Share Your Story

This is a little bit out of order than the original post. I talked about spending time with God, spending time with others, and then sharing your story. However, we have to talk about sharing your story before we can discuss spending time with others. So the question is: what does it mean to share your story?

At face value, you look at the statement and you automatically think about yourself, right? Your story, the things in your life, that have happened to you, things that you’ve learned, but the reality is it isn’t even your story… it’s God’s.

Last week, we discussed how God has literally done all of the work to establish communication and a relationship with us and He asks us to respond to Him by reading His word and by praying. Thereby establishing our part of the relationship. The more that we learn about God, the more time we spend with Him, and the more our lives are shaped by Him. This is a continual, ever and ongoing process as we walk through life itself. So our story is only ours because it happened in our life. But it is, in effect, the work of God in our lives, in both what we do and how we do it, that we are sharing when we share our story. So it truly is His story.

Every Christian should be making this a habitual part of their daily lives. Now, I understand that this can be a very difficult thing; talking to other people, let alone sharing your faith, can be very overwhelming. Overwhelming or not, we are called as Christians to be a faithful example and a truthful, clear proclamation of the one who saves our soul, and changes our life and sustains our every movement (Ephesians 5:1-2 clearly asks us to be imitators of God. It does not say, imitate God whenever you feel like it! John 13:16 tells us that Christ gave us an example and we are to follow it. Period).

The reality is, even those who are overwhelmed by talking to people can talk about something, something they enjoy or appreciate. And if that can be shared (or spoken to another person), then why not God? This God who literally saves us from death. This God who provides our every need. This God who laid down His life for us. Who shows extravagant love towards us!

How can we not share Him with others?

This is exactly why, in the Student Ministry, we work on this, every year. We specifically set time aside for students to work on their story, walking them through their lives in an observant manner. First, we put it in writing. We hone it using the following: your story should be something simple, something clear, something understandable, and something relatable (And honestly every Christian should be practicing this way).

Once each student is comfortable with their written story, then it makes it so much easier to verbally share it with one person. Slowly, one person becomes two, two becomes three, three becomes four, and I think you get the idea.

Ultimately, our goal is to help the students get to a point where sharing their story is as easy as telling someone their name and where they live. They will be able to share their story when they are sitting in their homes, playing at school, enjoying a stroll through the park, or when they are staying with friends.