How to be a Faithful Witness Part 2

Pastor Mike will be speaking on The Cause of Christ Part 2. He will be reading out of Acts 26:1-32.

And you may be facing a situation today and wondering how is it that you can take a step? How is it that you can turn the page? How is it that you can march forward for God? I tell you, it will only be because you are relying on the help that comes from God. Hello, and welcome to Hopeworth Having radio program.

This is pastor Mike Sanders from the Open Door Church, and I would like to give a big shout out to the Hopeworth Having radio ministry celebrating its twentieth anniversary. A happy birthday, Hopeworth Having. Today, we are going to be in Acts 26 verse one through 32, continuing our study on how to be a faithful witness. So let’s grab our bible, let’s get a cup of coffee, let’s get a piece of paper, maybe a pen, and let’s take notes together and get started. But I’ll tell you this, if you would identify with others, and you would help them see that you’re no different than them, You would open a door for them to be able to identify with you, and then you can share the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The apostle was a religious man, but he was not a righteous man before he came to know Christ in Acts chapter nine. And you see, Saul was a man who would go on later in verse nine of chapter 26. He said, indeed, I myself thought I must do many things contrary to the name of Jesus the Nazareth. It’s not just that he said, hey, I don’t want nothing to do with Jesus. It’s not that he was just, agnostic about Jesus.

It’s that he defied Jesus, and he was against the name of Christ and the way, and he persecuted Christians, and he did everything that he could to hinder the gospel of Jesus Christ. And those zealous people who were bringing the apostle before the courts, those Pharisees that were determined to bring about his demise when they heard his testimony of how dedicated and passionate he was about being a Pharisee and hindering the gospel of Jesus Christ, they could connect, they could relate with what he was saying. Here’s what I’m trying to tell you, that many of you have walked through many trials and troubles in your life. You’ve had some detours in your life. You’ve had some challenges in your life, and God wants you to use that as a testimony to share with others who are walking through the same season of life, or the same chapter in life, and different challenges of life.

And He wants you to use that as a platform to reach them for the gospel of Jesus Christ. The apostle was very dedicated to doing everything he could to hinder the gospel. And he wanted to reach those who were on that same path, who had that same ignorance about Jesus. And he wanted to say to them, Hey, I was just like you. My life was a mess.

And you say, some of you say, Well I grew up in a great Christian home. I got saved as a young child. And, man, I don’t have much of a testimony. We all have a testimony. It doesn’t matter that the grace of God has reached out to us.

But for some of us, I think about when I was a young child coming to Christ as a bus kid, but my life was so selfish and my life was all about Mike, and it was about what I wanted. And see, there are different ways that we can relate to people as we go through our circumstances. And I know you can one up me, and I know you can tell a better story than me, and I get it. I’m with you. I’m not against your story, and I’m for your story.

I just want you to use your story to get to His story. Meaning the story of Jesus Christ dying on the cross and giving us salvation, which leads me to my third point. How about that? Here we are. We’re not even that far down the road.

I’m not gonna tell you what time it is. All you already probably know. But if I start telling you what time is, you’re gonna start timing me. But I want you to know we’re on point three. And usually, I only have three points and I finish my sermon after three points.

Number three, aim to exalt Jesus, not self. Now we come down to verse 12. We come down to verse 12 of chapter 26. The apostle of the word of God says, while thus occupied as I journeyed to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief priests, at midday, O king, along the road, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me, and those who journeyed with me. And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice speaking to me and saying in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

It is hard for you to kick against the goats. Now I wanna help you a little bit because sometimes terminologies are used that we don’t understand. But when he uses the word goads, it’s just a stick that was used to prick the ox or the cattle to get them to do something. And so, he’s saying that and sometimes they would kick the goat or they would kick the stick that the farmer was using. And that’s what he’s saying is that God was convicting Saul.

God was showing Saul that he need to give his life to Christ, but he was resisting the conviction of God. He was pushing back. And notice what Jesus said in verse 14, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Friends, when you attack the church, you’re attacking Jesus. When you attack other Christians, you are attacking Jesus.

Remember that God’s people are the bride of Christ. They are the body of Christ. And we have to keep that in mind. And then look at verse 15. So I said, who are you, Lord?

And he said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. You and I know the story. We know the story from Acts chapter nine. We know that Saul, who would later become Paul, gave his life to Jesus Christ on that road to Damascus. But I want you to see something here that Saul or Paul is not pouting.

He is not complaining. He is not trying to negotiate a deal to the king, but he is letting him know how he came to Jesus Christ as a savior. He’s exalting Jesus, not self. Our witness as believers should always be first about Christ and what he did in our heart. You see here, he continues to point people back to Christ.

We go back a little bit on Acts chapter 26 to verse eight. As he was sharing the gospel with them, he said, why should it be thought incredible by you that God raises the dead. Why is that so stunning to you? He is wanting to engage their mind. He is wanting them to see that Christ is risen.

