A Disciple's Path: Walking in Witness

from my message on Nov. 24, 2013, from John 1:35-45

Brace yourselves.  I am about to share a very scary word with you.  Are you ready to hear it?  Ok, here goes.  Witnessing!

We have seen too many bad examples.  TV evangelists with hair that could preach Jesus.  Pushy people knocking on our doors, just wanting to share some literature with us.

We're Methodists.  We're uncomfortable with witnessing.  I can prove it by our Book of Discipline.  We used to have only 4 vows, only 4 ways that we said we would be following Jesus:  prayers, presence, gifts, and service.  It took us until the year 2008 to add the vow of witnessing!

And we're Westlake Methodists.  I mean isn't faith a personal, even private matter.  We don't talk about our faith.  And we inclusive, accepting.  We get along with people of other faiths or no faith.  We're afraid of offending others.

Today, we are finishing up this series on a Disciple's Path, the 5 ways we United Methodists say that we follow Jesus.  Today, it is witnessing.  I want to lower your anxiety about witnessing.  We will not be using any cliches.  You will not be asked to make cold calls on strangers.

In 1 word, witnessing is about relationships.  You will be asked to talk to people you already know.  I will give you 3 practical ways to witness.

The first is to connect our service, our missions projects with witnessing.  I told you last week we would revisit this topic today.  It is very simple.  We already do a great job of witnessing to our faith with our works. I am asking you to join words to the works.  Let me give you some examples.

We give out bottles of water or bags of grace to people on the street.  What if we added a message with them, a written message.  You don't even have to speak.  It might say, "This is a free gift to you, just like God's love for you.  This brings you refreshment, just like God's love.  We want to invite you to experience more of God's love by coming to worship with us at Westlake UMC, 1460 Redbud Trail, at 9 or 11:15 a.m. on Sundays."  That's not so hard.

Or it could be inviting someone to join you in  a mission project.  A young woman has been visiting us here.  She has a hard time getting her husband to come to worship with her.  However, when she invited him to join here for a Saturday at Habitat for Humanity, he jumped at it.  At the end of the day, he said, "That was so much fun. When can we do that again?"  People may not always join us for worship or Sunday School.  Their first step in faith may be joining us at a work project.  That's not hard.

In fact, I have been thinking about tweaking ReThink Church Day.  We have done this now 3 or 4 years, a time when we call off worship here and go out into the world to do mission projects.  What if this year, we invited someone to join us in that project?   They might help us feed the hungry or pick up trash or go singing or take care of the service animals.  It's not so hard.

 I would like for you to pray right now.  Who is that person on your heart?  Who would be the one that you could invite to join you in a mission project?  That's relationships.  That's witnessing.

 The second way we focus on relational witnessing has to do with the scripture lesson today.  John the Baptist already has some disciples, but when Jesus walks by, John names Jesus as the one to follow.  Two disciples do.  Andrew then finds his brother Simon, and tells him he has found the Messiah, and brings him to Jesus.  Philip does the same routine with Nathaniel, and brings him to Jesus.  So there is a chain reaction of people telling other people, people they know,  about Jesus.

Watch this video of Hector Ruiz, as he talks about those who told him about Jesus.

None of us got to know Jesus by ourselves.  Someone told us.  Who have they been in your life?  For Hector, it was his father and that Methodist Missionary, who became his spiritual mentor.  Who has witnessed the faith to you?  I know Thanksgiving is coming up in a few days.  Pause know and give thanks to God for those witnesses to faith in your life.  Then this becomes part of your witness to others.

Let me share part of my story.  I was baptized as an infant in the Methodist Church, confirmed at age 12.  I was always part of the faith community.  But I had my doubts. When I was a junior in high school, there was a girl name Sharon, the first girl I ever kissed, a Church of Christ girl (yes, God works outside the Methodists).  I told I wasn't sure about going to heaven.  She said I could be sure.  That planted something in my.  The next year I dated a Baptist girl (yes, not a Methodist).  She showed me a verse in the Bible that led me to an emotional conversion.  It was Ephesians 2:8-9, For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God--not by works, lest anyone should boast.  I had always try to earn God's favor, to prove that I was good enough for God to love me.  I was set free.  Salvation was a gift.

Later at A & M, I found a home at the Wesley Foundation, the Methodist Student ministry.  The campus minister there saw gifts in me, gave me a leadership role as we Aggies would go out and roof a little country church on a Saturday.  He asked me to consider ordained ministry.  Later, a seminary, my Hebrew professor let me see the layers of meanings behind the words of the Bible, an intellectual conversion.

Those persons who led you to faith become part of your witness to others.  You didn't get here by yourself. Others don't either.  It's about relationships.

The third way of relational witnessing is listening, about meeting people where they.  So each week on this disciple's path, I have been telling you a story from our 10 weeks of renewal leave this summer, from the Appalachian Trail, or climbing mountains in New Mexico.  The story this week is off the trail, what we did when we weren't hiking.  Cathy and I got hooked on the West Wing on Netflix, streaming video.  We did binge watching.  There are 7 seasons of the West Wing, 22 episodes a season, for a total of 154 episodes.  That's a lot of intrigue and political maneuvering in the White House over a summer.

The chief of staff is Leo Magarity, a recovering alcoholic.  He joins one of his staff members in their pain and tells a story.  There once was a man who fell into a hole.  Help, help, he cried.  A priest was walking by.  Help me, Father.  The priest wrote out a prayer and tossed it into the hole.  The man cried, Help, somebody, help me.  A doctor walked by, heard the man, wrote him out a prescription and tossed it into the hole.  His friend, Joe, was walking by.  Joe, help me, I've fallen into this hole.  Joe, jumps down into the hole with him.  Why did you do that?  Now, we both in the hole.  Joe responds, Yes, but I've been in this hole before, and I know the way out.

We listen to people in their need, their pain.  We meet them where they are.  And we help to show them a way out. That's witnessing.

Each week, I have been focusing on some shoes for walking this path.  Today, I am wearing my most comfortable shoes.  These are Rockports, probably 20 years or more old.  I polish them, replace the shoe strings, get them resoled.  They fit me.

That's how we do witnessing, in the way we are most comfortable.  It has to fit us.  We have to be genuine, authentic, credible.  Our witness has to fit like these shoes.

I have given you 3 ways to witness. There's a world in need of good news out there.  Amen.