Share the Love - Why It's Hard to Share the Love, Part 2

Do you know that every day we tend to believe lies that keep us from sharing God's love? Well, in this program, we'll expose those lies, and I'll give you tools that you need so the people that you love can hear the good news about Jesus in a way that they can actually understand. You don't want to miss it.

Stay with me. Thanks for joining us for this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Chip's our Bible teacher on this international discipleship program. I'm Dave Druey, and we're in Chip's series called Share the Love, How to Talk to Anyone About God. He is continuing his message from our previous program, talking about the lies we believe that make it hard to talk about Jesus.

Now, if you didn't get to hear part one, maybe pick it up later with the Chip Ingram map, or listen online at livingontheedge.org. If you have a Bible now, open it to your own to 2 Corinthians chapter 10, and let's join Chip for stronghold number five from his message, Why It's Hard to Share the Love. Stronghold number five, he or she will never come to Christ versus God desires all people to be saved. Is there anyone that just comes to your mind right now that you think to yourself, you know something, I hear what you're saying, but I mean, you don't know my dad. He's been an atheist.

All he does is rip me all the time, or you don't know my boss. Who's that person? Who do you think could never come to Christ? And as a result, you used to pray for him, and you kind of don't because why? They never will.

That's a lie. How many people, if Saul of Tarsus, after murdering a bunch of people, would say, hey, I think this guy's a real potential. I think, you know what, he's murdering a lot of Christians right now, but I think he'd make a great Christian someday. I'm thinking most people thinking a lot of people might follow Jesus, but this guy never. And instead, he goes from Saul to Paul, and he writes 13 books in the New Testament.

Don't give up. If you would have asked me, who do you think will never come to Christ? We've prayed, we've shared, we've prayed, we've shared, we've acted, we've loved, we've forgiven, we've, it was Teresa's dad, 87 years old. And I mean, every place I've ever been, he would come to church, and I'd make sure, I'd change my message when he came.

I'm gonna put the gospel in there somewhere. And he heard it, you know, from Teresa, and we loved him, and prayed, and everything you can do. And then, you know, when your kids, they start getting older, and, you know, they love the Lord, and, you know, you're praying as a family for granddad, and then pretty soon your kids, you know, 10, 11, 12-year-olds, granddad, yeah, our whole family wants you to be with us in heaven.

Do you understand that Christ died for you? You know, tears in their eyes. We were, I mean, a sincere, a little child, and, you know, you just think, he can't not respond to this, right? And he's, yeah, I'll brush your, I think, yeah, that's good for you, huh? And just going, you know, I just wanna knock him out.

And in my heart of hearts, I've watched my wife never ever give up, never ever give up, never ever give up. Guess what? Granddad came to Christ. Why? How? You guess what?

I have no idea. But it was the right place at the right time with sowing and watering, and as I look back, I think it revolved around some deep pains and wounds. He heard the gospel through someone he could identify with, bam, the lights came on. Don't you ever assume that anybody's outside of what God might do.

Don't give up. Look what the scripture says. This is good and pleases God our savior.

This is his desire, who wants all men to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth. Stronghold number six is I'm just not bold enough. That's the lie, versus I don't care enough. See, a lot of times I thought to myself, you know what, I'm just not bold enough. And then I think, well, gosh, you're kind of bold with other stuff. Yeah, that's true.

Don't confuse me with the facts. Listen to Paul's motivation. 2 Corinthians 5, 14 and 15, he says, for Christ, love compels me. The word means I was hemmed in.

It's a picture of Indiana Jones, you know, and the walls are coming in, there's no way out. That's that word. Paul's saying how much God has loved me, what he's delivered me from, what he's given me. It compels me.

