R1053A The Power Of A Personal Testimony

God has an encouraging word for you and me today through the Bible-based teaching of Dr. Don Wilton, all about the power of a personal testimony. I am so excited to invite you into this time of studying the word together. We'll head to Acts 26 in just a moment, but there is indeed power in a personal testimony. You have a story, and it's a story that doesn't have to have a lot of excitement and Hollywood endings. It just needs to be a story about how you know Jesus.

Are you sharing that story? Today, in the message from Dr. Don Wilton, we'll gain insight and a challenge from Dr. Wilton. And he also wants me to remind you to know that perhaps you already feel challenged and would love to have someone praying with you or for you. Let's do that right now. Our phone number is available. 866-899-WORD. We'll connect with one of us right now.

866-899-9673. We would love to encourage you. Now, Dr. Don Wilton. What a wonderful time. Goodness me. What a wonderful. Folks, I just want to say this to you.

I really want to say this to you. God has really blessed our church. We're not a great church. We're a graced church.

There's a big difference. We're by no means a great people. We're a graced, God's wonderful grace. And folks, we need to be very careful.

We need to be very careful that we make absolutely certain that we praise God and we give Him thanks. And we never take things for granted. One of my greatest concerns about our nation, about America, is that there are far too many people who have begun to just take this great country for granted. You just get so used to it.

You get so used to the blessings. We get so used to everybody wanting to come here. We get so used to our good paved roads and safety in our streets.

Plenty of food on our table. We get so used to the earthquakes happening in Chile and Haiti. We get so used to all the schools we have to pick from.

Colleges everywhere, churches behind every bush. We get so used to our motor cars, our lovely homes and clean water to drink. We've got to be careful because we take things for granted and God has, for whatever reason, has blessed our nation.

But I'll tell you just like that, He'll take His hand off this nation. And I'm concerned, I'm concerned because I think that the more morally we decline, the more we take God out of everything that we do, turn our backs on Him. We've got to be very careful.

Well, let's bring it in. I hope we don't take our homes and one another for granted. And the blessings that we have and then we have our churches. There's some wonderful churches around. God's blessing to be able to come together like this, worship Him. You know, even just in our church on Sunday morning, we offer four worship services, four. We are one church in four locations just on Sunday morning. This beautiful service, goodness, what a wonderful crowd. What a time with our choir and orchestra. Then at 1030, the most wonderful classic service. It's our classic service at 1030.

Place will be just like this again at 1030. And musically, we are slightly different. We're singing the same thing. What it's all about is worshiping the Lord. And our classic services, just a little quieter. And people, so many people just love to sing almost exclusively the hymns. This service, we have a blend of those two.

We have both. And then at the same time, we have an incredible service going on in that beautiful facility God gave us, called The Hanger, the Genesis service. Today we have guests there. My son Rob from vintage in New Orleans, cutting edge church folks. You can't imagine when Dr. Billy Graham and his team went there during Hurricane Katrina. My son was so deeply moved in his heart, that catastrophe that came over that city.

Churches closed down everywhere. And yet God's witness through God's people moved in, joining together with so many wonderful charities and still rebuilding that city. And God put on my son's heart to establish a new church work, a true church plant. That's a church plant.

That's what you do. Church plant is where you begin with nothing. You don't go and borrow from everybody else's congregation and build your congregation on other congregations.

You start from scratch. You reach that city for Christ. And they were lost yesterday. They were in Knoxville in a big conference preaching and leading worship. And I said, Rob, bring your team, be in our Genesis service. And so as I'm standing here, my own son, my oldest son is preaching right here. My middle son Greg is preaching in Shreveport, Louisiana right now. He's been there for a disciple now weekend. He and his wife, Abby, hundreds of young people.

He's preaching as I'm standing up here right now. And so with Rob there, that allowed Jared to come over and join with Steve. And boy, Jared is such a blessing. And the team members who came over because we don't, they don't get an opportunity.

