Oftentimes, I encounter a response from people that sounds something like this; God will judge the really bad people, like Hitler, or, the ones that God sends to hell are those who are murderers and do really bad things like that.
I went through the Gospel and the Law with one such lady a couple of years ago. She technically understood the Gospel and even admitted to lying, etc. Then it came time for the question, "Why would God allow you into heaven? Do you think you are a good person?" Her response was typical of our Western culture. It was something like, "God won't punish me in hell, because I haven't murdered anybody. I'm not a bad person!"
People are having a hard time seeing what God's holiness looks like. Many people answer like the woman I talked with that night. "God won't punish me in hell because I haven't murdered anybody." The problem with these people in their thinking is that they see a difference between the sin of being angry and outright murder, such as the acts of Hitler. It seems like Hitler (and his name always comes up) has become the standard of who goes to hell. Since people aren't as bad a he was, they reason, that they won't go to hell. I can understand their reasoning. But it is hard to communicate to them that even their 'white lie' is evil enough before a holy God to send them to hell for eternity.
This same criteria has come up again in a group setting which I am part of. Hitler's name comes up a lot and these people are using him as a standard of right and wrong, instead of seeing the Law of God (or even understanding it) as the correct standard. It sure sounds logical to them to talk about their white lie in comparison to someone who intentionally wanted to kill as many people as he could. Now to figure out how to bridge the gap.
The main way to bridge the gap starts with who God is and what He is like. Not only is He different than human beings, but He is holy, and He is without any kind of sinful flaw. How can we explain to people what He is like? What does His word say about Him?
People can read in History books what Hitler did. They can't see God with their eyes, because He is invisible. Unless people understand that God is all-knowing, and that God is a Spirit, they will fail to see Him as He truly is. They will be like the heathen in the book of Psalms, or like the scoffers who say that God doesn't notice their sin. He doesn't care. "When is He coming back anyway? We've been hearing this for centuries, and it hasn't happened yet, and I don't think it ever will." These people assume that a holy God isn't watching or they don't have to give account to Him because if they did, He would be visible to them.
God is the One who reveals Himself to people. That is why we need to pray that will happen. We have to pray for a deep conviction of sin in the hearts of these people. Only when they see their 'white lies' and 'taking something small when they were children' as serious sin, they won't truly come to Christ. They can technically understand the Gospel, but will personally not see a need for it. From that will only result false converts to deal with later on. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and that is what we need when presenting the Gospel to others.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Monday, October 3, 2011
Everyday Evangelism - October 1, 2010 - Planet X
I went to eat lunch with a friend on Saturday, and while I was waiting in the parking lot, I gave out some tracts. It can be an interesting adventure, as I really never know who I will run into. I didn't have any recording devices on me, and didn't plan to have any conversations at length as I didn't know when my friend would show up.
I talked with a man who was parked on the other side of the parking place. Seemed like a real nice guy. He was on a mission. He just got through bypass surgery and says that it is a miracle that he is alive. His mom was praying for him, and also told him that he would have three signs that had to do with God. He said he was going to read the tract I gave him. Perhaps that was one of the three signs? I would love to have talked to him about the Gospel, but he said he was on a mission. He went on to explain that Planet X would be here pretty soon and we need to be ready. Planet X comes once every 3800 years, he continued. When it comes, it causes severe tidal waves and most of America is going to end up under water. Planet X came by when Noah was in the ark. This man has bought some property that is way above sea level in Colorado, and encourages others to do the same.
Like I said , I wanted to get some words in about the Gospel. Don't get me wrong, he was really a kind man, just on a mission. He believes the most important thing that we can do is to get ready for Planet X coming.
I did get to explain that we need to get ready spiritually, and he seemed to understand what I was getting at.
We all should be on such a mission. Not to warn people about Planet X coming and creating gigantic tidal waves, but we need to warn people about the Judgment to come. The Bible is very clear that God will never destroy the earth with a flood again, as He did in Noah's time, but He will destroy it by fire. If we are not ready, when that day comes, we will be thrown in the Lake of Fire. God help us to take our mission seriously. May God give us compassion for lost people and the desire to make His name known.
