The L Word Tightrope

I'm not sure what it is, maybe my pentecostal background, but I get uncomfortable whenever the word love is brought up in an evangelism context. I find I am wary of where the speaker is heading, concerned that they are going to launch into a theologically inaccurate gospel presentation. However, I think it is important to constantly review the L word. We should remember that it is Christ's love that compels us, love for God and his glory and love for the lost. If we don't speak the truth in love then are we fully glorifying God as he should be glorified?

My bible study group is tackling a six week study on evangelism, Six Steps to Talking About Jesus from Matthias Media. The first week was titled LOVE. To my relief it was a balanced study that also featured God's righteousness, and his coming judgement while focussing in on our motivation being that of love. The passages studied were 2 Corinthians 5:10-21 and Ephesians 4:11-16 Good stuff. I am still concerned though that many christians could take materials like these and others and bend them to suit their own version of God, the cuddly god-is-love one. But I suppose we'll never get past that problem this side of glory.

It will be interesting to look into this study course and get a different take on evangelism. I've found the Way of the Master stuff to be the most helpful I have come across so far. I'll hopefully be able to keep you posted.

Evangelism Action has moved!

I have been unimpressed with the quality of Blogger's method of replying to posts for some time. It has been quite clumsy to use. I have also found the log on pretty painful I have decided to make a move to Wordpress and I am glad I did. It's just so much better.

I will leave my Blogger account here as long as I can as some interesting stuff has been written here. I have done my best to update the new Wordpress site with my Blogger archive, but unfortunately I won't be transferring anyone's replies. They all will, however, still be available here.

Now it's time to say goodbye to Blogger and check out the new Evangelism Action:

Christmas Evangelism

Isn't Christmas a great time to evangelise!

There is an easy opportunity right there in front of us all the time.

I've just got a new tract from Way of the Master that I've started using. It's the Christmas card tract:

http://wayofthemaster.com.au/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=169&osCsid=ec240a45257df0dfc4c851f44b4e1735

I gave a few of these out to people after having conversations with them today. They all appreciated the tract. The cards are a bit big but just fit in my back pocket. You can also post them in the mail as a postcard.

Nice one!

6 y.o. witness encounter

Kids can say silly things sometimes.

Yesterday I was talking with a 6yo and his Mother and we were talking about what he wanted for Christmas and he said. "I want a clothes line so that I can hang myself up in the sun till I die."

This was a pretty strange thing to hear him say and his mother told him off for it. I decided to ask him what he thought happened when he'd die. He said that if he was good he would go to Heaven or if he was bad he would go to Hell.

I was surprised that he had heard about Hell and I wanted to correct him on the way that people get to Heaven. I said, "How good does someone have to be to get in to Heaven"?

He didn't have a real answer. I took him through the analogy that if you broke the law the judge will have to sentence you on that offence, no matter what other nice or good things you have done. What needs to happen is for someone else to come along an pay your fine so that your case can be dismissed. I then went on to explain what Jesus did on the cross to pay for our crimes against God.

This was the first time that I have attempted to explain the gospel to someone so young and he seemed to get it. I tried to simplify my language. It was good that the Mother was there too because she got to hear a clear explanation of the gospel at the same time

Take the chance

Always be ready to go for it!

While picking up some equipment for school today I had an opportunity that I created using God's help and the "smart card" gospel tract. I gave the tract to a Allison; a very clever young lady who put the equipment in the boot of my car. She listened carefully as I talked and questioned her. She said that a friend of hers was a Christian but she was not. She listened very carefully and was very grateful for me taking the time to talk with her. She did not previously understand why Jesus died on the cross. I was able to tell her that Jesus was being a sacrifice for her very real sins of lying, etc, that she admitted to. I told her that Christ will give her His righteousness if she repents of her sins and trusts in Jesus' death and resurrection.

The discussion went much better than I am able to recount - Allison really seemed to get what I was telling her. All this took less than 4 minutes. I had such a buzz driving away in my car. Please pray for Allison that God migh cause the seed to grow in her heart.

Can you spare 4 minutes to share the gospel today? If you are a Christian you are qualified to do this sort of thing. Don't let fear stand in your way. Get some good quality training. I thouroughly endorse the Way of the Master: www.wayofthemaster.com. I have looked at a lot of evangelism training in my time but this is the training that finally has got me witnessing.

Evangelising Jehovah's Witness Doorknockers

This is a comment which Nathan recently made on an old posting that you might miss. I think it is really useful information that you need to have. Well done Nathan, keep up the great work!
(img: Watchtower Society HQ).

--

"I had an hour-long discussion with a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses who came to my house this morning. The guy who started talking seemed to be 'in training'. When I challenged his message of the need for Christ's death + good works as both necessary for salvation, the other guy, seemingly a JW guru, took over for the remaining 55 minutes. Thankfully, I've read about and had a bit of practice in talking with JWs about their discrepancies (to say the least!) in their understanding of Christianity. During our conversation we were able to discuss most of the differences between orthodox Christian belief and the teaching of JWs. Here is a (very) brief outline of some of what JWs believe:-

• God is not a Trinity-


• Jesus is not fully divine and not co-equal with the Father (Jehovah)-


• The Holy Spirit is not God either; rather 'it' is a force-


• Jesus was pre-existent as the arch angel Michael-


• There is no eternal damnation in Hell-


• Good works must accompany the death of Jesus for salvation

I was able to challenge him on most of these points and a few others. The difficult thing is that they are programmed by the Watchtower institution to not listen to people, nor are they to interpret the Bible for themselves (the Watchtower people do this for them).

The good thing was that the three of them were able to hear the gospel (there was a little kid with them too). Another good thing was that I held them up for an hour, which is an hour less of JW teaching being promoted.

Hopefully this guy will come back (he said he had to go and 'meet someone', but that he'd return next weekend).

