How To Be an Effective Witness for Christ?

Witnessing is much more than just telling others about Christ. That is definitely part of it, but more than that it is "being" a witness for Him. The best way to teach others about Christ and to make them desire to have Jesus in their own lives is to live a consistent, loving, Christ-centered life in front of them. If you are a good friend, a good listener, attentive to the needs of those around you and morally upright, then people will be likely to listen to you when you tell them about Christ because they will see that there is something genuinely different about you. "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. This goes under the witnessing heading of "I feel like God is calling me to preach)"(II Tim 4:2).

To be an effective witness for Christ, one must have a relationship with God not only knowledge of Him. John the Apostle speaks of this in 1 John 1:1-3, when he says, “That . . . which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at, and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of Life.” Today, we who have experienced new life in Christ give an account of His love and forgiveness, both verbally and in the way we live our lives. This is witnessing. To be effective in our witness, we should remember that the theme of our witness is Jesus Christ. An important part of this theme is the fact that Jesus Christ is the only way to salvation, not just one of many ways. “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6)

The power of our witness is the Holy Spirit. It is the Spirit who transforms a life (Titus 3:5), and a transformed life is evident to all. As we witness, we should spend much time in prayer, appropriating the Spirit’s power so that we are enabled to let our light shine in such a way that others will recognize the power of God in us. The validity of our witness will be shown in how we live our lives . The effective Christian witness will live his or her life above reproach in the power of the Holy Spirit, whose fruit we exhibit when we remain in Christ.

Perhaps most importantly, we must be familiar enough with the Scriptures to be able to accurately and coherently present the gospel to others. “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have” (1 Peter 3:15