The soul winning tip today is titled Opportunity.
You see, as a soul winner, we have an opportunity.
We have an opportunity to go soul winning.
Soul winning is a gift that we are given,
and it's something that Jesus Christ wants us to do.
Second Corinthians 5 18 says this, says,
and all things are of God who have reconciled us to himself
by Jesus Christ and have given to us
the ministry of reconciliation.
You see, we were given this ministry.
We were given the ministry of reconciliation.
And what we ought not do is we ought not look this gift
horse in the mouth.
So point number one that I have for you,
I have three points real quick.
Point number one is that we ought to,
when we're out soul winning, watch for opportunities.
You see, we need to be vigilant looking for those souls
to save.
We need to be looking for the people in the cars that
are sitting on the side of the road when we're walking.
We should be looking for people that
are walking down the streets.
We need to be looking for these opportunities in our daily lives
with the people we run into.
We want to be able to give these people the gospel.
We need to take the opportunities when
they're available.
You're there in Acts chapter 8.
Look with me real quick at verse number 30.
Verse number 30 says, and Philip ran thither to him
and heard him read the prophet Isaiah's and said,
understandest thou what thou readest.
Philip was walking by, and he's seeing
the eunuch in the chariot.
He's seeing the eunuch looking and pondering
the things of God.
He's witnessed an opportunity, and he took that opportunity.
He didn't just walk nonchalantly over there.
He ran over to this person.
He ran over to this person and started giving him the gospel.
And not only that, but when we are out,
when we are looking for these opportunities,
we need to be ready ourselves.
We need to always be ready to give an answer to the people
when they ask us questions.
We need to always be ready to give that answer
and to preach the gospel.
Look at Acts chapter 8 and verse 34.
It says, and the eunuch answered Philip and said,
I pray thee of whom speaketh the prophet this,
of himself or of some other man.
Then Philip opened his mouth and began at the same scripture
and preached unto him Jesus.
You see, Philip took this opportunity,
and he turned it into preaching the gospel to this eunuch.
And that's what we ought to be doing when we're out there.
When we see these opportunities,
we always need to bring the conversation
back around to the gospel
because that's what we're out there for.
1 Peter 3.15 says this,
but sanctify the Lord God in your hearts
and be ready always to give an answer to every man
that asketh you a reason of the hope
that is in you with meekness and fear.
Point number two, well, number one,
we ought to be watching for opportunities,
but point number two is this.
If that opportunity doesn't present itself,
if there isn't an opportunity that you see,
you need to create that opportunity.
Turn to John chapter four, if you would.
In order to create that opportunity, we have to do what?
We have to capture the person's attention.
We need to get them to focus on us
and focus on what we're doing.
You know, we see this every day in our lives with salesmen.
We see it at Walmart.
We see it at home everywhere.
There's always people trying to capture our attention
and that's the way that we create the opportunity.
And Jesus actually did this himself in John chapter four
with the lady at the well.
You're there in John chapter four, look at verse 14.
It says, but whosoever drinketh of the water
that I shall give him shall never thirst,
but the water that I shall give him shall be in him
a well of water springing up into everlasting life.
You see, Jesus took this opportunity to say to this lady,
look, I have something that's very valuable.
I have something I can give you.
Do you want it?
And you know, at the time, yeah,
everybody wanted water at the time.
They wanted water that would cause them to never thirst.
So he captured her attention with that.
Look at verse 15.
The woman sayeth unto him, sir, give me this water
that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw.
So she wanted to hear what he had to say
because he created this opportunity.
He created something to capture her attention with.
You know, this always reminds me of a time
when I was out soloing.
It was in the evening and one of the first doors,
actually, I think it was the first door we knocked on.
I knocked on the door and this man named Jim
answered the door.
And once he found out what we were there for,
he started saying, no thanks and shutting the door.
But for some reason, it's like slow motion,
shutting the door.
And I seized this opportunity to look him straight
in the eye and with all earnestly, I said, are you sure?
And I yelled it out like that.
I said, are you sure?
And he shut that door, right?
So what do we do?
We just continue on.
We finished the street.
And in the end, when we were by our cars,
we were praying, here comes Jim, he's walking up.
And he says, you know what?
I am not sure.
He wanted to know.
I created an opportunity there to give him a comment
that would trigger his interest.
And he thought about it for a little while
and he came out to find out what I had to say.
As far as I know, Jim got saved.
He got back into church and he started soul winning.
He became a soul winner.
That's what we need to be out there doing.
Not only that, should we be watching for opportunities,
not only should we be creating opportunities,
but when we're out soul winning,
it's not about seeing somebody saved.
I mean, we all wanna see that.
It's about leaving those results to the Lord.
It's about the fact that we're actually
out there going soul winning,
that we're actually out there attempting
to give the gospel to people.
That's what it is.
Turn to Revelation chapter 14, if you would.
See, on this earth, as Bible-believing Christians,
there's only two different ways
that we're going to suffer in our lives.
We're either going to be suffering by the hand of the world
or we're going to be suffering by the hand of God, okay?
1 Peter 3.17 says, for it is better
if the will of God be so that you suffer
for well-doing than for evil-doing.
The Bible says that, look,
we ought to be suffering for well-doing.
We ought to be suffering at the hand of the world
for going out and preaching the gospel.
We ought to be suffering for doing what's right by the Lord
than by what is right by the world.
And if we choose to decide to go out and live in the world,
we're going to suffer by the hand of God.
And that's the end of the stick that nobody wants to be on.
So we're blessed by going, we're not blessed by producing.
Revelation 14, look at verse 12, if you would.
It says, here is the patience of the saints.
Here are they that keep the commandments of God
and the faith of Jesus.
The patience of the saints.
What is the patience of the saints?
That's doing the commandments of God
and keeping the faith of Jesus.
That's going out and going soul winning.
That's going out and doing what God wants us to do.
The patience of the saints is soul winning.
They that keep the commandments of God
and the faith of Jesus are the soul winners.
Look at verse 13, it says,
and I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me,
right, blessed are the dead which die
in the Lord from henceforth.
Yea, sayeth the spirit that they may rest from their labors
and their works do follow them.
The Bible says, look, the people that have the patience
of the saints, the people that are the soul winners,
look, they are blessed which die in the Lord.
They are the ones that are blessed
for going out and going soul winning.
And their works, the people they see saved
will follow afterwards.
It's not talking about you're being blessed
if you get a bunch of people saved.
It's talking about you're blessed for actually going out
and doing what the Lord wants you to do.
So, you know, I've heard it said that we're always
one generation away from the end.
I mean, we're all part of this ministry of reconciliation.
I would hate to be part of that generation
that chooses to fail at that ministry.
I would hate to be part of that generation
that actually fails in giving the gospel
and then the end comes.
So number one, we need to watch for opportunities.
Number two, we need to create those opportunities
if they don't present themselves.
And number three, we ought to leave the results to the Lord.
It's not about how many people you get saved.
It's about the fact that you're actually going out
and giving somebody the opportunity
to reconcile themselves to the Lord.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that we all go out.
You fill us all with your spirit.
Would you give us the words which we would have to say.
In Jesus' name I pray, amen.