A few basic tips on how to deal with JWs-

• Don't invite them in (2 John 10-11)-


• Know your Bible-


• Pray-


• Read a good book on the cults (Fritz Ridenour's "So What's the Difference" is a good start)-


• Know what JWs (and Mormons) teach-


• Have nothing to do with them if you don't know how to correct them."

Keep a tract handy

On the way to a prayer meeting this morning a guy circled the round about that I was walking across and stopped and gave me the paper to drop in to the staff room. I said thanks and then quickly demonstrated a gospel tract to him which I pulled out of the leg pocket of my cargo shorts.

Evangelism tip - always carry a couple of tracts - don't stress out about having one hundred on you, just a couple in your pocket. They say that a good sign that you have become an evangelist is when your wife complains about all the coloured paper in the washing. This has happened to me more than once.

The best place to get tracts in Australia is on the net: www.wayofthemaster.com.au and go to the store - transactions are by credit card and delivery is very swift

Evangelism at Church

Just got home from Church. Have you ever considered sharing the law and good news to people in your Church? Today I took up a wonderful opportunity to talk to a couple up the back at the end of church. They had their bags in hand and were keen to get going when I stopped them. When they said that they were not Christians, I quickly went through the good test and showed them their need for righteousness on Judgement Day. They were going though Christianity Explained with my pastor but appreciated what I had to tell them. I later spoke with my pastor and he encouraged me to keep on evangelising.

In another conversation with a man I had an opportunity to share the gospel in some depth. He did not believe in God but came along to Church each week to support his wife. I was able to pick up on this in his answers to my questions and use some analogies to show him that to have a creation there must be a creator. We also discussed the evidence of his conscience - God's law was written on his heart and he knew right from wrong. Please pray for this guy (whom I have not named) that God will help him see the truth of the Gospel and be able to respond in repentance and faith. Also pray for the new couple that heard both a top message about Christianity from the pastor today and a gospel presentation from me.

SO there you go - be encouraged to go a little deeper with people in your church. Don't assume that they are already Christians. They might just be sitting there waiting for someone to tell them the gospel or answer their objections. If you haven't done any evangelism for a while this could be a great place to start.

Blessings,
Daniel C.

My Two Cents Worth

This is what I took away from our evangelism efforts of last night (see Daniel's post for the 23rd). Our second witnessing encounter, with a lady I didn't actually go to school with, but knew through activities we shared outside of the education system, left me incredibly saddened. To hear someone who has just been invited to look into the mirror of God's perfect law and assess their condition admit to being a sinner is always a good start. But to then hear them consider the outcome on judgement day and conclude something along the lines of "I still think I'm a really good person and I'll be happy to face God on judgement day and if He judges me according to the commandments I still think He'll agree I'm good..." is a bit heartbreaking. I mean, what a huge gamble! What could we do except try and get her to read a bible and find out who this God is and what He is like and what He requires of mankind? She was still not ready to hear the gospel, still totally proud and self-righteous.
We trust that our God is more than big enough to use our puny efforts to break through a little and follow up with more of His divine plan. Please pray!

Witnessing to someone who was a great person.

I have been out this evening with my wife at an awards function and we had the opportunity(took the opportunity) to witness to 2 people. The first was an elderly lady (pushing 60) who turned out to be a Christian already. It was a bit nerve wracking for me to swing it into Christianity but I just had to do it when she started talking about good people and bad people (my ears pricked up -> a good segue was at hand). After a bit of a discussion and inquiry about her Christian background I concluded that the lady was already in Christ and we encouraged each other.

After the big award for the evening was dealt out we met another woman in social chit chat- she was an old school friend of my wife and a successful local politician (ex. Mayor). She had a nice conversation with my wife and I joined in some of the time. Then, all of a sudden, when the conversation lagged (the new woman was a fast talker) I smashed in with the question. “Do you have a Christian Background?” She was very polite and said that she wasn’t a Christian but had talked with some pastors of a leading Christian group in the city as part of her political role

My wife and I took her through the good test. She had never lied or stolen in her life (that she can remember) but had blasphemed and committed adultery of the heart. She still, however, thought that she was a good person and could not understand that God had a standard of goodness that was different from her own. In fact, being a good person seemed to be particularly important to this woman, and very much a part of her philosophy. To think badly of herself might have been too much of a shift for her. I let her know that our greatest need was righteousness. We encouraged her to get a bible and read it.

Anyway. if you want more on this encounter, you could respond to this post and even ask my wife to do a post about her side of the encounter.

Humility: True Greatness

I am enjoying CJ Mahaney's skillful work. Since purchasing it on Thursday I am half way through. His writing style is just so natural and down to earth. I have had a few chuckles so far. I have enjoyed his practical applications for living humbly before God. He has even shown me how sleep is a gift from God to humble us. I will never think about sleep the same again.

I highly recommend this little book to you - its got a lot in it and it's easily accessed.

3rd Party Evangelism

I like to ask Christians what they would say if they had someone come up to them and ask them what they need to do to become a Christian. The most common answer is, "I'd invite them to Church."
I reply with "OK then, how about it they also said they only have 3 minutes to live."
They then reveal what they believe it is to be a Christian. I always try to show them that it all comes down to repentance and faith.

This week I was on a bus, seated with another Christian just behind the bus driver. I knew that he was listening to our conversation when he looked at his watch when we were both discussing how long it would take to reach our destination. I decided to talk to this Christian guy and took him through my questioning. I corrected his thinking - it was not just that we mealy believe in Christ, but that we actively repent of our sin which merits the wrath of God on judgement day.

I sort of felt that the bus driver heard us but I never got an opportunity to talk with him.

Evangelism Inaction

Inaction
n. state of being inactive.

....

