Take Time To Tell Your Story Of God’s Grace And Changed Lives

An unguarded strength is a double weakness.

“So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!”

— 1 Corinthians 10:12 I pulled a muscle in my back last week doing something silly. Yes. Most of the scars on my body are derived from a “Hey! I can do that!” mentality. But the good news is I got a lot of reading done.

One of the books I’m reading again is Luke’s gospel. It absolutely intrigues me and every time I read it I’m amazed. If you haven’t had a chance lately, read Luke chapter 20. Yes. The whole chapter.

The chapter starts off by a group of Pharisees and religious leaders coming to Jesus while he’s teaching in the Temple. They want to know by what right does Jesus have to preach in their holy place.

And, I’m sad to say, I can see exactly where they’re coming from with the question.

To become a pastor you have to have a college degree. Then you have to have an additional four year degree called a Master’s of Divinity. Then you have to have three years as an intern in supervised ministry. Then after that you can become an “Elder” in the church. This is for Method- ists, mind you, but overall you have to have as much schooling and on the job experience to be a pastor as you do to be a doctor or a lawyer. There’s a lot of investment of money and time in that.

Same thing for the Pharisees.

They spent years in their places of learning to get to the point in their lives that they were finally allowed to teach in the Temple. They studied under famous Rabbis. They memorized the Torah. They lived by exemplary moral standards. They tithed. They prayed. They fasted. They read scripture daily. They EARNED their place in the Temple.

Then all of a sudden comes this guy from some backwater town that no one knows. Nothing good ever came from the town. No Rabbi claimed him as a student. No seminary gave him a degree. He just shows up, no degrees. No honorary doctorates. No scholarly papers. And he starts to preach.

But worse yet, he starts to preach with a “new authority!” Which means the authority the Pharisees lived by was being questioned.

So their natural response would be, “Hey, Jesus! What gives you the right to come in here and start preaching like that? Who taught you? Where’d you get your degree?”

I’ve done a lot of sermons in my life. Some moving and some boring. And I can tell you that the most spiritually moving times I’ve ever had is when someone gets up to talk about how Jesus changed their life. We call it a time of testimony. To hear how God is working in people and transforming lives means so much more than some silly sermon.

And we need more of that in our churches. We need more people standing up telling their story of how God changed them to inspire those around them. We need to hear how the Holy Spirit is working to heal and bring about miracles of faith in our neighbors. We need to see how the grace of God is forgiving the sinners and redeeming the saints.

So as you read Luke 20 today, I hope you’ll come away with a crazy thought. I hope you’ll think, “Hey! I can do that! I can tell my story!” There may be bumps and bruises along the way, but when you tell your story with the authority that comes from God, the grace offered by Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit then you’ll see a true revival taking place. Let us pray. Dear God. We know that sometimes the hardest thing for us to do is tell others about Jesus. We pray this day that we don’t relegate the telling of your story to those in position of authority and ask that you give us the strength we need to stand up and let our own stories be told. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.