What does it mean to 'witness' to people?

[gowinsouls]

Originally Posted by Ronzo

They're also not the only scriptures in the bible so... have a nice day...

OOOPs I didnt mean for you to be offended.. Please point out the other scriptures. Sorry again if I offended you.

[gowinsouls]

Acts 17:6
And when they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also;

Proverbs 11:30
The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life; and he that winneth souls is wise.

Proverbs 14:25
A true witness delivereth souls: but a deceitful witness speaketh lies.

Proverbs 24:11
If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death, and those that are ready to be slain;

Ezekiel 3:18-21
18When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.

19Yet if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul.

20Again, When a righteous man doth turn from his righteousness, and commit iniquity, and I lay a stumbling-block before him, he shall die: because thou hast not given him warning, he shall die in his sin, and his righteousness which he hath done shall not be remembered; but his blood will I require at thine hand.

21Nevertheless if thou warn the righteous man, that the righteous sin not, and he doth not sin, he shall surely live, because he is warned; also thou hast delivered thy soul.

Matthew 4:19
And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.

Matthew 5:13,-15
Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.

14Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.

15Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.

Matthew 10:27
What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.

Matthew 22:9
Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the marriage.

Luke 10:2
Therefore said he unto them, The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest.

Luke 14:23
And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.

John 20:21
Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.

John 15:27
And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning.

Acts 1:8
But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.

Acts 26:17 - 18
Delivering thee from the people, and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee,

18To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me.

Luke 15:4
What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it?

Luke 24:47
And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.

1Corinthians 3: 6.9
I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.

7So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.

8Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.

9For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.

2 Corinthians 5:11
Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are made manifest unto God; and I trust also are made manifest in your consciences.

James 5:19-20
Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him;

20Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.

Jude 1:23
And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.

bump

[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by Ronzo

What does it mean to 'witness' to people?

Is it truly a biblical command to do it the way we do? Or is it a misconstrued, misunderstood concept?


Is there something deeper here that lies below the surface?

What is the way we do it? You left that part out.

I think thewayofthemaster does a good job of how biblical witnessing should be done.

[MissBrattified]

Originally Posted by Ronzo

What does it mean to 'witness' to people?

Is it truly a biblical command to do it the way we do? Or is it a misconstrued, misunderstood concept?


Is there something deeper here that lies below the surface?

To me...it has a dual meaning of both sharing the Gospel with others verbally or otherwise, and living the Gospel before them.

I'm not sure that its a biblical command to "do it the way we do"...that is, I think how we go about sharing the Gospel will have to be relative to the culture we live in and the people we are sharing it with.

[MissBrattified]

Originally Posted by gowinsouls

None of these scriptures show a way to win souls by looking nice, by being nice or by living right. We must go to win the lost!

These two scriptures kind of popped into my head....

I Peter 3:1 "Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word [something said] be won by the conversation[behavior] of the wives;"
I Peter 3:2 "While they behold your chaste[clean, innocent, modest, perfect] conversation[behavior] coupled with fear."

John 13:35 "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another."

It appears to me that the way we behave toward one another, and how we live has a significant impact on our ability to "witness", and in fact is witnessing, although I'm sure that isn't the end of the definition. Further, for wives of unsaved husbands, the way I understand this scripture to read is that a husband can be won to Christ without even having to speak to him about it, simply with chaste behavior coupled with respect. (I think "fear" means respect, but I could be wrong....)

Originally Posted by Praxeas

What is the way we do it? You left that part out.

Everyone does it differently... how can I tell you the way you do it?

That's the purpose of discussion... to bring that type of thing out, right?

I'm not going to make assumptions openly on the forum, just so I can be lambasted for making broad brush comments.

Let each person pipe in and say for themselves.

[gowinsouls]

As posted on another part of this forum, here are several affective ways I win souls. I hope its ok to post in this subject which ask how to win souls.

Free affective and Powerful ways to reach souls in your church!