Words of Cheer from Spurgeon

"Go on Christian for this is your promise, "He will put strenght in me."

"Weak, though I am,
Yet through his might,
I all things can perform."

Go on. Dread not God's power, but rejoice at this: He will put His strenght in you. He will not use His power to crush you."

The goal of God's love

I am always refreshingly encouraged by they way John Piper corrects crooked man-centred thinking. Getting your 'head' right effects your whole life and service to God (Romans 12 v2) ::

"...Notice that this ultimately loving act (Christ's sacrifice on the cross) has at the center of it the vindication of the righteousness of God. Good Friday love is God-glorifying love. God exalts God at the cross. If he didn't, he could not be just and rescue us from sin. But it is a mistake to say, "Well, if the aim was to rescue us, then we were the ultimate goal of the cross." No, we were rescued from sin in order that we might see and savor the glory of God. This is the ultimately loving aim of Christ's death. He did not die to make much of us, but to free us to enjoy making much of God forever." read the full article

Called to speak a message and a warning

I am learning to treat the reading of scripture with great care and that there is a right hermeneutic approach to take. I am not going to leap to any applications from Ezekiel, but I think this portion of scripture is worthy of observing. The weight of responsibility must have been heavy on Ezekiel.

Ezekiel 33 v2-12
"Son of man, speak to your people and say to them, If I bring the sword upon a land, and the people of the land take a man from among them, and make him their watchman, and if he sees the sword coming upon the land and blows the trumpet and warns the people, then if anyone who hears the sound of the trumpet does not take warning, and the sword comes and takes him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet and did not take warning; his blood shall be upon himself. But if he had taken warning, he would have saved his life. But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, so that the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes any one of them, that person is taken away in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at the watchman's hand.

"So you, son of man, I have made a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me. If I say to the wicked, O wicked one, you shall surely die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from his way, that wicked person shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. But if you warn the wicked to turn from his way, and he does not turn from his way, that person shall die in his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.

"And you, son of man, say to the house of Israel, Thus have you said: 'Surely our transgressions and our sins are upon us, and we rot away because of them. How then can we live?' Say to them, As I live, declares the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why will you die, O house of Israel?"

[Scripture taken from ESV]

Obstacles to Evangelism: Work!

Back at work now after 2 weeks of holidays. In my break I had a great opportunity to do evangelism. I think the beauty of holidays is that you don't have to worry about a whole lot of other stuff. That has now changed. I am finding evangelism difficult now for a couple of reasons.

Firstly, I have hardly any spare time. It's now 8:30pm and I am putting in this blog entry (first chance in last couple of days) but there is still stuff I could be doing instead. Secondly, I am finding it difficult to switch mindsets from High School teaching to evangelism. This sounds weird, but my job requires a lot of concentration and thought and it takes a while to come out of that mindset and start thinking about the lost around you. This second point is only subtle but I think its a bit of an obstacle. The main problem is just not having free time anymore.

My plan is to try and be ready for opportunities in and after school and not get completely sucked into work thinking. If I am honest, my weekdays do present me with the occasional opportunity. Also, I still have my weekends. Hopefully I can fit in an hour or so of intentional street evangelism - or maybe some open air preaching at these times.

I will let you know how I go with these new adjustments. It will probably mean a bit of slowing down on my blog too.

All the Spurgeon you will ever need

Check out the Spurgeon Archive if you have not done so already. He was know for his sound puritan doctrines and eloquent use of language.

This website seems particularly impressive. I holds a expansive collection of his prolific writing.

I am reading one of his sermons at the moment about the purpose and use of the Law. It's very good.

Daily Devotions ::

I have been pretty tied up the last 2 days and have not done any evangelism. That's really quite slack of me. On a more positive note, Angela and I have agreed to commit ourselves to daily devotions. Today I got a hold of DA Carson's For the Love of God. It should be a good plan to keep us in the word.

If you are reading this I would be interested to hear what your daily scripture plan is and do you keep it? It good to encourage each other to feed on the Word of God.

Daniel.

Having the right thing to say

2 Timothy 2:15
Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, [that is, one approved after being tested] a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.
----

I had a pretty loose attempt at witnessing today while waiting in a line. I started a conversation with the lady behind me. Up till that point we had been waiting and it was super slow service - well as soon as I got going on Christian stuff the line went flat out. The lady ducked and weaved on lying and said that white lies are ok. She had an attitued of "I'll find out when I die, if there is a God he will find me innocent because I'm pretty OK"

There were a few other points to our discussion but it really didn't get anywhere. I jsut didn't have the right answers to her questions/statements - a real contrast to my witness encounter at the Indian take-away.

I think that I can do a lot to improve in such a situation by thinking through what God thinks a lie is and what the consequence of lying is. ....

Daniel.

Is There A Hell, and if so...?

Hello there! This is my first guest posting on Daniel's blog, so I will try to make it worthwhile for you. I am Daniel's wife, and here's what I have been wondering about this week...

On Sunday I heard a sermon preached in which the preacher stated that he believes that Australians think that God is going to judge them. Hmmmmm, I thought, I am yet to meet anyone who actually thinks that. In my (admittedly limited) experience, everyone I have asked has thought that even if there is a hell, and they have broken God's laws, He will turn a blind eye to their sins because He is loving. They think God will not judge them because there are plenty of worse people than them, and He loves them, right? How could a loving God send anyone to hell? So the first of my questions for you to consider is: "Do Australians think that God is actually going to judge them or not?" If you don't know, let's get out there and ask them, tell them you're researching for a blog. Then tell them about the wrath to come.