He is wanting them to understand that He is alive. Now hang on. Your story of forgiveness in Jesus Christ, the path and the direction that God used in your life, the people, the circumstances that God used to bring you to that point of forgiveness and salvation. Your story of forgiveness is ultimately a story about Jesus Christ. It’s a story of God’s good work in you, In that Christ found you, and that Christ saved you, and that Christ has been sustaining you, and that he’s been meeting every need in your life.

You need to make sure that when you share Christ, it’s not about you. It’s not about all the stuff you’ve been through, but it’s always about God’s grace, God’s mercy, God’s strength, and what God has done in you and what God has done through you. Now, these people were looking for hope, and they wanted the hope of Christ. And the apostle was reminding them because they would have been taught about the resurrection as Pharisees, and they would have been taught about the Messianic hope that is found in Christ, the coming of Jesus. They would have been taught about that, and the apostle is just trying to point these people to Christ, and he’s trying to give a witness to what Christ has already done.

Now, let’s get point number four done. Now we get point number four done, guess what? We are halfway there. And so I figure in the next two hours, I should be able to get the last four points in. Amen?

I’m excited. I’m just trying to wake you up. Now nudge your spouse or elbow your husband and tell them to wake up. Now I tell people I’m not ashamed or I’m not even upset if you sleep while I’m preaching. It’s okay.

I just don’t want you snoring while I’m preaching. Amen? I mean, that’s ridiculous. You gotta quit the snoring. But number four, share the need, the need for and the benefits of the gospel with every type or all types of people.

So in verse 16, look at this. I’m in chapter 26 verse 16, And I want you to see what he says here. He says, But rise, this is the words of Christ. But rise and stand on your feet for I have appeared to you, and for this purpose to make you a minister and a witness. Both of those things which you have seen and the things which I will yet reveal to you.

I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles to whom I know, who I now send you, to open their eyes in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in me. The apostle is helping them to see as he’s sharing what Christ has said to him, what Christ has shared with him, that he has this role, he has this responsibility to go to the Jewish people plus the Gentile people, and he must tell them about the gospel. And not everybody will receive it. Not everybody will respond with great happiness. Others will reject it, but he has this responsibility to share to every person the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And he wants them to see the benefits of the gospel of Jesus Christ. What are some of those benefits? Well, again, look at verse 18, to open their eyes. To open their eyes. This is how I pray for lost people is that God would open their eyes, that God would help them to see the truth, believe the truth, and to embrace the truth, and to turn from their sin, and to receive the truth of Jesus Christ.

Unbelievers, unfortunately, are spiritually blinded by Satan. They are blinded from the truth. Sometimes people say, what’s wrong with these people? What’s wrong with this world? I tell you, it’s not that difficult to understand that the world is a mess because they are blinded by Satan to the truth of Jesus Christ.

What we consider to be common sense and understandable, and it just makes a lot of common sense to us that we should do A, B, or C, whatever it is. Friends, to the world, they are blind to the truth of God. That’s why Jesus says the truth will do what? Set you free. It’ll set you free.

But I’ll tell you another benefit, I want you to see it, it’s from darkness to light. Again, we’re still in verse 18, from darkness to light. So many people are walking in darkness. Think about that. They’re walking in darkness.

And I was witnessing to a young man, and he was already a Christian, but I was encouraging him to be a witness to his family, and he had some difficulties there. And I said, look, you have the responsibility to take the light of Christ to the darkness. To the darkness. Sometimes what we like to do church, is we like to curse the darkness. We like to throw bricks at the TV, or we like to be upset at everybody and their lifestyle and what’s wrong with them.

But here’s this, we need to remember they’re in darkness. And the best resolution, the best response is that we would take the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ to them. You can’t hate on people who are in darkness, who don’t know any better. They’re ignorant to the truth. So what we gotta do is get the light to them so that they can know Christ as their savior and that they can receive him.

And so all throughout the Bible, we see the picture of light as a picture of salvation. And God wants you to help people to go from darkness to light. What is the next benefit? I want you to actually back up to verse six of chapter 26. Here’s what I want you to see, and now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made by God to our fathers.

You see, we need to let people know that there’s hope in Jesus Christ. There’s no hope in this world. There’s no hope in circumstances, but our hope is in the promise of God. How many of you are ready to fly away today? Well, the rest of you can stay.

But for those of us that want to fly away, if God calls us and raptures us out of here, buddy, we are ready because our hope is not found in this world, but it is found in the promise of Jesus Christ that one day he will call his people out of this world, and we will live and reign with him forever and ever and ever. Amen. Yes. Go ahead and rejoice. Now people need hope.