These programs and more are free and listed on www.gowinsouls.com For more information please contact Brother Tim Downs tim@gowinsouls.com

1.)
Backslider or Prodigal Program
This is a program designed to reach out to all of the backsliders in your area. Basically we are getting together a list of all the people who have left our churches and sending them the first month a CD with music and a card and each month after you will be sending them a card. With the list of backsliders you will want to distribute this to all the saints to use for a prayer guide. We will want to pray for each person on our list daily.

It is important for the Pastor to remind the church regularly about the need for backslider’s information.

2.)
Sunday School Seed Program
This program reaches into the homes of our Sunday School children through a packet that is created to send home as a seed. Basically we make up folders that have the following information in them and send them home to each family of the children who come to our Sunday Schools. This program is very affective and is a great way to reach the parents of our children! Here is what we suggest putting in these folders. You can get the folders at any office store; they have the pockets on the inside.

a. Music CD
b. Bible Study ( Tim’s Bible Study is free and affective)
c. Letter From Pastor
d. Church Bulletin if you have one each week
e. Church Schedule of Services or Events calendar
f. McDonalds gift cards if affordable

3.)
Court House Program
This program is very affective. You want to have a couple of people working in this program. You will want to find out the schedule at the court house for all of the court sessions i.e... Criminal, Divorce, Bankruptcy and Traffic. One thing you can be sure of when people are going through any type of situation that brings them to court they are in need of prayer and willing to receive it! If you have people who can stand outside of the court room with a name badge from your church and possibly a nice sign that says “Prayer Request Taken” they can greet people and have a nice little book to record the prayer request of the people. In most court situations you have the person going to court and also their families, this is a great way to serve your community and show your church loves people and is willing to pray for them. The person who does this should make sure to dress nice and be very friendly and compassionate. Be sure to have plenty of church cards to offer people.

4.)
Free Cooking Class
This is a program that your older or younger ladies can do. If you have ladies auxiliary they can head this class up. Many times the elderly ladies do not feel there is a program for them to reach souls, here is one they can use! You will want several women to get together and have recipe cards of simple things they can prepare. Make up flyers that are exciting and tell people your church is offering FREE COOKING CLASSES! Take these flyers to all of the battered women’s shelters, wick offices, welfare offices or anywhere single and hurting mothers will be found. In the class you will just basically have one person per week show how to prepare one recipe. You will want to show the women how to make it and then sit down with them and fellowship and eat it. The first thing you will want to do is teach them to pray before their meals! Also you will not want to preach to them, use this as a fellowship tool, have some soft Christian music playing in the background and just show your self friendly! Each week other women from your church can teach her recipe.

5.)
Learn the English Language FREE!
This program will be very helpful in the next few months. We are seeing more and more Hispanic families in our communities and we can reach them with this type of ministry. Basically you will need someone who knows Spanish. They do not have to be a teacher or professor just someone who can speak and write Spanish and English. The person will want to teach 10-15 words per week. You can advertise to every Hispanic person in your area with flyers and news print. Once you have a group of people coming make sure to love them and let them know about your church services.

6.)
Sunday School Give Away Program
This is a very affective program to build you Sunday School. You will want to have a give away at your church and make flyers that list the items you will be giving away. Make this exciting, do not use words like Acts 2:38 and One God and all the other religious terms, just advertise Blessing Our Community Through Giving. You can give away a couple of hundred dollars worth of prized and reach many souls! We have a sample flyer on our web site that you can use. (www.gowinsouls.com) You will want to hand out these flyers all across your community. Apartment complexes, stores, schools where ever you see people. One of the best gifts to give is a free bicycle. If you have 25 families in your church who will commit to giving a donation of $100.00 through a period of one year you can have a bike give away each week and be known as the church that gives away bicycles! It will not take long for the community of children to hear about that! Door hangers are very affective in this program and others to be affective in reaching tons of families! You will want to choose several apartment complexes that you can basically adopt. You will want to visit there each week, take fruit snacks or some type of free candy each week and a flyer. Stay in contact with the children! You can purchase boxes of fruit snacks from SAMS CLUB for $7.85 per box….each box has 72 packages of fruit snacks in them and are very affective in giving to people and opening up the door to talk to them.