What wrath? I was reading 1 Thessalonians the other night and chapter 1 verse 10 states very clearly that Jesus saves us form the wrath to come. That would be judgement and hell. So my next question for you is: "Do you believe in hell?" If not, why not? Jesus talked about it more than heaven, yet most people are happy to believe in heaven and leave out the hell bit. My challenge to you is to read everything you can in the scriptures about hell, particularly in the gospels, and decide. Please remember that if we take one doctrine and believe it and reject others then we are starting to make an idol, we are no longer believing in the God of the bible. If you make up a god to suit what you are comfortable believing you are breaking the second commandment.

If there is a hell, that has huge implications for all your unsaved family and friends, neighbours, people you meet every day, maybe even you.

A Spicy Encounter.

7:30PM

Wow, I feel really amped at the moment. I have just come home and finished off the lamb vindaloo which I went into the Indian Take-away to get. I'll give you a short run down on what happened there.

I got out of the car and had million dollar tracts and a couple of optical illusion tracts and, because I didn't have a big enough pocket, held them in my hand with my wallet. When I went to pay it was really obvious that I had something that looked like a $100 note in my hand. There were 2 girls serving (they did a great job, and the food was yummy.) I had been making some small talk up till that point so I just went for it.

"Hey, which one of these do you think is bigger?" I said as I held up the illusions.
Interest ensued as they both took turns guessing. From there I gave them each a million dollars and said that it was a gospel tract. I then went on to take them through the good test on just lying and stealing. I felt really comfortable and it seemed that I was relating to them well. One girl was really closed off and had a concerned look on her face - but she listened - and the other girl was really interested and smiled and seemed to enjoy as I talked about her need for righteousness on judgement day and that God wanted to give them both grace and how they should repent and believe in Jesus.

"Wow - thank you Lord!" Please pray for the two girls. Neither of them has a bible at home but I encouraged them to buy one or check the internet.

Just so that you don't start thinking that I am always good at this, this morning I had a tradesman around for a quote and I totally wimped out on witnessing to him. It was definitely God's grace at work through me tonight.

Way of the Master Radio - interview with an Aussie

Check out WOTM Radio podcast: 19th September 2006: hour 2. Ray has an over the phone interview with an Australian in New York.

Ray did an awesome job relating to the guy and switched to the spiritual really well, but the Aussie, James, showed his hard heart. It was just so typical of an Australian and is well worth checking out. www.wayofthemasterradio.com/podcast

Free Willy!

Just read this today about reformed faith and evangelism:

"It is the doctrine of free will ...that destroys evangelism. The teaching that God loves all men simply reassures sinners that all is well with them. The idea that Christ died for them only confirms them in the mistaken notion that their situation is not desperate. To say that they have the critical choice in their own salvation - that God depends upon and is waiting for them - just establishes them in their rebellion against God and teaches them that they are as gods! It does nothing for the salvation of lost sinners!" Rev. Ronald Hanko

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Interesting, the doctrine of free will was brought up by the dude and his wife that I witnessed to on the weekend. If I had read this before then it could have given me a good response. God is not obliged to rescue anyone. He choses who he will save, because doing so brings him glory!

I think I need to do a lot more study on the doctrine of free will...

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[added @10pm: just found a massive source of teaching on free will -- - http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/topic/freewill.html ]

7Day/2aDay challenge: DAY 4 (Too much 'conversation' - 7 Day Challenge Failed!)

You will only get my pun for today if you know something about emergent religion (Read LA Times article).

I AM NOT LAUGHING.

I blew it today. I went out to evangelise this afternoon and blew it. I met an old friend from High School and thought that this would be a wonderful opportunity to share the good news, I really wanted to show him respect and caring and inquired for quite a long time about his life and shared a lot about myself and then all of a sudden he had to go. I realised that I had not said anything about Christianity (my whole point of being out and about talking to people) and tried to stop him.
"Can you give me 3 minutes, because I have got something really important that I want to share with you." I pleaded
"No seriously man, I've really got to go" He said as he left…

He wasn't trying to avoid Christianity because he had no idea that would be something I wanted to talk about. So there you go - friendship evangelism sucks. In retrospect I had plenty of time to bring it in, but I just thought that I should really try and build a strong platform for the gospel.

I RAN OUT OF TIME! I don't want to ever do that again. I am so disappointed in myself and I feel really bad that I was not able to achieve my goal for today. I know it was just a challenge that I set for myself, and I am amazed because I thought it was so simple to achieve and I thought that I had made the challenge too easy. Sorry for letting you down if you were reading this and thinking that Dan was some sort of ledged. Hope this proves that I am not. I have set a task to do and failed. The task was:

"7 Days of 2 a day. What will this look like? I intend to attempt to take at least 2 people a day (2Day) clearly and effectively through the Law of God to reveal their position before Him, and then to reveal what God has done for them so they need not perish on the day of judgement."

It's now even too late in the evening to call people. I suppose I could race into the City and try and find someone when, if I am honest, there were other opportunities (besides the old school friend) that came my way in the day. I'm just going to admit that I failed my challenge. Perhaps I was getting to proud and it's God's way of humbling me. Perhaps it just shows me how little I fear God and how little I truly care about people going to a lost eternity.

One thing I will say about today that I have not prayed or read the bible. I know that doing so is not magical, but what it means is that I am starving spiritually and weak. I should therefore not be surprised that I failed. I'm calling this thing failed..... I will however continue on witnessing every day - God willing and hopefully reach more than 2 people per day. By the way - in reporting on all this I am not try to boast or gain some sort of therapy. I want to encourage the body of Christ in everyday evangelism.

James 1:22-25 (ESV) But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.

Present Day Evangelism

Check out the article by AW Pink:

Extracts:

"The Gospel is not a thing apart. It is not something independent of the prior revelation of God’s Law. It is not an announcement that God has relaxed His justice or lowered His standard of holiness. So far from that, when scripturally expounded the Gospel presents the clearest demonstration and the climacteric proof of the inexorableness of God’s justice and of His infinite abhorrence of sin."

