This weekend we've asked you as leaders to pray over, prepare and share your personal faith story with your students. As is often the case for many of us who want to do a "good job" with our students, we want to rely on notes, funny stories, something to connect with our students. Now, I will be the first in line to emphasize that when we share with our students we need to be relevant - we've got to know them as our audience. We have to recognize where they are, listen to their hearts and think about their spiritual needs. That word relevant gets thrown around a lot, especially in church circles. But can I challenge you to define the word relevant this way - REAL.

For this Sunday's session (week 3 of our Evangelism curriculum) you received a brief outline that is designed to help guide you through your time of sharing with your students. Unlike most weeks where you have specific material, questions, application, etc we are asking this week that you think about three simple elements to sharing your personal faith story. What we want you to do is incorporate these elements into your story as a model for what you will teach your groups in Week 4 (where they will learn to write their faith story). I want to give you these elements again and I've added some personal things myself to help show you how this can be done.

The first element to any faith story should answer the question, what was your life like before Christ? If it was me sharing, I'd say "I grew up in a strong Christian home and through the influence of family and their testimony for Christ I realized there was something different about my parents. When I asked them what it was, they taught me how Jesus had saved and changed them and I knew, even at the age of 8 that not only did I desire to be a person who followed Christ, I also realized my need to be saved because of my sin." That was my life before I was saved. I hadn't lived long enough to do a whole lot one way or the other, but I knew what was true. Your story may be similar, or it may be different. Maybe you were saved later in life and you were drawn to Christ BECAUSE of the life you were living. Either way, BE HONEST and REAL with your students. Use wisdom and tact as you share (Daniel 2:14) but be willing to tell the story - who you were before Christ came into your life.

Second, be able to talk about the moment when you realized you needed to be saved and what happened as a result. For me, I was standing on the front row of Hunter's Glen Baptist Church in Plano and I knew beyond any doubt I wanted to follow Christ. I saw what I had seen in my home, I had been taught scripture and I knew there was no other way for me to be saved. So, I left my pew, walked up to my dad (who was one of the ministers at the church) and told him I wanted to know Jesus. What was that moment for you? That day, that conversation, that tragedy, that crisis, that confirmation when you realized your need for a savior? Maybe it's been a while since you've thought about this moment in your life but, remember, this was the moment when God called you and saved you. It should be the most vivid, easy to talk about moment of your life. Bigger than your wedding day, the birth of your kids, when the Cowboys won the Super Bowl - the greatest day of your eternity. For some of you, this may be an extension of the first part of your story. Your life before Christ may provide all the answer that's needed for why you became saved, and that's awesome. Again, the goal of sharing your faith story with someone is so that through the sharing of your life's experiences they begin to look at their own life and see their need for Christ.

Third, answer the question, "what changed?" Many people profess Christ in the church but nothing in their life has changed in such a way as to confirm the presence of Christ in their life. So, when you became a Christian, what changed in your life? Did you quit an addiction, see your marriage restored, watch your relationships change? Did you have more joy, more peace and a deeper assurance about life and eternity? Did the words of scripture come alive as you read them and did you sense a deep longing to know God more and more? For me, because I was saved at a young age, much of my life didn't change. In fact, I kept doing what I had been doing. I went to church, read my bible, prayed and even shared my faith with others. It was only later in my early days of college that I realized that was exactly what was supposed to happen in my life. I was growing in my faith. But for a long time I didn't FEEL like I was saved because my story wasn't like some of my friends who had been rescued from drugs, alcohol, etc. It was in college that I realized and understood God's plan and call for my life and I now see, looking back, what God was doing to prepare me for the life I lead now. It was a process and a journey. I truly believe that had I not made that decision to follow Christ my life would be totally different. So what changed in your life? This is the part of your story where we get to talk about the change Christ brings i n our lives. Again, be as specific and real as you can and keep the focus on what CHRIST has done in your life.

A lot of our students have grown up in church and that's a good thing - it's part of my story. But there comes a point for all of us where we have to take ownership of our faith - where we express our walk with Christ on a personal level. This was one of my challenges as a "christian kid" - learning to make my faith my own. One of the greatest ways we find that ownership is when we are able to reflect back on what Christ has really done in OUR lives. A walk with Christ is personal and the story of that journey is something you and I are called to share with those around us (see 2 Corinthians 5:15-20). That's our message this weekend so share your story boldly and honestly and remember, as you're sharing you're really teaching your students that a walk with Christ can be real.

JT