The subject that I'd like to talk about
today is evangelism in a secular world because
it's really where we're living.
And this is going to be kind of
an interaction time and also sharing a lot
of personal experiences that the Lord has brought
me through.
And at the outset, I want to let
you know my desire is not to offend
anyone by proclaiming a particular method of evangelism.
And as a friend of mine just shared
with me who had a big influence on
my life in this area just yesterday, that
often when we get excited about a particular
method in Christian life that may fit our
gift, we have this idea of gift projection,
that because we do well in this area,
that everyone else can do well in this
area.
And I do happen to think that lifestyle
evangelism is cut out for most people, but
my purpose is not to lay a burden
of guilt upon you through this discussion.
So I wanted to clear the air from
the outset.
I graduated from the Air Force Academy 10
years ago and left the pristine atmosphere on
the hill and had a fairly effective ministry
with cadets.
Although for those of you who know anything
about the military and even more about cadets,
you'd realize that they're basically a different breed.
And I'll let you take that whatever way
you want to take it.
And I went to medical school right from
the Academy to New Orleans.
I mean, I went from the hilltop to
the valley in terms of the people that
I related to.
I mean, it was like culture shock, something
I was totally unexpected for.
I mean, I thought I knew how to
relate to people, but I really didn't know
how to relate to the secular world.
And that was the first cold-water experience
that awakened my eyes in terms of broadening
my vision and how to relate to people.
Because I realized that my sometimes rather canned
approach of sharing the gospel to a particular
group of people just wasn't going to hack
it.
Because I would go to a function with
some of my medical student friends and someone
would be smoking a joint over in this
corner and you'd be trying to have a
conversation with someone and they're saying, you know,
I'm an atheist.
I don't have any interest in God.
And I'm just reeling and wondering where are
all these people?
Plus, New Orleans, I'm sure you're aware of
the nature of the city.
It contributes to that somewhat.
So that was kind of the motivation that
got me going.
A few people that have had an influence
on my life, Randy mentioned Dave Simon, and
also two authors, Jim Peterson and Joe Aldrich,
have had a tremendous impact upon my life
in this area.
And also a former NAVSTAF person who's now
with Church Resource Ministries, Scott Horn, has had
a tremendous impact on my life.
The theologians say that approximately in the United
States now, 50% of the people that
you and I relate to are secularized.
What they mean by that is they have
absolutely no interest in God, spiritual things, the
church or whatever.
They don't really even care.
So when you approach them from the standpoint
of, you know, are you interested in God?
They're not even interested in that.
And that's been a change over the last
several years.
At least when I grew up, most people
went to church.
They may not have had much more interest,
but there was more of a common ground.
Today, there is less of a common ground.
When you look at churches, only about 4
% of people do any sort of evangelism.
It's a pretty sad commentary.
And that's any kind of evangelism, whether it's
door-to-door, being involved with Billy Graham,
having an evangelistic Bible study.
And what I feel is an even sadder
commentary on our Christian heritage is, and this
has been well studied, 90% of people
involved in full-time Christian work are from
Christian heritages.
And that's not to downplay the importance of
a Christian heritage.
I only share that, that we're not getting
the job done.
Because if we are, we should have people
who have been reached from the secularized world
who are being used of the Lord.
I wanted to spend about, we'll divide the
time discussion into four equal parts.
And we're still just now on the introduction
part.
And under point A, I titled the issue,
the issue at stake.
You know, we've basically lost touch with the
non-Christian community.
And people have also looked at this figure,
that once a person becomes a Christian, within
two or three years, they've practically lost every
one of their significant non-Christian relationship.
And it's like they don't have any more
non-Christian friends.
And this is probably a result of kind
of the environment that we've grown up in.
And there's basically three types of evangelism.
There's proclamational evangelism, like Billy Graham does.
There's persuasional evangelism, where you go out and
talk to someone and present the gospel, whether
you're at a military base or on a
campus door-to-door.
And both of these are effective techniques.
However, they are more effective for people who
are at the reaping point, where they've been
prepared beforehand, and God uses that message to
allow them to come to know him.
And they're also effective if you're in a
ministry where you're trying to establish a small
group of believers, like a beachhead, and then
grow your ministry out of that.
It's a very effective technique.
That's why missionaries often do that.
They go and talk to people about the
Lord and make as many contacts as they
can to get a small group of believers
and then launch out with Bible studies from
there.
And it's also a very effective technique for
those people who are skilled in reaping.
And what I mean by that is, as
you know, there is a gift of evangelism,
but also the Bible states that God expects
all of us to be witnesses.
The people who have the gift of evangelism
usually have the gift of reaping.
God uses them in such a way that
they can share a word of the gospel
and it convicts people and they repent and
come to know the Lord.
But that's a very small percentage of the
Christian population who have that gift.
So what we'll be addressing is, how can
the rest of us fit into what God
has commanded?
The last type of evangelism is relationship evangelism.
This is what we'll be discussing.
Now, I want to lay the groundwork here
so you don't have a misconception when I'm
talking about it.
Some people consider, when they say relationship evangelism,
it's kind of like you witness by your
life.
You never say anything.
And that's not what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about aggressively pursuing relationships with people
and praying for opportunities and sharing the gospel
as God provides those opportunities.
Now, what makes this so exciting is that
all of us have a web of relationships,
either in our neighborhood or at the office.
We all know people who we relate to.
And no one else relates to them.
Your pastor doesn't relate to them and Skip
Gray doesn't relate to them.
But you have certain people that only you
will relate to and you may be good
friends with them.
And there's a certain web of relationships that
are around you.
And why this is important is if one
of that group in your web of relationships
comes to know the Lord, it is like
wildfire that that changed life spreads to the
other people.
And it's like something that you can't even
contain.
Whereas, you have these different friends and you
may not even know some of them, and
one person out of that group comes to
know the Lord, it has a tremendous impact
upon that circle of friends.
