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"And when Jesus came to the place, He looked up and saw him,
and said to him, 'Zacchaeus, make haste and come down,
for today I must stay at your house.'"
(Luke 19:5)
Last Monday, on February 24, I preached at a "Who's Your One" conference in Frankfort, KY. I flew out of Austin after church on Sunday, had some flight delays, and got to my hotel at 1:00 a.m. Up early the next morning, I had my quiet time and was at the church by 8:30 a.m. The pastor of the host church, Dr. Hershel York of Buck Run Baptist Church, shared a wonderful message from Luke 15. After I spoke on Matthew 4:19, Pastor Ted Traylor from Olive Baptist Church in Pensacola, FL, preached from Acts 28. Then Dr. Steve Gaines, pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church, closed out the morning. I was so inspired by these men and their teaching. (We will host a "Who's Your One" conference September 13-14 here at GHBC in Austin, TX, and I am looking forward to it.)
Whenever I fly, I ask the Lord to place me next to the person He wants me to sit beside. Things have changed through the years because more and more people put headphones in their ears and listen to music or watch a movie, and well, it is hard to talk to someone when they are otherwise occupied. But on this trip to KY and back, I had great conversations with three different people. The first was a lady named Laura who works as a social worker. After she told me about what she did, I said I was going to give her a pop quiz to see if she could guess what my occupation was. I asked her whether she thought I was a history professor, a pastor, or a banker (not sure where I got the "banker" option… haha). Laura told me that she knew I enjoyed history because I was reading Ron Chernow's Grant, a "tiny" book of only 1,000 pages! I had also told Laura that I had read two other books written by Chernow and he was an excellent author. I absolutely thought she was going to say I was a history teacher, but that is not what she said. She nailed me. She said, "You are a pastor." I then asked if she would share with me some of her spiritual beliefs, and she told me of having been forced to go to a Catholic church when she was young. So, I shared the grace Gospel of Jesus with her, and we had a great conversation. (I had one man tell me on an airplane one time when I asked about his religious background that he was a member of the largest church in America; "I am an inactive Catholic," he said.)
The other two people I had conversations with were both Christians. Melissa is a member of Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, and Brie is a staff member at a local church here in Austin. We had great conversations, and I was reminded of something I used to tell my students when I taught evangelism in two seminaries: when you witness to someone, one of two things is going to happen: either you are going to get to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ, if they are open to hearing it, or you will get to have fellowship with a brother or sister in Christ. Both are wonderful!
When Jesus told Zacchaeus that He must go to his house in Luke 19:5, it was urgent that He do so. Jesus wanted to obey the Father and go tell this tax collector about eternal life. The word Jesus used in Greek is dei, which means necessity and oughtness. It is the same Greek word Jesus used when He told Nicodemus in John 3:7 that he must be born again.
Do you have this urgency, this sense of oughtness to tell others about Jesus? I think it is pretty much impossible for a follower of Jesus who prays, reads the Word of God, is filled with the Holy Spirit, and walking in obedience to God to not share the Good News with the lost. However, the opposite is also true. It is nearly impossible for a Christian who is out of fellowship with Christ to share the Gospel with others. When we follow Jesus, we fish for men. When we do not follow, we do not fish.
Who is your one today?
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