How Do I Lead Someone to Christ?

[Music] how do i lead someone to christ i love this question it's so good it comes from a listener named brooke pastor john hello for our online church services during the coronavirus season i volunteered to reach out to people who have contacted us to let us know that they want to trust in christ yet i don't really know how to do this i've grown up seeing people walk through a written prayer but i wrestle with the doctrine behind the idea that you can simply pray this prayer in your good when someone says they're ready to accept christ how do you lead them great question great addition oh that every christian was ready and eager to declare the good news and to lead people into saving faith so thanks for the question it's very good for john piper to go back and rehearse the basics of the gospel and the practicalities of a phone call like this or a zoom chat or sitting across the table six feet apart maybe to share the gospel it's helpful to have a simple plan if we were all god we wouldn't need to have a simple plan we could just overflow spontaneously but we're not god the picture i would like to use for my simple plan is that we all need four treasure chests and i call them treasure chests because they're just packed with more than we could share at any given time and that's good we don't need to share everything in every treasure chest all the time the reason i choose the term treasure chest is because jesus said uh bumping into the kingdom and being ready to walk into the kingdom and be saved just like a man who stumbles across a treasure chest and then hid in a field so our job as a shepherds that lead new sheep into the fold is to unpack treasures so before i give you my my four treasure chests that you that you put in front of you on the table when you're talking or on the phone table maybe the first thing i would say to a person a total stranger say that i've just called up to follow up would be something like this i am so excited because you are about to enter into the hardest and happiest way of life that there is now they might be puzzled by that statement and it might issue in a little conversation but i think it strikes a very crucial balance hard and happy hard and happy you could explain from psalm 37 4 it's a happy way delight yourself in the lord the lord is worthy of our joy he wants us to be happy in him in his presence his fullness of joy at his right hand are pleasures forevermore psalm 16 11 and from matthew 16 24 you might explain that jesus said if anyone would come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me and you might say a few words about taking up the cross is not a vacation it's where you die it's where you suffer in other words you will you will say to them jesus will lead you through some very hard things through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom acts 14 22. now the reason for starting that way is the double truth and they're both so crucial is that the gospel is spectacularly good news i mean it's good news news news news really good good good news the best news in the world and we need to strike that note loud and clear i am about to tell you the best news in the world and jesus said luke 14 28 to 33 be sure to count the cost you don't want to go out against an army you can't beat you don't want to build a tower you can't finish you need to tell everybody this involves total devotion to jesus christ who was crucified so that's one possible way of starting the conversation happy and hard and and you can follow up maybe later with lots more about what that means because i think so many people are drawn into the christian life with some naive prosperity notion that things are going to get better for them when in fact they might get worse in many ways even though the joy is going to go down deeper than they ever imagined then i would begin to unpack my four treasure chests of biblical truth there are four great realities that you need to know in order to be saved by jesus christ that's what you want you want to close with christ receive christ believe christ engaged with christ have christ and there are four things you need to know and and you can name your four chests with four words and here's the basic simple plan god send christ faith i've remembered those for decades oh how they have served me so well god sin christ faith those are my four chests of truth and i call them treasure chest because every chest has dozens of passages of scripture and dozens of ways to talk about god and sin and christ and faith and i don't want to give the impression that there's a one-size-fits-all presentation of the of the gospel you have four chests they're full of bible truth and our job is to trust the spirit to guide us and then take out of each chest one or two scriptures to show those riches to your new friends so let's just walk through them real quick treasure chest number one truth about god everything starts with god everything starts with the greatness of god the glory of god you might start with his holiness or his justice because what we need to clarify here in this first treasure chest is that everything else is not going to make any sense if we don't have some sense of who god is and what he's like and how sin which we're going to talk about in treasure chest number two how sin is against god it's not just against people we can't do that if we don't know who god is so i like to start with god's glory because paul's going to define sin out of treasure chest number two as a falling short of god's glory so i would like to say to my friend isaiah 43 6 bring my sons from afar my daughters from the ends of the earth everyone whom i called by my name i created for my glory and i would say to them you were created you exist to glorify god to make god look glorious you were created to show god's glory his greatness his beauty his worth that's our duty first corinthians 10 31 whether you eat or drink whatever you do do all to the glory of god that's treasure chest number treasure chest number 2 sin truth about sin namely all of us have failed to live for the glory of god you have i have everybody has romans 3 23 all have sinned and fall short of the glory of god which i think