God’s People: Shaped By Evangelism

Sermon Summary:

In this powerful message, we’re reminded of the transformative power of evangelism through the story of the church in Antioch, as described in Acts 11. This early church, born out of persecution, became a model of cultural diversity and effective gospel-sharing. We learn that God’s message is universal, meant for all people regardless of their background. The gospel’s effectiveness is highlighted, showing how it can bridge gaps and overcome barriers when we simply plant the seed. We’re challenged to consider our own role in sharing the good news, realizing that even small actions – like inviting someone to church – can have a profound impact. The message emphasizes that the gospel is sturdy enough to withstand any challenge and holistic in its ability to transform lives completely. As we reflect on this, we’re encouraged to embrace our diverse community, break down prejudices, and actively engage in sharing God’s love with those around us.

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Sermon Points:

We believe EVANGELIZING LOST PEOPLE IS THE RESPONSIBILITY OF EACH FOLLOWER OF JESUS! Believers are to share the Gospel message with those who are lost. We begin in our own communities; however, Jesus commanded us to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. We are to join our efforts with other believers to ensure all nations hear the good news of Jesus. (Matthew 10:32; 28:18-20; Acts 1:8; Romans 1:16-17; Colossians 1:6)

CONTEXT: The early church was scattered from Jerusalem due to the growing persecution. There were some believers from Cyprus and Cyrene who came to Antioch and began to share the Gospel with both Jews and Gentiles! A church was established, and God used this church to launch the first worldwide mission effort in Christian history.

ANTIOCH: The city of Antioch was a diverse, cosmopolitan Greek city founded by Seleucus Nicator, a general who served with Alexander the Great. By the first century, it was a thriving, cosmopolitan, diverse Roman city with residents from across the known world.

CHURCH AT ANTIOCH: The church established in Antioch reflected the cultural diversity of the city. The cultural competencies displayed in this church enabled it to be effective in evangelizing the community. EVANGELISM: The church at Antioch engaged in evangelistic efforts that were effective and impactful. Jews and Gentiles alike responded to the message about the Lord Jesus.

THE MESSAGE OF THE GOSPEL:

-universal in its scope

-effective in its impact

-sturdy in its composition

-holistic in its transformation of people

Key Takeaways:

• The church at Antioch reflected the cultural diversity of its city
• The gospel is universal in scope, effective in impact, sturdy in composition, and holistic in transformation
• Evangelism requires cultural competence and a willingness to cross barriers
• The importance of inviting others to church and sharing the gospel
• The transformative power of the gospel in creating a unified Christian identity
• The need for believers to actively participate in sharing their faith

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Scripture References:

• Acts 11:19-30

Stories:

• The founding of the church in Antioch by unnamed believers from Cyprus and Cyrene
• Bob Goff’s New Year’s Day neighborhood parade
• Greg Barbanel’s work as a post-production sound engineer for movies
• Rosaria Butterfield’s conversion story through the hospitality of Pastor Ken Smith and his wife

Transcript

Well, I don’t know about y’all, but I feel like I’ve been to church. We’ve had baptisms and praise and prayer, and we’ve already heard two sermons, one from Isaiah, one from Conave. And so can we just say praise God for what we’ve heard today? It’s been awesome to be in the Lord’s house already. Well, you know that our theme for this year is Together, and we’ve been learning about what it means to be together as a church family for this entire year and for the missions month.

Our theme is Together to the People, and we have produced materials for you we hope are helping and shaping and guiding you. I hope you’ve gotten a copy of your devotional guide. It’s not too late to get one if you don’t have one. They’re available in all of our welcome areas today, and you’ll find in that guide there’s a together in Word Bible reading for the week. There’s a together indeed group of suggestions for how to put the material that we’re reading into action and so hope that you’re taking advantage of it.

Also for this particular month, there is just a lot of material in that guide to help you understand better our missional calling and what we believe the Lord has called us to and where he’s leading us in mission. And we’ve been using the Book of Acts as our guide. And so here’s what I would like to do this morning. I would like for you to look with me in Acts 11, and I want to talk to you this morning about my second favorite church, because obviously this is my favorite church, but my second favorite church is Church at Antioch, and it is described in Acts 11. I’ve entitled this message God’s People.