Also, your follow-up matrix is already established.
How many of you have been put in
a situation where someone asks you to follow
up this person that you never knew?
Well, you know, sometimes that works out, but
you have to build a relationship there.
And we'll talk more about this as we
get into the details of it later.
But the follow-up matrix is already established.
You already have a friendship with these people.
It's already within the context of life.
I mean, you don't have to go out
of your daily schedule.
You live in a neighborhood, you work.
It's not a lot of emotional energy to
meet these people that are already around you.
And lastly, we've already mentioned this, you may
be the only person to reach that individual.
As I said, half of the people in
the United States are secularized.
They have no interest in church.
They're not going to turn on the TV
and listen to Billy Graham or go to
church.
You may be their only contact.
And I don't mean to say that to
you to threaten you, but just to try
to encourage you that God wants to use
us in our respective environments.
Now, why do we have hindrances to healthy
relationships?
And I just jotted down six ideas here.
The first is we have too many relationships
or too many activities.
Now, some of us, I'm not a sanguine,
but some people are sanguine.
And as Lewis Hill mentioned yesterday, they are
ready to die for 100 people in a
night.
I mean, they have lots of relationships.
That can be a danger.
If you know too many people, you can't
get to know anyone.
I mean, if you have too many contacts.
And often, on the other side of the
coin, we're too busy.
We're too busy to meet with people because
we're involved with the board meeting one night
and then we have a docs meeting the
next night and then we may be involved
with a Bible study another night.
We have to prepare for Bible study and
then we're at church all day on Sunday.
And God help us if we want to
go out to the movie with our kids
because there isn't any time in the schedule,
much less try to have someone over to
get to know them any better.
Secondly, the pace of our life is, quite
frankly, too fast.
And we've already talked a little bit about
this this weekend.
But we're running through life and we have
little time for relationships with people.
We're a punch clock type of society.
Thirdly, we've had unhealthy role models as the
norm in evangelism.
And I wanted to share three of the
role models that most of us have been
exposed to.
The first is what is referred to as
the aquarium type evangelism, where you feel you're
going to bring someone in the church and
a pastor or someone who's gifted in evangelism
throws the line out there and reels it
in and hopefully you can get some fish
within a closed environment.
Secondly, we have, and Skip mentioned this the
other day, the ambush philosophy, where we feel
that evangelism is solely door-to-door, where
you go and you ambush someone and lay
the hot gospel on them.
And thirdly, that was the safari type of
evangelism, where you go out on a little
mission door-to-door.
The ambush is really best described where you
may have a prayer breakfast, for example, and
you mislead people to get them to come.
Hey, why don't you come and hear this
guy speak on something?
You don't let them know that they're going
to share the gospel and then they get
in there in this closed room, you close
the doors, and they can't leave.
Now, I don't mean to cast dispersion on
these methods, please understand me, but I think
a lot of times these methods are held
as the norm for everyone and the rest
of us get discouraged about sharing our faith.
Fourthly, we have promoted the axiom of separation
extremism.
Now, I don't mean to step on any
toes here, but there is a trend in
Christianity in this country today that greatly disturbs
me, and that is we need to pull
into this city on the hill, this beacon
of shining light.
And there are a lot of people talking
about building Christian communities where you don't have
anyone but Christians around.
Your shopping is there, your school is there,
everything is there.
And I'm sure for those of you who
follow the political scene in the last several
years as evangelicals have come to the forefront
in our politics that there is a little
bit of that that might disturb you also.
Now, God does state very clearly in the
Bible that we need to be separated from
the world, but not isolated from the world.
And I think too many of us, and
this goes back to the figure I gave
earlier, that's why after two or three years
of being a Christian we don't have any
non-Christian contacts anymore.
We're too involved with the Christian subculture.
Fifthly, I've titled it a disharmonic symphony.
What that means is an imbalance between the
words and the music of the gospel.
The music of the gospel is your life
witness around people.
You attract them by the way you live,
the way you react to situations, how you
treat your wife, how you treat your children.
The words of the gospel are actually sharing
the message of the gospel.
Both are important.
If you have someone who's playing the music
all the time, no one's ever going to
know what song you're singing because you never
tell them the words.
On the other hand, if you're shouting the
words all the time and you don't play
the music, people can't see the life context
around being a Christian and you'll be less
effective.
Lastly, we have a reaping mentality, and I
wanted to just spend a little minute on
this, that we acquaint evangelism with reaping.
There is nothing further from the truth, and
we'll share a scriptural basis for that here
in just a minute.
We feel that if we haven't led someone
to Christ, you're ineffective.
Please do not take that type of thinking.
It'll discourage you more than anything.
First of all, you are probably one of
the most of us that are not gifted
in reaping.
Second of all, as Skip mentioned, God may
not want you to reap.
He may want you to do the hard
work.
That's what Jesus said, that the person who's
out there plowing and cultivating, that's the hard
work.
You come along and share the gospel of
someone who becomes Christ, you better believe it
wasn't you that did that.
God used you to share that message with
that person at that point, but there has
been a lot of groundwork laid before that.
And this really revolutionized my thinking on evangelism.
It freed me up.
It freed me up so that when I
had coffee with someone and a little bit
of a spiritual door opened up, I didn't
feel like I had to dump the whole
truck on the person because I'd never see
him again.
I could just say some little, make some
little reference to the Lord or maybe a
little word of testimony.
Because you know you'll see that person again.
Or maybe if you don't see him again,
you know that God will use that.
Yes, Dave.
Yeah, we'll share that.
In fact, what a good break.
I wanted to open up.
Are there any other comments on what I
had to share?
Any other insights that you wanted to share
with the group from what we discussed so
far?
Yes, Reg.
Sure.
We are in a world, and you mentioned
it when you said 50%, immunity titer against
the gospel is extremely high.
