Say Something - Testify Part 1

Oh, come on, church, are you thankful today to be washed clean by the blood of Jesus? So amazing. So incredible. We can't sing that song without thinking about last weekend, celebrating the empty tomb, celebrating the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. What an incredible, incredible Easter weekend. And can I tell you that on Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday, 88 people got washed by the blood, gave their hearts and lives to Jesus Christ in one of our services. Absolutely incredible. And to every single one of you who volunteered and served, whether you're in the parking lot or ushering or in one of our bands or one of our campuses, watching kids, teaching them about the resurrection, whatever role you played last week, thank you for making it possible for thousands of our guests to hear the message of Jesus Christ. You made a difference. We're grateful for you. Well, welcome to you today here in Yorktown and Newport News, Virginia Beach, online, to the men at Indian Creek, and in a season like the one we're in, I don't think there's ever been a time where it's more important for us to be grateful, to lift our prayers, to surround those who are serving our country. Come on, many of them are in our service today. Many are joining us deployed around the world today. We love you. We're praying for you and your safety and protection and for your family, and we just count it a true honor and privilege to be your church family in this season as well. Glad you're here today. You're in for a, I think, a special message as we kick off a brand new series of messages. We're calling this series Testify, Testify, it just is an opportunity for us to learn what it means to open our mouth and testify to the goodness and the grace, the love, and the mercy of our God. I've got a message God's given me, my heart, to share with you today as we kick off this

series. Why don't you do this? Why don't you testify to somebody around you? Why don't you give somebody a high five before you're seated and testify, just hey, say God is good, all right? Just give them a testify, handshake, high five, and then you can be seated because we got work to do today, work to do today. We're thrilled, thrilled that you're here. If you're taking notes today, we've built this whole series of messages really around a famous story in the gospel of John, John chapter nine. You can write that, you can write that down in your notes and go back and read it at some point on your own. John chapter nine is a story of a man who was born blind. He's a beggar. This man does not want to be in the spotlight. He does not want to be the center of attention. He's not striving to be the next social media influencer. He doesn't want to be a big name preacher. He doesn't even really want to be noticed, but Jesus's disciples point this man out. They really want to use him as an object lesson, so they point him out to Jesus, but Jesus never uses people. Jesus loves people, and so rather than using him, Jesus heals him. Jesus gives the blind man sight. That's awesome. That's awesome. Don't act like you've seen that every day. Jesus heals the blind man, and he can see for the first time in his life. He can see. He can see the clouds and the sun. He can see the trees and the flowers.

He can see the ground he's been sitting on. He can see the faces of those who have passed him by. He can see. He can see his hand for the first time in his whole entire life. He can see, and the Bible tells us in John chapter 9 that there's a group of people who don't like that. In fact, the religious leaders of the day, they don't like the fact that Jesus just healed this man. They feel threatened by Jesus and by this miracle, so they pull the man in and start to ask him questions. They really kind of read him the riot act. They almost put him on trial. By the way, can I just tell you that that's the pattern of how the world works? When Jesus begins to work in your life, when Jesus begins to change something on the inside of you, when Jesus gives you a story to share, you better be prepared for opposition. You better be prepared for resistance. That's exactly what happens in this story. The man is changed by Jesus, and immediately, immediately he comes up against some opposition and some resistance, and the religious leaders, they start to question. And he's like, hey, are you really healed? Like, can you really see? And then they start to say, is it really you? Are you the same guy that used to sit there and beg and be blind? Are you sure this isn't like your twin brother that you guys didn't do like a switcheroo on us? Like they're doubting everything about this man's story. And then they eventually get to the point where they're questioning the miracle. Well, tell us how it happened

and explain to us why you think it happened and by what means it happened. And then they start to actually say, what do you think about the guy who healed you? This guy named Jesus. Is he who he says he is? Do you think he's a sinner? And I want you to see, I want you to see this man's response. It's what we've built the whole series around. This one simple response that really shuts up the opposition. The man says, when they say, do you think he's a sinner? He replies back and he says this, I don't know whether he's a sinner. The man replied, but I do know this. I was blind and now I can see. That's his response. I think that's an awesome answer, by the way. I don't know all the theological nuances. I can't tell you all the history. I'm not sure by what means or why he did it. I'm not sure how he even did it. I just know this, before him, I couldn't see. And now I can see my life's been changed. He testified. And I want to teach you today that that's exactly what God wants you to do as well. God wants you to testify. In fact, if you know Jesus today,