That’s what we’ve been talking about this month. But God’s people Shaped by Evangelism so look with me at Acts 11, verse 19, where the Scripture says now those who had been scattered by the persecution that broke out when Stephen was killed traveled as far as Phnenicia, Cyprus and Antioch, spreading the Word only among Jews. Some of them, however, men from Cyprus and Cyrene went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks, also telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus. The Lord’s hand was with them, and a great number of people believed and turned to the Lord. News of this reached the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas Antioch.

When he arrived and saw what the grace of God had done, he was glad and he encouraged them all to remain true to The Lord with all their hearts. He was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and faith. And a great number of people were brought to the Lord. Then Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul. When he found him, he brought him to Antioch.

So for a whole year, Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great Numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch. During this time, some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. One of them, named Agabus, stood up and through the Spirit, predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. This happened during the reign of Claudius.

The disciples, as each one was able, decided to provide help for the brothers and sisters living in Judea. This they did, sending their gift to the elders by Barnabas and Saul. Well, this morning we’re going to talk a little bit about what it means to be shaped by evangelism. Y’all know that as I’ve shared with y’all before, some of y’all may be new to our church, but Baptists have gathered around confessions of faith for most of our history. We’re not creedal people.

We don’t prepare creeds and recite them in worship. We actually write confessions of faith that at a particular moment in time express what we best believe. Our church has adopted one of those. The first confession that was adopted by Southern Baptist in America was in 1925, and it was named the Baptist Faith and Message. It was revised in 1963.

That is the confession that our church has embraced that most accurately represents what we believe. We have taken the articles of the Baptist Faith and message from 1963 and we’ve condensed them and into what we call our core beliefs. Let me read to you the article about evangelism from our Core Belief statement. We believe evangelizing lost people is the responsibility of each follower of Jesus. Believers are to share the gospel message with those who are lost.

We begin in our own communities. However, Jesus commanded us to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. We’re to join our efforts with other believers to ensure all nations hear the good news of Jesus. And we base that upon several core passages that we have listed. And that is just a summary, succinct statement of our core belief about evangelism.

Mission. Next Sunday morning in worship, you’re going to hear a sermon from Dr. Elijah Brown. He is the current general secretary of the Baptist World Alliance. It is the largest Baptist group in the world.

It’s a coalition of Baptist. Our church is a member of the Baptist World Alliance. Dr. Brown represents over 50 million Baptists across the world. And he is going to share with us a message about how we’re taking the Gospel to the world.

So I’m excited about hearing him next Sunday morning. But let’s go back to church at Antioch. When you come to page 11 and acts, here’s the context. The early church was scattered from Jerusalem due to the growing persecution. We read about it in Acts 7 where Stephen was martyred and Saul of Tarsus was one of the ones who was persecuting the church.

Here’s what’s fascinating when you read this introduction. In Acts 11, particularly verse 20, there were some believers. We don’t know who they were. They were common people, lay people. They were from Cyprus and Cyrene.

They came to Antioch and they began to share the Gospel with both Jews and Gentiles, which was a revolutionary step. And a church was established. And God used this church to launch the first worldwide mission effort in Christian history. I love that. Now I’m a little frustrated with Luke about this.

Luke is an incredible church historian. And as a fellow church historian, I would like to ask him in verse 20, who were these men? Could you not at least tell us their names? Just some people. He said just some men from Cyprus and Cyrene because they made an incredible revolutionary step that’s going to change the history of Christianity.

How many Gentiles in here this morning? How many of you are not Jewish in your ethnicity? Most of you. Okay, guess what? Good news.

Somebody decided it was okay to share the Gospel with us. Can we just clap for these men? I don’t know who they were. Thank you. I’m so glad that you decided it was okay to tell us.

It changed the history of Christianity. And I think there’s one of the reasons Luke did that was just to help all of us realize it was just some people like you. Kurt mentioned a word about these ping pong balls. Well, what we want you to do, people like you, people from Arlington, just start praying for and sharing the Gospel with other people. We have no idea how God may choose to use it.

Well, what was interesting about Antioch, let me just remind you, some of you may not be familiar with the city of Antioch, but the city of Antioch was a diverse, cosmopolitan Greek city. It was founded by Seleucius Nicator. He was a general for Alexander the Great. So it was founded as a Greek city, but by the first century, by the time we read this text, it was a thriving, cosmopolitan, very diverse Roman city with residents from across the known world. By the time we get to Acts 11 is the third largest city in the Roman Empire.