But it's not just an emotional love response. It's objective truth because notice what he says, because we're convinced that one died for all. That's Jesus. Therefore all died. And he died for all that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised again. Where it says he died for all, that little word for means for the sake of and in the place of. See, the apostle Paul had this conviction. His conviction was there's a real heaven, there's a real eternity, and there's a real Christless eternity. And he says, I'm compelled by what Christ has done for me and I realize he died for all. This unlimited grace of God, this work on the cross, this resurrection, this offer of eternal life, it's for everyone who ever would respond. But the conduit and the link between that truth and that reality and people's hearts and souls and lives are people like us. And so he says we don't live any longer for ourselves, but for him who died and gave his life so that we're his ambassadors, we're his agents, we're his conduit of grace. And see what happens is I think I'm not bold enough, but when I'm really honest what I realize is I just get consumed too much with me and my world and I am not convinced, I'm not convinced of what's on the line. I don't think about eternity. I don't think about lost people the way God thinks about them with compassion.

I get intimidated by some things that they bring or what they say instead of looking past that and seeing the need and the hurt and the way God looks at them. Sometimes God gives you great opportunities to learn and I taught a little two-day seminar for a group down in Orange County and so I was flying back. A young gal from Dubai was there. She works for Google as a project manager and I kind of looked at sort of my daughter's age. She looked like one of those mid to late 20s and we got talking a little bit and had a conversation and I'm reviewing my notes. I mean the very notes right now to give this message to you.

I'm reviewing them and I always rewrite them on Saturday. And so we get talking and so I'm very aware this would be a great opportunity to tell her about the love of God since I've been thinking and praying and talking about this. And so we talked and I sort of go around it this way and round it this way and have you ever gotten where you sort of have this lump in your throat like you could tell I don't think they'd really be closed but and you just don't quite get it out? Does that happen to anybody else? And so you know I keep waiting, I keep waiting and then like God gives me like opportunity one, opportunity two, opportunity three and I just weenie out.

I mean I'm just sitting there and I'm thinking about this and I have an outgoing personality. And then she starts reading a magazine and I just oh man I blew it. I mean there was an opportunity, there was a window, she was and so I put my headphones on and I saw okay I better finish my notes.

So guess what? I'm on this one. I'm writing on the plane with her next to me.

I'm writing down. Paul's convinced. I got to tell him are they are you really convinced that eternity is real?

How much God actually loves them? And what I realized afresh was the stronghold is about whether I'm bold or not. It gets to be all about me and what I'm doing or not doing. And as I read that just all I can tell you I don't know how it works but something it was almost physical like the Spirit of God came in in a fresh way and said I love her. Can we get off of you right now? I just love her.

And so I thought old John Saville what the heck? I turned to her and said hey how's that magazine going? Great. I said can I ask you something?

Yeah. I said has anyone ever explained to you how much Jesus loves you? And I'm thinking okay. And she goes no. I said well would you mind if I just told you a little bit about that?

Sure. And pretty soon I find out she's only been married a year and you know I draw a little triangle with God at the top and men and women at the bottom and how we need physical intimacy and emotional intimacy but also spiritual intimacy. Oh my husband he's very spiritual.

I'm not at all. And I talked about how you get closer to God than you get closer to each other because I know she's real motivated in her marriage. And then I had a book with me called Good to Great in God's Eyes and you know she's from Google so I said have you read Colin's book Good to Great? Oh yeah and we went through you know getting right people on the bus and all the jazz and I said I was with an organization trying to do that and God showed me that you know there's practices that people that really get close to God have and I opened it up and I went through each of them and she's like wow. I said would you like this?

Yeah. So I signed it for her and you know we I said here's my email if you have any questions at all and so we get up and okay she did not pray to receive Christ she didn't share it with the rest of the you know we were getting done all right. But I mean it was like lie number one she's not open. Boom.

Lie number two it's a superstar. I got an outgoing personality and I was hedging and then it was it's just a process and what happened was I loved her. I saw her the way Jesus saw her and I just wanted to help her and even if she would have not responded positively it's okay because this isn't about me and it's not about you. It's just about extending the love of God and so we get done I mean this really cracked me up so it's all over you know and I've written the book note and so you know how when you get off you go up the ramp and once you get off the ramp and she was ahead of me a little bit and she stopped she turned like this she goes in her heart you get to see people long to be loved and the Jesus that we serve loves them.