if Jesus has changed your life, if he's worked in your life, you don't have to have all the answers and you don't have to know all the reasons and you don't have to be able to explain all the theology and you don't have to be an expert in the Bible or be able to defend all the propositions of our faith. All you have to do, all you have to do is just open your mouth and be able to say, I once was this, but now I'm not. I once was lost, but now I'm found. I once was ashamed, but now I'm free. I once was guilty, but now I'm forgiven. I once was blind, but now I see. Because if you know Jesus, you have something to say. You do. You have something to say and all you have to do is open your mouth and say it. That's what this whole series of messages is gonna be about. You have something to say. Now, I want you to think about something and I want you to really consider this. Why is it that saying something about Jesus is so hard for us, but saying something about anyone or anything else is so easy for us? Have you ever thought about that? Like most of us, most of us, and I know there are a few like extreme introverts here

and you're like, I don't talk to anybody about anything. Okay, I get that. But for the rest of us, most of us, most of us can talk about a lot of other things and a lot of other people fairly easily, fairly naturally. It just kind of rolls off the tip of your tongue. You don't have to plan for it, study up on it. You can just kind of talk about it and it just kind of comes out, except when it comes to Jesus. Let me prove my point. Let's just have a little fun with this. A little audience survey and you can play along here in the room with a show of hands over online, jump over in the chat and participate. I'm gonna give you some categories and you just, with a show of hands, you just show me whether or not you have a problem talking about these particular categories. For example, how many of you by a show of hands, you have no problem talking about family and friends? No problem, you could talk to me right now. Show of hands, you could talk to me right now about friends and family. Yes, most of us in the room, most of us. If you didn't raise your hand, I'm assuming you don't have any friends or family and that's okay, that's okay. But for the rest of us, yeah, I can talk to you about my,

I can talk to you about my wife all day long, tell you how awesome she is. I can tell you, hello. I can tell you about my kids, how proud I am of them. I can tell you, ooh, I can tell you about my granddaughter. I'll even show you pictures. Like talking about friends and family, no problem. No problem for most of us. How about this next category? How many of you have no problem talking about entertainment and social media? Entertainment and social media, what you like to watch, the latest movie you saw, the funniest viral video you just saw on TikTok. Come on, yeah, that's a bunch of us. If you're watching Survivor season 50, let's talk afterwards. I want to talk to you. Like I'm fired up about that. No problem whatsoever, no problem. Talking about entertainment and social media. This next category is my favorite to talk about. I love, love, love to talk about. Look at it, food and dining. How many? If you're food and dining, talk to me, let's go. Y'all are like, oh, I can tell you have no problem with food and dining, pastor. I love it. We can talk about it all day long.

I tell you for the next, I don't know, probably 10, 15 minutes, I can tell you about my favorite restaurant. Tell you all about it. Tell you about when they sit you down and they bring you that little bread basket, all the different kinds of bread they put in the bread basket I can tell you all about it. And then they come out, this is my favorite part, they come out and they bring the butter, but this particular restaurant, that's my favorite. They've got the butter in one of those like cake decorating tubes. So they squeeze it out for you in a nice swirl. It's soft butter. Oh, I love it. I love it. And then the thing that kind of tops off the experience is kind of one of those fancy restaurants. They come along and the server, after you eat your bread, the server comes up. I don't know what they call this thing. I don't know. I call it a crumb comb. A crumb comb. You've seen one of those little things the server has and he reaches down and he scoops up any of the bread crumbs you left on the table. Yes, he does. That's awesome.

That's awesome. I can tell you about the cowboy cut rib eye. I love to order medium, medium, medium. Don't judge me medium rare people. Don't judge me right now. I can tell you about the 460 degree plate. It arrives on sizzling in a pile of butter. I love it. I love it. We can talk about it all day long. 10 minutes, 10 minutes. Have no problem. You probably have a favorite restaurant you could tell me about, a favorite recipe that you could tell me about. No problem whatsoever talking about food and dining. How about this one? This one is a select group of you. A select group of you. How many of you could talk about current events and politics with no problem? Current events and politics. Some of y'all are lying because I've seen your Facebook pages. You've got no problems talking about current events and politics and you've got an opinion and you don't mind sharing it. It just flows, flows out of you. I'll give you one more just so all of us can participate. How about hobbies and work?