Rome, Alexandria, Egypt, and Antioch. Probably around half a million people we believe lived there. It’s 300 miles north of Jerusalem. At the time, it was in Syria. Today it’s in the southern tip of Turkey.

It had a huge commercial trade economy because it was located on both a land route and a sea route. And it was long known as a diverse city. People from literally all over the known world lived in Antioch. They were from Asia, they were. They were Greeks from the Greek world, they were Romans.

And because of the establishment of the city, Jews were welcome to come live there. So there was a large group of Jews who also lived in Antioch. So very diverse, very cosmopolitan city in the ancient world. These men arrive in Antioch, start to share the Gospel, and they establish a church at Antioch. Well, what do we learn from that church?

Well, this church that was established in Antioch, here’s what we know based upon the text. It reflected the cultural diversity of the city. The cultural competencies displayed in this church enabled it to be effective in evangelizing its community. When you look at how this church developed, you have to look for clues. Luke doesn’t just spell it all out for you.

You’ve got to do a little homework to come to grips with it. But we know this. If you go back to Acts 6, the church in Jerusalem established a group of men to take care of the widows in the church. Sometimes we refer to those men as deacons. They weren’t actually called deacons in the text, but that’s who we believe they were.

One of them was a man named Nicholas. Now, Nicholas is a Greek name for a Jewish man at the time. But here’s what Luke tells us. He was from Antioch. So he’s a Greek speaking Jewish man from Antioch living in Jerusalem.

And he’s elected as one of these first deacons. Y’all still with me? So that’s kind of the first taste we get of Antioch. Then we come to Acts 11 and we discover that a church is founded there. And if you just flip over another page or two in your Bibles, you’ll look at Acts 13 and here’s a listing of the leaders of that church.

In chapter 13, verse 1, he says Luke tells us there were prophets, there were teachers, Barnabas, Simeon, Lucius, Menean, Saul. Now he gives us a little clue about each one of those men. Barnabas, we know, was a Levite from Cyprus. So he’s a Jew who lived on the island of Cyprus. Simeon was called Niger.

Niger in Latin that means Black. So Simeon is a black man. Some people think he might be Simon of Cyrene. Y’all remember him. He was the one who carried the cross for Jesus.

Y’all remember. Some people think that’s who that is. Lucius of Cyrene. Cyrene is a city in North Africa. And so here’s another African.

He presumably would have been a black man. Manean was a Jew who was a part of a royal family. He was connected to Herod Antipas. Herod Antipas was Herod the Great son. And then Saul.

Saul was a Jew, a Hebraic Jew who lived in Tarsus. In other words, this church represents the cultural diversity of the city of Antioch. Even though these folks were not all from Antioch, they represent the diversity of the people who lived there. And while they were there, after the Gospel was sure the first time, they began to disciple and bless this mixture of Jews and Gentiles. Now, the barrier between Jewish people and Gentile people in the first century was incredibly thick and tall.

It was a huge wall. It was a religious barrier. It was a racial barrier. It was a cultural barrier. Jews and Gentiles in general did not mix.

They certainly didn’t mix intentionally. More often than not, they engaged each other commercially, economically. For example, Jesus lived in the most diverse part of Israel when he was working as a carpenter, he lived in Nazareth. He was connected to the Decapolis. Those were cities in the northern part of Israel and beyond who were Greek speaking Gentiles.

More than likely, Jesus and his dad plied their wares in communities like that. And that’s how you engage the gentiles commercially, economically, you did not engage them socially, you didn’t eat with them, and you certainly didn’t have anything to do with them religiously. These were separated people. We got it. They had nothing to do with each other.

And however, in Antioch, at the church, they were brought together. So somehow they bridged these gaps and they stepped over these walls and they were able to bring themselves into the same church together. Come on, y’all. They were able to bring themselves into the same church together. Now, you and I don’t live in Antie, we live in Arlington.

Do you know, according to the research, when you look at dimensions like socioeconomic issues, cultural issues, economic issues, on their own, household issues, religious issues, there is a group of folks who study our cities across America according to those five dimensions. And the latest researchce that’s been published by them says this Arlington is the fifth most diverse large city in America.

Think about that. Arlington. That means we have people across our community who have all different kinds of backgrounds, and they represent the incredible diversity of America. And we are now the fifth most diverse large city in America. Now, right adjacent to our campus is the University of Texas at Arlington.