Napoleon said that leaders are dealers in hope. The reason some leaders fail in their leadership is that they’re always negative. They’re always critical. They’re always hateful, but a leader is always bringing hope. A leader is always seeing the optimism that is found in the gospel of Jesus Christ, and we are called to be a people who are out there fanned out into our community, bringing the hope of the promise of Jesus Christ to every person.

Now let’s get to number five. We need to stick to the message of the resurrection and call people to repentance based upon the Scriptures. Look at verse 19 of chapter 26. It says, Therefore King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision, but declared first to those in Damascus and in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea and then to the Gentiles that they should, what? Repent.

Just wanna make sure you’re awake. Turn to God and do works that are befitting to repentance. You see, the message of the resurrection, the message of repentance is what we are called to chair as believers. We are to emphasize that the Messiah suffered. He died and He rose again.

This is what He accomplished. And so again, we come down to verse 23 of chapter 26, that the Christ would suffer, that he would be the first to rise from the dead, and would proclaim the light to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles. He did not get off track on the message, but rather, he stuck to the message of the gospel, which is the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. And I know that the message seems so simplistic, and maybe sometimes you feel like I’ve heard it so many times. It’s not as effective to me.

But friends, I would say to you again, taste again the preciousness and the beauty and the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the death, burial, and resurrection of our savior. Rejoice in it and do everything that you can to spread that message to every person that you can. Now, the Apostle stuck to the message and he stuck to the message so much that he called people to repentance. Now don’t be afraid of the word repentance. You don’t hear it a lot in churches.

You don’t hear it a lot among Christians. That’s too harsh. That’s too mean. No. But that’s what the Bible means, is that we’re to turn from our sin.

We are to turn from our selfishness, and we are to turn to God, and we are to love Christ, and we are to put him first place in our life, and we trust in what he did on the cross, the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. We trust it for our salvation. That’s what it means, friends, to come and to know Jesus Christ as our Lord and savior. Now let’s look at verse 22, which brings us to our next point, point six. Rely on the help that comes only from God.

Rely on the help that only comes from God. Verse 22, Therefore, having obtained help from God, To this day, I stand, witnessing both to small and great, saying no other things than those which the prophets and Moses said would come. The apostle has not gotten rid of the Old Testament. He is helping them to see that the New Testament is the fulfillment of what the prophets and the patriarchs and the great men and women of God have proclaimed in the Old Testament, that they synchronize, they align together. But how is it that he was able to be so faithful despite all that he endured for the gospel of Jesus Christ?

How was it that he kept moving forward and did not quit throw in the towel and say, I’m done with that. Look at verse 22, having obtained help from God. You see, you’re not gonna be a faithful witness in trying times unless you obtain the help from God. And that you understand that without Christ, we can do nothing. We can do nothing.

We need His strength, we need His power, we need His energy, we need His wisdom, we need the help of God, church. When you consider that the apostle, for two years, has been sitting in prison, and throughout those two years, he’s been drugged before different courts, that the only way he could remain as confident and as positive and as determined and resolved as he did, was because his help came from God. And you may be facing a situation today, and you may be before a challenge today, and wondering how is it that you can take a step? How is it that you can turn the page? How is it that you can march forward for God?

I tell you, it will only be because you are relying on the help that comes from God. May God bless you and me to look to him in these troubling times for the help that only comes from him. The next point, point seven. And you know seven, my grandson, Colin, just turned seven. And I told him seven is the number of God.

It’s the favorite number in the Bible. It’s wonderful to be seven. Wouldn’t you love to be seven again? Amen. It’d be awesome.

Right? It’s a lot better than being 53. But I tell you that point seven also comes before point eight, which is the last point in pastor Mike’s sermon. We’re gonna make it after all. Be prepared for rejection and ridicule.

Verse 24. Now, as he thus made his defense, Festus said with a loud voice, Paul, you are beside yourself. Much learning is driving you mad. Now, I have considered saying that to many of professors in the educational world, that I think much learning has made them crazy. But here, the apostle defending the gospel, trying to share with others how to become a Christian is Whoops.

I’m sorry. I jumped to the last point, didn’t I? I just looked at my notes here. But we’ll make eight seven and seven eight PowerPoint people. Alright?

And that is that Festus, he called Paul insane. He called him crazy. Now when you go out there and stand up for God, I just want you to understand something. That not everybody’s gonna get saved. Not everybody’s gonna get saved.

But you you and I don’t witness for God because of the results we see. We witness for God because we are commanded by God. That we are to be a witness and we want to honor Him and we want to obey Him. God is looking at our life and He wants to see faithfulness and He wants to see obedience to God. We think about Noah for a hundred and twenty years.

He preached righteousness to the people, but only his family responded. We think about Isaiah the prophet who preached to the people and God said, I’m just gonna tell you upfront, Isaiah, that when I send you out to these people, they’re not gonna listen to you. They’re not gonna even respond to you. And some of you are frustrated because this person hasn’t responded or that person hasn’t responded. Your success is not determined by the response of others, but it is determined by your obedience and faithfulness to God.