"The way of salvation is falsely defined. In most instances the modern “evangelist” assures his congregation that all any sinner has to do in order to escape hell and make sure of heaven is to “receive Christ as his personal Savior.” But such teaching is utterly misleading. No one can receive Christ as his Savior while he rejects Him as Lord! It is true the preacher adds that the one who accepts Christ should also surrender to Him as Lord, but he at once spoils it by asserting that though the convert fails to do so nevertheless heaven is sure to him. That is one of the devil’s lies. Only those who are spiritually blind would declare that Christ will save any who despise His authority and refuse His yoke: why, my reader, that would not be grace but a disgrace — charging Christ with placing a premium on lawlessness."

7Day/2aDay challenge: DAY 3 - Late Night Evangelism.

OK, I will try and shorten my report of this encounter. I think I have been far too detailed and it takes ages to write and for you to read. Also my wife is getting sick of it taking up our talk time.

Well I had not witnessed to anyone today till 7pm (its now 8pm). I chose to do street evangelism instead of over the phone - I think street is a lot less scary to do. I have just got back from a trip to town. I drove in to the local food mall, parked the car, got out and walked over to the first couple of people that were sitting at a table and asked if I could sit down and chat for 5 minutes with them. They were just hanging outside smoking so were happy for the new conversation.

Ashlee (man) was really open and Allison was inoculated by exposure to Catholicism at school and has no time for it, but thinks she knows everything about it. Ashlee, on the other hand, showed signs of conviction and a real eagerness to hear what I had to say, but Allison was crushing the message a with some off the wall questions and statements.

I didn’t realise till I was driving away in my car exactly what had been going on. Everything that she had said was pointing to the fact that she sees Christianity with infused righteousness goggles. I did feel that I managed to clearly explain the gospel to them both and show them that they needed Christ’s righteousness on the day of judgment and how to obtain forgiveness by repentance from sin and faith in Christ alone.

Thanks be to God for his leading and help. Overall they were both quite nice to talk to and we had a friendly exchange. Please pray for both Ashlee and Allison, I encouraged them to read their bibles which they both have and to think about why I would come out late at night to share this message with them. Thanks also to you if you have supported me in prayer in this 7 day challenge.

The very latest breakthrough in everyday evangelism:

"The Church has been totally missing the point of evangelism! Now a leading group of scholars have unlocked the secrets that the Church has neglected since bible times."

Wow, and I thought doing The Way of the Master was tough. I have been doing it all wrong. Now I have discovered the very latest method in evangelism. It is called The Way of the Masochist.

(Just joking really. I guess anything is OK to pull in a crowd. All I am concerned about is what their gospel message might be.)

7Day/2aDay challenge: DAY 2 (Is Dan becoming a tele-evangelist?)

We went to City Park and cruised around and fed the ducks and watched the monkeys. The weather was overcast and we probably left it too late in the day (a recurring theme). There weren't a lot people around - there were a few here and there but I wussed out of it. I don't really know why, but I just couldn't get the never to approach people.

Next stop was the supermarket on the way home, just gave the checkout lad a million dollars - he was very excited about it. Oh, yeah, that reminds me, we also gave a tract to the drive-through at Hungry Jacks at lunch time (Ok is that revealing too much information on my diet?)

So I ended up being at home at 5pm and had not yet witnessed to anyone. I thought to myself that I could just wimp out completely and confess to everyone on my blog that I failed today. But accountability is a cruel master. No! I mustered up all my courage (and it took all that the Lord would give me) and called 3 numbers from the phone book (one ended up being an answering machine for a podiatrist.)

The first was a man who sounded like he was in his 50's and I caught him just going out the door so he could only give me a minute (I could hear his mate rushing him to go). I had do go straight into the law because I had no time. Also, I realised that is pretty much what you have to do if you are cold call evangelising. He thought that he could justify his lying, etc as it was not that bad because there are all sorts of lies. In the short discussion that followed he mentioned 'confession of sins' so I think there was some sort of Catholic background coming out. I left him still being self-righteous.

The next turned out to be an elderly lady who was 87. As I explained who I was and why I was calling She had to get down from her walking frame to continue our conversation. I took her through some of the commandments and she honestly believed that she had never broken any of them. She also added that she had worked at hospitals on went on listing all the community service work she had done in her lifetime. I came out and said:
"You must have broken God's law at some point for the bible itself say that there is no-one that is righteous and no-one who seeks after God.... that is why Christ died on the cross, you need the righteousness of Christ"
She didn't really like me saying that and became negative and quickly asked to finish our call.

So there you go. Day 2 gets a big tick. I achieved the task - even if it was a bit un-orthodox. Telephone evangelism is quite interesting. I kind of felt a bit like doing an open air. By its very nature you have to jump right into it.

Hey I have a challenge for you: Why not do what I did just once. I opened up the phone book to a random page and placed a local call to someone. I said "Hi, my name is Daniel Chapman and I live in Launceston. I just flipped open the phone book and called your number and was wondering if I could have a couple of minutes to ask you some spiritual questions, from a Christian perspective...?"

You might be really surprised. You might even make it a habit on a certain night per week or something. The bonus is that it is really quick. I was able to get people thinking about their position before God in 5 minutes, then you hang up and go on with your evening. What is the worst that could happen? I think that this whole "but you might offend them by your manner and methods" thing is a pretty lame excuse. PEOPLE WILL BE OFFENDED BY THE MESSAGE NO MATTER WHAT! Jesus said it would happen! Why are we so surprised? We don't want to necessarily add to people offence, but I think its going to be offensive no matter what - unless we choose to water down the actual message and give an erroneous message!

Ok, this is a pretty harsh rant from me and not normally like me. I am not going to bother going back to correct it either.

Am I way off? It is possible. Let me know your thoughts.

Way of the Master amps me up!