How many of you have no problem talking about hobbies and work? Let's talk pickleball. Let's talk about it for a minute. Oh yeah. Let's talk about the drama at the office. I'd love to hear it. Do you see? Most of us have no problem opening our mouth. We have something to say when it comes to friends and family, entertainment and social media, food and dining. When it comes to current events and politics, hobbies and work, there's at least one category up there that every person in the room and online can say, yeah, I can talk about that. No problem. But what about when it comes to this last category, the category of Jesus? Crickets. Crickets. In fact, we should have put a little crickets sound effect right there after the word Jesus. Because for whatever reason, and I think I might know why, we have no problem talking about all the other things in life, all the other people in our life. But when it comes to the most important, it's hard for us.

It's difficult for us. It's hard to open our mouths and say something. I wanna submit to you today the reason why. I actually believe that this is a ploy of the enemy, that the devil uses this as a tactic. Because while God has given you a voice and you use that voice confidently to talk about so many other things, I think the enemy's ploy, the devil's tactic is to try to silence your voice by planting little doubts, little seeds of fear and insecurity. In fact, I never want you to forget this. Write this down. One of the greatest tactics of the devil is to try to keep you silent. Oh, he loves it when he can silence your voice about the thing that is most important to your life. He loves it. But his greatest tactics is to try to make you feel not confident. It's to try to create insecurities in you so that you run scenarios like, oh, but if they ask me this, I might not know the answer to that. You know what we think? Like we think, oh, I don't know enough to talk about Jesus. I'm not informed enough to talk about Jesus. I'm a little scared that they might ask me a question about the Bible or about my faith.

And I won't know the answer. And so we stay silent. Now, let me. that that doesn't apply to any other area of your life. You realize that, right? There's no other area of your life. None of those other categories, do you have that same fear? Or do you wrestle with that same insecurity? Like, if you were to say to me, pastor, you sure talk a lot about that restaurant. Where do they get their beef? You know what I would say? Don't know. Don't care. That's what I would say. Don't know. Don't care. Because I don't feel like I need to know where they get their beef in order to talk about their beef. Here's all I need to know about their beef. When I go there, I'm hungry. When I leave there, I'm full. I like their beef. It's good beef. That's all I need to know. I don't need to know all the other answers. You know what you need to know about Jesus? You need to know he's good. That's all you need to know.

Oh, but what if they ask me something else? What if they do? I don't know. I don't know. All I know is I was once blind, now I see. I was once lost, now I'm found. I need Jesus. And he saved me. It's like this. So many of us are fearful of talking about Jesus because we're scared we're gonna offend somebody. Why would Jesus offend somebody? And why would you stay silent out of fear of offending somebody? Do you think I care if you're offended that I love steak? Did my illustration offend all the vegetarians? If you're offended, get over it. I love steak. And if you're a vegetarian, I'm glad you don't because that means more beef for me. You see, this logic doesn't apply to any other area of our life. And yet the enemy has tricked you into believing. Oh, if you say something about Jesus, they're gonna ask you a hard theological question and you won't know how to answer it and then you'll look like an idiot. Or if you say something about Jesus, you're gonna offend them in such a bad way that they're not gonna be your friend anymore.

This is the enemy's greatest ploy. He wants to try to silence you. And this is why we're in this series because God wants you to know. Now you got something to say. In the book of Acts, it's just the story of the beginnings of this movement called the church. And at the very beginning of the book of Acts, we see Christianity, this movement of Christ moving and advancing two followers of Jesus named Peter and John are among those who are testifying the loudest. They're telling the story of Jesus. They're sharing the most about Jesus. And as they're sharing and as they're testifying, because they got something to say, the religious leaders and the politicians of that day, I think they're being used by, honestly, by the enemy. I think they're pawns of the devil because they're trying to silence the movement. Look at what the Bible says in Acts. It says, but to stop this thing, this thing being Christianity, to stop this thing from spreading any further among the people, we must warn them, that's Peter and John, we must warn them to speak no longer to anyone in this name, the name of Jesus. And then they called them in again and commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. So they're trying to keep them silent.

