How to Effectively Spread the Joyous Gospel with Heart Wide Open ⋆ Effie Darlene Barba

As we live life in this broken world awaiting our Saviors return, how do we effectively spread the joyous gospel message with a heart wide open? Our hearts break with the sorrows of this world. Trials press in from every side. Sometimes our hearts crush with the weight of this world. So much useless pain, sorrow, and suffering. Humanity seeking everything that is not God plunging the world farther away from any hope of true peace or joy. We who know him, are looking and longing for His return. Our hearts break as we watch evil appearing to win. At times it looks so hopeless. Were it not for the faith He so freely gives us, we would fall in despair.

Yet, as we study His word, we are shown His steadfast love and faithfulness. So many prophecies have been fulfilled. We can trust in His Sovereignty and Power to finish all He has planned. Furthermore, we see the life of Christ. His love reached out with humility. So much so, He willingly paid the full price for our salvation.

Then there are the miracles within our own lives, when He has reached out to us in our darkest hours, so we might see His providential hand cradling and protecting us. Sermons, friends, and songs touch us, enwrapping us at just the right moment or hour. Magically, He holds us up in His loving arms. He loves us so much that He would never leave us here one moment more, except He has a purpose yet to fulfill in our lives. Preparing us for an eternity of overwhelming joy, we are being sanctified. Also, He shares bits of His Glory in us each time He allows us to share the gospel with someone in need of Him.

Spread the Joyous Gospel with Heart Wide Open

So, in a world with so much sorrow and heartaches, how do we with heart wide open still proclaim and spread the Joyous Gospel? Will they not think we are hypocrites? We proclaim the good news, covered with battle scars and tear-stained faces. Will they believe us? Paul the Apostle shows us how to speak truth with a heart wide open, honestly, and passionately telling our story. Is that not also the example first given to us by our precious Savior?

³Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, ⁴who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. ⁵For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ. ⁶But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; or if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer; ⁷and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are partners in our sufferings, so also you are in our comfort. 2 Corinthians 1: 3-7 NASB

We learn through affliction how to minister to others who are afflicted. It is amid the sorrows we learn to trust and lean into the arms of Jesus. Then we can tell others of our wondrous hope because of Him. Ours is not a frivolous joy, but rather an abiding and steadfast joy that carries us through the darkest hours. Steady as we go, pressing forward and trusting in Him.

2 Corinthians, Paul’s letter with Heart Wide Open

Throughout this letter to the Corinthian church, Paul writes with his heart wide open. He recalls the previous letter. In I Corinthians he told them to stop allowing and applauding open sin within the church. Which is true. We cannot applaud sin in our midst. Never are we called to compromise the truth or to water down the Christian life. Neither, however, are we to continue with unforgiveness either. Apparently, the one that was expelled from the church repented, left his sin, and was now overwhelmed with sorrow. He felt all alone. Therefore, Paul writes this:

2 Corinthians 2: 3-11 (NKJV).

³And I wrote this very thing to you, lest, when I came, I should have sorrow over those from whom I ought to have joy, having confidence in you all that my joy is the joy of you all. ⁴For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you, with many tears, not that you should be grieved, but that you might know the love which I have so abundantly for you.

⁵But if anyone has caused grief, he has not grieved me, but all of you to some extent—not to be too severe. ⁶This punishment which was inflicted by the majority is sufficient for such a man, ⁷so that, on the contrary, you ought rather to forgive and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed up with too much sorrow. ⁸Therefore I urge you to reaffirm your love to him. ⁹For to this end I also wrote, that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things. ¹⁰Now whom you forgive anything, I also forgive. For if indeed I have forgiven anything, I have forgiven that one for your sakes in the presence of Christ, ¹¹lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices.

Heart Wide Open—Humility

Paul reminded us here that we all have sinned. Jesus forgave us. When we fail to forgive others, we are in danger of pride. After all, I would never do that? Whatever that is. And there Satan takes what began as righteous becomes consuming to our own heart.