You just heard Isaiah give a testimony about his work with the Baptist student ministry there, the international ministry. Well, according to the research I’ve read, and I may not have the latest research, UTA right now is the sixth most diverse university in all of America. So that campus is filled with people from across the world. In other words, our field for ministry is very similar to the field in Antioch. Does that make sense?

It’s very diverse. I’m not surprised by that. I look at my world, I live here. I walk around all the time. I go to the grocery store, I go the ball field.

I go to my little daughter’s, my daughter granddaughter’s little band raage, you know, my daughter Ada now is playing the violin. Look out, y’all. I’m just saying.

And you know what? When I walk into those school recitals, when I go the ball field, when I go to the grocery store, you know what I see? Diversity. People from all over the world, all kind of backgrounds. And the church somehow has got to figure out how to be culturally competent enough to embrace the community in which it’s located.

Because we live in a world that is characterized by so much brokenness and separation and sin. The evil and sin of things like racism still exists in our society. Prejudice, all kinds of prejudice. You know, people are prejudiced against all kinds of things. It’s amazing, isn’t it?

NT Wright tells a story about a friend of his who his. This friend of his daughter talked about how she was prejudiced against a certain group. And the dad asked the little girl, well, well, do you know anybody from that group? She. She said, no, if I did, I wouldn’t be prejudiced against them.

Okay, well, that’s a pretty insightful comment here from a little girl. Think about the social prejudice that exists in our society, the economic prejudice that exists in our society, the gender prejudice. We have people who have decided for themselves what men can do and what women can do, and they’re the resident experts of it. We have political prejudice. We judge each other based on our politics, and we demonize people who disagree with us as if we’re always right.

Y all need me to say that again or. Y’all already know that.

So here’s what I would say. We’ve got to cultivate some skills if we’re going to reach this society. Because all of that already exists. And you can find it wherever you want it, Right? If that’s what you want and you want to live in your prejudice, in your racial bias, in your gender bias, in your political bias, in your socioeconomic bias, if that’s where you want to live, you’ve got all kind of options to do that.

I just don’t believe you have the option to do that at church. So we’ve got to listen to each other, we’ve got to learn from each other, we’ve got to live with each other and we need to learn how to love one another. That’s what I would say. Because I want us to be the church that God’s called us to be in Arlington. Now, with that said, let me just talk to you’all real quickly about evangelism, okay?

The church at Antioch engaged in evangelistic efforts. When I read the text, they were effective. They were impactful. Jews and Gentiles both responded to the message about the Lord Jesus. And do you notice if you go back and just look at the text when.

Look. Look at how Luke puts it. It’s interesting how he chooses to word this. We look at verse 20. He says they came to Antioch and they told the good news.

In other words, they evangelized. Notice how he puts it? He doesn’t say Christ Jesus. Now there’s nothing wrong with saying Christ Jesus, but Christ is a word in Greek that meant something to a Hebrew. It’s the Greek word for Messiah.

So he doesn’t say. In Antioch, they preached the Messiah Jesus he could have. It doesn’t mean Jesus isn’t the Messiah. What does he say? The Lord Jesus.

In other words, this was a message for Jews and Gentiles. He s saw about the Lord and the Lord’s hand was with them. And look what happened. A great number of them turned to the Lord. Barnabas is sent down there by the church.

It’s always interesting. You’re sit down from Jerusalem, even though Antioch north. But you know you’re always sent down from Jerusalem. That’s how Jerusalem viewed itself. Barnabas was sent down there.

And when he got there, he was glad he saw the grace of God. So let me walk you through just three or four lessons about the gospel. Can I do that real quickly? What about the message of the gospel? Why does it work?

Well, first of all, it’s universal in its scope. You and I need to understand that the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is for everybody. Jesus said in Acts 1, you’ll be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea Samaria, and the ends of the earth. In other words, just for everybody. Matthew 28.

Jesus says, make disciples of all nations, all different peoples. The disciples are going to have to learn that, because remember the question the disciples asked Jesus in Acts 1? Are you now going to restore the kingdom to Israel? In other words, that was their way of asking, are you going to finally do what you came to do, which was put us back in our place? And Jesus says, you know, it’s not for me to know the times and the seasons of all of that.

You will be my witnesses to everybody. Jew, Gentile, ends of the earth, Samaria. That was the challenge from Jesus. The Gospel, everybody. It’s universal in its scope.