And that's because of repeated exposures.
And also, repeated exposures to vaccine, which is
false gospel.
People have named the name of Jesus Christ,
but they have not been Christians.
And so forth, they get exposed to the
true gospel and the false gospel, either of
which, if you don't respond, is capable of
producing immunity.
And so here we are, we're in a
field where there are susceptibles, mostly exhausted, and
we're just trying to infect people.
And it takes a great deal of effort
and a great deal of God's spirit to
infect people in an area where there's immunity.
And then somebody comes from another country and
they say, oh, I just proclaimed the gospel
and 24 people received Christ the first night.
Well, they were in an area where there
was a large degree of susceptibles and not
so much immunity.
That's good.
That thing, the illustration has helped me a
great deal in not feeling guilty about the
fruit.
Okay, very good insight.
Very good.
Thank you.
Anyone else wanted to share anything about what
we discussed so far?
Okay, I passed out some verses for some
unsuspecting souls here to help me go through.
And on your sheet there, Galatians 2, 4,
and 5 omit that.
That was a mistake.
And the first one, 2 Corinthians 6, 14,
and 15, that was the verse about an
unequal yoke.
We already talked about that, how people have
taken that verse and taken separation to an
extreme.
Who has Luke 7, 33, and 34?
What I'd like for you to do is
if you could read the verse and then
give a brief comment on how this relates
to lifestyle evangelism.
Oh, you don't have a handout.
Oh, gee.
Yeah, I do.
There's in the folder there, there's many more.
Who else doesn't have a handout?
Gee, I'm sorry.
Raise your hand high, and there's plenty more
here.
I apologize for that.
I thought I'd gotten everyone.
Well, at least you didn't have to read
the verse.
I missed you.
Okay, who has Luke 7, 33, and 34?
For John the Baptist, when ye say he
hath a devil, the Son of Man is
come eating him, right?
He's a friend of publicans and sinners.
Okay, how do you think that has to
relate to our subject today?
I see two points here, really.
There were criticisms of John the Baptist for
not doing these things, and there were criticisms
of Jesus for doing these things.
But really, focusing on evangelism, Jesus was in
amongst the sinners.
Very good.
Who has 2 Corinthians 5, 9-11, and
20 and 21?
Okay, Terry.
So we make it our goal to please
Him, whether we are at home or at
home.
We must all appear before the judgment seat
of Christ, that each one may receive what
is due him for the things done while
on the body, whether good or bad.
Since then we know what it is to
fear the Lord.
We try to persuade men.
What we are is plain to God.
And I hope it is also plain to
your conscience.
We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God
were making His appeal through us.
We implore you on Christ's behalf.
Be reconciled to God.
God made Him who had no sin to
be sin for us, so that in Him
we might become the righteousness of God.
We are automatically an ambassador for Christ in
our situation.
Our representative says that in Christ we might
become the righteousness of God.
That there is something unique about Christ being
in us to represent the world.
Very good.
Thank you for reading that, Terry.
2 Corinthians 2, 14-17.
Yes, Jim.
Let thanks be to God, for we
are not speaking in Christ.
Okay, good.
What insight do you have out of that
group of verses?
I think that we are going to be
ambassadors.
It is going to be Christ working through
us in His life.
Excellent.
For Him and the breakers.
Excellent.
And something that you will notice out there,
when people smell perfume, some like it, some
don't like it.
So there will be some people who don't
like it.
There will be some people who will like
it.
But let Christ be the perfume, not you
be the perfume.
And I love that phrase at the end,
where it says, we are not like many,
peddling the word of God.
I think that just communicates so much, that
we should pray that we are not out
there just peddling the word.
That we are Christ's fragrance, as you mentioned.
1 Corinthians 9, 16-23.
Who has that?
Okay, Gary.
Before I preach the gospel, I have nothing
to boast of, for I am under compulsion.
For it woes me if I do not
preach the gospel.
For if I do this voluntarily, I have
a reward.
But if against my will, I have a
stewardship entrusted to me, what then is my
reward?
That when I preach the gospel, I may
offer the gospel without charge, so as not
to make full use of my right in
the gospel.
For though I am free from all men,
I have made myself a slave to all,
that I might win the war.
And to the Jews I became as a
Jew, that I might win the Jews.
To those who are under the law, as
under the law.
Though not being myself under the law, that
I might win those who are under the
law.
To those who are without the law, as
without the law.
Though not being without the law, God, but
under the law of Christ, that I might
win those who are without the law.
To the weak I became weak, that I
might win the weak.
I have become all things to all men,
that I may by all means save some.
And I do all things for the sake
of the gospel, that I may become a
fellow partaker of it.
With the priority that God has, God's
priorities, so that my purpose in life is
to give people the knowledge of Christ that
I have.
His desire was to become all things to
all men.
How much of a desire do we have
to reach our friends and neighbors around us?
Do we have enough of a desire to
get into their world?
And we'll be talking more about that in
a minute.
Yes, Terry.
Excellent, yes.
Very good, thanks for sharing that.
John 4, 35-38.
Others have labored, and you have entered into
their labor.
Okay, Wayne.
It says several things.
First of all, it says, it's not to
procrastinate, don't think that the harvest isn't ready
for four more months.
It's white, ready to harvest now.
We can do that many times where we
really make God and the Holy Spirit very
impotent in thinking that our next door neighbor
just isn't ready yet, or some associated work.
There are many excuses that we can make
to think that it's just not the right
time to start in.
And then he goes on to talk about
both sowing and reaping.
First of all, he says the fruit that
we will get will be an eternal kind
of fruit for the people, that it's an
eternal thing, an eternal life.
And that there's two different jobs.
There is the job of sowing and reaping,
like you were talking about, and I guess
alternating that you don't have to do both.
You're going to enter into labor.
