Discerning How To Pass Along Faith

Last week we talked about the wonder of passing along our faith and the impact that it makes not just on others, but in our lives too. While understanding the great impact this can make is wonderful, if you have never shared your faith with others or even for those of us who have but still get fearful at times, we often have a lot of questions about the “how” of passing along our faith. How exactly are we supposed to do that? What does that look like?

As we’ve talked about before the first step to passing along faith is to have a solid, growing faith of your own. How is your relationship with God? Are you spending time with Him? Do you talk to Him? Are you growing closer to Him? We can’t share what we don’t have. 

If our relationship with God is close and growing closer, that makes talking about Him to others a little easier. How many of us have a loved one or close friend that we never talk about with anyone? It would be a little weird to have known someone for years and never hear them talk about anyone that they are close to. That’s just not what we do. Now, I know that some of us are more introverted than others and may not talk about anything, including our relationships, as much as other people do, but even the most introverted around us share in spaces where they feel safe and with people they are close to. We’ve also probably encountered a few people who talk way too much about their relationships and nothing else, and that gets a little awkward, uncomfortable and taxing at times. 

The same things can be true of our faith, our relationship with God. If we are really close to Him, but never talk to others about Him that is a little strange. Talking about God should be as natural a part of our day as talking about anyone else that we are close to. Just like Deuteronomy 6 says, we should be making this a part of our day to day life throughout each and every day. Some of us tend to worry that if we talk about our relationship with God it will be awkward, uncomfortable or off-putting to others. While it can be, if we become like people who dominate conversations and always force their way back to talking about their own relationships and nothing else, if we allow it to be a natural part of our conversations with people just like any other relationship it usually won’t be as awkward as our fears try to tell us it will.

So how do we get to the point that talking about God and our relationship with Him is that natural? How does anything we do become more natural? Practice. Start small. As you are with people that you are comfortable with and feel safe with like family members, friends, and other believers, start sharing a little bit about your relationship with God: what you love about Him, things He has done or is doing in your life, something new you’ve learned about Him or He’s taught you. As we get used to having these types of conversations with people who we know will understand, it becomes more natural to us. We get used to talking about Him in ways that don’t feel uncomfortable or forced. The more we do this, the more it will start to become a part of our natural vocabulary and become easier to talk about with others who may not know God.

As we are building up this ability and desire to talk about God, hopefully we are also beginning to understand more about why we believe what we believe. The better we are able to understand the gospel and what we believe, the more effective we will be at communicating it to others. While we should never wait until we “have all the answers,” we should always be growing in our knowledge and ability to communicate the truths of God.

Another important aspect in how we pass along faith is similar to where we started with making sure we have a solid relationship with God. As a part of that solid, growing relationship with God, we also need to be living out that faith and relationship. This means learning and obeying God’s commands. As I like to say, He created everything and knows how it works best and because He loves you He wants the best for you which means following His ways. In seeking to do this, we need to let the Holy Spirit develop His fruit in our lives. Living with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, goodness, and self-control will set us apart. It will often lead to others wanting to know how we can act and respond in the ways that we do when we’re led by the Spirit.

While all of the fruit of the Spirit are important, as Paul said the “greatest of these is love.” As we seek to be obedient and pass along our faith, we need to actually love others and be interested in them. If we try to talk to people about God or share our faith with them just so we say we can or can say that we’re obeying God, then we are missing a big piece of the puzzle. Yes, we are to do this, but we are also called repeatedly to love others. In sharing our faith, we are sharing God’s love. When this is done without love and care, we become hypocritical and begin making our conversations about Him seem awkward, uncomfortable, and off-putting if we always try force our way back to talking about God.

This may seem like a lot. It can sound daunting or like we need to be perfect, but that is far from the case. The apostle Paul said this about himself in 1 Corinthians 2:1-5

“And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.”

If Paul experienced fear, trembling, and feeling weak, then we are in good company when we feel the same sharing our faith. Like Paul though, we need to allow the Holy Spirit to work through us and demonstrate His power. This leads us to one more important “how-to” for passing along our faith: Pray. We need to pray and be led by the Spirit. Listen to God and His promptings for what and when to share. Then ask the Spirit to give you the courage to obey and allow Him to speak through you.

As we are faithful to seek Him, grow in Him, and talk about Him throughout His day, we can trust that He will do mighty things in our life and in the lives of those around us.