Devotional: “Christian Conversations” (03 Feb 2019)

We all know we should be having more ‘spiritual’ conversations with our Christian friends. After all, we’d think it odd if a bunch of footy fans only ever talked about golf when they got together. So isn’t it equally odd when followers of Jesus only talk about the footy or worse, Married At First Sight when they get together?

I did some thinking and came up instead with some questions we could ask each other in our conversations that might turn the talk to more eternal things. You might want to use these yourself. I’m going to give it a go!

  1. How did you become a Christian? (Note: we might have known someone for years, and never asked this simple question!)
  2. What’s your favourite verse or story in the Bible? Why?
  3. What is something you’ve learned recently about Jesus?
  4. What are you thankful to the Lord for at the moment?
  5. What do you think the Lord is teaching you at the moment?
  6. What are you praying for at the moment?
  7. How do you think you have grown as a Christian in the last year or so?
  8. What are you finding hard about being a Christian right now?
  9. How could I be praying for you?

These aren’t going to transform your Christian conversations overnight (or maybe they will!). At their heart, they’re just ways to show love, care and interest in what the Lord is doing in the lives of our brothers and sisters in Christ – those who share the same relationship with the Father, forgiveness through the Son, indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and secure future in glory.

It’s a way of doing what the Bible tells the church to do:

“Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.” (1 Thessalonians 5:11 ESV)

Live it: Think about ways you could initiate more Christian conversations to encourage and build one another up.

 

– Clint Lombard