That neighbor might be ready, because someone like
you, just the other day at lunch, may
have just given some, may have planted the
seed, may have said some words of wisdom
very briefly out of God's Word or something.
You don't know that, but maybe the Lord
has inspired you to come along and to
be the reaper.
Very good.
Thanks for expounding that.
Let's see, the next passage, 1 Samuel 30,
24.
Yes, Bob.
For as his share is, it goes down
into the battle, so shall his share be
who stays by the baggage.
They shall share a life.
Extracting that, there's supportive functions, evangelism, and they're
in the front line.
And then here it tells us that both
share a life and blessings.
What an encouragement that God doesn't put the
same price tag on things that we do.
1 Thess 1 5.
Randy.
But also with power, deep conviction, know how
we lived among you for your sake.
What Paul's pointing out here, I think it
supports the point you're making earlier.
It's not just a matter of living a
life.
It's not just a matter of sharing the
words.
And it's not just a matter of both.
It's a matter of doing both those plus
the power of the Holy Spirit to give
power to the message, bring conviction of sin,
and then the ultimate fruit.
Very good.
Thanks, Randy.
I think, Bill, you had the last verse.
Romans 15-20.
Very good.
That is one of my life verses, so
to speak, that I pray for myself, that
God would let me reach the people that
may not be reached by anyone else.
I just wanted to share these verses with
you to give you a scriptural basis for
what we're talking about.
It's there, and there's many other references in
Scripture to support this aspect of being out
there, rubbing shoulders with the secularized and winning
them for the Lord, doing a lot of
plowing, some reaping.
Now let's go on to the third aspect,
the principles of lifestyle evangelism.
Yes, Lynn.
One thing that has really struck me, sometimes
our husbands are out meeting me.
We're back with the children at home.
That has been a tremendous encouragement of support.
If I free Bill up to be able
to be out in the front lines sharing
and don't make him feel resentful about me
being away and so forth, but free him
to be able to be out there, then
I can also enjoy the blessings of that.
Excellent.
Thanks for sharing that.
That is a very good insight.
CB, did you want to share something?
I want to share that it's really been
a blessing to have him.
That is, we have a five-year-old,
and by the time Steve gets home at
night, he's in bed.
He's a basketball player.
And Steve's tired, too.
And so we looked at his schedule, and
we found a time in the schedule that's
really prime time where all the patients want.
But we take two of those hours a
week, and that's Chris's time, and I'm running
around to see his dad.
It's really built in his life.
Chris chose toys from his room that he
took to his dad's office, and he has
time there.
And it's hard on me, because I'm learning
all the time, but it's really helped him
as a child.
Thanks for sharing that.
It's a prime time that all the patients
want, but we don't have enough of it.
That's another example of what Lynn just shared.
Okay, as we go on here, I'm going
to try to disperse these with some personal
examples that the Lord has allowed us to
be involved in, and we're going to talk
briefly about some principles of lifestyle evangelism, and
then I'm going to give you just a
way that we have found helpful, practical aspects
of relating.
That's the fourth point.
As I already mentioned, we need to get
into the non-Christian arena.
Jesus was criticized for relating to sinners and
publicans.
You're going to have probably your greatest source
of conflict will be from other Christians wondering
what in the world you're doing.
But if you have your heart squared away
before God, you can know that the Lord
wants you to relate to non-Christians.
And why is it that we have a
hard time relating to the non-Christian and
getting into his world?
Well, I jotted down a few things.
I think, first of all, our lifestyles are
too different.
Now, that's not to say you take the
non-Christian's lifestyle, but that often hinders friendship.
Rather than looking for other things that you
could build that friendship upon.
Often we have evangelistic motives for friendship.
I have a friend from medical school.
He's an agnostic Jew.
This is just after I came out of
the academy.
I still haven't learned much yet.
I had him over for dinner, and the
first night I just shared the gospel with
him.
Well, I didn't really even know where he
was coming from, and he shared with me
that he didn't really know much that God
is there, much less that there was even
a God.
This kind of took me back.
And I thought, well, gee, can I be
this guy's friend?
Our friendship kind of waxed and waned through
medical school more on the basis of how
interested I thought he was in the gospel
rather than just being his friend.
We had more chances in Iraq.
Well, he stayed in New Orleans for a
couple of years in a surgery residency, and
then he got tired of that and got
married and moved out to Seattle to do
emergency room medicine work.
And his wife, and let's talk about the
sovereignty of God, his wife was frustrated in
their marriage because of his work schedule and
the like, just walked into a church one
day and got saved.
I didn't know his wife at the time
because it was, I just didn't know her,
but I didn't know what cultivating that, going
on behind that.
Well, she went home and told Matt what
had happened.
And here's this agnostic guy, and he's not
very interested, but she said, well, this really
means a lot to me, and she got
involved with a Bible study, and she said,
would you promise me one thing?
Would you get involved with a Gospel of
John Bible study with me?
So Matt was in that thing for a
year and a half, and he, this chokes
me up a little bit, he finally came
to know the Lord.
And the other day, well, it was not
the other day, it was about a year
and a half ago, he called us up,
and Diane and I noticed something different about
his attitude on life.
But he didn't share anything, and we had
one of those call waiting things where he
had to go to another line, and we
talked amongst each other.
I said, you know, it sounds like he's
interested in spiritual things.
And so we came back on, and we
said, well, Matt, what's happening?
And he had shared that he had become
a Christian.
And the reason why I shared that story
is because I looked at our relationship, and
I had more of an evangelistic motive for
our friendship rather than to really just love
and accept him.
And I'm not sure God really used that
to show me that when you relate to
non-Christians, you can't have any price tags
thrown on there.
And the Lord was gracious enough to use
other people to influence him, and God really
used that example to really minister to me.
And I wanted to share that as a
principle that don't get into friendships just with
evangelistic motives because the non-Christian will pick
up on that, and it won't work.