7.)
Witnessing in Restaurants
This is an instruction sheet helping people understand how important it is to act appropriate in restaurants. Each person needs to have a copy of this! The Apostolics are not the only church that act crazy in restaurants however we look different than any other Christian so attention is drawn to us and the separation from the world is a way that people know who we are. We have to be very careful how we act in public and also use this time to be an affective witness. You can down load this at www.gowinsouls.com.

8.)
Youth Outreach Program
Each week we end up giving our kids 15-20 bux to go out with their friends after church to eat.

If you have 10 young people they can take $5.00 per person put it in a can and now they have $50.00. Take the $50.00 to Little Caesars Pizza, get 5 large pizzas for a total of $25.00 this is plenty of pizza for like 25-30 people....then you buy 2-3 12 packs of Coke and Mountain Dew....that will cost you another $15.00 you have $10.00 left to go to wal-mart and buy a cheap basketball.

Now you have pizza, soft drinks and a basketball, take it to a park where there are a bunch of people playing ball and announce you are having a FREE PIZZA PARTY and also going to give away a Basketball! You will meet tons of new friends, eat pizza with them and witness! Be sure you take church guest registration cards with you and church cards and flyers. You will use the guest cards to get information, you tell the people it’s for the basketball give away. Once everyone signs up and you eat have one of the guest draw the guest card for the winner. Now, you have all the information from the people who were glad to give it to you so they could win a ball, your youth have had fun and ate pizza and witnessed and it only cost them $5.00!

Of course if you have more youth or chip in $10.00 per person you can obviously have a bigger party...this keeps your youth busy reaching souls and not going to local restaurants complaining and talking about how terrible life is!

9.)
Sticky Notes
You can purchase sticky notes in bright yellow and have your church info printed on it for less than .1 cent per sticky note. You will want to make sure that the top line of text is in large letters and says “INVITATION”. You will want to list the church service times, phone number, web address if you have one and any other info, it is not recommended that you put a bunch of church words like REVIVAL, ACTS 2:38, ONE GOD, JESUS NAME stuff…yes we believe that to be the message however someone who reads your sticky note for the first time out of the world will not know what any of that means. You can use these sticky notes all over! Pass out stacks of 100 to each family and have them start sticking them everywhere! Here is one web site that carries these: http://www.bizforms.com/postit.htm

__________________________________________________ _______________

All of these programs will help you in reaching the lost. We do not believe these are the only programs that work, however we can say that they do work! Please feel free to edit them, change them or use them in any way to reach souls. I believe God has given me the wisdom to instruct many about reaching souls and I want to offer what he has taught me to each person!

We have many other ideas available on our forum, you can get there by going to www.gowinsouls.com and clicking on Our Forum.

These programs will not work by simply being good ideas, you must put them into place and use them to be affective. We must reach our world and we have little time left to do this! Let’s get busy church!

[mizpeh]

Originally Posted by MissBrattified

These two scriptures kind of popped into my head....

I Peter 3:1 "Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word [something said] be won by the conversation[behavior] of the wives;"
I Peter 3:2 "While they behold your chaste[clean, innocent, modest, perfect] conversation[behavior] coupled with fear."

John 13:35 "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another."

It appears to me that the way we behave toward one another, and how we live has a significant impact on our ability to "witness", and in fact is witnessing, although I'm sure that isn't the end of the definition. Further, for wives of unsaved husbands, the way I understand this scripture to read is that a husband can be won to Christ without even having to speak to him about it, simply with chaste behavior coupled with respect. (I think "fear" means respect, but I could be wrong....)

Excellent post. We are living epistles known and read of all men.

Our words and actions without mentioning the gospel speak volumes. Most of those I work with know I'm a Christian. Occasionally God has opened the door for me to witness of what He has done in my life and how He has changed me. But most of the time I try to live it before them and by all means not to bring a reproach on the name of Christ.

I'm working really hard on having a good attitude even if I'm being dumped on with a rotten assignment by not complaining, smiling, helping others, and trying to do all things as unto Christ and not men. Hopefully, I'm being a good example of the believers.