The Art of Evangelistic Preaching | What Billy Graham Taught Me About Gospel Invitations

What if the biggest obstacle to evangelism isn't skill—it's fear of failure?

In this conversation, two pastors with decades of experience in evangelism discuss the questions pastors and everyday Christians ask most often about communicating the gospel.

Greg Laurie is joined by Pastor Bob Franquiz of Calvary Fellowship in Miramar, Florida, for a practical conversation on preaching, personal evangelism, and helping people take a genuine step toward Christ.

They cover:
• How Chuck Smith identified the gift of evangelism in Greg before he saw it himself
• The difference between evangelizing and being an evangelist
• Why Greg says "study to be simple"—advice he got from Billy Graham
• How to build an evangelistic culture in your church
• The mechanics of a clear gospel invitation (and why most fall apart at the landing)
• The role of music, storytelling, and cultural awareness in reaching people
• Why success in evangelism is faithfulness, not numbers

Whether you're a pastor looking to sharpen your calling or a believer wanting to share Christ more naturally, this conversation is honest, practical, and full of hard-won wisdom from five decades of ministry.

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CHAPTERS
00:00 Cold open: proclaim, leave results to God
01:19 Discovering the gift of evangelism
04:09 Accidental pastor, disciplined teacher
06:39 Adapting the gospel to shifting culture
09:24 Studying to be simple
13:08 Building an evangelistic culture in your church
20:21 Empowering others when you're not the evangelist
24:52 Preaching a text vs. preaching for a decision
29:29 The shift from teaching to preaching
33:58 Clarity is everything in the invitation
44:35 The role of music in the invitation
54:21 Getting out of the Christian bubble
01:01:15 Fanning your gift into full flame

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Life audio.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
My job, your job, our job as preachers is to
proclaim the Gospel and leave the results in the hands
of God. You know, it's his harvest, it's his work.
Success in evangelism is faithfulness in giving the message. Hey, everybody,

(00:33):
I'm here with my friend Bob Frankuist, pastor of Calvary
Fellowship in me or Mar, Florida. So I just got
to know Bobby came to church recently and he said,
can I talk to you about evangelism after the service?
And so we went in my office and we're talking.
I said, Bob, those are great questions. We should record this,

(00:54):
and so that's what you're about to hear. We sat
down and he asked me a lot of questions, not
just that a pastor would ask of another pastor, but
just questions that a Christian would ask of another believer
on how to share our faith. So if you're a pastor,
if you're a leader, you will benefit from what you're
about to hear. But if you're just a believer wanting

(01:16):
to know how to be more effective and telling others
about Jesus, I think this will be a meaningful conversation
for you too, So check it out.

Speaker 3 (01:25):
Okay, So when did you realize that you had the
gift of evangelism.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
I think I realized that I had a gift of
evangelism when I just went out and started sharing the
Gospel with people. You know, That's what the pastor told us.
Pastor Chucksmith said, God and share your faith. And I
started doing that, and I noticed that it was not
that hard for me.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
In fact, that's.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
Kind of what prompted me to write a little cartoon
book look called the Living Water Track, because all the
tracks that's what we called them, that were out those
days are kind of health, fire and brimstone. In fact,
I even remember reading one before I was a Christian,
when I was high on drugs, and.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
I laughed at it. Wow.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
So I thought, I want to write something that I
think people will read and not laugh at me get
their attention. So I was a cartoonist. So I drew
this little track and I took it to Pastor Chuck Smith.
If you saw the Jesus Revolution movie, that scene is
in the film, and that's very accurate. I showed it
to him, and I think I was hoping he might
want to do something with it, because it was based

(02:29):
on one of his sermons, and he was giving from
John four, and he said, redraw it in this format,
and then we published it. But then fast forward a bit.
I'm hanging around at Calvary Chopel, volunteering my time, doing
whatever needs to be done. And so Chuck wanted to
do like these little Bible study classes, sort of like

(02:51):
a little school that people could come to for a week,
you know, and all of us would teach in different spaces.
And I was just starting out, and he says, Greg,
you should teach a class on evangelism. I said why,
He said, because you're an evangelist. And at that point
I thought it was a pastor, which I was. But
Chuck saw the gift in me. Even before I fully

(03:13):
saw to myself, I thought of my sharing the Gospel
as just doing whatever Christian should do, you know, evangelizing.
But there's a difference between evangelizing and being an evangelist.
Every Christian may not be called to be an evangelist,
but every Christian is called to evangelize. Paul said to Timothy,

(03:33):
do the work of an evangelist. And the only person
who was specifically identified as an evangelist was Philip And
so it's not a common gift, though. I think Paul
certainly had that gift as he obviously preached, and Peter
certainly had that gift Day of Pentecost three thousand believed,
later five thousand believes. But Philip specifically was called an evangelist.

