BEING A PATIENT WITNESS
2 Timothy 2:24-26
There are many ways to be used of God. There literally 1,000’s upon 1,000’s of ways God uses his children. There are certainly categories we could list all of those ways under.
But there is one way and approach that is always right – It is to go forward in humility.
Reaching people for Christ takes humility.
I. A witness for Christ must not be harsh
To not be harsh involves two things in the passage:
A. Not Striving
Not striving means that we should not be argumentative or have quarrels with people.
We often say, we are not arguing, just discussing intensely.
Culture or not, arguing is arguing. God says if we want to win people to Christ it is not going to be by arguing or out talking them.
B. Be gentle
Gentle is to be proper, affable, mild and kind
When Christ was winning folks to Christ, he wasn’t trying to impress them, but He did try to appeal to them through kindness, being genuine, and by having compassion.
He did not do it by being the loudest or quick witted or belittling people, he found ways to meet their needs and to get to where God could touch their hearts.
II. A witness for Christ must not be hesitant
The scripture here says that we must be “apt to teach.”
Apt - “qualified, ready, and inclined to do something.” Apt to teach is being qualified, ready and inclined to teach.
When we talk to people about the Lord Jesus Christ we should be:
Qualified – saved, understand how we were saved, and have the knowledge to share it with others
Ready – means to be in the right spirit to share that message, we often call it being soul conscious, being concerned with the souls of men around us.
Inclined – means having a ready mission to deliver that message, ready with our weapon with the safety off and our finger on the trigger aiming down range. I’m qualified, I’m ready, and I’m inclined, but with the Gospel.
Our generation is far to hesitant with the Gospel, we come up with excuses all the time of why we shouldn’t do it, lets be looking and ready for reasons to give out the Gospel.
III. A witness for Christ must not be hasty
• Christ was never hasty in his business for God.
Patient here means enduring of ill, forbearing. Sometimes we will give out the Gospel and it seems like no one is listening, or we were ready and there were no opportunities; or we gave it out and it was readily rejected.
Be patient, don’t get to hasty, don’t get frustrated. It is like my soulwinning partner in college, he had a bad temper problem – we were at a door and the lady was quite rude to us – but he was ruder, he said as we were leaving – “Well you can just go to hell then.” He was hasty, he wasn’t patient for God to work.
God hasn’t forgotten us nor did he gives us a false mandate to carry out the Great Commission, but we need to continue to steadily throw out that seed. Some of it will land on hard ground, some will be snatched away by birds, some will fall in amongst the weeds and thicket, but some will land on good soil, just don’t be hasty.WITNESSING IN HUMILITY