Gee I am pumped. I haven't watched any WOTM for a while and I just watched the episode "God has a wonderful plan for your life" and I just want to get out there and do it. I am so revved up about it.

My Wife and Daughter and I will be going down to City Park this afternoon to try and achieve my goal for today.

Tell you later how it went.

7Day/2aDay challenge: DAY 1

12:57pm EST (+10:00)

• Ok, I am half way through the day and I have not evangelised yet. I have washed the cars, sprayed the weeds in my lawn and even turned over some lawn for our new veggie patch. BUT I HAVE NOT WITNESSED. Believe it or not, I have had contact with non-Christians (but I was too busy doing all that stuff).
• I have not read the bible or prayed. Doing so will really help. Perhaps I can do that now and head of this afternoon to do try and reach my goal for today (which is really pretty easy).
• check back here in about 3-5hours an I may be able to give you some good news.

5:45pm EST (+10:00)

• Glory to God. He does answer prayer. Got back from a witness encounter with 2 people about an hour ago. God just set it right up. I will tell you more later when I get some time.

6:55pm EST (+10:00) - Time to give you a report on the encounter!

Well @ 3:55pm (after reading Galatians 4) I had some time up my sleeve to get out there. I was thinking all afternoon of going down to the boardwalk near the river and find some people to talk with (notice with, and not to). I told my wife where I was going and she suggested that I just pop over to the local shopping centre instead. I agreed with her practical idea - much better. So, off I drove. On the way I became really anxious about the whole thing but then I just got so sick of being nervous inside myself I just decided to not waste time dwelling on possibilities, just to go to enjoy conversations and meet people. This new mindset was really helpful. I really wanted to show respect to those that I was talking with (see discussion with John) and not have the whole agenda thing spinning in my mind. I just trusted that it would all be there when it was time to go for it.

As I got out of the car an elderly lady pulled up beside me and got out. I said hello and started a conversation. We talked about the lovely weather and working in the garden. We walked in together and she seemed really happy to chat with me. I hesitated as she was about to go into the supermarket, but I called her back and gave the lady her first million! She received it and kept it, even after I pointed out that it was a gospel tract and had a message on the back. I (accidentally/rudely) said"I hope the print is not too fine for you to read", but she didn't mind my remark.

I said goodbye to her and walked down the shopping centre looking for someone with time for a chat. A group of elderly men were engaged in heated discussions on some benches. The roller doors on all the shops were closing - it was 4pm. Did I leave it all to late??? Before I left to come here I had asked my wife if she wanted anything - she requested cream buns. I headed into the closing bakery to try and meet that request. I had a casual conversation with the two shop staff members and they hadn't had any such treats all week. As I was leaving I offered the girls a million dollars each. One took it. When I mentioned it was a gospel tract she returned it with great vigour. I let them close the doors. Before I left they recommended the other bakery down the end of the centre.

On my way there I passed 2 boys with their skateboards under their arms coming out of the toilets. I overheard one of they say something like:
"...and then he asked me to go to Church."
I thought for as second that I should double back and inquire what they were talking about, but I just kept on walking.

I arrived at the bakery and it looked like they were staying open longer to catch all the closing business. They had buns! I scanned around and everyone looked busy. There was a big group (5) outside talking, but I thought it would be pretty stupid to go and break in on that.

As I was leaving I somehow glanced and noticed a guy sitting with his wife and then to my surprise, on my way back to the center I saw a poster with a guy that looked exactly like the guy I had just caught a glimpse of. I stopped and looked backwards and forwards. It was him.

"Hey, is that you?" I asked?
"You bet." he replied with a big smile.

We started up conversation and I took a set at their table. We talked for quite a while (5-10min). He was a magician/mime artist and he was sitting with his wife who helps in the show. They travel around Australia and the world as professional entertainers. I won't reveal their names as I didn't ask permission to put them in my blog (forgot to ask).

He was, loud and confidently gregarious (our conversation could be heard by lots of people all around the bakery), his wife was the complete opposite. I was really interested in asking him about mime as I had been doing study on it earlier this year and we shared a lot of common ground in our passion for performing arts - we swapped a lot of stories and information.

After a slight beat in our flamboyant exchange (mostly from his side), I jumped straight in to the spiritual:
"As well as getting cream buns, I came down here to talk with people about spiritual stuff. Do you have a Christian background?"
"Yes, I was an alter boy when I was young but I haven't done anything much since then. I am now an agnostic." he declared.
"No, not at all", she replied.
I got them to take the good test and they admitted to lying, stealing and blaspheme - neither of them would admit to adultery of the heart (perhaps they were embarrassed in front of their spouse.)

He mentioned that its all OK if you repent. (in hindsight I should have checked what he meant by that). I corrected him; "We need to also have faith in Jesus. We need to trust in what he has done on the cross for our sins - we receive His righteousness. That's what we need because there is no-one who is righteous. The Bible says that everyone has sinned and broken God's law."

He said that he would still get in to heaven because God forgives everyone. I responded with the analogy of the good judge and man who asked for forgiveness. Well after that he wanted to argue the toss an nit pick everything I said.
"Well not necessarily - judges need to take a lot of things into account..." He went to some lengths to explain how it is not so black and white as I was suggesting.
"Its just an analogy" I retorted, "but the bible does say that God will judge in righteousness. His judgements will be fair."
Next in our conversation he brought up a red herring question that he claimed no one has been answer since he first asked it to his Sunday school teacher when he was an alter boy. His question was about Judas - He was essentially asking about free will / God's fore-knowledge of all things, etc.
"What if Judas didn't betray Jesus. If he stopped and didn't go through with it. Then Jesus would not have been crucified. So it was all up to Judas - he had no choice. Do we therefore have no free will - because if God knows what's going to happen then we don't get to choose.