So keep that in mind. Remember that Paul the Apostle said in first Corinthians one verse 23, we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness. They look at the gospel and they they don’t understand. The Greeks, they want to be stoic. They wanted to achieve.

They wanted to win something. And so they wanted to get into heaven based upon what they achieved. But friends, we don’t get to heaven based upon what we’ve achieved, but based upon what Christ has achieved. Amen? And it’s not always the most fittest that wins in the faith.

But God gives grace upon grace upon grace to us. We rely on Him, and we recognize His good work in our hearts. To the Jews, it was a stumbling block because they had all these rules, they had all these regulations, they had everything that they had to follow, and they were doing their best, and they were ranking themselves based upon their ability to follow these rules. Sometimes Christians and churches get trapped into these rules, and they make these lists, these long lists of rules. Like one church, I heard one church said that you weren’t allowed to watch VHS, And I said to the pastor, what are you gonna do when VHS no longer exists?

If the rule is from God, it should always be permanent. Right? See what I’m saying? We make rules up that aren’t rooted in the Bible, and then we think our salvation or our maturity is rooted in rules. No.

You don’t need a rule from pastor Mike. Okay? What you need to do is be led of the spirit of God. If the spirit of God says you shouldn’t do it, then bam, don’t do it. If the spirit of God says you should do it, then do it.

Sometimes people say, if you don’t do this, pastor Mike, I’m not gonna do that. And I say, well, let’s get on our knees right now and pray to God and say, God, is this what you want me to do? One man said to me he was not gonna tithe anymore unless we made a decision that he wanted. I said, let’s get on our knees and let’s pray to God and say, God, I’m not going to tithe anymore. Let’s see how God thinks about that.

You see what I’m saying? I love it when I call people out. I love it when I call them out because they think that they can operate in the flesh. That they can manipulate in this flesh instead of being led of the Spirit of God. Do you understand the difference?

Do you see that church? What I wanna encourage you is to be a person who is prepared, knowing that it’s not religion that saves you, it’s a relationship with Christ that saves you. Knowing that even as you are faithfully sharing Christ, there will be others that will ridicule you. Now, the last point. I’m gonna mess up.

You know, I told you I had eight, but I actually have nine. But we’re not gonna make it to nine. But PowerPoint people, I know you are totally confused. Okay? Just follow me.

Okay? Do not go by what the PowerPoint says. But that is this, because this is my I I do want this point to get across, and I want us to finish out this way. Is that we need to pray for people that we’re trying to witness to. Now we come down to verse 29, and Paul says, I would to God, that not only you, but also all who hear me today might become both almost and altogether such as I am, except for these chains.

And what he is literally saying, he is expressing his prayers. He’s expressing his prayerful desires for everyone to know Christ. The power in evangelism is prayer. You got a family member that needs to come to Christ? Get on your knees and pray for them.

When I was in bible college many, many years ago, they taught us to make a list of God’s most wanted. And they said, start with your family. And we would write that list down. We would write that list down. And the first person I wanted to be saved was my mother.

And it took a long time, but she came to Christ, received Jesus as her savior. And I wanted to pray for my aunts, because they had such a big part of our life. And I just made a list of people. And what’s been so neat is to watch one by one to come to Christ and to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Friends, I want you to know that prayer is powerful and that you need to be a praying people.

Now, I know you wanna pray for grandma’s ingrown toenail, and God bless you, I hope you do, but you need to first pray that people will get saved. Adrian Rogers, the great preacher in Memphis, Tennessee, who was the pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church, over 20,000 people every Sunday, he used to say, we pray harder to keep people out of heaven than we do to keep people out of hell. I would encourage you to pray like never before and to make it a priority to pray for people that you work with, friends, family members, to pray for them to be saved. May God grant us help to make His grace known to a broken world in loving ways, and may He give us the grace to be able to share his grace with every person that we come in contact with. Let’s pray together.

Whenever you’re witnessing for Jesus Christ, you always need to exalt Jesus and not self. Sometimes there’s the temptation to tell such an amazing story about ourselves and how we came to Christ that we’re not exalting Christ, we’re exalting self. So our witness should first always be about Christ. And that’s what I want you to take home with you today. Make sure you’re witnessing for the Lord and about the Lord.

Now we encourage you to check us out at hopeworthhaving.com. We would encourage you to reach out to us. And if you just send us some prayer requests or how the Lord’s working in your life, then we would love to send you one of our free books that I recently wrote, daily dynamic devotions. And these are just some devotions that will encourage you in your walk with God and help you to keep your focus on him and not on your problems. So reach out to us so we can send you a free copy of dynamic devotions.

This is pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ, there is hope worth having.