Day 25 of 50

READING GUIDE:

• Read today's devotion below and Matthew 4.
• During days 22-28 (at your own pace) read chapters 11 thru 16 from Joining Jesus on His Mission.
• After days 22-28, meet with your small group and follow the back-of-the-book discussion guide for SESSION 4.

"So Philip ran to [the Ethiopian] and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, 'Do you understand what you are reading?' And he said, 'How can I, unless someone guides me?' And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. Now the passage of the Scripture that he was reading was this: 'Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter and like a lamb before its shearer is silent, so he opens not his mouth. In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth.' And the eunuch said to Philip, 'About whom, I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?' Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning with this Scripture he told him the good news about Jesus." (Acts 8:30-35 ESV)

A number of years ago the church my family attended did a sermon series focused on evangelism titled, "Talking to Your Friends About Faith." I had the opportunity to teach a Saturday morning workshop during this series on how to do just that. In my opening remarks I shared that really we could change the title to "Listening to Your Friends About Faith" because when it comes down to it, listening is 90% of the conversation. In listening we better meet people where they are at when sharing the good new of Jesus.

And good news to you introverts, as Finke writes in chapter 14, "...a strong argument can be made that introverts are actually better suited for missional conversation--once the difficulty of initiating conversation is overcome--because they would rather ask questions and listen than hear themselves talking."

It is a short story, but look at what you read of Philip and the Ethiopian. Philip did initiate the conversation, but after listening to the Ethiopian and hearing what he was struggling with, "then Philip opened his mouth..." What a perfect example!

Finke closes chapter 14 with these words and a question, "Jesus can do more with two people who are talking with each other than he can with two people who are successfully ignoring each other. So, what kind of conversations are you having with the people around you?"

And speaking of listening, from reading Matthew 4, what do you hear Jesus teaching you? What act of faith is He challenging you to practice?