Sermon Tone Analysis

My Readiness Can Make A Difference

Today we continue with our difference maker teaching series.

During this series, we're looking at how your ordinary actions can have an eternal impact.

Today I want to talk about how God wants to use your readiness to make a difference.

That's right, your readiness.

Because if you think about it, God gives you opportunities, every day of your life, to be a difference maker.

Opportunities at work, at home, at the gym, or even at church.

Opportunities, every day, to make an eternal difference in someone else's life.

I want you to think about this.

What happens if God brings one of those divine appointments into your life, one of those God moments where you can talk about your faith, you can talk about Jesus, and you're not ready?

And you miss it.

I got to thinking about how in other areas of our life if we're unprepared, caught off guard, or we're not ready, how sometimes, when it happens in other areas, it can be funny.

Sometimes it's even painful.

So you see, not being ready can be a very painful experience but very funny for the rest of us.

Let me tell you, there is a time when not being ready, not being prepared is never funny.

That's when God gives you one of these divine opportunities to share your faith with someone, and you're not ready.

A person asks how was your weekend?

When you tell them what you did, they say, "So you go to church.

Why do you go to church?"

It seems like the words just don't come out.

Or a co-worker, they see you praying before your meal and they say, "Are you a Christian?"

You say, "Yeah."

They say, "Well, why are you a Christian?"

You just don't have the words to answer.

Or a person you know is going through a breakup or a really bad divorce.

They come to you and say, "Hey, look, you've got this peace about you that I don't have.

There's something different about you, I want it.

What is that you have?" and you don't know what to say.

You see, your readiness to share your faith is important.

I’ve heard people say, "I wish God would give me more opportunities to talk about my faith, more opportunities to share my faith," but let's be real for a moment.

God gives us those opportunities.

He gives us those divine moments every day.

The problem isn't the opportunities.

The problem is either we don't recognize the opportunities when they come or when they do come, we're not ready for them.

I have two goals today.

One, that you'll leave here today more aware of those opportunities that God is giving you every day of your life to be a difference maker and to share faith.

Then, two, I want you to leave here today more prepared than ever before to be able to talk about your faith and talk about why you're a Christian, why you love Jesus when those opportunities come about.

We’re going to do something fun this morning.

I’ll give you permission to draw in your notes.

That’s right.

Permission to doodle.

I want to illustrate for you some easy ways that you can be ready to share your faith when the time comes.

Now listen, if you're here today and you're not a Christian.

If you're not yet a follower of Jesus, I think you picked the perfect Sunday to be here, because before the day is over, you're going to know what it really means to be a follower of Jesus.

We're going to pull back the curtain.

You're going to see what a Christian really believes.

Go ahead and find your message notes.

They're in your program.

They look like this.

Go ahead and pull those out.

Let's look at a really cool story from the Book of Acts in the New Testament, Acts Chapter 8. From this story, we're going to learn some important lessons about why it's important to be ready if we want to be difference makers.

Acts Chapter 8, it's a long passage.

Follow along in your notes as I read it out loud.

It's the story of Phillip and the Ethiopian.

Phillip was one of the leaders in the early church.

This is an incredible story.

God provided this opportunity to Philip to share Jesus with this Ethiopian government official, we don't know but who perhaps was the very first African Christian.

Perhaps, he was the one that went back to Ethiopia and began the Ethiopian Christian Church that still exists today 2,000 years later.

This divine encounter may have changed the history of the world, but here's the catch.

If Philip had not been ready for this encounter, God could not have used him.

He would've been unable to use him.

Open your notes up to the inside and I want you to see our difference maker principle for this week.

Each week, during the difference maker, we get a different principle of the week.

This is this week's difference maker principle, "God uses me when I'm ready to be used."

Difference Maker Principle: God uses me when I am ready to be used!

If Philip had not been prepared to talk about his faith, he never would've been able to introduce this guy to Jesus.

The truth is, if I am not ready, no matter how much I want to be a difference maker, no matter how much I want God to use me, God can't use me.

We have to be ready.

How do we ready ourselves to influence others for Jesus and change the world?

Look in your notes, three quick steps to readiness.

In fact, I want you to jot these down in your notes.

Three steps to being ready to make a difference.

Be Where God Wants Me to Be

This is physical readiness, being physically where God wants you to be.

Look, you can't influence who God wants you to influence if you aren't where God wants you to be.

God told Philip that he needed to go down to that desert, road that ran between Gaza and Jerusalem and Philip went.

God told Philip, the Holy Spirit said to Philip in Acts 8:29,

"Go over and walk along beside the carriage."

God told Philip go and talk to this Ethiopian treasurer and Philip did.

Now listen, God seldom speaks audibly and tells you exactly where to stand, but God does lead you to where He wants you to be.

In fact, let me say this.

You're where you are for a reason.

The people that God has put in your life whether they're co‑workers, classmates, neighbors, friends, or family, whoever they are, they're not there by accident.

God has them in your life for a reason.

He has you, your job, and your family.

He wants you there because he wants you to influence those people for Jesus.

You're where God wants you to be.

Be there, don't miss this point.

Be where God wants me to be.

Be Aware Of Who God Wants Me To Invest In

I call this "spiritual readiness."

Be physically where God wants you to be and then be spiritually aware of what's going on.

By this, be aware of who God is working on around you.

Go and join God in what He's doing.This is what Philip did in Acts Chapter 8, Verse 30.

Philip ran over and heard the man reading from the prophet Isaiah.

He asked, "Do you understand what you're reading?"

You see God was already working in the life of the Ethiopian treasurer.

I mean he traveled to Jerusalem to find more about God.

He is reading an Old Testament passage to find more about God.

God was working in his life and Philip was spiritually ready.