A man told the following true story:
A man suddenly knocked a glass off the table and stood up, his face red and his eyes bulging. A piece of steak had lodged in his throat and he couldn't breathe. I glanced around the room hoping someone would rush to him to apply the Heimlich maneuver. But everyone froze helpless. I pushed my chair back and ran to his side. When I wrapped my arms around his girth and squeezed, the meat dislodged from his throat and I could hear the welcome sound of a deep breath.
Later, several people came by my table and expressed appreciation that I had helped. One gentleman said, "I am so thankful you knew what to do. Could you tell me where I could learn to do that? I want to be prepared too."
The choking man's wife left a note for me with the cashier. It said, "Thank you, my husband wanted to thank you, but was too embarrassed and weak to say anything. We are so thankful you were not afraid to help us."
But no one could have been more afraid than me. It wasn't absence of fear that made the difference; the difference was I was prepared. This experience taught me that I might be the only hope for someone whose life hangs in the balance.1
Just as knowing how to use the Heimlich maneuver can save someone's earthly life, knowing Jesus and knowing how to make Jesus known to others, can enable you to be a tool in God's hand to save someone's eternal life. Unfortunately, the sin of silence, the sound of silence, is deafening in our churches when it comes to the saved sharing with the sinner how the sinner can be saved.
Too many people are like a lady I heard about who took a course in First Aid. Later on, those who took the course were giving testimonies as to how effective they were and she said, "I want to tell you how much my first aid meant to me. The other day out in front of our home there was a terrible automobile accident. An old man left the road, hit an oak tree and was thrown out of the car. His head was cut, his eyes were rolling back, his bones were splintered, he had compound fractures, he was bleeding from several places and groaning profusely."
She said, "It was absolutely terrible, but then I remembered my first aid. I remembered if I would put my head between my knees I wouldn't faint and I did."
Someone has observed that there are only two kinds of Christians in this world:
Those who talk about the lost.
Those who talk to the lost.
Which one are you?
You have not been saved just to sit in church, or to soak up truth, or to sing in a choir, or even to send missionaries around the world. You have been saved to share.
Do you know what God's greatest tool is to reach other people for Jesus Christ? Well, the answer is YOU! A survey from the Institute of American Church Growth showed that 75 to 90% of new believers come to Christ through a friend or acquaintance who explains the Good News on a one-to-one basis. Only 17% of all conversions come through what is called an "event"—such as a pastor preaching a Sunday morning message, a crusade, or some other church activity.2
Every true Christian has in his heart perhaps the single most powerful tool available to be an effective witness for Christ—his personal testimony. That is all Paul had as he stood before a king in Acts 26—and it was all he needed. In this chapter we see the three simple things Paul did that every Christian can begin to do today to be an effective witness for Christ.
I. Recount Your Condition Before Christ
Every life can be chronologically divided the same way our calendar is—B.C. which is "before Christ," and A.D. which is "after Christ." As Paul stands before King Agrippa, he begins by describing his life B.C.—"before Christ."
On the one hand, it is interesting to note that Paul describes himself as religious.
"Then Agrippa said to Paul, ‘You are permitted to speak for yourself.' So Paul stretched out his hand and answered for himself:
I think myself happy, King Agrippa, because today I shall answer for myself before you concerning all the things of which I am accused by the Jews, especially because you are expert in all customs and questions which have to do with the Jews. Therefore I beg you to hear me patiently. My manner of life from my youth, which was spent from the beginning among my own nation at Jerusalem, all the Jews know. They knew me from the first, if they were willing to testify, that according to the strictest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee." (vv. 1-5)
Paul was a Hebrew by birth, a Roman citizen; raised in the Greek city of Tarsus and had studied at the feet of Gamaliel, one of the greatest Jewish rabbis of all time. Most importantly, he was a Pharisee.
Today people would have called Paul "a fundamentalist." Pharisees were the theological conservatives of their day. They dotted every theological "i," they crossed every theological "t." They were meticulously religious; painstakingly religious. Anyone who knew Paul would have said, without question, that Paul was definitely going to heaven.
There was only one problem. Paul had to acknowledge that he was not only religious, but also rebellious.
"Indeed, I myself thought I must do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. This I also did in Jerusalem, and many of the saints I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests; and when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them. And I punished them often in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities." (vv.9-11)
Paul was the star of the number one TV show in that day—"Israel's Most Wanted." He had made it his fulltime passion in life to hunt down Christians. It was open season on those who were believers in Jesus Christ. He hunted them down like dogs. All because he felt that he "must do things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth."
