What if God isn't asking us to make big changes in His world? What if God is using us to make small changes? God is not absent from the world He created; He is present and He is at work. He does not need us, but yet He delights in using us to accomplish His purposes. So what does it looks like to make small changes for God? It starts with expanding our every day world. Bestselling author Erwin Lutzer recently described four steps to expand our world.
Here are Four Steps to Expand Your World According to Dr. Erwin Lutzer:
1. See with Your Eyes
Christians should actively pursue opportunities for the gospel. We should be looking for those in need as Jesus did. Jesus looked at human need, and He ministered to crowds and multitudes. Dr. Lutzer explains, “What you are in your heart determines what your eyes see.” If your heart is only focused on you or your family or your job, then that is all you will see. We can miss opportunities to take part in God’s work by not seeing the world through God’s perspective.
When Jesus tells a lawyer in Luke 10 the story of The Good Samaritan, He points out that first a priest and then a Levite saw a man left for dead by robbers. The passage says they saw him…but passed by. They had eyes only for their own need, but another man, the most unlikely of the three—a Samaritan, had compassion and showed the man mercy. Jesus told the lawyer, “You go, and do likewise.”
2. Feel with Your Hearts
It’s not enough just to see, we also have to feel compassion in our hearts. It is compassion that prompts action. Matthew 9:36 tells us, “When he [Jesus] saw the crowds he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”
What kind of world do we live in? Dr. Lutzer describes it as a crowded world (nearly 7 billion people), an urbanized world, and a suffering world. This world is full of poverty, natural disasters, starvation, abuse, persecution—it is a world filled with pain. But we are not called to look out for ourselves and our own…we are called to look upon this world as Jesus did and have compassion.
3. Go with Your Feet
In Matthew 9:37, Jesus says to his disciples “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” This passage tells us the harvest is plentiful…that there is work to be done; it also tells us that Someone is already at work in the harvest, and He is in charge of sending out workers to His field. It is God who sends out laborers to work in His field, and we are to pray for more to be sent including ourselves.
What does this look like in action? It looks like going into neighborhoods and areas of need, participating in local ministries, and giving or going with international ministries. But good works are not enough, we have to share God’s message with our mouths.
4. Speak with Your Mouth
We have seen that people are in need, and we know that they need more than our good works. They need us to explain the gospel; they need to be invited to the story. Only God can transform hearts, but He is constantly preparing hearts to hear His message—an amazing opportunity He so graciously shares with us and desires us to take part in. If you’re wondering if the need to speak is really that great, Dr. Lutzer puts it this way, “Do we understand what it’s like to be disconnected from God? Groping to try to find him but not knowing how.” Do you remember what it was like before you or someone in your family accepted Jesus as their Savior?
Dr. Lutzer states that it’s as simple as befriending someone and asking them, where are you on your spiritual journey? We don’t have to have all the answers, but when we ask questions we start to build bridges toward relationships. Dr. Lutzer also comments that he’s never had anyone say no to this question: “Would it be OK if I share with you something that somebody once shared with me that changed my life?” Try to think of three or four non-Christians that you know and want to pray for, and then ask God to send you as a laborer in His field.
The most important thing to remember is that this is God’s harvest not our harvest. He is at work preparing hearts to hear His Truth, and He calls us to be co-partners—something we are incredibly unworthy for, but by His grace are included in. We must ask God to break our hearts for what breaks His; we must pray for opportunities to show compassion to those whom He loves. God allows us to make small changes in His big world by sharing the testimony of His great truth and grace with those whom He has prepared to hear. Will we let those opportunities pass us by, or will we see, feel, act, and speak with His mercy?
Written by Liz Kanoy, editor for Crosswalk.com. Sponsored by Moody Bible Institute Distance Learning. Learn how others are serving God in their communities. Find out more about Moody’s online classes.
Publication date: February 12, 2016