means romans 1 23 we have exchanged the glory of god for images all of us have preferred other things to god and so we've made the glory of god look worthless we've dishonored god in so many ways which means we've chosen the way of death romans 6 23 the wages of sin is death but the free gift of god is eternal life in christ jesus our lord and sin isn't just things we do it's the way we are we are by nature paul said ephesians 2 3 children of wrath like the rest of mankind none of us escapes this condition none of us escapes the penalty of death and judgment and hell whoever jesus said john 3 36 does not obey the son shall not see life but the wrath of god remains on him so without salvation we're all sinful by nature and we're all under god's wrath that's treasure chest number two here's treasure chest number three truth about christ the saying is trustworthy deserving of full acceptance christ jesus came into the world to save sinners that's why this phone call is happening first timothy 1 15 everything up till now is designed to make christ and his way of salvation appear as great and beautiful and wonderful as it really is god sent his son his divine eternal son to bear the punishment we deserved this is the heart of everything this is the most glorious news in the world there's no way we could save ourselves from our sin and from his wrath so here's the wonder romans 8 3 god has done what the law could not do by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin he condemned sin in the flesh god condemned sin he punished sin the death of jesus his son is our punishment all the sins of all those who would ever be united to christ by faith were punished in jesus so he says there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in christ this is spectacular news no more guilt no more punishment no more wrath no more condemnation eternal life peace with god forever romans 6 23 the gift of god is eternal life in christ jesus our lord that's treasure chest number three christ and here's the last treasure chest truth about faith i think it helps at every point by the way along the way to make these as personal as possible from your own experience i might say my favorite verse in the bible to help explain how to receive all of this is ephesians 2 8-9 by grace you have been saved through faith this is not your own doing it is the gift of god not a result of your works so that no one may boast in others you can't work for your salvation you can't earn it it's a free gift you can't deserve it it comes from god's grace or god's love just a few verses earlier it says god being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with christ by grace you have been saved that means that even your faith is a gift of god right now in this moment if you are reaching out to take christ if you are ready to have him as your savior and lord and the treasure of your life you are a miracle god has made you alive it's called new birth trust him speak to him tell him all your heart declare your faith to him welcome him as your friend and you might ask at this point you have any questions of course they're going to have questions you have to decide how long you're going to talk and and you might draw things to a close either by inviting them to pray or giving them the option of dealing with god in private i've done it both ways send them away to pray i said you need to get alone with god and deal with him on the basis of everything you've heard so that i don't do any manipulating here and i remember one wonderful night at about 11 o'clock in my my office a man was just so ready i was not about to send him away because he was just oh i want to get this over and oh my was glorious the way it got over but i didn't put words in his mouth i mean i've already put 100 words in his mouth by sharing the gospel you will you'll suggest some texts that they should read when they when they hang up maybe some places to go in the bible giving them particular scriptures you may welcome them into a discipling relationship with yourself or with somebody else your church has arranged or invite them to a class you want to encourage them to think about baptism and prepare for baptism in due time and you're going to warn them that the devil is real and will put them to the test you're going to say resist him firm in your faith and you're going to you're going to leave them with a promise and oh my there's so many you could choose maybe you'll leave them like this hebrews 13 5 i will never leave you i will never forsake you so we can confidently say the lord is my helper i will not fear what can man do to me incredibly simple and clear and glorious outline thank you pastor john well on friday we talked to new believers about how to first approach the bible it seems like a very intimidating book it is an intimidating book with lots of places where you could start so how do we approach the bible for the first time come back for that that episode really pairs nicely with this one that's going to be on on friday but thanks for joining us today on the podcast for our feed our archive or to send us your own question go to our online home at desiringguide.org forward slash ask pastor john up next time we're going to talk about john chapter 6. uh there you'll remember that jesus miraculously fed 5 000 hungry mouths with five loaves and two fish and the next day jesus told that very same crowd do not work for the food that perishes but for the food that endures to eternal life which the son of man will give to you so the question for all of us is well then should we labor and work to buy bread should we work at all or should we just trust god to supply all of our bread needs supernaturally the answer to this question actually sheds a lot of light on what it means to work nine to five as a christian so that's the topic up next time on wednesday when we return i'm tony reinke we'll see you then you

Channel: Desiring God

Views: 56,350

Rating: 4.9484735 out of 5

Keywords: Desiring God, John Piper, God, Jesus Christ, Christianity, Ask Pastor John, APJ, Salvation, Evangelism, Gospel, Preaching, Witness, Prayer

Id: FZ16SYB2EtI

Length: 15min 15sec (915 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 10 2020