The other aspect, kind of sharing my failures
at the start here, is that we're too
busy to be involved with non-Christians.
We mentioned that earlier.
But when I was at the Air Force
Academy, I was so heavily involved with the
navigator ministry.
I was leading Bible studies.
I was one of the key men at
the Academy.
And this kind of grew as my four
years went on.
In my first two years there, when I
wasn't as involved in the ministry, I had
excellent non-Christian relationships.
And I remember when I was a sophomore,
I had like ten of my classmates involved
in a John study.
And some of them came to know the
Lord.
I don't know where a lot of them
are right now, but I did things with
my friends in the squadron.
But then my senior year when I'm, quote,
doing the ministry, I had very little contact
with the non-Christians.
So much to the point that I really
hardly even knew my classmates very well when
I left.
And that, I think, is a sad commentary
on our Christian subculture that we get people
so busy in activities that we don't give
them enough time to relate to non-Christians.
And I share that as a warning.
The other aspect that keeps us from getting
involved in non-Christian arenas is that we
expect them to have Christian attitudes before we
can develop a friendship.
And Jim Peterson, who directs the NAV work
in Latin America, and for many years learned
this principle in Brazil, that, boy, you know,
if you try to get to know someone,
you have to have the right type of
personality before you get to know them.
You'll never get to know many non-Christians.
It really will block you from significantly developing
a friendship.
You'll never have significant relationships.
So, in this aspect of the non-Christian
arena, we have to really ask God ways
to show us to get into their world,
to relate to them, because no one else
is going to reach them.
The second point is, I entitle the stupor
of culturally drawn methods, that, you know, you
look at the things that you do or
that the things that you're told in the
church or Bible study are involved, ideas that
we have about non-Christians, so much of
it is culturally related rather than scripturally related.
That's why I wanted you to read that,
where we shared that verse about Jesus relating
to the publicans and sinners.
I mean, that was directly against what the
Pharisees, which the Jewish laws at the time,
rulers, said you should do.
I mean, he was criticized for that.
When you think about why you do something,
it's often good to say, is there a
biblical reason why I do this, or is
this because I live in this culture?
Because sometimes the two can seem to be
close together, and I'd caution you against that.
Which leads into the third point about the
tension of Christian opinion.
I think I have taken more, I haven't
personally taken a lot of shots from other
Christians, but I know there have been a
number of people that have not understood what
Diane and I have been doing.
Because when we go in an area now,
and we'll develop this here in a little
bit, we want to relate to non-Christians.
And like I've already said, to do that,
you need time.
I'm busy in medicine.
We have small children.
That consumes most of it.
So when we get involved with a church,
what we usually say is, we find one
thing that we can do to serve in,
but we tell them that we're not going
to be there every time the door is
open, because of our schedule.
We just do not have the time.
It doesn't mean that we're not supporting them,
and praying for them, and giving for them,
but we just aren't able to minister to
both worlds.
And as I mentioned earlier too, non-Christians,
many of them are unchurched.
And if your ministry is in your church,
you're going to limit the people that you
can minister to.
So, in this area of the tension of
Christian opinion, and I don't mean for you
to go on and offend anyone, because we
should never have that as our goal, but
if you feel before God, that He wants
you to minister to non-Christians, and you
have to make a decision about your activities,
it's better to offend the Christian by that
decision, than the non-Christian.
Hopefully that won't ever have to happen, but
I guarantee that you will have misunderstandings, and
hopefully the Lord will allow you to clear
that up with the Christian, but if you
have to choose between offending a non-Christian,
and offending a Christian, I hope you know
how to make the decision, because that non
-Christian will not have anyone else maybe to
relate to.
Now, also in this tension of Christian opinion,
I think we need to be careful too,
that we hold to biblical absolutes about sin.
The Bible is very clear about things that
are sin, that you should not get involved
in.
However, there are a lot of things that
our Christian subculture makes sin, in terms of
relating with non-Christians.
One example is in the area of alcohol.
Now, I don't mean to step on anyone's
toes here about their conviction about alcohol, but
I can tell you that there are Christian
missionaries, in the Navigators and other places, that
have found through trial and error, that they
have gone to a subculture, whether it's overseas
or in this country.
My friend Scott Horn, who related to the
Southeast Louisiana Cajuns.
Their idea of a good time was having
a beer and eating crawdads.
And if you were going to have a
get-together, if you didn't have beer there,
you offended them.
That's not to say that the Bible is
clear about drunkenness, but there are some aspects
that, and I know probably all of you
have related to this in some sense of
a word, there are some areas of the
Christian life that we have put a taboo
on, from our own personal conviction.
You need to be careful about that, because
you may be put in a situation where
the people you're relating to, you may offend
them more by this position that you have
held, that, quite frankly, you cannot make a
strong case from Scripture.
So make sure you hold to biblical absolutes,
because that is the light that attracts people
to Christ.
Yet don't cling to a lot of things
that aren't really clearly spoken against in the
Bible.
There are many of them.
You will turn people off.
Yes, Billy.
Would you say the same thing would apply
in terms of our participation in them?
Well, that's a question I can't answer for
you.
Diane and I have found, I guess the
question is when you go there, what will
be going on?
If it's just a drunken orgy, that's often
not productive.
I think most of us wouldn't have any
problems with that.
But oftentimes that is the way that professional
people mingle.
And you can go there, at least we've
found too, that going early to some of
these functions is a lot better than going
late.
And you can get to know people.
And let me say here also that, this
kind of goes back to what I said
at the beginning, not all of us are
able to relate in some of these circles.
Maybe because of your past, maybe because you've
had an alcoholic family, or you've had a
particular problem before you were a Christian with
an area like that, and you just know
before God that you can't even get involved
with that.
And God honors that.
I don't mean to push you into an
area that you feel the Lord has spoken
you not get involved in.
I'm just trying to open up the avenues
to be creative here in relating to people.
