You’re a Witness

Welcome back to Ignite, everybody. I want to talk to you about the fact that you're in full-time ministry. What? No, I thought my pastor is in full-time ministry. I'm a businessman. I'm a housewife, I'm a teacher, whatever. I'm a student. Now, where we are, you're in full-time ministry. You just can't get away from that. You are a city set on a hill. If you're a Christian, there are some people, maybe not many. Everybody should know, but at least some know that you're a Christian. And if they know you're a Christian, they're judging God by your actions, okay? They do. That means everything you say and do. From the moment you get up in the morning, the moment you go to bed at is moving people under your influence closer or further away from God. That means you're in full-time ministry. You really are. You're a witness. You might be a witness for the prosecution, or you might be a witness for the defense of the gospel, but you're a witness. I watched a famous basketball star years ago to the point of being legendary who was totally misbehaving and did about everything wrong in his life and is still doing it to this day. It lost his career, and all, and Jay Leno asked him and said to you, you know you're a role model. People are watching you. He says, I'm not a role model. No, not me. Well, they're young kids a day that see him as a role model. And he hasn't been playing for 15 years. He's a role model. We have responsibility. You hear us talk, move everybody every day closer to Jesus. We do that either intensely or even unintentionally. I'll give you a good example. Christians like to go out together after church on Sunday, right? And so you get some friends together, a couple of families, couples, whatever. You know what? Nobody happens. You go. You probably stayed longer than you should because you're having a good time. And you're having such a good time. You're probably a bit louder than you should be. And you're probably more demanding. And all of our wives here, and you talk about God and church and all that. And then you walk out the door and you stiff the waiter. Give them a 10% tip. Do you know that waiter servers hate working on Sundays? You ask them ask any waiter. They'll tell you they hate working on Sunday. It's less now only because there's less of us going to church back in the days when everybody went to church. It was a huge problem. But here's a gal whose kids are at home, whose husbands at home, if she has one, even, and she wants to be with them, but no, she has to work on Sunday. And then all these Christians come in and talk about God. He's so wonderful, whatever, and keep asking for things. Oh, can we have some more of this and some more of that? And they leave. What do you think they did to that server and to everybody else in that restaurant? And corporately, you're really moving everybody further away from God without even realizing it. And that's just one example. It's done all the time without thinking. You're not even thinking about it. Who's standing right there? Who's watching you? You're in full-time ministry, folks. You need to understand this. Everything you do and say leads to people closer or further away from God. Here's the other side of that story. When we go to restaurants, we don't always do it, but every chance we get, we banter with the server. And then we say, oh, by the way, before we pray for a meal, we always ask our server, is there anything we pray for you about? And you know it's a crazy thing. We get answers. Everybody's hurting today. And so we get some really important answers back. And then we can pray for those needs. And so is there anything we can pray for you about? I got to tell you, more than a half the time, there's not just a response. There's an emotional response. And even for the few, and there are a few, I was saying, no, no, my life's good. You know, life's not good. Well, they're trying to make pretend that it is. And that's how most people are today. They're trying to have this premiere, but underneath. So what you can say is don't, don't, don't put them down for that. I don't argue with them. I'll just say, oh, that is so good to hear. And so Bob, we're just going to pray for you and thank God that that he's giving you such a wonderful life and he'll even open up more doors for you. And then love him for the rest of the meal, love on him, compliment him, generate your love on him, and then tip him well. And guess what? You'll move him closer to Jesus. People have a bad opinion of Christians. Most people don't like Christians. They don't respect Christians. If you Google, why are Christians so? Why are Christians so? You'll say, why are Christians so narrow-minded? Why are they so damning? Why are they so mean? Why are they so cheap? There's nothing about love. See, just said, they'll know you by my level. We're not expressing love for more. If they're not like us, we just go on and wear our bubble. We're having great time. And we're doing ministry. We're really doing wonderful things. And we're ignoring the world that all around us is lost. We had what I would just go and just a brief, I got a million of I could tell you. But we had this one that I've been telling quite often lately because it's just so remarkable. We asked the waitress and she said, yes, it has a problem. And she waits for some other people. She goes back and now I can take the time. And she explains that her best friend's a trucker, a couple of states outside, gets a call. His daughter's been found unconscious. By the time he gets back to her, he's really for about 20 minutes. She dies. Scripts don't work in those kinds of situations. Tell your life story. It doesn't work in those kind of situations. Fortunately, Luke 12-12 says, I'll give you the words to say when you need them. And in this case, I don't give my phone over at anybody. But I felt I should, I felt the edge. Sorry, but when I named out, I said, would you tell your friend to call me if he'd like, because my wife and I lost our daughter three years ago and we may be able to help him. So the next morning, he calls me and I won't use his name. But he's Mr. McGuire. This is his name. And he says, I want you to know, first off, I'm a Christian. Oh, good. And my daughter's a Christian. Oh, this is really good. He says, yeah, he says, but I want you to know this. I'm a car guy. And I feel like I know you. I watch you all the years on TV. I know you so well. And then I follow you as social media. And I see how you minister to people. And I even know that you lost your daughter three years ago. He says, can you possibly imagine the impact ahead on me a few moments ago when my best friend calls me and says, Barry McGuire wants me to give you his phone number and watch you to call him. I broke out laughing. I said, you know what? I don't need to say word. I do not need to say word. God's already said it clearly. God knows who you are. And he's going to walk you through this season of your life. And he said, you're right. You're right. And that's started a conversation with a truck driver in Kansas City that we it goes on to now. And he's serving the Lord and joy whatever. All of that happened because I asked the servers anything we could pray for you about. And how many people has that server told? Oh, and by the way, that server and the truck driver told me that his closest friend, this server at this restaurant has come back to the Lord. When you do those things, it just lights your life. It just gives you so much. I've got I keep saying, God, you just use me. I'm a I pedal car wax. He just used me to change the life of a trucker in Kansas City that I'll probably never meet. Wow. Until I get to heaven. It's just it's just it's just so much fun. So I just want you to understand. It's everywhere. When you're you know, I talk to pastors. They say, I you know, what you're out there about I'm a pastor. I'm in the church. I know you never go to Starbucks and stand in line or you never go to the drugstore or you're never in a waiting room or you know, ever where your ad is where God has directed you to be and you're in full-time ministry. And and the whole point of our ministry. And if we would all do this, we could ignite a miracle if I was so quickly, if we'd all just move everybody every day, close to Jesus. See you next time.