But Peter and John replied, what is right in God's eyes? To listen to you or to him? Ooh, that's a good question. That's a question some of us need to wrestle with in our life. What's right in God's eyes? Am I gonna be concerned about them? Or am I gonna be concerned about him? Am I gonna keep silent because I don't want to offend them? Or am I gonna get loud to testify about him? It's a great question. But then it says this, you be the judges. As for us, as for us, we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard. They testified. We have something to say. And Peter and John, Peter and John didn't say we cannot help speaking about what we have learned and what we know. You see that? They didn't say that. We cannot help speaking about what we have studied and read books on and are experts on and now can answer every question you have about. They didn't say that. They just said we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and what we have heard. Sounds a lot like the blind beggar that Jesus healed. I don't know a lot.

But I know this, I was blind, but now I see, I have something to say. And this is what a testimony is. The little word testify that's used all throughout your New Testament in the Bible. The little word testify comes from the Greek word, martyreio, martyreio. You'll see in that little Greek word where we get our English word, martyr, you see it? I know that's not very inspiring. But a martyr is someone who bears witness even at a great cost to themselves. That's who a martyr is. And the little word martyreio translated for us in the Bible is testify. It means to bear witness or to speak from firsthand knowledge. And that's the beauty of a testimony. You don't have to know everything. You don't have to have all the answers. You don't have to be an expert witness. You don't have to have an explanation. You don't have to have studied it for years. I'm trying to give you freedom today. I'm trying to give you permission today. I'm trying to let you shake off the fear and the insecurities and the doubts that arise about testifying. Just say, all you gotta do, all you gotta do is open your mouth and share what you've seen

and what you've heard. Because if you know Jesus, you got something to say. You have something to say. And the devil wants to keep you quiet. But God wants you to testify. Well, let me give you four reasons why. And if you're taking notes today, you can jot down these four reasons. If you're not taking notes today, you can jot down these four reasons. All right, here we go, here we go. By the way, did you know our Water's Edge Church app has a little section called fill in the blank notes and you can actually fill in the blanks on that notes page and then you can send it to yourself or save it for later reference. Fancy, fancy. Speaking of fancy, I got so fired up, I forgot to tell you this. During this series, we are introducing a new feature. If you use your phone and you tap the sticker in front of you on that seat back, you can actually tap to testify. That's what I'm calling it. Tap to testify, trademark. Tap to testify. And if you tap, you can actually fill out a form and testify and share with us all the ways God's working, some of the things He's doing in your heart. And we'll be doing that all series long

where you can tap to testify. Yeah, I'm fired up about that too. You know what I'm hoping for? I'm hoping that by the end of the series, there's four weeks of this, by the end of the series, all of us, all of us, we wanna testify so badly. We gotta tell the story of what God's done in our life so much, we'll do whatever it takes because we want people to know what God's done. Four reasons why, why should you testify? Number one is this, when you testify, you honor God. It honors God when you testify, when you talk about Him, when you speak the name of Jesus, when you share with others what you've seen and what you've heard, what God has done in your life, it honors God. It's actually a form of praise and worship. When you open your Bible to the middle of your Bible, you find there the book of Psalms. And the book of Psalms is really just a collection of songs of praise and worship. The Psalms teach us to lift our heads and lift our hands to honor and praise God and lift our voice to honor Him. And this idea of testifying, it's all throughout the Psalms. I'll give you a little sampling. The Bible says this, it says,

give praise to the Lord, proclaim His name, make known or testify among the nations what He has done. You see, God is honored. God is praised when we just tell others what He's done. We just talk about the things He's done. Another verse says this, declare or testify His glory among the nations, His marvelous deeds among all peoples. I'll give you one more. The Psalmist said this, sing the praises of the Lord enthroned in Zion, proclaim or testify among the nations what He's done. What He's done. What has He done for you lately? What He's done for you? Oh, I don't really know. It's hard for me to say what He's done for you. Do you have breath to breathe? Did you wake up today? God's done something for you. And when we speak of what God has done, when we share with others what He's done, it's a form of worship. It's a form of praise. It's a form of praise and it actually honors God. It's a way to express gratitude. He wants you. He wants you to testify because it honors Him. It honors Him. I'll let you in on a little-known secret about testifying.