We just need to get rid of the lies. Stronghold number seven is actually something that I've never taught before. Usually when you get to this point in a message my experience for me and many others is okay I'm gonna really try harder to love. I'm gonna try harder to love. I'm gonna be more loving. I'm gonna really work up my love. Love love love love love.

Oh God help me love and depending on your personality you do that for two days two weeks or two months and there's not many two-month-ers and then you'll be right back to where you are right now. Stronghold number seven is I need to try harder to love people versus I need to experience more of God's love personally. See we don't need to try harder we need to experience God's love at such a fresh and new depth that we could just not not share it and as I thought of this I was thought of the passage here where Jesus says to a woman who is wiping his feet with her hair and her tears dripping and a Pharisee thinking that she's an immoral person and he couldn't be a prophet because he would know about this woman and you can see the passage there in Luke where Jesus turns to the Pharisee and he goes you know this woman has responded in ways because she's been forgiven much and her sins they are many but those who've been forgiven much love much and he wasn't saying that the Pharisee needed less forgiveness than the woman what he was really saying is she actually gets and is experiencing what I've done for her and you don't get it. When you experience God's love you can't not share it. One of the greatest qualities in my wife has seen her experience God's love and my testimony is is that I'm so oriented toward performance that I often struggle with I think God loves me when I'm doing good and I don't think he loves me as much when I'm doing bad and that's not true and so I thought it would be more helpful and more powerful for you to hear from someone who because of her life story she really grasped how to experience God's love so honey will you come share with us?