¹⁴But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us reveals the fragrance of the knowledge of Him in every place. ¹⁵For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing: ¹⁶to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other an aroma from life to life. And who is adequate for these things? ¹⁷For we are not like the many, peddling the word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God. 2 Corinthians 2: 14-17 (NASB)

But you, like I may say, how do I do that? It is the vicious cycle we so easily fall into.

⁴Such is the confidence we have toward God through Christ. ⁵Not that we are adequate in ourselves so as to consider anything as having come from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, ⁶who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. 2 Corinthians 2: 4-6 (NASB).

Heart Wide Open—because the veil is pulled back by Christ

When Moses went before God, he returned with a veil over his face. The Glory from God’s presence was so bright that the people could not look up Moses’ face. Many still cannot see God. They remain blinded to the truth with the veil obscuring God’s glory.

¹⁶Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. ¹⁷Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. ¹⁸But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. 2 Corinthians 3:16-18 (NASB).

Glory to glory, tiny glories to tiny glories we are being transformed in the image of Jesus Christ. How amazing is that? I, who have nothing of my own to give, am being changed little by little. But what about all those around us that hurt us?

Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart…. ³But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, ⁴whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. ⁵For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. ⁶For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 2 Corinthians 4: 1,3-6 (NKJV)

Clay Vessels Filled with God’s Glory by Grace

⁷But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. ⁸We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; ⁹persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed— ¹⁰always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. 2 Corinthians 4 (NKJV).

The power to spread the joyous Gospel with heart wide open is given to us by Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit. Clay pots break easily. Yet through those broken spots light shines forth from the light within.

It is through the broken cracks that the Glory of God may shine forth to a world in need of hope.

¹⁶Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. ¹⁷For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, ¹⁸while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

2 Corinthians 4 (NKJV).

Ambassadors of Christ with Heart Wide Open

²⁰Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. ²¹For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

2 Corinthians 5 (NKJV)

It is best to always be with a heart wide open, quick to stand for Christ and quick to forgive. In sorrow, we grow. When I accept the truth, sometimes that is painful. Yet, it leads to edification or growth in Christ. I do not always want to hear the truth. But it is the truth I need always. The same is true that we sometimes must speak the truth in love.

⁸For though I caused you sorrow by my letter, I do not regret it; though I did regret it—for I see that that letter caused you sorrow, though only for a while— ⁹I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. ¹⁰For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death. 2 Corinthians 7 (NASB).

Be encouraged by this.

Heart Wide Open Strengthened by God Himself who Provides our Weapons

³For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. ⁴For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, ⁵casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, 2 Corinthians 10 (NKJV)

It is God Himself who wins each battle for us. He casts down every argument against us and ascertains that we will grow in our knowledge of Him. Only He can bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. As we gaze upon Him, He transforms us into the likeness of Jesus. However dimly we see Him now, the veil is pulled back so that we might see Him clearer each day. And one day, I will see Him face to face.

Until then, I must not fall back in fear of what anyone will think, but boldly with heart wide open I proclaim the Joyous Gospel to all who will listen. Though that may mean they see all my blemishes, I must proclaim Him as the only hope, joy, peace and means of salvation.

DO YOU KNOW CHRIST AS YOUR SAVIOR AND LORD? He is our only Hope in Life and Death! Our Joy is found in Him.

Therefore if you don’t know Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord: I urge you today. Go to my page titled How to Be Saved by clicking on this link. There is nothing more important than this; because He is the way, the truth and the life. Therefore, I urge you to seek Him today.

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The Greatest Exegesis of the Gospel Message is Found in Romans

DISCLOSURES©Effie Darlene Barba, 2023Disclosure of Material Connection: I have not received any compensation for writing this post. Furthermore, I have no material connection to the brands, products, or services that I have mentioned except for my own books. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

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