study group, about eight 10 people. And she did things for money that no woman should do. And everybody in the group knew it. And we're talking about talking with a woman at the well one time. You've had five husbands, and the husband you're living with now is not your husband. And in the middle of that Bible study, she looks up, says to the whole group hey, that's me. That's me. And they all go yeah, that is you. That is you. Well, she got saved. And a week or two later, she comes back on Monday night, and she said hey, she said this is really crazy.

She said things are really different. I said like what? She said well, I I go to the bars and she says like I don't want to be there. And it's like there are things I used to do, I don't want to do anymore. She said I feel bad about it. She said what up, dad? I said well, what up, dad is this. That's the Holy Spirit starting the ministry to you, speak to you. He's wanting to change your life not because he's a killjoy, but because he knows those things are destructive and are taking you away from the life he wants you to live.

Just yield to that. Just yield to that. And see, that's not our role. No one ever cleaned you up. There may be people that took you to Jesus, and when you got there, he cleaned you up. No one ever cleaned me up. People were an influence on me, but they never cleaned me up. That is always a role of the Holy Spirit. Don't get that role confused. Don't be the Holy Spirit. Be someone that takes someone to Jesus. Explain what that conviction process is, but don't be the Holy Spirit. That's when they begin to have a desire to clean up their lives.

And so our goal with unsaved people is not to point their sin out to them or judge them for their sin. Even Jesus won't do that now. Jesus said for God so loved the world he sent His only begotten son that whosoever believe in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For I did for Jesus for I did not come into the world to condemn the world but that through me the world might be saved. He doesn't come pointing a finger, judging. He comes like this. How do we come like this? No, we come like this.

We come like this. Invite them in. Tell them Jesus loves them. He died for them. Welcome them like this, and then the Holy Spirit, the velvet hammer will start on them in just the right way, in a way that doesn't hurt, in a way that you can't pull that off. And so our goal with unsaved people is not to point out their sin, not to judge them. Even Jesus won't do that. Our job is to get that light switch flipped from off to on, which allows the Holy Spirit to begin doing His good work. John 16 verse eight again, when He comes the Holy Spirit, He will convict your friend of His sin and of God's righteousness relative to him and of the coming judgment against your friend.

That's His role. So how does today's lesson apply to me? Number one, on prayer, the takeaway. Remember to be alert in prayer, faithful in prayer because prayer protects you from Satan's strategies, and they are complex. If you want to do more study in this, I encourage you to listen to the the teachings on Ephesians chapter six that we did. Second, on witnessing. If your job has become boring, unfulfilling, I 'm giving you homework for this week. This week in that setting in school, share Christ with someone or pray with someone at work, maybe at a break, or maybe take someone out to lunch the same gender and ask them how their life is going, how church, if they're interested in spiritual things.

And practice really really really really listening. Ratio of 10 to one. Really listen. And third and last, for the really really rough unsaved believers around you, remember do not Carino them. Don't expect them to think like, act like, talk like a Christian until they become one and have the Holy Spirit. You know, this one of the this one of the gripes I have because we're trying to get them to see things from a Christian perspective. They're not going to. Not the unsaved world. Let's work in the church. That's where we should be talking. But uh wow, get the switch flipped on, then things will start to make sense.

And when that is your view of that person, the priority shifts from trying to change their behavior to flipping the switch on. And folks, that's when it becomes really fun to watch as the Holy Spirit starts cleaning them up and starts bringing conviction. And you hear those things come out of their mouth like you know, I don't think I should do this anymore. And man, that gets fun.

Guest (Male): Pastor Tom Keller on the necessity of the Holy Spirit to bring conviction. And we are poor substitutes, but we can pray and be good listeners. For more encouragement to that end, join us next time here on Study the Word. You can hear this message again online at ccleb .com or subscribe to our YouTube channel at Calvary Chapel Lebanon. If you'd rather have a CD copy, call us at 717 273 5633. Have you been helped by the ministry? Let us know that. It would be so encouraging to pastor Tom and the team. Give us a call at 717 273 5633 or write to Study the Word 740 Willow Street Lebanon, Pennsylvania 17046.

You can also email us through the website at ccleb .com Study the Word is made possible through the generous support of listeners just like you. And thank you for helping us reach out with the love and truth of Jesus Christ and a time in human history where people really need biblical encouragement. You can give online at ccleb .com or call 717 273 5633. We hope you'll visit us sometime here at Calvary Chapel Lebanon. For our service times and more information, go to ccleb .com on the web. You can also watch our live stream there at ccleb .com or on our YouTube channel at Calvary Chapel Lebanon.

Study the Word with pastor Tom Keller is brought to you by Calvary Chapel Lebanon, Pennsylvania. May God richly bless you as you Study the Word.