The fourth point is that, we've already mentioned
this, evangelism is not an event, it's a
process.
You meet someone and there is a period
of time that they may take for them
to become a Christian.
And please get out of this reaping mentality
and get into more of relationships and seeing
people progress, as some authors have said, from
the pit to the kingdom.
You may meet someone who is way over
in left field.
Don't get discouraged with that.
I mean, maybe after your two or three
years with that, they'll know that there's a
God and that you have a life that's
different from them.
They may not be Christians yet, but God
has used you to do that cultivating.
The fifth aspect under this is that actions
really do speak louder than words.
And I'll go into that a little bit
more detail here, as I share some of
my personal examples in the last part of
this talk.
But some areas that I just want to
throw out for you to consider is that,
there are certain qualities that will allow the
non-Christian to be attracted to you.
And one of them is hospitality.
And I think we've already mentioned this a
little bit.
Your home is a tremendous avenue for you
to reach out to people.
Because the world doesn't see that.
I mean, if you open up your home
and have a doctor and his family in,
and see how you relate with your wife
and your kids and that you're real people,
that really speaks volumes.
The other thing that really speaks volumes is
a serving attitude.
You're willing to go over and help out
your buddy, you know, build a fence or
do this and that.
That really speaks volumes also.
And the last thing is, in this aspect
of our actions with non-Christians, is that
there are certain godly qualities that really minister
to a non-Christian.
And that is how you respond to suffering.
Are you honest?
Are you a generous person?
Is your marriage strong?
And are you competent in your work?
Those are just five aspects that I thought
of.
See, in order for a non-Christian to
see this, he has to see your life.
You have to be transparent.
I mean, for you to be able to
share, I'm not talking about dumping the truck
here, but just to be honest with people
that you do have problems that you go
through.
And it just blows their mind that they
see that you go through the same thing
they do, but you're able to come through
with a smile on your face.
And that you can be a Christian and
still be pretty competent in your job.
And the point is that for a non
-Christian to see this, they have to be
around you enough life and life exposure to
get that kind of exposure.
The sixth point is that try as best
as you can to eliminate Christian caricatures.
Now, what is a caricature?
It's an over-exaggeration of truth, and sometimes
not so truth.
But you would not believe the caricatures that
non-Christians have of Christians.
I mean, they think, I don't know what,
everything from, gee, to become a Christian means
you have to give up everything that's fun,
or you have to go to church every
time it opens up the door, or God
is going to take away all your possessions.
You wouldn't believe what people hold as their
caricature of a Christian.
And this is where Dave has really helped
Diane and I.
He's often said, just relate to people and
have fun.
You can break down a lot of these
caricatures just by relating to people, and they
say, gee, Dave's a Christian, and he doesn't
seem to be having a bad time here.
He can go ski and have fun, and
he's able to still be competent in his
work.
So God can really use you to blast
those caricatures away.
Lastly, and I'll just mention these in the
interest of time, because I do want to
spend the last 15 minutes on some practical
aspects, is that there are three hindrances to
evangelism, and I'll just list them for you.
You can go look up the passages later.
The first is hypocrisy.
Boy, there's nothing that will hurt your witness
more than hypocrisy.
That's what the Pharisees did.
You say one thing and do another, or
you do one thing and say another.
And the reference on that is in Matthew
16.
Impurity of life.
With the current moral persuasion of our culture,
boy, it speaks volumes to have a faithful
husband-wife team, and for people to see
that.
That is something that will wreck your ministry,
impurity of life.
1 Corinthians 5.
Legalism.
You're so dogmatic about something that the Bible
doesn't really speak that much about that you
turn people off.
Legalism will also destroy relationships.
Galatians 5.
Yes, Jonathan.
I think, I'm not advocating dropping the ball,
but I think God really uses that.
Especially if you're honest about it.
They can see you, that you have problems.
They're not blind.
But what they don't understand is how you're
able to rise up and keep going.
Or how you're able to overcome a problem.
That you're honest about it.
Most people that we live and work around
have this mask on.
They're always keeping the mask on because they
want people to see how they really are.
So I would just be honest with people.
Anger.
That's aggravating.
I find myself having to go back and
apologize.
But I wonder, I worry that that's calling
a witness.
But yeah, I still go back to you
and apologize to you.
I guess what they need to see is
that God is working and changing you.
Very good.
Bill, did you want to comment on that?
I have the same problem.
And one of the greatest witnesses is going
back and asking for forgiveness.
Yeah.
Yes.
Also, I think it's important, at least with
the other people who I know in my
professional life, the thing that I get commented
about so many times is that you make
mistakes.
I think it's important to let them see
that Christians, we're no different.
We're struggling with sin.
We're struggling with being hypocrites.
We're struggling with going against things we believe
in.
Because those are things that they're struggling with
too.
I think the difference is that we are
trusting in the Lord to help us get
through that.
And like you said, we rise above it.
But I think it's important for them to
see that we do make mistakes.
Very good.
Because I think that's one of the caricatures
they have.
Christians have got to be perfect.
And there's just no such thing.
If there was, Christ wouldn't have had to
come.
Yes.
Very good.
Yes, Billy.
Bob, would you consider moralism and judgmentalism as
part of legalism?
Yes, very much.
It will kill a relationship faster than anything.
Moralism and judgmentalism being part of legalism, it
really is part and parcel.
Like what you were saying earlier about we
can't expect them to have a Christian attitude
and lifestyle.
Right.
It seems so simple, doesn't it, when you
think about it?
When I go back and think of the
relationships I've had, a lot of times I
think, if this person doesn't seem too Christian,
I don't know if I really want to
get involved with them.
What's the purpose of our...
Like Dave was sharing with that Bible study,
when they invited that couple, they decided they'd
rather go out and get a Bible.
Well, that's where we should be.
That's where we should be.