I did my best to answer him, even though he was evading my question about where he would go if he was found guilty on judgement day. I referred to God's sovereignty and that if God was to crush us all today it would not affect his holiness and righteousness;
"...he made us, we are all guilty of rejecting him, but just an act of his wonderful love that keeps it going".

He revealed that he had recently read a book called the Judas Gospel (or something like that) saying that it was found with the dead sea scrolls and pre-dates all the other gospels. He said that Jesus and his disciples were rebels and what we would refer to today as terrorists. I questioned him on the authenticity of the book he was reading and he was without a real answer.

Well our conversation/encounter finished not long after that. They were leaving from the bakery to travel back to their home interstate - they had just come in to Tassie to do shows today and they were leaving again. They took the million dollar notes and went on their way. We were all very nice to each other and very friendly, even after engaging in some weighty conversation.

So there you go. God answers prayer. I was able to witness to 2 people that had similar interests, across a comfortable table with people that were willing to listen and respond. I was able to achieve the goal which I set yesterday! When I had finished and got home I realised that it all took about 40 minutes - that meant that I had been speaking with the couple for over half and hour. Thank you Lord!!

Ultimately they were still very proud. He was quite intelligent and not really humble about his sin - he ducked and swerved to avoid conviction. Please pray for our unidentified couple. They were really lovely, welcoming and compassionate in the way the talked.

Ok

7 days of 2 a day

Ok, you may have heard about my 2 hours of street evangelism. I ended up witnessing directly to 2 people, handing out a tract to another and leaving a tract on top of a power point next to a hand towel dispenser in a public men's toilet. (If you think about it, it is quite a wimpy effort - I spent a lot of time just cruising around)

I like the idea of setting measurable and achievable goals. I have a tendency to set ridiculous goals and standards for myself and then to feel bad when I have not fulfilled them. Also, often such goals are implicit or not clearly stated, so I find myself self-flagellating over some thing that I think I 'should' have done but I never really planed on doing it anyway. I know that all this sounds weird, please let me know if it is striking a chord with you.

Well, anyway, hear and now I am setting myself a goal. Inspired by the fact that it is possible to for me to have a go at evangelism again, my goal is: 7 Days of 2 a day.

What will this look like? I intend to attempt to take at least 2 people a day (2Day) clearly and effectively through the Law of God to reveal their position before Him, and then to reveal what God has done for them so they need not perish on the day of judgement.

Sat 16...Sun 17...Mon 18...Tue 19...Wed 20...Thr 21...Fri 22
...1..........3............5.............7.............9.............11..........13
...2.........4.............6.............8............10...........12..........14

WOW, that's a total of 14 people hearing the good news in 1 week.
"With your help Lord it is possible!"
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The results! Give me a mark out of 10 ::

Well, how did I go with the self imposed evangelism task? I am sure you want to know... (see '2 hour evangelism task' (was actually 3hrs))

OK, here is a run-down of how it went ::

I went to drop off the car an guess what? There were only a couple of tracts in the car I was sure the car was loaded with tracts before I left. "Ahh", I cried to myself, "how am I going to do 'Cold Evangelism' without a tract to get it going?" "Loser" I said to myself, "that will teach you to leave things to the last minute." All I could do was dream about the stack of million dollar tracts sitting on our bookshelf at home.

After dropping of the car and not witnessing to the dude at the tinting place I walked along the street into the city (why didn't I try it with the car guy? He just seemed too busy (is that a wimpy excuse?)) I found myself looking at everyone in the eye as I passed them thinking to myself, "how can I get them to stop and have a chat?" My answer was that I couldn't really do much about it - I would have to wait till I find someone with time on their hands - so I could start up the conversation.

OK, first stop Gloria Jeans for a coffee. While waiting for my Berry-Vanilla Latte I scanned the customers and decided to try witnessing to a guy wearing black (possibly a department store uniform) who wore a silver tie and a black zip up jacket. He was by himself sipping away his time:

"How's it going," I inquired?

"Good" he replied in a nervous tone.

Now our conversation was destined to become very anxious. I started to pick up on his emotional state and it started to overpower my voice as I spoke.

"Are you a regular customer," I asked?

"Yeah, I come here every morning"

Now at this point I could have built up the conversation/relationship more soundly, but he was giving me a highly suspicious vibe, so I decided to leap into the spiritual (in hindsight, not a good idea - maybe??) Some of the questions I could have asked were "what is the best designer coffee they sell?", "Do they give you a discount?", etc. but I just wasn't that quick at the time.

I was increasing in my nervousness for another reason. This guy was giving of a lot of gay signals. His voice turned out to be very camp and just everything about him yelled GAY!!! I am not homophobic; homosexuality is another sin that will take us to hell, along with every other sin. But my increasing nervousness was only pampered to by each of the thoughts running in my head such as: "It looks like you are trying to pick up on this guy by sitting down next to him and starting a conversation." These thoughts didn't help. I ended up going for it very early on...

"What do you think happens when you die?"

"I don't know, just nothing. I don't think about it at all."

"Well it's the ultimate statistic, 10 out of 10 people die"

"Yeah I suppose."

"Would you say that you're a good person?"

"Yes"

"Do you mind if I ask you a few questions to see if that's true?"

...I was saying all the right stuff but for some reason we were both ridiculously nervous in our questions and answers. This goes to show the need for a display of confidence - it helps the other person relax.

Well we went through lying and stealing and I got him to admit to both. I got to the lust question...

"Jesus said that if you have ever looked at someone with lust that you have committed adultery with them in your heart. Have you ever looked with lust." (notice I said "someone" instead of another woman)

"I'm sorry but I have to go" he replied, and as fast as a fish darting through the water he scooted up out of his seat and fled elsewhere.

OK - was that a success? Let me know what you think in a comment....

