Latest / Time with God with John North / Talking To People About God Pt. 3

Transcript

Talking To People About God Pt. 3 · Time with God with John North

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Good morning. All this week we're talking about, as a Christian,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: having conversations about God with people in our lives.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: And we saw on Monday that actually people want to
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: talk about God. They want to hear about our experience
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: of God. They want to know what it means to
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: start a relationship with God. What does it look like
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: in your life when God is actively involved in your life.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: People are curious, and we should be sharing them.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: We saw yesterday that it's a basic part of God's
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: plan for you as a Christian to be a witness
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: about Jesus. Throughout the book of Acts we see.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Jesus' followers, just saying we're witnesses of these things that
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: we're talking about, and we too have had experiences of
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Jesus in our life, and how he's changed our life
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: and what it means to us to have had our
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: sins forgiven, to start a relationship with Him, to know
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: he's there with us as we go through struggles and
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: trials in our lives, what a difference that makes, just
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: be a witness to the people in your life.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: This is what Jesus wants for you. Well, today we
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  Speaker 1: want to go to the next step, and I want
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  Speaker 1: to give you a practical suggestion about having conversations about
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  Speaker 1: God with people in your life, and that is this.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Move your conversations forward with a question that invites people
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: to go deeper than the surface.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: Move your conversations forward with people with a question that
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: invites them to go deeper than the surface.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: We've commented already this week that nobody likes someone who
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: shoves their beliefs down other people's throats. So do not
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: be that person.
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: So how do you know who wants to talk about
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: God and life issues with you? Not everybody does, but
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: a lot of people do. Here's how you know. You
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: just ask a simple question that invites the conversation to
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: go deeper, and their answer lets you know how deep
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: they want to go.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Let me share with you a story that happened in
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  Speaker 1: our own lives. Our family moved into our current neighbourhood
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: quite a few years ago, and we knew that we
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: wanted to have conversations about God with people in our neighbourhood.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: A couple of years went by, we were so busy
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: with life, and we'd not really met many of our neighbours,
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: at least to go deeper than the surface in conversations
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  Speaker 1: with them. So how would we know which of our
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  Speaker 1: neighbours wanted to have those kinds of conversations? Well, we
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: sat down for a morning Bible reading time with our kids,
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  Speaker 1: and we said, guys, when we moved in here, we
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: knew God wanted us to be witnesses in our neighbourhood.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: So let's just pray that God would work it out
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: for us to get to know our neighbours, and that
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  Speaker 1: they'll be out when we're out, and we'll meet them
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: and get to have some deeper conversations with them. Let's
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: pray that that would just happen naturally. So we prayed
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: that together. It was great to hear our kids praying
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  Speaker 1: that along with us.
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  Speaker 1: When we finished praying, we were still sitting there on
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: our couches, and the front doorbell rang, and I thought, well,
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: who would be ringing the doorbell at this time of
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: the morning? And I went to the door, and there
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  Speaker 1: was the wife of one of the couples that lived
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: right next door to us, and we'd said hello to them,
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: but nothing deeper than that. Well, she said, hello, I'm
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: so sorry to say this, but
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  Speaker 1: I didn't realise your ute was parked across the street
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  Speaker 1: from our driveway, and I just backed my car into
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  Speaker 1: your ute.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: Well, great. So I walked out the front door with her,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: and as I was closing the door, I realised this
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  Speaker 1: is just what we prayed for. It wasn't how I
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: expected God to answer it, but we went out, we
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: exchanged information. She said, Oh, my, my husband's coming out.
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  Speaker 1: He'll talk to you. So I talked to him. They
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  Speaker 1: are an African couple. His name was Ibrahim, and I said,
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Would you guys like to come over for a barbecue
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  Speaker 1: on Tuesday? I know this isn't the way we wanted
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  Speaker 1: to get to know you, but
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  Speaker 1: And they were really keen. So they came over on Tuesday,
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  Speaker 1: and as you do, he came out with me to
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  Speaker 1: the barbecue as I was cooking sausages and lamb chops.
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  Speaker 1: And as we were out there, he said, what do
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  Speaker 1: you do for a living? And I thought, well, how
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  Speaker 1: can I share with him what I do? And I said, well,
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  Speaker 1: tell me, uh, your name is Ibrahim, that's Abraham. That
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  Speaker 1: means you probably have a Muslim or a Christian background.
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  Speaker 1: Which is it?
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  Speaker 1: And he said, Catholic, but we haven't been to church
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  Speaker 1: in forever, and I know we need God in our lives.
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  Speaker 1: You see what I mean by moving the conversation with
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  Speaker 1: a question that invites the conversation to go deeper, and
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  Speaker 1: they'll let you know what that led to a beautiful
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  Speaker 1: conversation about God. You can do the same thing with
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  Speaker 1: people in your own life. I'm John North.
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  Speaker 2: To go deeper in your faith, visit AFCI.com.au.