STUDY SUNDAY: STEWARD THE GOSPEL

MATTHEW 18:12-14 [NIV]

What if I were to tell you it is not enough for us to be disciples of Christ and proclaim our salvation to other disciples? What we need to do is share the gospel to those who are unbelievers and may have never heard of it or have but you could give them more knowledge on the message and who Jesus is. But also, share your experience of salvation to them, so that the lost sheep are found. This is stewarding the gospel.

If you want to learn more about the concept of stewarding the gospel as you evangelise, keep on reading. As always using the SOAP Method to study the word today which is on the Parable of the Lost Sheep.

SCRIPTURE

Parable of the Lost Sheep – Matthew 18:12-14

¹² ““What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? ¹³ And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. ¹⁴ In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.”

OBSERVATION

Symbolism:

• “Sheep” = follower of Jesus + saved soul
• “Lost sheep” = unbeliever + unsaved soul.
• To God the ninety-nine sheep are not enough, for the lost sheep must also be saved.

Rhetorical Question:

• Jesus asked this rhetorical question to His disciples (v.12).
• The Lord’s answer to the question was also said in a rhetorical question (v.12) to get us to think to ourselves whether we believe that this is the heart of God. Would God really “leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off?”
• The Lord’s answer is simple, all souls must be won to Christ. This means everyone should be given the opportunity to hear the gospel message and to be saved. And from there it’s up to them whether they believe in Jesus or not.
• However, this rhetorical question was not just asked so that we understand the heart of God and His concern for the lost sheep but, it is to challenge followers of Jesus to steward the gospel.
• Jesus was talking to the disciples, and we are too His disciples. So, that also means He is talking to us.
• Thus, to steward the gospel means that the lost souls are supposed to find the gospel through us, who have experienced salvation.
• And then God does the saving of souls, as He sent Jesus to die for our sins, so that we do not perish but have eternal life in heaven (John 3:16).

Cross Reference:

• Going back off disciples of Christ having to steward the gospel – that is why we are given the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20). 
  • After Jesus had resurrected, before He ascended into heaven, He commanded the disciples (and this includes us also) to do these 3 things:
    • Make disciples – this is discipleship (if you want to know about discipleship read our discipleship blog post series).
    • Baptise disciples – baptism of water and the Holy Spirit (if you want to know more about baptism read our baptism blog post series).
    • Teach new disciples – be obedient of God’s commands.
  • This all encompasses evangelism – because when you spread the gospel to nations you are making disciples who will then want to get baptised; to be born again Christians. And then they will want to develop an intimate relationship with Christ by learning about Him through studying the word of God. And due to their love and knowledge of Christ, they will want to proclaim their salvation to unbelievers – evangelise.
• The gospel is for everyone to hear the message and to be saved – John 3:16.
  • The gospel is for everyone no matter their race, ethnicity, background, religion, gender, sexual orientation because all people matter to God – God so loved the WORLD; this includes everyone; the 7+ billion people in the world.

APPLICATION

With that being said, do you speak about Jesus to just other believers? Or do you make the effort to speak about Jesus to others who don’t share the same faith as you or even have a faith?

To evangelise it is not to just proclaim your faith to fellow believers.

Why share the light to the light when there’s people in darkness? The light is supposed to shine in darkness not in light.

It is about you having the compassion and empathy for people who are unbelievers, because it burdens you to witness others not living in this free gift that all are souls are desiring. The free gift being Jesus. So, it leads you to have the passion to share the gospel.

Look at Paul for example of who we can learn from and follow in his footsteps.

Paul was an apostle; he taught the word of God, but he is also profoundly known for his evangelism and we see this mostly in the Book of Acts.

In the context of Acts 17:1-31 [NLT], here are practical steps we can use and have when evangelising:

1. Preparation (v.1-2)
   1. It was Paul’s custom to go to the synagogue and evangelise.
   1. We should have the same mindset and approach. As I previously explained Jesus commanded us of the Great Commission. 
   1. Therefore, it is too a custom for us to evangelise. 
   1. So, having this mindset will motivate you to learn, study and pray on how to evangelise to be prepared and equipped to spread the gospel.
   1. Make sure before you go to evangelise that you pray for the Holy Spirit to give you boldness to preach the gospel in truth and love.

• Attitude (v.3-18)
  • Paul was persecuted and imprisoned for spreading the Gospel, but that did not discourage him to stop preaching and teaching the gospel after he was released.
  • He found a different crowd that were more open minded to hear the gospel.
  • This is the attitude we should have when evangelising, we shouldn’t get discouraged or get offended when people reject the gospel and persecute us for it. 
  • Jesus did warn us that we will face persecution for following and believing Him, because the same happened to Him and first (John 15:18-25).
  • But also, have the ability to let it go and move on (read our Faith Friday on Evangelism to understand this more). 
  • Although the gospel message is for everyone, don’t expect everyone to want to hear it and believe. But that shouldn’t affect you from not spreading the gospel.
  • In fact, it should make you have more of a burden and passion to share the gospel.
  • See, Paul was “deeply troubled” by the idols he saw all over Athens, which encouraged him to speak daily and debate about it with the people.

• Technique (v.16-31)
  • Paul connected to the people of Athens by interacting on their level.
  • Paul knew his audience, and therefore adjusting how he was going to preach the gospel in the way they would understand.
  • See, the people of Athens loved idols and philosophy (creating new ideas).
  • Paul used those two things together to deliver the message of the gospel.
  • He noticed that they had an altar that said on it “To an Unknown God” and realised that they had been worshipping a God that they didn’t know or have an idea about. 
  • Therefore, he used this to teach, preach and debate about the ‘Unknown God’ who was in fact Jesus.
  • Hence, when you evangelise make sure you are delivering the message in the way that is specific to the person and easy for them to understand you. Don’t use Christianese (Christian language that only Christians would know).

• Content
  • The main gospel message to talk about:
    • Jesus is the Messiah (Christ, God) (v.3).
    • He suffered and died for our sins and saved us from dying, but so we can have eternal life (v.3).
    • Jesus rose from the dead; resurrected (v.3, 18, 31).
  • Then you can go on to share things related to what the person you are evangelising to would connect with and need to know.
    • Paul talked about God being the Creator and that He is not crafted by human hands – because the people of Athens would craft gods as their idols (v.24-27).
    • Paul mentioned a poet that they knew who also believed in Jesus – as they loved poets, philosophers etc. (v.28).

PRAYER 

We must pray for the nations to come to know the Lord – you would start to have this burden to share the gospel when you begin to realise the value of the good news.

Look at it from this standpoint, if you had known 9/11 was going to happen and that the twin towers was going to collapse and burn, wouldn’t you have run and told as many people as you could, so that they could be saved and not die?

The same way as believers we have a valuable message to tell people and we should have the courage and burdened desire to share it with people, so that they do not die but be saved.

May prayer for you is that the Holy Spirit rests His power on you to be bold and have a burdened desire to evangelise the gospel message in love and truth, in Jesus name, Amen. 

If you have made it to the end, thank you for reading this far and I hope you have gotten some knowledge and insight on how to be a good steward of the gospel when evangelising.

Stay Blessed,

Divine L.