Good morning. Well I am excited to share with you how I experienced God's love and I encountered real love for the first time when I was 25 years old and I accepted Christ as my savior and I realize now as I look back God had been drawing me with his love for quite a while but it was when I actually came to a point where I understood and I recognized his love that I accepted Christ as my savior and it was a real turning point in my life. In 1 John 4 10 it says this is real love it is not that we love God but that he loved us and sent his son as a sacrifice to take away our sins so that's what real love is that it's God sent his son to die for us to take away our sins because he loved us so much and he wanted us to be close to him. Now this love that I experienced at age 25 was different from any love that I had known up until that point. I had never thought of love and God in the same sentence which to me seems odd now but I really never did. When I thought about love it was romantic love it was between a man and a woman but not about God and a man and a woman and I didn't grow up in a Christian home and I never heard my parents say to each other that they loved each other they never told me they loved me verbally I never heard that word expressed in my home and so this love that I was starting to experience was so different for me and it was wonderful. Well by the time I was 25 I realized that there was a big hole in my heart and that there was an ache there that longed to be filled up and I had tried to fill it up with so many things that didn't work and I made lots of bad decisions in my early adult years just trying to make life work out and trying to fill up that hole in my heart and all growing up I could never please my dad so I always felt like a failure and I felt like I was not very lovable and so I was trying to find that love. Well I ended up getting married and it was not a good situation and you know it was just the dream of my life that somebody would love me and care for me and it just did not work out well and by the time I was 25 I was a single mom I had been abandoned by my husband I had twin baby boys and I was just in a desperate situation I was lonely I was depressed I didn't have any money I felt abandoned and I didn't have any hope but it was at this time that I experienced God's love for me in an amazing way. The Lord led me to work with the director of admissions at Fairmont State College and this man was a very godly man and he seemed to not be shy at all about sharing his faith even on a secular campus which I am so thankful for now but as we work together and as time would permit he began to share with me about the love of God and he shared with me things that I had never heard before he told me that God's love is a love that lasts forever that it will never end that God's love is a love that will never change his love is unconditional it doesn't matter what I do it doesn't matter what I did in the past that his love never changes for me and that his love will care for me that through his love he will provide for my children and that he has hope for my future and for my kids and so I began to listen to what my friend was saying to me and it started to all make sense and I realized that's what the need in my heart is longing for it's that real love that I've been longing for all this time and on a Sunday evening in August when my two little boys just turned one year old I accepted Christ as my savior and at that time I began to experience the love of God in an amazing way and he changed my life he changed my future he changed the direction and the future of my children's lives and he took all those broken pieces all the terrible things that had been a part of my life and he put it all back together and he cleansed me from all of my past and he made me new and clean and a new vessel that he would fill up with himself that he would fill up with his love so that he could love others through me well I learned to experience that I could experience God's love in many ways from the time I became a Christian up until today every day I experience God's love in many ways and one of the ways that I experience his love is through people it's through the body of Christ it's Christians loving each other and caring for one another people when I was a new believer reached out to me and provided for me cared for me and welcomed me and loved me in spite of what I had been through and I experienced the love of Christ and I experienced God's love through his word as I read his word every day as I open up this book that God has written to us because he wants us to know how much he loves us and every day I get a new glimpse into who he is and how great he is and how full of love he is for me and how he wants to work in my life and so through his word I experience his love I experience his love as I pray and as I cry out to him for the needs of my heart the desires that I have for the people that I love and I watch as God responds in just amazing ways that he shows up in doing things that I just never believed could happen I see his love and I see him every day I see him in big things and I see him in little things I see him as I walk through my day and one of the times I especially see him is early in the morning when I go outside with my dog and take him out every morning and it's dark and on the days that I can see the stars out and I look up into the sky and God reveals himself to me and I see his greatness and his power and that he is so big and he is so full of love and he cares about me and every little detail in my life he loves me and he loves you well as we experience God's love in our life what happens is in the scriptures teach that through the Holy Spirit God just pours his love through our lives and it's like a flood he says he floods our lives with his love and I've had my house flood before so I know that a flood is very hard to stop it's a powerful thing and it just impacts wherever it goes it changes things and when God's love floods through our hearts see we can't stop it it impacts the people that we're around and it's just a natural thing that happens and so as he floods our hearts it just naturally flows out to other people and God shows his love to others through us well a couple weeks ago God gave me a really wonderful picture of what it looks like for me to love people to love especially lost people those who don't know Jesus as their savior and this one morning I got up and I just glanced out the window in that corner of my eye I saw this big bird walk across the grass in the back and you know I didn't think much of it but a couple hours later I glanced out and the bird walked back this way and then I looked closer and I saw that's a seagull and I thought that was kind of strange because I've never seen a seagull in my yard and a couple hours later he's still out there and he's just walking around in the yard and I thought why is he hanging out in my backyard so I went out to check