The prayer request here is that God will show Himself to this man, named Dominic. Dominic needs to be preparing himself for the day he will see God. He needs to be clothed with righteousness. He needs to be washed. All of us need to be ready for that day. We will either die in our sins, or, die with our sins completely erased. We need to hear the Gospel and respond. So do those around us. Let us love our neighbors as ourselves and preach the Gospel to them.
I talked with a man who was parked on the other side of the parking place. Seemed like a real nice guy. He was on a mission. He just got through bypass surgery and says that it is a miracle that he is alive. His mom was praying for him, and also told him that he would have three signs that had to do with God. He said he was going to read the tract I gave him. Perhaps that was one of the three signs? I would love to have talked to him about the Gospel, but he said he was on a mission. He went on to explain that Planet X would be here pretty soon and we need to be ready. Planet X comes once every 3800 years, he continued. When it comes, it causes severe tidal waves and most of America is going to end up under water. Planet X came by when Noah was in the ark. This man has bought some property that is way above sea level in Colorado, and encourages others to do the same.
Like I said , I wanted to get some words in about the Gospel. Don't get me wrong, he was really a kind man, just on a mission. He believes the most important thing that we can do is to get ready for Planet X coming.
I did get to explain that we need to get ready spiritually, and he seemed to understand what I was getting at.
We all should be on such a mission. Not to warn people about Planet X coming and creating gigantic tidal waves, but we need to warn people about the Judgment to come. The Bible is very clear that God will never destroy the earth with a flood again, as He did in Noah's time, but He will destroy it by fire. If we are not ready, when that day comes, we will be thrown in the Lake of Fire. God help us to take our mission seriously. May God give us compassion for lost people and the desire to make His name known.
The prayer request here is that God will show Himself to this man, named Dominic. Dominic needs to be preparing himself for the day he will see God. He needs to be clothed with righteousness. He needs to be washed. All of us need to be ready for that day. We will either die in our sins, or, die with our sins completely erased. We need to hear the Gospel and respond. So do those around us. Let us love our neighbors as ourselves and preach the Gospel to them.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Everyday Evangelism - Tongue Tied Evangelism
Are you sometimes afraid to talk to people about the Gospel? Maybe you are one of those people whose mouth dries out while you are speaking. Or maybe your voice quivers or you lose your voice when you start talking. Maybe you can't remember what to say or your mind goes blank. If your like me, you fit in all the above listed categories. On top of that, you listen to a message on evangelism, then feel guilty because you remember the last time you tried to talk to somebody, they wouldn't listen and you never wanted to try again, at least for a long, long time.
It is not easy to share the Gospel. In fact, it really is impossible. That is why Jesus promised that the disciples would receive power when the Holy Spirit came upon them. Evangelism takes the power of God to carry it out and be effective.
One time Moses told God, that he didn't want to go to where God was leading them, unless he knew that God's Presence was going to be with them. The Bible says that the power of the God is in the Gospel. That is why we cherish it. That is why we need it.
I will give a little bit of my story to encourage you, if you are one of those people who feel like you are slow to speech, when it comes to evangelism. I was a very unlikely candidate for being a person that could share the Gospel. First of all, I didn't really know how to talk well. I had a small vocabulary, plus just didn't know how to communicate about anything. I remember as a child, going to the doctor's office and the doctor would be talking to me, and my mom had to do the responding for me because I didn't really know how to answer him. Kids bullied me around because I didn't talk, and I ended up being very disadvantaged because of my lack of ability to speak. I felt stupid around other people, and basically didn't really even want to socialize very much because of that.
At the age of seventeen, something dramatic happened to me one Sunday morning. My life was changed and I believe it was because the Gospel connected in my heart. I got it, finally. I was never the same. My friends tried the year before to get me to pass out tracts. I didn't really understand what that was all about, but God was working in my heart making me ready to respond to Him. God helped me understand the Gospel and it took root in my heart. I had a great desire to share the Gospel and preach the word after that.