I don't think Jared's been here for over a year. I don't know that he's had the opportunity. Just like Steve.

Steve never gets the opportunity to go on over there. I get that opportunity from time to time. And the place is packed out at nine o'clock and at ten thirty, the Genesis service. And God has allowed us to become a church where everyone, everyone can invite anyone. Anyone got a question about what anyone means? Everyone can invite anyone to come to First Baptist Church to encounter the living one. You are welcome in this place.

Everyone can invite anyone. There is a place for you to come. We want you to be at home. We do not compromise over the word of God. This encouraging word, God's word. We blessed and I'm blessed. You are blessed. We're blessed to be here together like this. And we pray for one another and we give God thanks. And I'm so grateful to a church family.

You folks that have been willing to say whatever it takes. And our pledge together is to save to know nothing among one another, accepting Jesus Christ and Him crucified. We keep the main thing the main thing. If you're wondering about this church, folks, we don't sweat the small stuff. We don't spend more than five seconds a month worrying about things that don't count anymore. It's why you've come to a church where you don't hear people fussing and arguing and getting up and all that sort of stuff that's going on that's ruining the witness of Christ across America. We do not do that. Not in the presence of the Lord Jesus.

This is not the United States Congress. And we refuse as God's people to be dragged into that kind of junk. There are too many people in the world today who need Jesus.

Amen. I want to give you a reason to really thank the Lord. You know, on Monday night, under the incredible leadership of Eddie Robertson, our minister of evangelism and recreation, our upward leagues had their banquet. We had one hundred and seventy decisions for Christ on Monday night. I want to make an announcement.

That's the best health care plan you've ever heard. Now, you're going to need your Bibles this morning. We're going to be in Acts Chapter 26.

I can hardly wait because Jesus Christ has an encouraging word just for you today. I want to read to you the most incredible passage. It's a long passage, but I've got to read this to you. So you'll need your Bibles today. I want to speak to you about the power of a personal testimony. We're in Acts Chapter 26. Listen to what happened. Then a gripper was the king, said to Paul, you have permission to speak for yourself.

All right, everybody just listen to me. Back in Paul's day, he wasn't living in America. Right now, we have permission to speak.

I fear for our country. There are people who hate God so much. There are movements going on in America today to stop people speaking up about Jesus.

Back in his day, he had to get the permission of the king. And so we begin then, I'm not going to read all of the details to you, but I want to pick up at verse 8 of Acts Chapter 26. Paul asked a question, why should any of you consider it incredible that God raises the dead?

I'd like to read that question to you again. Why is it that there are some of you that actually think that God cannot raise the dead? He was asking that question concerning Jesus, because God by his power raised Jesus from the dead.

And this is what Paul said in answer to his own question. I too was convinced that I ought to do all that was possible to oppose the name of Jesus of Nazareth. And that is just what I did in Jerusalem. On the authority of the chief priests, I put many of the saints in prison, and when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them. Many a time I went from one synagogue to another to have them punished, and I tried to force them to blaspheme in my obsession against them. I even went to foreign cities to persecute the Christians.

On one of those journeys, I was going to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. At about noon, I was on the road and I saw a light from heaven. I remember when I gave my heart to Jesus.

I'll get into that. I want to just tell you about that in a minute. Paul, this is what happened to Paul. He was on the road just like you and me. He was taking a journey, and suddenly he was confronted by the Lord Jesus. He saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, rising around me and my companions, and we all fell to the ground. And I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

It is hard for you to kick against the pricks or the goads because I'm God. God was saying to him, I'm not going to leave you alone because I love you. Then I asked, Saul, who are you, Lord? And he said, I'm Jesus whom you are persecuting. The Lord replied, now get up and stand on your feet. And I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen of me and what I will show you. And I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I'm sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified in me. I want to skip all the way down to verse 24.

I want to encourage you to read this entire account yourself. But in verse 24, at this point, Festus interrupted Paul's witness. Have you ever had someone interrupt you when you're trying to tell them about Jesus?