Why don't we just spend the last 10
or 15 minutes on some practical aspects of
relating?
And see if I can share some examples
here.
The first is visualizing God using you in
your sphere of influence.
And we've already talked about the value of
being in the same trade, for being in
a neighborhood, people that you relate to around
you.
You have natural affinity groups there that I
really am of the conviction that you ought
to pray that God lets you start there,
unless He specifically calls you out to another
type of ministry.
Because if you're being a doctor, working in
this neighborhood, decide to go work with the
high school group across town, well, that may
be what the Lord wants you to do.
But you're going to have to spend a
lot of other emotional energy to cultivate relationships
and time and all that.
Whereas in your sphere of influence, there is
the natural relationships that are there that we
often forget.
We're looking elsewhere and we don't see the
own nose on our face in terms of
people that we can relate to.
Secondly is you start out with making acquaintances.
And this is what Diane and I do.
Every time we move someplace, we spend time
praying that God would just let us meet
people.
And we don't make it spiritual.
We just try to get to know the
people that we enjoy being around.
A lot of times I was under the
guilt trip about, gee, I better go meet
50 people and I may not like half
of them.
Well, we all have different temperaments and the
like.
You don't need to worry about that.
Just as you get to know people, and
you have to go out of your way
initially, go down and meet them in your
neighborhood, have some people over, go to these
cocktail parties early, go to these functions where
you can meet people.
And don't spiritualize it, just let it be
natural.
The people that you enjoy getting to know
are the ones that you can begin to
cultivate a friendship with.
We've also found helpfulness to try to get
interested in what they're interested in.
People love to be listened to.
You probably have already noticed that if you're
on a plane or something and if you
just ask people questions about themselves, boy, they
love to talk.
Then after they finish they say, gee, I
really enjoyed that conversation.
Because you allow them to express themselves.
So much of our culture is expressing about
me, me, me.
When you have someone who finally wants to
listen to you, you, you, it really speaks
volumes.
So when you're getting to know someone, find
out what they're interested in because you may
find an area of common interest.
Maybe you can play tennis together, sew, cook,
watch kids together, whatever.
But get into their world and interact on
their terms.
Be flexible enough.
This is where you have to have your
time schedule free enough that you are able
to interact on their schedule.
The third point is begin to establish a
growing relationship.
And two keys in this is that it's
going to take time and trust on your
part for God to keep the relationship together.
And you have to be available.
It will cost you.
I'll just tell you at the outset that
being involved with people will cost you your
time and it just takes a long time.
When I was at the Academy, I had
this vision of, you know, gee, someone comes
to know the Lord after three weeks of
evangelistic Bible study.
Six months later, they ought to be a
growing disciple.
One year later, they ought to be leading
their own Bible study.
And two years later, they're leading all the
Bible studies.
And then three years later, they're ready to
go overseas on missions.
Well, it just doesn't work that way in
the context of life.
It may work that way in a college
where people have a little bit more time
and commitment.
But you're talking about busy professionals with families
and children.
I mean, it takes a longer period of
time.
But the results and the dividends are very
great.
You tend to have a more committed person
after that long haul.
Let me share a couple of examples with
you.
These are on the positive side here now.
There are two couples that Diane and I
know.
One, both of them I knew from the
Academy.
And one was in my squadron.
His name was Rob Sayers.
And we seemed to follow each other everywhere
we go.
He went to 18th squadron of the Academy.
I went to 18th squadron.
He went to medical school at Tulane.
I went to Tulane.
I just followed him a year later.
He went in pediatrics at Travis.
I went into pediatrics at Travis.
And I remember getting to know him at
the Academy and talking about making acquaintances.
I did everything I could to interact on
his terms.
I'd say, well, let's go run together.
Well, I don't want to run.
I'm not interested in running.
Okay, well, let's go out for dinner together.
I mean, it always seemed like I was
initiating a relationship.
I don't know if you've ever been put
in that situation.
Don't be discouraged about that.
If you just remember, non-Christians, you know,
a lot of times they're interested in their
own world.
And don't be discouraged if you're always initiating
a relationship initially.
Well, I got to know Rob a little
bit at the Academy.
Went to medical school.
And after being there for a year and
a half, we got him and his wife
in Bible study.
He was in Bible study for about a
year.
And finally he came to know the Lord,
him and his wife.
And then we continued to develop our relationship.
And they're now overseas.
And funny thing, now he's following me.
I'm leaving Eglin.
He's coming to Eglin.
But him and his wife are very committed
to the Lord and having an active discipling
ministry with other physicians.
And another couple is Pete and Cindy Crow.
Pete and I are also Academy graduates.
And he went to medical school in Chicago,
and I went to medical school in New
Orleans.
And since I'm from Chicago, I'd see him.
I'd drop in and see him.
And we had this relationship for six years.
And Pete's a real nice guy, very likable
type person.
So he enjoyed being around him, but not
much interest in spiritual things.
And finally, after knowing him for six years,
Diane got to know his wife.
We both got married in between.
And I asked Pete if he'd be interested
in getting involved with evangelistic Bible study.
You know, we felt after five years, six
years, it might be time maybe to initiate
that.
And he said yes, and his wife said
yes, but it was a little bit more
reluctantly.
And we had one Bible study.
And then the next time we got together,
they said, you know, we don't want to
do this anymore.
We don't do this anymore.
You mean we just started this thing.
And they said, no, we just feel like
God wants us to stay.
And they're both in the Catholic Church, and
they said we want to stay involved with
the Catholic Church.
And we don't want to have any interest
in Bible study.
So it was hard for us, but we
prayed that we would still keep the relationship
going.
And we didn't say much more.
Well, a year later when we went out,
we did the residencies.
He was in family practice.
I was in pediatrics at Travis.
After about a year, they finally started to
show some interest again.
And then they then decided to get back
in Bible study and finally came to know
the Lord.
