Spring Conference 2015: Theme
CONFERENCE THEME: “MAKING CHRIST KNOWN!”
John 17.20 & Acts 8.4
Gospel missions is all about “MAKING CHRIST KNOWN!” This is what Jesus meant when He repeatedly commanded us: “And you shall be My witnesses.” To “be a witness” for Jesus Christ means that we are “making Christ known” to all those who do not know Him.
When Jesus prayed His commissioning prayer in John 17, He prayed not only for those disciples who were in His immediate company – who had come to know the Father through His own witness – but He prayed also “for those who will believe in Me through their word” (verse 20). In other words, Jesus prayed for all of us who have come to know Him through the testimony of those first witnesses who made Him known.
The apostle Paul passionately stated in Romans 15.20 that his personal goal to “make Christ known” to his entire then-known-world: “And so I have made it my aim to preach the Gospel, not where Christ was named [or ‘already known’], lest I should build on another man’s foundation…” In other words: “I am committed to giving my life to make Christ known to all the people in all the places where He is not known now!”
The first-century Christians modeled how every one of us should be personal messengers of Jesus Christ everywhere we go and to everyone we encounter. “Therefore those who were scattered went everywhere preaching the word” (Acts 8.4). Their “preaching the word” was not so much through their formal assemblies and services – though obviously they did preach Christ in their churches. But, they were “preaching the word / evangelizing” through their personal word-of-mouth conversations with other people – long before our current days of instant world-wide communication.
We are asking the Lord to inspire and challenge us all to make renewed commitment to use all the means of communication available to us to “make Christ known” to everyone in the world. So many opportunities are wide open and available to us all, especially through our electronic media. Literally, the world is at our fingertips with the stroke of a key. We must be using all means to “make Christ known” that we might “by all means save some” (1 Corinthians 9.22).
May God help us to embrace the same aim.
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