When you testify, when you open your mouth and speak of the goodness and the love and the mercy and the grace of God, when you share what He's done, it actually cultivates an atmosphere for Him to do more. It's like this in our services, those who engage the most during worship, those who lift their voice to sing out the praises of our God are those who are most ready to receive the Word of God when I stand up to preach. Did you know that? Because here's what happens, as you lift your voice to praise God, it starts to break up that hard ground of your heart. It starts to open your spirit up to the things of God. It starts to prepare you to receive the Word of God and the seed of God that's gonna be planted now in fertile soil, and it's all been cultivated because you opened your mouth to worship. And that's actually the way it works in life. I'm telling you, open your mouth and start to testify, and you watch, miracles will follow. You watch, you watch, it'll change the atmosphere because you're testifying and honoring God, and wherever God is honored, He favors. Wherever God is honored, He's present. So when you testify, you honor God. Number two, when you testify, here's the second thing that happens, you encourage yourself. This is why you should testify. You encourage yourself. You know this, your words very much impact your feelings. You know this, right? Your words, the things you say, very much have impact in how you feel, how you view your life, what your perspective is, your outlook, your emotions, and so something remarkable happens when you start to speak about what God's done in your life. The people I know that are most encouraged, the ones I know who have the best outlook on life, the ones I know who can shake off the stress and push through the difficulties and challenges, aren't the ones with the least amount of challenge.

They aren't the ones with the least amount of problems. They're just the ones who know in the midst of those problems that you can still declare God's goodness. You can still talk about His goodness. It's a way to encourage yourself. The Bible says this about David in the Old Testament, I love this, it says, David encouraged himself in the Lord, his God. He encouraged himself. Because how many of you know, sometimes you can't count on nobody else to encourage you. There ain't nobody else bringing encouragement, so I'm going to get on that encouragement train, choo-choo, and I'm going to lead the way, and if nobody else joins on, even if there ain't no caboose behind me, I'm going to be the engineer encouraging myself. I'm going to talk about what God has done. I'm going to remind myself of God's goodness in my life. I love that. The psalmist said this, let all that I am, let all that I am, never forget, never forget the good things God's done for me. Because we can forget it real easy. Life will make us forget. You notice that? Life will give you short-term memory loss. It will make you forget what God's done for you. You got to remind yourself by testifying. I love this verse, it says, I will praise the Lord no matter what happens. I will constantly speak of His glories and His grace. I will boast of all His kindness to me and let all who are discouraged, including myself, take heart. Because I encourage myself when I speak of God's goodness. You start talking about Jesus this week, and you'll start feeling better this week, I promise you.

You talk more about what God has done than the challenges you're facing. Talk more about how good God is than how bad the issues are in your life. Talk more this week about the power of God than the problems you're dealing with. I promise you, you'll encourage yourself and miracles will happen because you've created the atmosphere for it. God will favor those who testify. Number three, number three, where are all the parents? in the room. If you're a parent, raise your hand. I want to just see you for a moment. Parents, parents, parents, parents. That's amazing. I pray for you. I pray for you. No, I do. I do. I really pray for you. I pray because you've got an amazing calling on your life, parents. And the reason you need to testify, if you're a parent, this point's for you, parents. The reason you need to testify, number three, is you instruct your children when you testify. You instruct them. Man, the devil's done a great job of scaring you into not talking to your kids about Jesus. He's done a great job. He's convinced you not to talk to them about Jesus because maybe they'll ask you a question you don't know how to answer. Not to talk to them about Jesus because maybe they'll see something in your life that doesn't line up with Jesus's life, and then they'll know. He's convinced you not to talk to them about Jesus, so you've stayed silent about Jesus instead of testifying about Jesus. But that's the enemy's tactic. So today, listen, I'm going to give you permission to just testify about Jesus. Permission. You don't have to know all the answers. You don't have to be able to explain all the theological nuances. You don't have to give the treatise on the existence of God. No, no, no. In the problem of evil in the world, you don't have to know any of that stuff. All you have to be able to do is tell your kids how good Jesus has been to you, how much he loves you, how much he means to you. That's it. Just talk to him about Jesus. Just talk to him about Jesus. That's it. The Bible says this, let each generation tell its children of your mighty acts. Let them proclaim, let them testify your power. This is a story your kids need to hear. The bedtime story you should tell your kids is how good Jesus is, what he's done for you today, the opportunities he's provided for you today, how you love him today. The psalmist says this, he says, we will not hide these truths from our children, but we will tell them, we will testify to the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord.