on him and his wing was broken and I felt so sorry for that bird and I was trying to think what can I do I've got to help this bird I can't he's he can't fly he's stuck here he he'll die if I don't do something because I knew that he couldn't get out of my yard and so I thought a little bit about what to do and then it came to my mind that I could call the wild animal rescue so I called the rescue and I wasn't sure if they would respond to this but the first you push a number it says if number one if if it's an animal emergency so I pushed number one and I explained to this lady that I had a seagull in my backyard with a broken wing and and I said is this an animal emergency because I wasn't sure there's thousands of seagulls would they come and save just one little seagull and she was so nice so nice and so a couple hours later here pulls up the van wild animal rescue and comes in my backyard and rescues this this stranded little bird and I felt so good I felt like what I really I really did something good today I did it I did a good deed and then God spoke to my heart and this is what he said and I wrote it down because I wanted to remember he said people who don't know me are like that seagull and he said they're broken and they're lost they're stuck and if somebody doesn't help them they're going to die and they're going to be separated from me forever and then he asked me do you care as much about my people who are lost as you do that little bird in your backyard would you take that much effort to care for lost people and I realized that it's the love of God that compels us that just it's like I was compelled I had to help this little bird it's that love that God gives us that just compels us to reach out and to share and to love those that are lost because we realize they're broken and they're separated from God and they'll be separated from for him from ever and they're stuck in their condition unless unless one of us tells them unless we love them and reach out to them with the love of God and so my prayer for me and for all of us is that we would be compelled by the love of God to share and reach out and care for those that are lost before chip comes back with his application just a quick reminder that this message why it's hard to share the love is from his series share the love how to talk to anyone about God for lots of reasons we can be hesitant to talk about our faith that's why chip taught this four-part series to boost your confidence and help you have spontaneous conversations about your relationship with Jesus now if you'd like to hear this message again the chip Ingram app is perfect for free access or one tap sharing of these powerful messages if you prefer CDs take advantage of our on-air discounts and remember the mp3s are always free just visit us online at Living on the Edge dot org or give us a call at triple 8 3 3 3 6 0 0 3 well chip you asked Teresa to finish the teaching today what was it about what she shared that you thought was different from what you would have brought to the message I'm convinced that that number six and seven are the ones that really get us unstuck and lie number six is that I'm just not bold enough versus I don't care enough I mean that is so convicting I mean that is just so pierces my heart you know and I was trying to be pretty honest about my neighbors and you know some relationships where if I really cared about them I would be sharing and the thing I realized was my wife is really winsome she has a she's an introvert she does not have an outgoing personality and she really shares God's love not because she's an extrovert or has the gift of evangelism she so has experienced personally God's love that she literally feels compelled to share it with other people and she doesn't just experience that love at salvation I mean I watch her get up in the morning and talk and and pray and you know wipe her tears with tissues and and really experience God she can't help but tell people because whatever we're excited about what whatever we love we share for example if you are with my wife and you're even remotely interested on her phone she has a picture of many grandchildren okay she's going to share that with you I have another friend that I talked about earlier but he is like a sportsaholic and if you are at all interested he's going to tell you you know this team and that team and his fantasy this we all share about what matters to us and so what I want people to understand is we have to pull down these strongholds or myths and it's not trying harder or making this an event or it's not a checking a box or a duty you know you're supposed to do this and almost every Christian I meet feels overwhelmingly guilty about not sharing their faith what I would say is forget that start loving people and then let God love you and if you don't have any love for people ask him to fill you up and then instead of talking or thinking there's a big event just start caring invite people over love them pray for him God will open the door and I'll give you some tools next time about what to say when he does sounds good thanks Chip well listen today's a special day it's called Giving Tuesday before we wrap it up would you give us a quick reminder about what this is and why it's important be glad to Dave Giving Tuesday is a time where nonprofits ministries all across the country kind of come together and say let's really focus on generosity and here Living on the Edge many of you know that we have an absolute commitment to help Christians live like Christians and when you think of what's happening in our country when you think of the pressures that people are experiencing when you think of a time for generosity and love to make a difference when Christians live like Christians that's how we're going to make it through this so this Giving Tuesday I just want to encourage you prayerfully ask God what he would have you give to Living on the Edge and a great special highlight for us is every gift given on Giving Tuesday will be doubled dollar for dollar so ask the Lord what do you want me to do for Living on the Edge they're making a difference and I want to make a difference Dave wanted to share with them how they can get on board happy to it's pretty straightforward to send a gift and have it be doubled just go to Living on the Edge org tap donate on the app or give us a call at triple 8333 6003 that's triple 8333 6003 and let me thank you in advance for doing whatever the Lord leads you to do you know a great way to stay engaged and connected to chip and Living on the Edge is with the chip Ingram app you'll get free access to all of chips recent messages his message notes and much more and not only that but it couldn't be easier to call or email directly from the app will be with us again next time when chip continues his series share the love how to talk to anyone about God until then this is Dave Drewey for everyone here saying thanks for listening to this Edition of Living on the Edge.