But there were still problems. I was still a tongue tied person. It was still hard to communicate. I gave tracts out to my classmates, but if they were to ask me questions about the Gospel, I felt so unprepared. Time went on. I got married. I went to an evangelism course called "I Found It". I took Evangelism Explosion classes. I join Child Evangelism Fellowship. I had a lot of teaching on evangelism. But I still found it hard to talk to people. Usually, my mouth would dry out. If I could get words out, then I would lose track of what I was saying and couldn't follow the conversation. I was still leaving tracts out at the mall when I was 22, but the desire to evangelize became weaker. Then after having four children over a period of about 13 years and homeschooling, who has time for evangelistic activities? Evangelism was now a foreign concept to me, or just a fading memory by this time. I thought maybe one day it would happen, at least maybe I could still leave tracts around, but even that seemed a long way off. Even though I continued to go to evangelism classes as they were offered, I was pretty much resolved to the fact that the best I would ever be able to do would be to lay tracts around, or, maybe if I could get brave and make my voice strong, I could actually give them to people. But it would only happen if someone else were leading that way. I certainly was not now envisioned to lead in this area!
Well, it happened. We had an evangelism class at our church that used videos from 'The Way of the Master' and I came to the church building at 8:30 am, which was way too early for me to be anywhere. There were opportunities to go out and evangelize. The desire came back into my heart again to do this. I wondered if it would be different. I certainly had a better understanding of the Gospel. It looked so easy on the videos watching Ray and Kirk talking to people. Guess what? I went out there and it was still hard. My son and I would go out there with the group and since he wasn't afraid to start conversations with people, I took advantage of this. I would jump in and be able to talk to people once the conversation started. But there were still problems. Sometimes, it was just me talking to someone, and my mouth would still dry out. I still had some fear of man. My mind would still go blank. Sometimes, I would start shaking and couldn't talk. But my heart really wanted to do this. Why would God give me the desire to do something and then have it not work out. Again, I was resolving myself to just pass out tracts and lay them in conspicuous places.
It came to the place where I had to be in prayer about this. Since it was a major struggle, I would have to wrestle in prayer. My desire to carry out this 'work of service' would have to be strong enough for me to stay in prayer over it. So that is what I did. I prayed for God to change me. I am still praying that I will have the grace and ability to do this, and that I will not be afraid of people. I will have to pray for this until my last day on earth, because I cannot do this in my strength. I need help, God's help.
Now, we are at the place we God has allowed me to be prepared for this work. I am still afraid at times, but I am not paralyzed anymore. My mouth dries out occasionally, but most of the time, everything goes well. I can have conversations with people and help them understand the Gospel better. I need to keep reminding myself that there are some people who really are interested in listening to what God says. There is only a small handful of people who are antagonistic toward the Gospel. And God can give wisdom in those situations. He can also lead us to talk to the people He wants to hear the Gospel, on that day. We can be in faith that God is at work, because He is here with us. He will help us when we get stuck. He will give us courage to talk to people. He will do all this for us, but we need to be in prayer for ourselves and for the lost. The key to all of this being successful is trusting God and being diligent in prayer.
If God can take one person and help this person to learn how to go from just leaving tracts in places to actually communicating the Gospel in conversations with people on a regular basis, He can do it for anyone who has that desire in his or her heart. It may take months of praying, but praying is a must. The fruit that will come out will be amazing and many people will hear the Gospel that would never have had any opportunity if that person did not learn to share their faith. God is able to make us able. Let us trust in Him now.
It is not easy to share the Gospel. In fact, it really is impossible. That is why Jesus promised that the disciples would receive power when the Holy Spirit came upon them. Evangelism takes the power of God to carry it out and be effective.
One time Moses told God, that he didn't want to go to where God was leading them, unless he knew that God's Presence was going to be with them. The Bible says that the power of the God is in the Gospel. That is why we cherish it. That is why we need it.