Paul is a picture of every person born into this world. Paul was not born a believer in Jesus Christ; he had to become one. No one is born a Christian—you must be born again to become a Christian. The first birth gets you onto earth; the second birth gets you into heaven. By the first birth you enter an earthly family; by the second birth you enter into an eternal family.
Jesus once said, "He who is not with me is against me." (Mt. 12:30) We are all born "against Jesus Christ."
As I think about Paul, I think about an actress named Amanda Donohoe, who was in a TV role where her character spit on a crucifix. She said she enjoyed doing that: "I'm an atheist, so it was actually a joy. Spitting on Christ was a great deal of fun—especially for me being a woman….I can't embrace a male God who has persecuted female sexuality throughout the ages, and that persecution still goes on today all over the world."3
Now you may protest that you are not a Paul or an Amanda. Like Paul, you may claim your religious background. But Paul had to realize what you need to realize, which is being born into a religious family or raised in a church does not make you a Christian anymore than being born in a garage makes you an automobile. We are all born in unbelief.
Until you believe in and receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you are against Him. You may not spit on crucifixes or persecute Christians, but if you do not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are condemned just as Paul was. "He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." (John 3:18)
In order to give an effective testimony, you must go back to the time in your life before you received Christ, and understand your condition before Christ, which was to be separated from God, lost in sin, and in need of forgiveness.
II. Recall Your Conversion to Christ
There have been many remarkable conversions in the history of Christianity, but none more remarkable than Paul the Apostle. One meeting on a dirt road heading out of Jerusalem to Damascus, resulted in the gospel being carried to the center of the Roman Empire, and one-half of the books of the New Testament being written.
Paul shifts the conversation from his past before he met the Lord, to his experience of meeting the risen Christ.
"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 all had 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 goads.' So I said, ‘Who are You, Lord?' And He said, ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.'" (vv.12-15)
Now we can all relate to Paul because he stood in a unique position to the other disciples, and stands in the same position that anyone who meets Christ stands in today. You see, all the other disciples knew Jesus in the chronological sequence of His birth, life, death, and resurrection. But Paul, like us, encounters Jesus Christ in the logical sequence of His resurrection, death, life, and birth. From the moment that he met Jesus Christ, he looked at everything through the keyhole of the resurrection; and so do we.
With one question: "Who are you Lord?" and with one answer: "I am Jesus whom you are persecuting," Paul's religion collapsed like a house of cards! He finally realized he did not need religion, he needed redemption. He did not need Judaism, he needed Jesus. He did not need the law, he needed the Lord. He did not need a synagogue, he needed a Savior.
Well, with revelation came revolution! Paul had seen a new light. He was now under a new Lord. He was filled with a new love. Now there are some skeptics who say that Paul was simply afflicted with sunstroke. Well they were right if you change one letter. It was a Son-stroke, rather than a sunstroke!
Furthermore, he was a changed man; not just from the outside in, but from the inside out, and it happened at a certain time and a certain place. It is so important to understand that no one gradually becomes a Christian. Now a person may gradually come to the point where they become a Christian, but for salvation to occur, a definite person must accept a definite Savior at a definite time at a definite place. That experience becomes one's personal testimony.
One man was talking to another man about salvation and he said, "Do you know for sure that you are saved?" The man said, "Absolutely." The other man said, "How do you know?" He said, "Because I was there when it happened!"
Well, it may sound facetious to ask, but "Were you there when it happened?" Can you point to a time in your life when you, too, had an encounter with Jesus Christ; realized that your religion and your righteousness were of no use in being saved; understood that Jesus Christ died on the cross and was raised from the dead to pay for your sins; and therefore you repented of your sins and by faith asked Christ into your heart? That is the key question you must continuously asked yourself throughout this entire message.
No matter how simple your story might be, never underestimate the power of conversion, nor the impact of your own conversion experience on the lives of others. Psychologist Stanton Samenow, and Psychiatrist Samuel Yochelson, spent 17 years studying criminals. They discovered that criminal behavior could not be tied to any environmental causes—not ghettos or poverty or any of the other conventional explanations.
Instead they found that crime results from a conscious decision. People commit crimes when they make wrong moral choices. Here is the fascinating thing about their study. They ended it with this startling conclusion. The only way a criminal can change is by a conscious shift to a new way of thinking—what they called a "conversion."4
Unbeknownst to them, they were exactly right. Jeff Fenholt could give testimony to that fact. Jeff Fenholt played the original Jesus in the sacrilegious musical Jesus Christ Superstar, which purposely leaves out the Resurrection.
