Common Ground
February 7, 2019
Yes, whatever a person is like, I try to find common ground with him so that he will let me tell him about Christ and let Christ save him. 1 Corinthians 9:22 TLB
Our world concentrates on our differences. We have focus groups, divisions, biases about gender, age, race, color, clan, traditions, and much, much more. We teach tolerance, and lead classes on diversity. We try to help people tolerate each other and live through the differences.
When we become followers of Jesus Christ, we get to live a whole new way. We get to become part of the group of people who realize we are all made in the image of God, and we have more in common than we can imagine. We concentrate on those things.
The first and most important thing we have in common is that God is FOR us! He loves me deeply and devotedly, but not more than He does that woman in the grocery store, that man at the gas station, the easy to love and the not so easy. We begin to plan and strategize ways to connect with them and let them discover the love of Jesus.
Creating common ground is the place to start: Perhaps it could be a hobby, an experience, a mutual like or dislike. But we look for that thing we share on a perhaps very superficial level to begin. From there we connect. We take a step toward relationship. As we connect, conversations begin. The more we invest in each other, the more we talk; the more the things that are most important to us surface. Then the person with whom I have developed a relationship is most likely to let me tell him about the difference Jesus Christ has made in me, and more often than not, he will let Christ save him.
- Think about people with whom you share a common interest: sports, music, a hobby, kids’ events. Who among them do not yet share the life that is in Jesus?
- How can you invest in them and get the connection moved up to the next level?
- Pray for them, and pray that God will help you develop patience, wisdom, and grace to wait on His timing, but then move forward in courage.