Load of Garbage 4: I’m too chicken!

I almost can’t title this post “Load of Garbage” even though it’s part of that series because struggling with witnessing is normal. It’s NOT a load of garbage to say you have a hard time talking about Christ. On the one hand, good witnessing Christians will make you feel guilty for not being as bold as they are. The Bible refers to them as “Judgmental Know-it-All A-holes.”  I think that’s in Proverbs 29.  Not sure.  And on the other hand, your non-Christian friends will make you think you are a weirdo.  Can we take step one?  You are a weirdo.  So let’s be done with that.  If you feel like a weirdo, that’s how you know you’re doing it right.  The trick is not to figure out a way to witness without feeling weird.  The trick is to get to where you are okay with feeling weird.

One of the greatest contributors to this blog recently asked me about this. He asked for practical information about how to witness when you’re nervous about doing it. He mentioned being in a small group discussion with non-believers and was upset he didn’t chime in and witness his faith. He chickened out.  Yeah. BEEN THERE! Ever turn down the Christian song you were blasting because you realized you were at a stoplight and people might hear it?? I’ve done that too. Here was my answer, and I thought it might be helpful to everyone:
______________________

Dude. YOU HAVE A BLOG!! Start there, bro. It is so much easier to first proclaim your faith on an anonymous internet. At first mine was completely anonymous. I had a blog titled “So Long Self” after the Mercy Me song. And you would never have known it was me. Now here I am blogging the crud out of the Bible every day with my personal email address and even phone number out there for the world. Everyone at work knows it, and trust me, my family knows it and is probably about heard enough of it.

Start small. Take that small group, for example. Maybe that was too much for a start. We think that witnessing is the process of converting people from hostile non-believer to believer in a single conversation. It’s rarely that. Perhaps never that. These are people who have literally seen faith, checked it out, and said, “No thanks.” I will work on them later. You witness to the hurting. To the empty. To those who society has forgotten. That includes the divorced or soon to be divorced. Those buried in debt. The homeless. The mentally challenged. The depressed. The single mom.  The EVERYONE! Right?

And here’s another tip if you’re nervous. ACT FIRST. TALK ABOUT FAITH SECOND. I spend a fair amount of time pouring into the lives of others. I give a lot. Not a lot of money. I give a lot of time. When they figure out I am a Christian, they have a context to fit that into. And the context is someone who gives all the time without ever asking for something in return. Then the resurrection makes more sense. I have given them an immeasurably small taste of the shocking level of giving of Christ engaged in when He died on the cross for us. My giving is nothing compared to His. But it is a starting point. Give first. Preach second.

So do this. Spend one hour today thinking of ways you can give selflessly this week without ever giving anyone any money. You can give some money too, but do that next week. Giving without giving cash is harder than you think. Do that. For a week. Even just a few things. Give. You will see doors open up to talk about your faith. Over time. Not ten minutes of time. Ten months of time. Jesus spent three years with his disciples and they still didn’t get it until he walked out of that tomb. Look how much giving he did during that time!

Start with giving, and report back if you don’t mind. Let us know how it goes, and if any doors opened up for you. For me, it’s been debt. I help people get out of debt and fight off collectors for free (I’m a lawyer so I know all the good tricks.) And during that months-long process I tell them how I decided to get out of debt. The Christians who poured into my life. The principals I learned before I even knew they were Biblical. That’s my thing. Find yours. Today!
________________________

So those were my thoughts and I wanted to pass them along to everyone. But let’s do this. What are YOUR thoughts? At some point you may have been nervous about witnessing your faith. How did that change? No theories. Just nuts and bolts stuff. Leave a comment. I’d love to read about it.

We were built to be heroes. It’s about time we started acting like heroes.