I will give a little bit of my story to encourage you, if you are one of those people who feel like you are slow to speech, when it comes to evangelism. I was a very unlikely candidate for being a person that could share the Gospel. First of all, I didn't really know how to talk well. I had a small vocabulary, plus just didn't know how to communicate about anything. I remember as a child, going to the doctor's office and the doctor would be talking to me, and my mom had to do the responding for me because I didn't really know how to answer him. Kids bullied me around because I didn't talk, and I ended up being very disadvantaged because of my lack of ability to speak. I felt stupid around other people, and basically didn't really even want to socialize very much because of that.
At the age of seventeen, something dramatic happened to me one Sunday morning. My life was changed and I believe it was because the Gospel connected in my heart. I got it, finally. I was never the same. My friends tried the year before to get me to pass out tracts. I didn't really understand what that was all about, but God was working in my heart making me ready to respond to Him. God helped me understand the Gospel and it took root in my heart. I had a great desire to share the Gospel and preach the word after that.
But there were still problems. I was still a tongue tied person. It was still hard to communicate. I gave tracts out to my classmates, but if they were to ask me questions about the Gospel, I felt so unprepared. Time went on. I got married. I went to an evangelism course called "I Found It". I took Evangelism Explosion classes. I join Child Evangelism Fellowship. I had a lot of teaching on evangelism. But I still found it hard to talk to people. Usually, my mouth would dry out. If I could get words out, then I would lose track of what I was saying and couldn't follow the conversation. I was still leaving tracts out at the mall when I was 22, but the desire to evangelize became weaker. Then after having four children over a period of about 13 years and homeschooling, who has time for evangelistic activities? Evangelism was now a foreign concept to me, or just a fading memory by this time. I thought maybe one day it would happen, at least maybe I could still leave tracts around, but even that seemed a long way off. Even though I continued to go to evangelism classes as they were offered, I was pretty much resolved to the fact that the best I would ever be able to do would be to lay tracts around, or, maybe if I could get brave and make my voice strong, I could actually give them to people. But it would only happen if someone else were leading that way. I certainly was not now envisioned to lead in this area!
Well, it happened. We had an evangelism class at our church that used videos from 'The Way of the Master' and I came to the church building at 8:30 am, which was way too early for me to be anywhere. There were opportunities to go out and evangelize. The desire came back into my heart again to do this. I wondered if it would be different. I certainly had a better understanding of the Gospel. It looked so easy on the videos watching Ray and Kirk talking to people. Guess what? I went out there and it was still hard. My son and I would go out there with the group and since he wasn't afraid to start conversations with people, I took advantage of this. I would jump in and be able to talk to people once the conversation started. But there were still problems. Sometimes, it was just me talking to someone, and my mouth would still dry out. I still had some fear of man. My mind would still go blank. Sometimes, I would start shaking and couldn't talk. But my heart really wanted to do this. Why would God give me the desire to do something and then have it not work out. Again, I was resolving myself to just pass out tracts and lay them in conspicuous places.
It came to the place where I had to be in prayer about this. Since it was a major struggle, I would have to wrestle in prayer. My desire to carry out this 'work of service' would have to be strong enough for me to stay in prayer over it. So that is what I did. I prayed for God to change me. I am still praying that I will have the grace and ability to do this, and that I will not be afraid of people. I will have to pray for this until my last day on earth, because I cannot do this in my strength. I need help, God's help.
Now, we are at the place we God has allowed me to be prepared for this work. I am still afraid at times, but I am not paralyzed anymore. My mouth dries out occasionally, but most of the time, everything goes well. I can have conversations with people and help them understand the Gospel better. I need to keep reminding myself that there are some people who really are interested in listening to what God says. There is only a small handful of people who are antagonistic toward the Gospel. And God can give wisdom in those situations. He can also lead us to talk to the people He wants to hear the Gospel, on that day. We can be in faith that God is at work, because He is here with us. He will help us when we get stuck. He will give us courage to talk to people. He will do all this for us, but we need to be in prayer for ourselves and for the lost. The key to all of this being successful is trusting God and being diligent in prayer.
