How to Plant Seeds of the Gospel

How can we witness to lost sinners and at least plant a seed so that someone else might water it?

God Gives the Increase

How can we witness to lost sinners and at least plant a seed so that someone else might water it? The late pastor Adrian Rogers once put it nicely when saying, “It’s not our responsibility to save anyone…it is their response to His ability,” meaning only God can save. Even so, He is pleased to use us as a means to His end and save those who will hear the Word of God. We can plant the seed of God’s Word, but only God can make it increase. When the early New Testament church began to grow, it wasn’t an effort by evangelists or preachers, but it was “the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47b).

God Opens Hearts

The point of all this is we cannot open a person’s heart to receive the gospel. God alone does that, but we should be compelled to share the gospel so that God’s Spirit can take God’s Word and birth a child of God from above (John 3:3-7). A good example of that occurs in the Book of Acts where it says “One who heard us was a woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul” (Acts 16:14). Paul didn’t open Lydia’s heart…it was God, but Paul did need to share the gospel so that Lydia could “pay attention to what was said by Paul” so that she could be saved.

The Seed

Clearly, the Parable of the Sower is about God’s Word and the sower is necessary to sow the Word, so you and I can be used by God to sow His Word so that God can prepare the soil and make it grow. The Parable of the Sower shows that only 1 in 4 who heard the gospel believed, so what do the 4 different soil types represent? Jesus said “A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured them” (Matt 13:3-4). What the birds missed, the rocky ground took care of as there was “not have much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil” (Matt 13:5). It might have been an emotional experience but not a quickening by the Holy Spirit (Eph 2:1-4), so it produced a false convert. That’s why “when the sun rose they were scorched. And since they had no root, they withered away” (Matt 13:6).

Producing Fruit

The other “seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them” (Matt 13:7). Only 1 in 4 of the seeds took root and “produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty” (Matt 13:8). The power is in the gospel leads to salvation (Rom 1:18; 1 Cor 1:18), not in the power of the speaker. Sow the Word; leave the results up to God. No farmer, no matter how hard he or she tries, can make a seed grow or make it “hurry up” or sprout instantly. Only God can make it take life, then sprout and finally, grow.

Know the Gospel

You cannot share or plant the seeds of the gospel unless you know it well enough to explain it. The grace of God or the “good news” is only good until you’ve shared the bad news; a holy, righteous God requiring wrath someday for the sinner. This makes them (should) run to the cross for mercy. The mercy of God is not important until the wrath of God is explained. There would be no good news if there were not bad news to come (Dan 12:1-3; Rev 20:12-15). The gospel is summed up in several places like in 1 Corinthians 15:1-5 or Romans 10:9-13, and of course in John 3:16, but John 3:16 never stands alone because Jesus goes on to say that “whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” (John 3:18b). You cannot share what you do not know, so know the gospel well.

Divine Appointments

Before I start my day, and sometimes, the day before, I pray for God to provide divine appointments. That is that God would put someone in my path today or tomorrow that has a heart already prepared to hear the gospel or for someone to have a seed planted. God has answered this so many times I have lost track. He is faithful to provide us opportunities if only we would pray beforehand. Pray for divine appointments and be prepared to be surprised, but also be “prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect” (1 Pet 3:15). Without gentleness and respect, you won’t be a good witness, but rather a bad one.

Pray for Laborers

The harvest is wherever you look my friend. Wherever there are people, there are souls that God wants saved. Pray for the Lord to provide more laborers (Matt 9:38), but enter the labor yourself. I too am responsible for sharing Christ. We all are. Great places are surgery waiting rooms, standing in line at the grocery stores, banks, or convenience stores. Look for places where you can pray for people, then ask them if you can pray for them, and see what happens. The worse that can happen is they say no, but that’s even more reason to pray for them.

Conclusion

By the way, I pray you have already put your trust in Jesus Christ. If that has not happened yet, you are in real danger of hell fire because you are one only breath, one heartbeat…one accident away from eternity. Then, it’s too late to repent. Today is the best day to believe (2 Cor 6:2) because tomorrow is not guaranteed. If Jesus Christ came right now, you are in big trouble (Matt 7:21-23). I plead with you as you read this, repent today and put your trust in Jesus Christ. If not, prepare to face God’s judgment after death (Heb 9:27) or at Jesus Christ’s appearance (Rev 20:12-15), either of which could happen at any moment.

Here is some related reading for you: How to Share the Gospel With Family

Resource – Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version^® (ESV^®), Crossway Bibles. (2007). ESV: Study Bible: English standard version. Wheaton, Ill: Crossway Bibles. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Tagged as: evangelism, gospel, Seed, Sharing Gospel, Word of God