Well I wasn't too pumped about the whole cold evangelism thing after that. I especially regretted not giving him one of the few tracts I had at the start of the conversation. I went into an open book store and checked out their books. I was amazed at the quantity of new-age books lining their shelves - a typical 'secular' bookstore. There was even one title You are their heaven: why the dead will never leave you. What will spiritual gurus invent next. I think if was in some way connected to the Medium TV show. I just goes to show that people will make up any religion they want and be able to sell it. Why does this stuff sell? Its all about YOU! Yes you are God. You are the centre of the universe. People love this self glorifying garbage and will pay to get it. (I didn't lift up the book and check it out, but I think one can judge a book by its cover pretty well.)

After my retail therapy (for which I was worse off) I wandered through the mall, walking past people who were standing waiting to go into shops (it was 8:45am). Some guy was sitting down on a mall bench and I went and stood next to him. I introduced myself to him and engaged in a small amount of chit-chat. He was giving me some very suspicious looks through his sunglasses and I went straight to explaining why I had approached him for a conversation.

"I was wondering if you would like to talk about spiritual stuff."

"No, not at all" was his reply.

Well from there, instead of moving on I stayed and engaged in some more chit-chat. Well it turned out that we have a very enjoyable natural conversation for 10 minutes. We had a lot in common. He talked about his wife who taught at a Catholic school and the whole Catholic church wedding thing from last century (It was taboo for Catholic/non-Catholic weddings to take place). He told me his stories. I listened and responded. I was thinking that I should somehow try and take him through the 'good test' but I just didn't want to after his stern resistance earlier in the conversation. Well, in hindsight, I should have at least had a go.

Conversations happen so fast, but we have time to think of a million other things and make decisions all the time; we can um and ah about bringing in the gospel and end up defeating ourselves. I think what I have learned from this encounter is that if I am in doubt I should go for it. There is nothing to lose for me and everything to gain for the other person(s).

Well after that man, I decided to have a break and do a bit more looking in shops. Here ended my evangelism exploits. I gave out my one million dollar bill to one retail assistant when I purchased some literacy books for my English Teaching, but beyond that I never really did much more evangelism. In hindsight I did wast time and perhaps I did shrink back by choosing to look in the shops instead of being more active.

Summary: Well, I do think that God did answer prayer as I was able to do some cold evangelism (I must come up with a more positive name for this type of evangelism - perhaps its street evangelism???) with complete strangers. I think I could have done more with my time and made a few more opportunities, but at least I did have a go, which is more than I have done in the last few months.

Thanks if you could pray for the two nameless guys and the lady I gave the tract. Please pray also for courage and wisdom for me from the Lord.

Bless you,

Daniel

2 hours of street evangelism

Is there a neologism which we can make up combining the words blog and accountability? How about blogtegrity? Accountablogability?

Well in half an hour I will be taking my car in to get its window's tinted (gee we are spoilt in the west). I will spend 2 hours in the city.

"Lord give me courage and strength and wisdom to do the work of an evangelist today."

OK, if you get on here before 11am EST (+10:00) please pray for me.

I will let you know how I go when I get back, later today.

Do you wimp out of witness opportunities?

I know that I am not alone...

If you are reading this and you can say, "yeah, Dan that's me right there" or "sure, just about every time" then could you please add a comment and share it with me.

Thanks
Daniel Chapman
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Reformed Evangelist

Check out the Reformed Evangelist site.

Very nicely done

A great blog about evangelism. Its three authors have developed a host of cool articles in their achieve. Once you get past the USA specific content there is some refreshing quality thinking. It's classified as a blog, because it regularly updated, but it is much more - some of the articles are quite lengthy.

The theme of sound doctrine linking to sound evangelism is repeated in this site. I was first exposed to this through Todd Friel's insight expressed on Way of the Master Radio

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Hell's Best Kept Secret

Do you have a spare 60 minutes up your sleeve? Want to be encouraged and motivated to effectively reach out to the lost all around you?

Watch Hell's Best Kept secret

Available from Living Waters

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What a failure!

What is with this, just blew it with my neighbour. I was over there talking to them and chickened right out. What a wuss I am. I was thinking stuff like; "If I bring it up now I will sound really arrogant or like a bible basher because I have not spoken to them for such a long time", "Its going to look too forced", etc.

Well these are some of my thoughts, but do they in anyway give a valid reason not to evangelise when I know how to and have done so in the past very successfully? Na.

OK lets try again next time.

Possible extra reasons:

• I have not been mucking into the word
• I have not been praying

Ray says: "If you want to push over someone twice your size, go to a country where they have starvation, then you will be able to do it easily ... you are weak when you don't eat - the same applies spiritually." I have not been building myself up - doing so should help.

Task:

Report back on how I have been building myself up - give me a couple of weeks an I will let you know if I have consistently applied myself. At the moment, I can honestly say that I am weak on this, very week.

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Getting back to the task

Ahhh.

The challenge of evangelism - love of our own comfort; love of a good report from others; love of reputation. All this can easily be overcome by love for God (connected to the fear of God). Are we truly grateful for all that the Lord has done for us in His choosing and redeeming action? Thank you Lord for the cross - you died that those who repent and believe may be justified and counted righteous, where there was no chance of ever being such. You have done this for me. Thank you God.

Thanks God for all you are continuting to do.

I want to get back into it. Last December/January I was on to it most serverly, even so to the point of doing open air evangelism on a beach to groups of sunbathers. Then I got a job Teaching @ a High School and moved into Launceston from Scottsdale and (for some reason that is not clear) ended up pulling back from making opportunities and taking opportunities. Well I am on holidays now and it is a good time to refresh and refocus my evangelism efforts.

Tasks to get me going:

• I will be re-watching The Way of the Master series and taking time to get out there and do it. This blog should encourage you if you have got slack about it too. Just do something.

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