If you asked them, most Christians would say they want to live their lives on mission. But when it comes to what they actually do with their time, living on mission doesn’t seem to be a priority. The truth is that we all have things we want to do, but never do. Too often, there’s a gap between our intentions and our actions.
Why is there a gap?
Typically, the gap is built on excuses. Think about it: What’s holding you back from telling people about Jesus? There could be any number of reasons that you might give. But, when you really get to the bottom of those reasons, what’s left? Aren’t they really just excuses?
One day, Jesus told the story of a king who hosted a banquet and invited all of his friends to come. The king waited for everyone to show up, but no one came. Instead, “They all began making excuses” Luke 14.18 NLT.
One of them said that he couldn’t come because he’d just bought a field and had to inspect it. Another said that he had to try out the oxen he’d just purchased. A third person insisted that he couldn’t come to the party because he’d just gotten married.
Excuses are explanations for why you can’t do something. They sound rational; that’s why they’re also called rationalizations. Unfortunately, excuses don’t help. They simply keep you from doing the things that truly matter.
In life, important things are seldom easy. There’s usually a little bit of risk required. It may take some sacrifice to make progress in an area that you’ve neglected. That’s why excuses are such a problem. You can always come up with an excuse to let yourself off the hook from doing what needs to be done.
Leave your excuses behind
To start living the way you want to live, you have to leave your excuses behind. Specifically, when it comes to sharing your faith, it’s time to move beyond your excuses. Every time you give an excuse for not sharing your faith, you’re robbing yourself of the joy that comes from being obedient to God and sharing His good news with someone else who needs to hear it. Additionally, you’re robbing the other person of the opportunity to hear and respond to the good news of a God who loves them and has done everything necessary to restore their relationship with Him.
That doesn’t mean you have to be harsh with people. It also doesn’t mean that you should adopt a slick, canned approach to evangelism. It just means that you should be ready and willing to share the gospel when the Holy Spirit gives you an opportunity.
When it comes to sharing their faith, most people are held back by four common excuses: fear, busyness, indifference, and disobedience. These things tie people up in indecision and inactivity, and Satan couldn’t be happier about that.
This blog originally appeared at: Don’t Let Your Excuses Hold You Back – discipleFIRST and features an excerpt from one of their Student Series books, Reach Your World.
Because of the importance of intentionality in disciple making, we at Discipleship.org are going to emphasize this skill set and mindset over the next four months. Please join with us and seek to share understanding, insight, and practical tools so that you can become skilled at intentionality in relational disciple making and you can help those on your team or in your leadership group to do the same. There are four ways in which we are emphasizing intentionality to help you in the next four months.
- Discipleship.org City Tour Forums – our four City Tour Forums are designed to help you and your team both understand and develop an intentionality posture. The tour is comprised of one day, high impact forums where there will be teaching and round table discussions. Every attendee also gets a copy of Brandon Guindon’s new book, Intentional: Living Out the Eight Principles of Disciple Making.
Click the image below for more information.
Take the FREE Individual Disciple Maker Assessment – we designed this assessment with a team of national and international disciple making leaders to help each individual be able to evaluate their disciple making mindset and skill. Just by taking this assessment, you will gain an appreciation for the value of intentionality, along with a sense of how you can increase your own level of intentionality. Click the image below to take the assessment.
- Read the short FREE book, Becoming a Disciple Maker: The Pursuit of Level Five Disciple Making – Bobby wrote this short eBook with statistician Greg Wiens to help you understand the mathematical and practical impact of one person’s disciple making efforts and skills.
Click the image below to download this free eBook.
- Read Brandon Guindon’s book, Intentional: Living Out the Eight Principles of Disciple Making – Brandon wrote this Discipleship.org book and Zondervan is publishing, because the understanding and practice of disciple making is so crucial. Every attendee at each of our City Tour events (Nashville, Houston, Dallas and Raleigh), as mentioned above, will receive a FREE copy of Brandon Guindon’s book.
Click the image below to order Brandon Guindon’s book from Amazon.com.
Please join with us in this quest to better understand and practice intentionality. It will help us all to become more and more like Jesus, the world greatest disciple maker.