If God can take one person and help this person to learn how to go from just leaving tracts in places to actually communicating the Gospel in conversations with people on a regular basis, He can do it for anyone who has that desire in his or her heart. It may take months of praying, but praying is a must. The fruit that will come out will be amazing and many people will hear the Gospel that would never have had any opportunity if that person did not learn to share their faith. God is able to make us able. Let us trust in Him now.
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Everyday Evangelism - People Need to Wrestle with God
Here is my evangelism thought for today. People need to wrestle with God. The problem with modern evangelism is that we have the idea that everything should be easy for us. We try to make the Gospel easy for people to understand. When we see people start to wrestle with God, we try to stop it. We mistakenly think that people are rejecting God when they are in wrestling mode. We make false assumptions because of our misunderstanding. We think because they are wrestling, that the Gospel is too hard for them to accept. So then we water the Gospel down to make it easier for them to grasp. In doing that, we have taken out the workings of God in their hearts. I think the reason we fail in this area is because we don't understand the power and greatness of God. We think that a person is credited with righteousness if they have a good understanding of the Gospel. We give more credit to a person than we should. Salvation is of the Lord and we need to be careful to not stop the work of God in their hearts.
When people are afraid of going to hell, do we help them understand why people end up there in the first place, or do we try to give them a false comfort leading them to believe that they won't go there because they are afraid. How many times have we seen something like that. "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved..." or "Whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.."? Don't get me wrong, those Bible verses are effective in their context. But when a person begins to wrestle with the things of God, how easy it is for us to just pop a verse and try to solve a person's problem. Let's take time and talk over things with people, instead of just trying to give them an answer that will make them calm. Every time God works in a heart, there will be conflict. That is good. It is kind of like pouring peroxide on an open wound. When there are bubbles, that means the peroxide is working. Pouring peroxide on a wound is painful. Be prepared for discomfort if you try it! But teaching the word of God to people has a similar effect. People will feel pain and struggle. That is a normal reaction of God's working. As God begins to work, and people begin to feel growing pains, that is good. Don't interrupt that with trying to make the person feel good. Help them by applying the Gospel to their hearts. It will be amazing to see what God does in a heart that wrestles with Him.
When people are afraid of going to hell, do we help them understand why people end up there in the first place, or do we try to give them a false comfort leading them to believe that they won't go there because they are afraid. How many times have we seen something like that. "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved..." or "Whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.."? Don't get me wrong, those Bible verses are effective in their context. But when a person begins to wrestle with the things of God, how easy it is for us to just pop a verse and try to solve a person's problem. Let's take time and talk over things with people, instead of just trying to give them an answer that will make them calm. Every time God works in a heart, there will be conflict. That is good. It is kind of like pouring peroxide on an open wound. When there are bubbles, that means the peroxide is working. Pouring peroxide on a wound is painful. Be prepared for discomfort if you try it! But teaching the word of God to people has a similar effect. People will feel pain and struggle. That is a normal reaction of God's working. As God begins to work, and people begin to feel growing pains, that is good. Don't interrupt that with trying to make the person feel good. Help them by applying the Gospel to their hearts. It will be amazing to see what God does in a heart that wrestles with Him.
Monday, September 19, 2011
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Everyday Evangelism - A Letter to an Email Spammer
Here is one way to tell the Gospel, especially since we get a lot of these types of emails in our email boxes.
I was going through my junk email box, and came across this type of letter which I have received from supposedly different people. This tim I wrote back. These letters are usually from someone in the Middle East supposedly, who had a relative or spouse who died. Somehow the money is supposed to be delegated to us. Here is what I wrote back to Mrs. Gore Thorsten:
Hello Mrs. Gore Thorsten,
I don’t know who you are and I can only imagine why you are writing to me. I don’t know if you are aware of this, but I have gotten this same kind of letter from hundreds of other people at different times. It looks like you are sending out emails like this in order to get personal information from people. Needless to say, it looks very suspect.