These people in Antioch displayed that and lived it out, really, for the very first time. Simon Peter had already been given the clue in Acts 10 when he went and took the gospel to Cornel “es remember? And here’s what’s going to happen to Simon Peter. Do y’all know he goes to Antioch? Y’all remember that story?

He goes to Antioch. And Paul talks about it later in his letter to the Galatians. And he chastises Simon Peter because here’s what he says in Galatians 2, Paul says, I had to confront Peter because he came to Antioch and he ate with the Gentiles. And then he decided they needed to become Jews first. And he said, I, I confronted him face to face.

He says, a matter of fact, he even influenced Barnabas. In other words, Paul said, the church at Antioch got it right. I believe they did list you. And I get it right. Here’s what else I say about the gospel.

It’s effective in its impact. You know, the gospel’s powerful. Jews and Gentiles were both saved. The gospel will do its work. When the gospel shared one of my favorite stories Jesus tells in Mark 4, he says, the farmer went out and sowed the seed.

And whether he stayed up all night or slept all night, it didn’t matter. Automatically, the seed grew. Automat is the Greek word, automatically. In other words, the gospel just needs to be planted. I know this.

I’ve pastored two country churches. I know enough to know if you leave all the seed in the barn, you won’t grow anything. Now, I’m not much of a farmer, and I know very little about rural life, but I did learn that you ve got to tell the seat out of the barn, put it in the ground, and trust it to do what only it can do. Well, you and I have got to share the good news. Do you know Life Way research continues to ask people, unchurched people, why would you ever go to church?

Do you know what consistently is the number one answer in America? Number one, hands down, every survey, why would you go to a church? You know what their number one answer is? Because I was invited or if I were invited.

Now, who ought to be inviting unchurched people to church? I think other unchurch people. Don’t y’all let them do it? No, it’s us, you and I, we’ve got to invite people. The gospel is effective if we plant the seed.

I would also say this about the gospel. It’s sturdy in its composition. I love that about the gospel. These people had been persecuted. It still was a powerful message.

They didn’t give up on it because the gospel sturdy. It withstands any and all attacks. They still believed. It applies in every situation. It can bridge gaps, it can overcome barriers.

The gospel is sturdy in 30s, in AD 30s or 40s, when this church was established. It’s sturdy today in Arlington. No matter what you face the gospel stury enough for it. Jesus said, it’s like building your house on a rock. And then finally, the last thing I’d say about the gospel is it’s holistic and it’s transformation to people.

What happened in Antioch? They shared the gospel. Verse 20. They evangelized, right? They told the story.

Verse 21. People got converted. A great number of people believed it says verse 24 the same thing. A bunch of folks turned to the Lord. Then the the discipleship took place.

It’sAul and Barnabas. They began to teach the people how to walk with Jesus and they were transformed. Verse 23. Barnabas says, Stay true to the Lord with all your heart and you’ll change. Verse 26.

The people of Antioch came up with a nickname for the disciples. And what did they call them in Antioch? Christians. In other words, they associated them with Christ. The people were change.

They were transformed. They were no longer Jews and Gentiles, they were now Christians. That’s what characterized them. And they were generous. A prophet came down and said, there’s going to be a famine.

We need famine relief in Jerusalem. They all gave as they could. The Bible says in verse 29. Then if you flip over a couple of Pages in Acts 13, you know what this church did? This church sent out the very first Christian missionaries in the history of Christ Christianity.

They took on the world and sent Paul and Barnabas on this incredible missionary journey. What a transformation of a group of unassuming people in a diverse city. Like Antioch, y’all, when I read that text, they were generous, they were gracious, they were missional. They were willing to give money to famine relief. And they started sending their own missionaries.

You know who that starts to sound like to me? This church would did God that. It always sounds like that. But that’s who we are because of the power of the gospel. The gospel is transformative.

It’s holistic. It affects everybody. Everybody has to be in it. There are no spectators. We’re all in it.

Bob Golf. Some of y’all famil with Bob Golf. I think many of you are. He tells a very interesting about what his family does. I don’t know if you know this or not, but over 20 years ago, his family decided to have a New Year’s Day parade in their neighborhood.

There are 22 houses in their neighborhood. They live on a cul de sac, he said. So we got together, we went and visit all of our neighbors. We told them, we’re throwing a parade for you. This parade is for us just to thank you for being our neighbors.