And about his power and his mighty wonders. If there's any one thing I could help parents know today is this, not a single verse we've read yet about testifying. Not a single, single verse we've read about testifying has anything to do with you being an expert. Not a single verse we've read about testifying has anything to do with you knowing all the answers, with you being well-versed in the scriptures. Do I want you to be well-versed in scriptures? Do I want you to know answers? Do I want you to mature in your faith and have an understanding? Of course I do. Of course I do. But none of that, none of that is a prerequisite for testifying. Every single verse we've read in the scriptures about testifying have just been about what you've seen, what you've experienced, what you've heard about God. That's it. That's it. You just have to tell your story. You just have to tell how good he's been to you. You just have to tell how he came through for you. That's it. That's it. You just have to talk to him about Jesus. Because God wants you to open your mouth because you got something to say. You can testify. Fourth reason. Fourth reason. When you testify, you honor God, you encourage yourself, you instruct your kids, and then number four, you reach your people. You reach your people. You are God's plan to reach your people. And all of us have some people. We all have some people. Let me take it a step further. We all have some people, and some of our people really need Jesus. Oh, don't act like you didn't hang out with them last night. They need Jesus. And you know what happened? God put you in their life with a story of him working in your life so that you could reach your people for Jesus. The Bible says this about you. If you know Jesus, the Bible says, so we are Christ's ambassadors. You know what an ambassador does? An ambassador represents the one who sent him or her. That's what an ambassador does. They represent the one who sent him or her. And Jesus has sent you to your people to represent him. He wants you to carry He wants you to carry your story, your experience with Jesus, your life change with Jesus. He wants you to carry it to the people in your life. And by the way, he really wants you to carry it to your one more. Remember, we've talked about one more before. There's one more person in your life. one who is near to you, but far from Jesus and his church. And you're praying for that one more. In fact, we have these one more cards

out at the invite kiosk. You can follow the link for a digital version of this card online, these one more cards. They're reminders of who we're praying for, who we're reaching, who we're inviting, who we're telling our story to. You know, the greatest way to reach your people for Jesus is your story. Word of mouth marketing. Can we talk about it like that? If you own a business, you know, the greatest way to grow your business is word of mouth marketing. You can spend all the money you want to on advertising, on social media, on ads, on commercials, on print media. You can spend all the money you want to, but the greatest way to get your business to grow is word of mouth. Let somebody tell somebody else who tells somebody else who tells somebody else about how wonderful their experience has been. That's how you grow a business. You wanna know how we reach people for Jesus? Word of mouth marketing. He puts you in a circle of influence, strategically, intentionally, he placed you there. Not so that you will be silent, but so you will open your mouth and tell others what you have seen and heard, and their lives will be forever changed because of you.

Do you know that? There's a story in the scriptures where Jesus heals a man and the man's life is so radically changed by Jesus, so exorbitantly changed by Jesus, that he decides, I wanna go with you, Jesus, wherever you go. He's like, I'm gonna travel with you, Jesus, I'm gonna join the band and I'm gonna be on tour, and I'm going with you wherever you go, Jesus, I'm going to the next city, to the next city, to the next city, to the next city, to the next city, to the next city, to the next city, I'm going to the next city, to the next town, I'm with you wherever you go, I'm gonna quit my job, I'm gonna leave my family, I'm gonna leave my people, and I'm going with you wherever you go, which is kind of admirable, kind of amazing, kind of cool, but Jesus has a response that might shock you. Jesus looks back at this man who says, wherever you go, I'm going, I'm not going back home, I'm going wherever you go, and this is what Jesus says to him, Jesus says, go home. Go home, by the way, this is my favorite verse, my favorite verse to preach on the last day of student summer camp, y'all know about student summer camp? You got a middle school or a high school,