And they're just doing super.
Right now they're overseas also.
So I shared those two stories as examples
that it takes time.
You've got to really initiate the relationship.
Don't be discouraged if it's always on your
terms.
Don't abandon the relationship if it doesn't seem
to be going too far.
Because God will use that.
And he may even in a setting maybe
not use you.
He may use someone else to actually bring
them to know the Lord.
Just a couple other points as we're running
out of time here under establishing a growing
relationship.
I found it helpful to identify with Christ
early in the relationship in a positive way.
The way Diane and I do this is
as we're getting to know them, the couple,
we have them over for dinner and usually
you're saying, well, gee, how did you get
to know each other and all that.
And in that context, we just share how
we kind of got to know each other
and were married and give a little testimony
as to the fact that we're Christians.
I find it helpful because early in a
relationship there seems to be more freedom to
share that.
And then there's a period of time where
you're getting to know everyone and find out
where you're coming from that it's a little
bit harder to share about spiritual things.
And then later on as you get more
comfortable, I think probably everyone's been through this,
you're more free to share spiritual things.
It really helps to identify with Christ in
a positive way early in the relationship.
We talked about using the home.
It's a tremendous vehicle.
Spend as much time together doing social things
and the like.
And then the last thing you want to
do is you want to pick a few
people that you really feel that God is
leading you to be around and really pray
for them specifically.
Now you've gotten to know a bunch of
people.
You've related a few of those out of
that group that you enjoy being around.
You're establishing a growing relationship.
And now you're praying for just a couple
couples specifically.
And that leads us to the next point
about using an appropriate harvest vehicle.
That after you've gotten to know someone for
a while, what we do is we pray
for them and we feel if it's at
the right time that we ask them if
they'd be interested in studying the claims of
Christ from the Bible.
We start out with a vehicle that Dave
mentioned the other day, a study of John,
the Gospel of John.
And we tell them the only commitment they
have to make is being there.
And we give them a little sheet and
we say we want you to read the
chapter beforehand.
And it's a freewheeling discussion.
We may have people who have little interest
in God to who may be closer.
And a funny thing happens.
We tell people, you know, commit yourself to
these six Bible studies.
And if you don't like it, you can
get out after that.
But what happens is after they get into
the group, they get the relationships going.
The relationships usually keep them in the Bible
study.
And here's another key point.
This really has influenced my concept of evangelism.
Oftentimes I get them in there, I think,
well, gee, after six lessons in the Gospel
of John, they ought to be Christians.
Isn't that right?
Well, that hadn't been our experience.
When we were out at Travis, we had
about eight docs and their wives in Bible
study.
Half of them were not Christians, but they
wanted to be in the study.
So I got to the end of the
six chapters of John.
I thought, well, now what do I do?
You know, I have these half Christians, half
non-Christians.
I thought, well, we'll just keep going.
And we went through some follow-up principles.
So we're having non-Christians having a quiet
time, memorizing Scripture, getting together.
And one guy in particular, he was from
a Catholic background.
He wanted to be a priest, and then
he went into medicine.
It took him two years of Bible study
before he made a commitment.
And it kind of just came out one
night, him and his wife, in the context
of our Bible study.
We were studying Romans then.
We were doing chapter analysis Bible study.
And this really changed my thinking, because in
the past, I would have thought, you know,
if you're not a Christian, boom, you get
out of here.
We're going to take these Christians and run
with them.
And it's made us be more flexible, because,
gee, you think, what in the world am
I going to do?
But I haven't found it to be offensive
to them, and it's a very effective technique,
because you've already followed them up even before
they become to know the Lord.
And it sounds funny, but, I mean, this
guy was having a quiet time every morning.
And particularly with Catholics, it's time in the
Word that changes their thinking.
It's when they see that what they have
been taught is different than what the Bible
says.
That is really what will strike a chord.
So don't abandon these people.
If they want to stay in your Bible
study, let them stay in, and it may
take several years.
For them to actually trust Christ.
And then lastly is just sharing the words.
And, you know, that's when you get to
the point where finally that individual will say,
you know, I just realized that you've got
something that we don't have.
And you're giving the chance to the reaping.
God may not ever give you that opportunity.
You may be always in the cultivating stage.
Don't be discouraged about that.
We're over time.
I'm sorry I took too much of your
time.
But I guess we have just a couple
more minutes for any other inputs.
Yes, Billy.
Do you have any particular pertinent comments to
make about non-Christian families?
Being in your own family?
Yeah, the only comment I have to make
is that it's very, very difficult.
Because I think what it is is our
family sees what our lives were like before
we came to know the Lord.
And any time we go back into that
environment, that's how they expect for you to
relate.
And it really is lifestyle evangelism at its
hardest.
Because it really is the grace of God.
I mean, it always is the grace of
God, but particularly in that setting.
Any other comments?
Yes, Randy.
Out of
some sense of protection under Caleb, we feel
like we can't just leave him.
We would never let Caleb go to their
house.
And when he's at our house, one of
us, we've determined that he can come to
our house as long as one of us
is supervising the interaction all the time.
But there's a concern about the interrelationships between
the children.
Just because we are concerned about Caleb and
his self-image and his own development.
Have you been confronted with this?
And if so, how have you dealt with
it?
We don't want to isolate ourselves, like you
said.
But on the other hand, we want to
protect.
The only point I'd have to say about
that is we have a negative example regarding
the kids.
Our neighbor across the street, their kids are
absolute, which is wild.
Diane and I have communicated, I know by
body language, how we feel about their children.
It has hurt our relationship.
And children can be either an asset or
a liability in terms of ministry.
The only caution I would have is you
have to be very careful that even if
you have an irritating child that you're relating
to, or that situation you gave, how you
project yourself to the non-Christian family.
Because if they realize you don't accept their
children, it really does put a strike, drives
a nail through the relationship.
And sorry I went over there.