Lesson Ten – How to Develop and Use a Testimony
A testimony is a convincing declaration of what Jesus Christ has done for your life. And there are principles for developing and using it all through your Christian walk.
God has testimonies to us that we can believe and personally apply. They then become our testimonies. We should have many testimonies based on the Word, what it says, and what it has done for others. We can even testify when nothing has yet happened to us.
Psalm 119:2 says, “Blessed are those who keep (obey) His testimonies…” Keeping God’s testimonies can mean believing what He had said or promised. John 6:39, “this is the work of God, that you believe in Him who He has sent.”
The foundation of a powerful and effective testimony must be faith in Jesus Christ and all He is and all He has done and promised to us. Then it can become a useful evangelistic tool.
Developing your testimony is unique by God’s design and is a life-long process. Personal failure is built in to this by God’s foreknowledge. Don’t let it discourage you. This is process. “Procession” is a similar word. You are in the parade of God, featured as a precious person unlike no other and constructed to touch lives like no one else can. Ephesians 2:10 states that “We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”
Many Christians feel like they have no testimony. We generally think in extreme or dramatic terms of a pre-salvation lifestyle filled with drugs, jail, the occult, or alcoholism. If you haven’t lived that sort of life before you got saved, then how can you now be that much different? How can your testimony really be effective to draw people to God? Here is the good news….your testimony is ALWAYS powerful now that you’re saved.
It’s not so much your former life that distinguishes you, but your conversion. Conversion is the key. No matter how dramatic or routine our conversion seems, the fact that you were called out of darkness into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9) means an amazing miracle has occurred. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the lord (Ephesians 5:8). There are no distinguished saints. All are products of the same Holy Spirit power.
This is the foundation of developing your testimony. It begins with our understanding of basic Biblical principles that should give us confidence in who we are now. Not what we were, but what has happened inside our hearts that has caused transformation to take place.
How do we use all this…to evangelize and reach the lost? Wait! We also use our testimony to bless God and His saints on earth. Your testimony is to be used for everyone’s edification. 2 Corinthians 2:15-16, “For we are unto God a sweet savor of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish. To the one we are the savor of death unto death and to the other the savor of life unto life.”
We are to be witnesses. Witnessing for Jesus is not just speaking; it is also being. “You shall be witnesses…” Acts 1:8.
Using your testimony requires flexibility, coupled with God’s wisdom. “Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time.” (Colossians 4:5). It takes great wisdom and patience to know how to use a testimony. Most Christians don’t realize the power of gracious words. Often we are too forceful. We think it’s up to us to save someone. How should be speak? Colossians 4:6 says, “Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt that you may know how you ought to answer every man.”
Don’t compromise the seriousness of the gospel, but do it like Jesus did. People wondered at His gracious words (Luke 4:18, 22). Yet there was authority in His speech (Matthew 7:28-29). In using your testimony, try to target a common need that you and your audience both have. For example, “I was afraid of what the future held until I put my faith in Jesus.” Or, “I knew I needed forgiveness.”
By all means, use the name of JESUS in your testimony. Don’t shrink back. Too many Christians, especially contemporary musicians and singers, write their lyrics and sing testimonies without using Jesus’ name. There is power in that name. You won’t “turn off” someone who is already “off”, but you will draw those to God whose hearts are prepared to hear the gospel. This is an important key in testimony. You’ll feel the atmosphere change when the name “JESUS” is used. (It changes the atmosphere when “Jesus’ is used as a cuss word, does it not?) Hebrews 4:12 says “The Word of God (JESUS) is quick and powerful, dividing soul and spirit and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
Use your testimony in the 2 Timothy 2:23-26 way. Since “giving testimony” implies dialogue, you will surely face, at times, an arguer. Stick to the claim that Jesus has on all our lives. Sure, go ahead and answer a peripheral question about other Biblical issues, but gently steer the discussion back to what Jesus did for you and must do for your hearers. Don’t strive. Especially if Mormons or Jehovah Witnesses are involved. Be sweet. Be at peace. God alone can change a heart. People will always remember how you made them feel. Titus 3:2 “To speak evil of no man to be no brawlers, but gentle, showing all meekness unto all men.”
Our testimonies are always developing because Jesus is still at work in our lives. We are ever learning Him and ever testifying of Him. Christ in you, the hope of glory! Now that’s a testimony!