Fenholt toured the United States and recorded the album which sold approximately fifteen million copies in this country alone. He later became a vocalist involved with Black Sabbath, a rock group with an anti-Christian name. Although he was tremendously successful on the outside, he said on the inside he felt a "deep emptiness."5
But Jeff Fenholt had an encounter with the risen Christ, and he has since come to embrace the Jesus Christ that Paul met on the Damascus Road as his own Savior and Lord, and today he is a singer and speaker for the Lord Jesus Christ.6
Like Jeff, like Paul, and like so many others, every true Christian has a story. Every Christian has been converted or else he is not a Christian! Like Paul, any Christian can simply, through the power of the Holy Spirit, tell his story of conversion; how he came to know Christ as Savior and as Lord.
III. Recommend Your Confession of Christ
Paul was not finished and as King Agrippa was to learn to his sorrow, Paul was not on the defense, he was on the offense. He was a prisoner, true. But he was also hoping to take prisoners for the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, that is the very reason that Jesus saved him. "But rise and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and of the things which I will yet reveal to you." (v.16)
Now the Lord Jesus expressly told Paul why he appeared to him and why He saved him. First of all, to make him a minister. The Greek word there literally means "under-rower" which referred to a sailor under command of the captain. From this point on, Paul was no longer marching to the orders of the Sanhedrin or even his own heart. He was to march to the orders of his Commander in Chief, the Lord Jesus Christ.
But furthermore, God had called Paul to be a messenger. The word witness there is the Greek word martus which gives us the English word martyr. A martyr originally meant someone who has information about something or someone and can testify to it.
You see, Paul had been given a specific assignment. He was literally saved to share. His job was to go to every person that he possibly could get to without Christ, "to open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me." (v.18)
That's why Paul went on to say to King Agrippa in v.19: "Therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision…" Now this is the crux of the issue: to fail to witness, to fail to testify, to fail to share what Jesus has done for you with others is to disobey the very Lord who has saved you.
Now notice that as a witness Paul was simply to do two things: (1) share his testimony; (2) call for a decision on the part of those with whom he was sharing. As Paul went about Damascus, Jerusalem, and all Judea, sharing what Christ had done for him, he would then share that "they should repent, turn to God, and do works befitting repentance." (v.20)
Our job as a witness for Christ is to simply tell the truth about Him; share our testimony and then call people to repentance, redemption, and righteousness. Notice very carefully that it all begins with repentance. Just as we recount our existence as a sinner before Christ, we must confront others with the fact of their own sinfulness. In short, you cannot get a person saved until they understand they are lost.
I can hardly believe it when I read the words of Robert Schuller who said: "I don't think anything has been done in the name of Christ, and under the banner of Christianity, that has proven more destructive to human personality, and is counterproductive to the evangelistic enterprise, than the un-Christian, uncouth strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition.7
With all due respect to Dr. Schuller, nothing could be further from biblical truth. Rather, Martin Luther was right when he said, "The ultimate proof of the sinner is that he doesn't know his own sin; our job is to make him see it."8
At first blush, it appears as if Paul was unsuccessful. "Then Agrippa said to Paul, ‘You almost persuade me to become a Christian." (v.28) You would think that it was all for naught because Agrippa did not come to Christ. But listen carefully. Paul was successful because he was faithful. He was indeed "obedient to the heavenly vision." Any witness is successful when he or she simply testifies to the truth of Jesus Christ, shares the story of their own conversion, and leaves the results to God. Because that is all God has called us to do, is to simply tell the truth about Jesus.
[At this point the pastor should share his own personal testimony of how he came to Christ.]
[After the pastor shares his testimony this would be the time to have the congregation write out their own personal testimony.]
Finally, the pastor could end with this—if you do not have a testimony or you are not sharing your testimony, you need to examine yourself as to whether or not you have truly met Jesus Christ. Has there been a time in your life when you repented? When you truly truly turned to God? Are you now doing works befitting repentance? If you do not have a testimony, today you can.
1. William Fay, Share Jesus Without Fear, pp. 139-140.
2. Ibid, p. 12.
3. Quoted in American Association Journal, (November/December 1991, 3.
4. Cited by Charles Colson, A Dance with Deception, p. 188.
5. Biography on Jeffery C. Fenholt, Jeffery Fenholt Outreach, Uplands, California.
6. Jeffery C. Fenholt, From Darkness to Light, (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Harrison House, 1994).
7. Robert Schuller, Self-Esteem: The New Reformation, (Waco: Word, 1982), 98ff.
8. The New Book of Christian Quotations, (West Chester, Ill.: Crossway, 1984), 226.