He interrupted Paul's defense. Look what he said, you are out of your mind, Paul. He shouted, your great learning is driving you mad. You ever had anybody say, goodness me, you must be mad. You must be insane to follow Christ. How could you be so ridiculous?

Please forgive the interruption, but oh, what powerful teaching from Dr. Don. And you may be in that situation right now. You may have had someone say that you're ridiculous for wanting to follow Christ. You may be having to go to work with someone who is oppressing you in your faith. You may have a friend in your social group, maybe your sports group, maybe even a family member, and they don't understand how passionately you love Jesus Christ. Perhaps you need someone to pray with you about your particular situation.

It may be totally different. You need to know we're here to pray with you 24 hours a day at 866-899-WORD. That's the phone number, 866-899-9673. It's also the place you can order remarkable resources that will help you grow in your faith. One of Dr. Wilton's friends, who's with the Lord right now, wrote a powerful book.

Charles Colson wrote it, My Final Word. If you want to know about that and the message to it, Dr. Wilton is paired with that. You'll find it on our website right now. It is indeed a remarkable resource that will help you grow in your faith. All of it is at our website, TEWOnline.org. Let me slow down and give you that one more time.

It's TEWOnline.org. We would love to connect with you. Now, we've not missed a thing. We're diving right back in where Dr. Don is picking back up on this concept of, have you had someone say that you're ridiculous for wanting to follow Christ? Perhaps you said, oh man, that religious stuff, man, all that is is a crutch. Get a life. You don't need to worry about Jesus.

Why are you getting so excited about this? And this is what Paul said. He said, I'm not insane, most excellent, festus, Paul replied. What I'm saying is true and reasonable. The king is familiar with these things and I can speak freely to him. I'm convinced that none of this has escaped his notice because it was not done in a corner. And King Agrippa said, do you believe the prophets?

I know you do. Then Agrippa said to Paul in verse 28, do you really think that you can persuade me to become a Christian in such a short space of time? Listen to what Paul said in verse 29. He replied, short time or long time? I pray, God, that not only you, but all who are listening, may one day, soon as possible, right now, become what I am.

And of course, Paul was in chains, he said, accepting, I wouldn't wish you to be in chains like I am, held in captivity like I am. It was some weeks ago, I was headed to a conference to go and preach for the state of Mississippi. I want to be perfectly honest with you. I was a little on the tired side. You know, when you get on an airplane and you're just worn flat out and you're off on a business trip or you're doing something.

This was a late night flight and I was just going there and back to see how far it is and got on the plane. And I said to myself, you know, I'm going to take a little nap, take a little siesta here, recover a little bit, put my head back, enjoy my full meal of peanuts and a diet Coke. And I'm ready to just, and a young man sat down next to me. And would you believe we hadn't sat down for two minutes and he asked me a question. I thought, I cannot believe this man is asking me a question.

He was a fine young man. Turned out he was a medical doctor and he asked me a question. And he's almost very next question was, are you one of those Christians?

I thought, I can't believe this. Why has he got to ask me that when all I want to do is have a nap? I mean, the Lord knows that this is reasonable. I, you know, why, Lord, why are you doing this to me?

And so I will be quite honest with you with somewhat of a little bit of a reluctant heart. I looked at him and we began to talk together. He was as fine as you can imagine. And you talk about sharp. I mean, a brilliant man.

Brilliant. He said to me without apology, he said to me, well, I'm a Muslim. I said, oh, tell me about it. Well, before we had gone about 10 minutes. He and I began to talk and he shared with me.

I mean, from his heart, he was a fine man. And he knew what he was talking about. He began to quote the Quran to me.

I would answer him and he would answer me. After a while, he looked at me and he said, you know, it seems to me, you know what you're talking about. And I looked at him and I said, well, it seems to me, you know what you're talking about.

