In church today, we were learning from the end of John’s gospel, chapter 21 verses 1–14.
Here, seven of Jesus’ apostles (John calls them ‘his disciples’) are waiting in Galilee after Jesus resurrection, probably because the angel told them he would meet them there (see Mark 16:7). While they’re waiting, they decide to go out fishing — Jesus has risen but they still have to eat, after all! It is as this night’s fishing is drawing to an end that Jesus chooses to make his appearance. He uses their experience fishing to teach them what every disciple needs to know for the work of ‘fishing for people’ that Jesus has given us. If you want to hear more, you can watch the live stream.
Christians have great good news: we can be God’s children with our sins fully forgiven only by believing in Jesus, who died for us and rose again. Sharing this news is the job of every Christian, not just a few special ‘evangelists’. God the Father is in the business of bringing the whole world safely into the shepherding arms of his Son (Ephesians 1:9–10). Wonderfully for us, God has chosen to use all his children in his mission to do this. There are plenty of places where Jesus explains the plan and we can see it being worked out in Acts. But let’s have a quick look at two verses in Paul’s letter to the Colossian Christians, where it is put very succinctly.
Be wise in the way you act towards outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation always be seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
Here we can see that Jesus’ strategy involves Christians acting wisely and well. Elsewhere, Paul will write that good living ‘adorns the good news’ (Titus 2:10), i.e. attracts people to its truth. The essence of the plan is Christians sharing the good news about Jesus in ‘salty’ conversation. What on earth does that mean? Well, salt preserves food, or we could say ‘saves’ it. Having conversation that is seasoned with salt means sprinkling our conversation with the message of salvation in Jesus. If we’re ready to do this, then we can ‘make the most of every opportunity.’ Whether we’re at work, in the pub, or a family gathering, Christians won’t just talk about the sport or the weather — we’ve got something so much better to talk about! And the brilliant thing: Jesus promises to be there with us by the Spirit living in us adding his life-creating power to his words that we speak.
Ok, so now I’m finally going to get to the reason for writing this post. How can we be prepared so we can have ‘salty’ conversations without it feeling strained or weird? The key is to have practiced explaining the good news plenty of times. If we are confident with the content, we can easily adapt the way we say things or what aspect of the good news we include to suit the conversation as it progresses. One way that many Christians have found to be helpful here is to learn a short gospel outline. I have often used one called Two Ways to Live. I made six videos back in lockdown teaching this outline back in lockdown as a Thought for the Day series. Be warned… I have a serious lockdown (lack of) haircut!
The images that go with the 6 bible verses and explanation in this outline are designed to be so simple that you can draw them on a napkin. But you can also buy little leaflets if you want to. Or there is a web app you can call up on your phone:
Finally, Andrew made another series of videos early on in the first lockdown which tackle a little more generally the topic of sharing our faith. I recommend them to you.
Sharing our faith videos
Andrew's six videos providing encouragement and teaching in this area.
While we work hard to making sure we’re ready to always give an answer for the hope that we have, let’s remember that unless we remain joined to Jesus, we can do nothing. We’ll be able to love our friends, family, neighbours and colleagues best if we keep coming to him for food. His word sustains us and that is why we meet every Sunday to hear him and encourage one another.