Here’s our only rule. There can be no spectators. You all have to be in parade. We’re just going to parade to the end of the street to our house. We’re going to cook lunch and we’ll all have time together.

He said, so if you feel led to walk out on the front porch, don’t do it because we’re going to come get you unless you turn your back and go back in the house, okay? So he said they had their first parade with nobody watching. Everybody was in on it. They all walked. He said, just dress like you want to.

Doesn’t matter. We’re going to. Only thing we’re going to bring are balloons and hot dogs. So they put a bunch of balloons together. He said they all dressed up, kids had fun.

People enjoyed it. They’ve been doing that now for over 22 years. Everybody in the on the street and now participates in the parade. Now they have several hundred people that come every year and just watch and participate. Friends and family members.

They’ve all gotten to know each other. They have loved each other. They’ve learned about each other’s families. They’ve been to see each other in the hospital. They’ve taken them food when they’re sick.

They’ve cared for each other just because they’neighbors And Bob Gol says, we don’t do any planning because that just takes two effort. So the week before, we go around door to door and say, okay, we need a grand marshal. And a queen. Everybody’s make your own decorations. We’ll see at the end of the street when the parade is over and we’ll have hot dogs together.

That’s all they do. Here’s what he said. Stop waiting for a plan. Just start loving everybody.

We don’t need a plan for evangelism. We just need to love people. The gospel is good enough and it’s for everybody. It’s for me. It’s for.

It doesn’t matter who you are. All of us can do it. There’s a guy named Greg Barbanell. Never met him, never heard anything about him. I was reading an article about him the other day.

You know what he does for a living? He puts all the little sounds in movies that you hear that help to make the movie what it is. He’s a post production sound engineer. So he puts in things like footsteps, doors creaking, knocks on doors, clothes, you know, swishing when they walk. He puts all that in so that the movies feel real.

The teeny tiny part. But can you imagine the movies and the TV shows we watched? It didn’t have all that in it. Everybody has a role to play. You may be just the person that puts the footsteps in.

That’s good enough because we need you. And you know what? When you share the gospel changes people’s lives. Many of y’all, some of y’all may be familiar with the story of Rosaria Butterfield. Let me tell you about her.

She was raised in a liberal Roman Catholic family. She loved books, philosophy. In her late 20s, she was allured by the feminist philosophy, the LBGTQ politics. She adopted a lesbian identity. She earned her PhD from Ohio State University in 1992.

She taught in the English department in women’s Studies programs from 1992 to 2002. She had tenure. 1999. Her specialty was critical theory, specializing in queer theory. Her historical field was 19th century literature.

She advised L LGBTQ student groups, co authored. She worked at Syracuse University. Syracuse University’s domestic partnership policy for same sex couples. Actively lobbied for legal advancements alongside her lesbian partner. 1997, she was researching the religious right and what she called their politics of hatred against people like me.

So she wrote an article against Promise Keepers. There was a local pastor there in Syracuse named Ken Smith. Ken and his wife Floyd. She received all kind of letters from pastors and others in the community criticizing her for her stance, castigating her for her beliefs. Ken and Floyd wrote her and invited her to dinner.

So she went and for a couple of years they had dinner together regularly, every week, prayed together. They asked her to start reading the Bible with her. With them. She started reading the Bible. And miraculously, Rosaria Butterfield was converted to Christ.

And her life has been incredibly transformed. And she wrote a book called the Gospel Comes with a Key. They gave her a key to their house. Hospitality. Loving people.

It’s not rocket science. Some people say, well, I just don know t know how to share the gospel. Yes, you do. Yes, you do. Invite somebody to dinner, have them over to your house, talk to them about the stuff that matters to you.

And you may think it’s just a little bit any thing. It may not be anything bigger than a footstep stuck in a movie. Good. There may be somebody else, though, who’s more inclined to take the next step. And if we all do that together, who knows what God may do through this church?

Y’all, we’re God’s people, and we’re to be shaped by evangelism, just like the church at Antioch. Let’s pray together.

Father, we love you. We thank you for your love for us. We thank you for a good, holistic, powerful, sturdy gospel. I thank you, Lord, that it’powerful, that it has impact in our lives to this day. And I pray that you’ll find us faithful in sharing it.

And I pray that in the name of Jesus, amen.