And all of a sudden, the trip became irrelevant because we began to talk together. This man had grown up in another country as I had. And he was a Muslim. He told me as far as he was concerned, he couldn't begin to imagine why we would believe things like this. He told me that in his religion, they very much respect Jesus. And of course, in our discussion, he told me that most certainly Jesus was not the son of God. In fact, he even told me what I already knew that in his religion, he believed that Jesus was a Muslim. And I said to him, well, if Jesus was a Muslim, how did you arrive at that point?

And he said, well, it's quite simple. He said, Jesus obeyed God. That's what Muslims do. Muslims obey God. So Jesus obeyed God.

Yeah, that made him a Muslim. Of course, my next question was now, who is your God? Well, of course, he was talking about his God, Allah. I began to talk to him about my God, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And why believe these things? And he said, well, in that case, where did your God come from? I told him. So I said to him, well, why don't you tell me where your God came from and where is he now? And he explained to me about Muhammad, the prophet.

We talked about 630. We talked about his death. We talked about all those kinds of things. And he readily agreed with me that Muhammad was dead. I pointed out to him that my God, in fact, was not dead, that he's alive. He began to quote chapter and verse out of the Koran, and I began to quote chapter and verse out of the Bible. We got to a point where it became somewhat interesting, to say the least. And we had a friendship going. There was no question about it. He looked at me and he said to me, well, he said, I tell you, if I could sit around with someone like you, he said, you're the first one who's ever bothered to sit down and explain it to me without threatening me.

I said, I'm not here to threaten you, my friend. I'm just here to tell you about something that really has nothing to do with anything because it's about someone, and it's about the Lord Jesus. Well, we finally approached where we were going, and I realized we were running out of time, and so I looked at him and I said to him, I want to ask you a question.

And perhaps it's the most important question you and I have ever discussed, we've ever pondered, we've ever considered. I pray that you've heard, Dr. Don, as he's been teaching and preaching from the pulpit in the book of Acts 26, I pray that you've been encouraged by that, you've been strengthened by that. But I will tell you, Dr. Don Wilton's greatest prayer is that you've not just heard his voice, but you've heard the scripture itself come alive by the power of God.

The power of God's word through God's servant, Dr. Don Wilton, is what we pray for every single time we share these broadcasts. And if the Lord has stirred your heart, I pray especially that you would open to your heart that Dr. Don wants to share next. Are you ready to give your heart and life to the Lord Jesus Christ? Why don't you pray this prayer with me right now? Dear God, I know that I'm a sinner, and I know that Jesus died for me on the cross. Today, I repent of my sin, and by faith, I receive you into my heart. In Jesus' name. My friend, I welcome you today into the family of God.

This is exciting news. If you just gave your life to Christ, praying along with Dr. Wilton, welcome to the family of God. Maybe today is the day that you rededicated your life, and you know that from this point forward, it'll never be the same. God is in control.

You've surrendered to Him. Either way, we would love to pray with you and for you and connect you with some free resources Dr. Don wants you to have that'll help you grow in your faith. Our phone number is 866-899-WORD.

That's 866-899-9673. And Dr. Wilton would love to hear your story, be able to pray for you, and again, send you these resources. You can also connect on our website as well at www.tewonline.org. That's www.tewonline.org. Did you know The Encouraging Word has a YouTube channel? On this channel, you can watch over 100 of Dr. Wilton's sermons.

You can also listen to the weekly Words of Encouragement, a devotional series written by Dr. Wilton. Visit us on our YouTube channel today. Now after you enjoy those YouTube videos, be sure to drop by our main website, www.tewonline.org.

It's just been two days online, but everybody's asking about this My Final Word Chuck Colson resource and more. It is a powerful, powerful statement of faith in this remarkable century of how to be a vital Christian witness. Again, www.tewonline.org is our website. That's www.tewonline.org. While you're there, be sure and sign up for the daily Encouraging Word devotion from Dr. Don. A powerful insight in God's Word, absolutely free. Sign up today online at www.tewonline.org. That's www.tewonline.org.