you better get them registered for student summer camp, and my last, my last sermon of the week, I love to preach on this verse, because I'd have been with those jokers for four days, they're smelly, they're nasty, you know all about them, you live with them in your house, and I just look at them and I'm like, go home, that's what Jesus wants you to do, go home to your own people. Jesus says, go home to your own people and tell them, tell them everything you've learned about me, everything you know about me, everything you've studied about me, all the books you've read about me, answer all the questions they have about me, Jesus doesn't say that, Jesus says, go home to your own people and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he's had mercy on you, and that's his message to us, open your mouth, because you have something to say, so say it, testify, share it, if you know Jesus, you have a story to share, a story of how he saved you, if you know Jesus, you have a story of a time where he came through for you, a time where you needed provision and he brought it, if you know Jesus,

you have a time where you needed direction and he provided it, if you know Jesus, I bet you there's a time in your life and you can remember it right now, that you needed to be encouraged and God sent a word of encouragement for you at the exact time, or you read a scripture that encouraged you, or you listened to a song on the radio, or somebody came by just the right time and you felt encouraged, if you know Jesus, I bet there was a time where you were anxious and you prayed and immediately felt peace, I bet there is a time in your life, if you know Jesus, where you were grieving and immediately you felt comfort, I bet you there was a time in your life, if you know Jesus where you were lonely and he provided you a friend or he became your friend, I bet there's a time in your life where you're scared and he gave you courage, there's a time in your life where you needed to say something to a friend and you didn't know what to say and immediately the Holy Spirit gave you the words and you spoke it and it changed their life forever, a time where the Holy Spirit prompted you to take an action

and you did it, there's a time when you came to a church service like this, when you sat in the seat you're sitting in today, a sermon spoke to your heart in such a way that you knew it could only be God. The lady testified after the service. She said to me, Pastor, 13 years ago, I was saved in this very building. Seat row number five, seat number three, she said. My life was changed. She testified. You know what I didn't say to her? I didn't say to her, quote, the scripture. I didn't say to her, explain to me exactly the process of regeneration. I didn't need to know the scripture or the regeneration. I just needed to know her story. That's how you testify. That's how you testify. So let me give you the homework for the week. Spring break is over, everybody. It's over, so it's time for homework. Here's your homework. You have something to say, so say something every day. That's your homework this week, every day this week. Set a reminder on your phone. Let the little alarm go off to remind you. Make an appointment on your calendar. Text your group members and say, hey, I need some accountability this week.

Text me at 9 p.m. every night and ask me, did I say something about Jesus today? And if I didn't, I'm gonna say it right then and there. Every day, say something about Jesus. And you watch what happens as you step into the flow of naturally speaking about Jesus. Every single day, it'll become natural to speak about him. You'll testify about him every day. Say something, because you have something to say. Okay, you got it, everybody? Okay, sermon's almost over. Take a breath. Thank God for waters as breath mints. Thank God for them. Okay, okay, I'm being a little silly because I'm gonna do something I've never done in 30 years of preaching. I've never done this except the last service in 30 years of preaching. And depending on how the next two minutes goes, I may never do this again, all right? So admittedly, I'm gonna take a bigger risk here, and I'm just gonna admit that to you. And if you love what we do to end this service in just a second, thank God for it, okay? We give him credit. If you hate what we do to end the service, blame me for it. All right, don't blame God, okay? It just felt counterintuitive to me to preach about testifying

and to tell you you have something to say, but never giving you a chance to say it. So I thought we should practice what we've learned today. We should testify. I thought of a bunch of different ways. Like I thought, well, we could just set a microphone up and say, come testify. Thought that was a good idea till I realized some of y'all would say crazy stuff. I'm like, no, we can't do that, we can't do that. I said, hey, do we have that little sensor button y'all can push in the back and little five minute delay, five second delay or whatever? They're like, no, we don't have that. So I'm like, okay, we gotta come up with a different idea. That's not gonna work. So here's what I came up with. I think you can do anything for 30 seconds. I mean, you can endure anything for 30 seconds. And so I'm actually gonna invite you to testify about Jesus to your neighbor. Pick one sitting around you online. You're gonna testify in the chat. Type out a little testimony, but to your neighbor, pick the one who looks like they're the most fun to talk to. All right, just pick one. I'm gonna give you 30 seconds to testify to your neighbor. And then I'm gonna give them 30 seconds to testify to you and then it'll be done, it'll be over with. All right, that's how we're gonna end the sermon.