I can’t really help you with sending any more information, but I can tell you of something that is far more valuable than all the money in the world. You may or may not have heard of the Gospel. It involves information that we need to know, in order to understand where we will spend eternity.
Mrs. Gore, have you ever thought about what happens after a person dies? There are only two places that people go to after they leave this earth. One of them is Heaven, and the other is hell. Heaven is where God is, and because He is holy, no sin can ever be present there. Hell is a place for eternal punishment for sin. The problem is that every person that has ever lived (except one) has sinned. Each person will stand before God after he or she dies. If that person dies in their sin, they will spend eternity in a place of torment and will never be relieved of it, nor will they be able to leave that place.
You might ask, how does a person stand before God without sin? You might be thinking, do I have sin? Here is a way you can find out. Take the 10 Commandments. Look at them. Ask yourself if you have ever lied, stolen, lusted, cheated, loved other things more than God, hated, and many other things we do. If you have even broken one of those Commandments, ever, you will be marked with sin that God will judge one day. That is the bad news. You might be asking, what is the Good news then?
The Good News is that you don’t have to die in your sin. Here’s why; God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, 2000 years ago to take the punishment for all our sin. Your sin and my sin were put on Him when He was dying on the Cross. He never broke any of the 10 Commandments and always obeyed God, His father. After He died and was buried, He rose from the dead. You can turn from your sin and trust in Him as your Savior today. You can have a life that pleases God and glorifies Him. The choice is yours. Please consider this before you put your head on your pillow tonight. Life has many choices. Eternity has only two.Susan Seifert
Monday, August 22, 2011
Everyday Evangelism - The Stolen Beach Balls
I was recalling a funny story in my mind today, and wondering what God was doing in it. A couple of years ago, I ordered a bunch of beach balls which had some words imprinted on them. On one side, it asks the question, "What can wash away my sin?" and on the other side it reads "Nothing but the blood of Jesus. www.thegoodtest.net "
I had them in a basket at a garage sale at my daughters house. I put a sign on top of the basket telling people to take one per family (actually, if someone asked, I would let them have more if they had other family members that would want one). I had the basket of beach balls near the sidewalk so that when people were walking up to the garage sale, they would notice them first.
It was later in the day, and the traffic was slowing down, as far as the amount of people that were garage sailing that day. A car pulled up to the side walk and stopped. It had a couple of what looked like to me, African American men in it. The driver opened his door, and grabbed whatever beach balls were in the basket, about five or six. Then he took them and went back to the car and drove away. Now I can't imagine why someone would have done that. Perhaps he wanted to use them for his own evangelism, or maybe he was going to resell them. Maybe he had grandchildren and wanted one for each one. No one from that car even looked at the garage sail items. It was all very interesting anyway. God knows where each of the beach balls ended up and He will get glory for that whole incident. It was kind of funny though, and I will never forget that incident. Maybe someone will end up in heaven one day, because they saw the message on the beach balls. Maybe God used it to reach into someone's heart, that we have no idea of at this time.
I had them in a basket at a garage sale at my daughters house. I put a sign on top of the basket telling people to take one per family (actually, if someone asked, I would let them have more if they had other family members that would want one). I had the basket of beach balls near the sidewalk so that when people were walking up to the garage sale, they would notice them first.
It was later in the day, and the traffic was slowing down, as far as the amount of people that were garage sailing that day. A car pulled up to the side walk and stopped. It had a couple of what looked like to me, African American men in it. The driver opened his door, and grabbed whatever beach balls were in the basket, about five or six. Then he took them and went back to the car and drove away. Now I can't imagine why someone would have done that. Perhaps he wanted to use them for his own evangelism, or maybe he was going to resell them. Maybe he had grandchildren and wanted one for each one. No one from that car even looked at the garage sail items. It was all very interesting anyway. God knows where each of the beach balls ended up and He will get glory for that whole incident. It was kind of funny though, and I will never forget that incident. Maybe someone will end up in heaven one day, because they saw the message on the beach balls. Maybe God used it to reach into someone's heart, that we have no idea of at this time.
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