What does it mean to answer the call as a believer? This just happened to be in my readings this morning and it seemed so timely that I just felt the need to share it. I especially love Moody’s response to the question “When are you going to preach to the unconverted?”

“Someone has said to me: “When are you going to preach to the unconverted?” Well, I don’t know that I shall preach to them at all. I will get YOU to preach to them. We want five or six or seven thousand sermons preached to the unconverted every day. We want thousands of men and women going out to tell the story of the cross. It is very easy when we get enthusiasm and are full of love for God and His work.

Remember, my friends, God can not use you until you are willing to have the world point the finger of scorn at you. If the world hasn’t got anything to say against us, it is pretty sure that Christ won’t have much to say for us. Because, if we love God in Jesus Christ we shall surely suffer persecution; and if we are afraid of our dignity and reputation and standing, we are not fit for Christ’s service. Somebody spoke once to a young convert who got up in the streets and tried to preach, and said: “You ought to be ashamed of yourself.” “Well,” he said, “I am, but I am not ashamed of my Saviour.” So let us be ashamed of ourselves, but not of Christ, but speak out in our business and in our homes, everywhere where we are, for Christ.

If every man and woman born into the Spirit in this assembly to-night should say, “By the grace of God I will try to lead some soul to Christ this week,” how many would be converted! Now, haven’t we got that desire? Hasn’t that come upon the hearts of this people? Or are we only ready to hear? It is very easy to come here twice a day, but we want to preach off these chairs; we want to get you so full of enthusiasm that you must go out and preach Christ; must go out of here and call your neighbors together and pray with them. It won’t do to have all the work done in this Tabernacle, but we must carry it into every street and every alley and every cellar; and if the Spirit of God comes upon us we can do it.

If a man has no desire to go out and win some soul to Christ; no desire to see his own son converted, or to see his own relatives brought to the Saviour, he is sound asleep spiritually, isn’t he? What we want to do is to wake up and get this building filled with non-church-goers. I don’t feel that I have a mission to come and preach to you people who have been sitting here under able ministers for twenty or thirty years. We want you to go out of this building, and the men who haven’t heard the Gospel for twenty, thirty, or forty years to come in. We are not going to do it by advertising in the papers, nor by notices, but by having every one go out as a missionary. I would like to see this Tabernacle filled with the rum-sellers of Boston. I would like to have the fallen women come here. I would like to have them know that faith in  Christ is power unto salvation.

The devil has deceived them and they don’t know it. Now, we send a lot of men abroad as missionaries, and God forbid that I should say one word against missions. God bless the missionaries. I wish we had thousands more going round the world for Christ. But don’t let us forget the people at our own doors. What are we doing for them? Sha’n’t we have some enthusiasm to go and reach these men who are right here by our side?”

Are you ready to answer the call?

Moody, D. L. (1877). New Sermons, Addresses, and Prayers. (pp. 118–119). Cincinnati, OH: Henry S. Goodspeed & Co.