So it's 30, if you're an extreme introvert, get Papa's Annex, here we go, all right? I get it, okay? I get it. You're like, oh my gosh. No, no, no, no, no, listen, listen. I'm gonna give you permission. I'm gonna give you permission. If this makes you like more uncomfortable than you can handle for 30 seconds, please don't leave or log off or anything. Just if this makes you more uncomfortable than you can handle for 30 seconds, just say pass. So if your neighbor looks at you, just look at him and say pass, pass. And don't get offended, all right? Don't get offended if somebody says pass. Just know they're not up for it and that's okay. And also we don't have equal numbers in the room. Like, so not everybody's gonna have a partner and that's okay too. That's okay to either just jump in and become the third person in that conversation or just sit this one out and it's just gonna take. One minute, and then I'll wrap us up. Here's my thought. If you can't testify about Jesus in here, you'll never do it out there. So let's just get into practice of it today.

I'm gonna give you, I'm gonna help you because some of you like, I don't even know where I would start with a testify moment here. So I'm gonna help you and I'm gonna give you some prompts and you're just gonna pick one of these three prompts. Okay, just pick one of these three. Like number one, you could just start your testimony like this, hey, one way Jesus has changed my life is, and then you just share it. And by the way, these prompts are gonna stay on the screen. So you can just read it off of there and you can just look at the person behind you and say, I'm gonna do number one, one way Jesus changed my life is, and then you're gonna talk for 30 seconds. Okay, or you can choose number two. You could say, hey, one thing Jesus has done for me is, and if you don't have an easy answer for that, you could just say, hey, one thing Jesus has done for me is he woke me up this morning, gave me breath to breathe, put a song in my heart, I'm here, that's it. Number three, or you could just say, hey, one thing I really, really, really love about Jesus is, and just fill that in. You just gonna choose one of those three. There's gonna be a little countdown timer on the clock and it's just gonna run us down to 30 seconds, that's it. And I'm doing that because if you're an introvert, I want you to know this doesn't last forever, okay?

It's just 30 seconds of uncomfortable pain. You're gonna make it through. And then at the end of the 30 seconds, I'll say switch and the other person will share online. You type it in the chat for 30 seconds and then read somebody's testimony for 30 seconds. I'm gonna just make a prediction. At the end of the minute, you're not gonna wanna stop. I'm telling you, I'm telling you, this is, I just experienced it in the last service. And it was like the Holy Spirit breathed through the room because we invited his presence by testifying about him. I'm telling you, it's gonna happen. 30 seconds and then 30 seconds. You got your neighbor, pick somebody, pick somebody, pick your prompt. The 30 seconds begins right now. Testify, testify to somebody. Okay, you got 10 more seconds. That's it, just 10 more. Testify. Okay, that's it, that's your 30 seconds. Now it's time to switch. The other person is gonna testify for 30 seconds. We're starting now. Just 10 more seconds. Three, two, one. You did it, everybody, you did it. Praise God, praise God, praise God. Praise you, God.

Come on, praise God today. God, you are worthy. God, you are great and greatly to be praised. You've done great things, God. Now listen, listen, listen, listen. Listen, let your life be a testimony. Let your life be a testimony. You have something to say, so say it, say it. How awesome, how awesome. You sense it? The atmosphere shifts when you lift the voice of Jesus. When you talk about it with your voice, the atmosphere shifts. Now, for some of you, this was difficult because you don't know Jesus yet, but today's gonna be your day. You've heard the testimony of somebody else, and now God wants you to have a testimony. Jesus wants to save you today. So bow your heads and close your eyes. We're just a few minutes late here, and I apologize, but I think God wants to move in your heart. He wants to say something to you. If you've never said yes to a relationship with Jesus, this is your moment. If you've never said yes to a relationship with Jesus, this is your moment. Would you give your heart and life to Him right now? If you'd say, pastor, I'm ready to do that. Right now, I'm gonna give my life to Jesus.

Would you shoot your hand high in the air? Because I just want to know I'm praying with you today. God bless you, how awesome. God bless you. Pray this now and really mean it. You can put your hands down. Just say, Jesus, I want to know you, and I want my sin forgiven by you. And I want to live my life for you. So come into my life, be my Lord and Savior. In Jesus' name we pray, amen, amen. Come on, everybody, let's thank God for all He's done today. ♪