(03:57):
And so it was Pastor Chuck that really identified that
gifting of evangelist in my life for the first time.

Speaker 1 (04:05):
Hmm. Interesting, that's amazing.

Speaker 3 (04:08):
So you start teaching, yes, and when you started teaching
the Bible, where is it immediate that you started giving
invitations for people to come to know Jesus.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
Yeah, it's kind of the reverse of that. So I
started preaching with the Christian bands. I was traveling around
with them and I would get up an evangelize, and
so that's what I now thought I was called to do,
be an evangelist. And there was this little Bible study
in Riverside, which is about forty five minutes from Orange
County where I was living, that needed someone to teach,

(04:43):
and I went up and started doing it and it
began to grow, and thought, I need to find a
pastor to take this thing over, because I'm going to
go travel around and evangelize well, I couldn't find anyone
to take it over, and pretty soon people were calling
me pastor, pastor Greg and I'm thinking, I'm not a pastor.
I'd only been a Christian two years. I was still learning.

(05:03):
I'm still learning, but I was really still learning then,
so was I really was already naturally an evangelist. So
it was always very easy for me to sort of,
you know, put an evangelistic hook at the end of
a message. That was the easy part. The part where
I had to really discipline myself was learning to teach,

(05:23):
because when you're a traveling preacher or an evangelist, you
know you have one simple message. I remember once hearing
the story of Billy Graham in a longtime associate T. W.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
Wilson.

Speaker 2 (05:34):
Billy was thinking about what he was going to preach.
He said, tw I can't really think of what I
should preach on tonight. And tw said, Billy, you only
have one message, you know. So technically an evangelist really
only has one message. He may have a different text,
different illustrations, but it's a message of the Gospel. So

(05:54):
I was doing that already, and I had a few
messages I would preach over and over again, but now
to teach people, to take them through a book of
the Bible, to let the text dictate the direction of
the message. That was in new discipline, and to study
because that was not a good student in school. So
to build a library and to learn how to process

(06:15):
information and organize it and then deliver it. That was
where I That was where I needed to use discipline
of my life, and I had to really leave my
comfort zone. Evangelizing was the easy part. Teaching was the
more challenging part.

Speaker 3 (06:32):
So it's been over fifty years since you've been preaching
and pastoring. How would you say, obviously, the gospel doesn't change.
How has your presentation of the gospel changed or maybe,
for lack of a better term, become more polished over
the five decades.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, it's really good question.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
Well, the gospel doesn't change, but culture does change. And
you could see that Paul took a different tact on
marsh Hill. Then he took another place. S Paul spoke
to such diverse audiences, governors, just general multitude, Jewish audiences,
gensale audiences. Marcel, of course, was there in Athens, Greece

(07:14):
that was the intellectual capital of the world, with the
philosophers would gather and discuss the ladiest teachings, and Poul
took the time to walk around assess the culture. In
his message, he said, it was walking around your city
and I noticed that ultra erected to the unknown God.
That's the one I want to know, the one I

(07:34):
want to talk to you about today. It was said
that there were more gods in Athens than that were people.
They worshiped everything in everyone. So Paul took time to
assess the culture. He even quotes one of their secular
poets while he's speaking, as your own poets have said,
in him we live and move and have our being.

(07:55):
He was speaking to two basic groups of people, the
Epicureans and the Stoics. The Epicureans, simplified, believed in the
pursuit of pleasure to the party animals of the first century.
The Stoics were more disciplined. We might compare them to
New Age philosophy today. So he understood his audience and

(08:17):
he adapted his message to them. Peter on the day
Pentecost is speaking to a largely Jewish audience. So you
see him liberally quoting Old Testament scriptures. So I think
you have to assess your audience. And I think, as
I've been doing this for a while, especially in crusades,
I mean I was living in a different time when

(08:39):
I did the first crusade. Vanilla Ice had a hit
on the radio. I think Seinfeld was still on television.
George H. W. Bush was president, there was no such
thing as an iPhone, the Internet was coming, was in
its infancy, So it was a different time. But then
there's similarities. And the similarities are, you know, everyone is empty,

(09:03):
everyone is lonely, everyone is guilty, everyone is afraid to die.
These things will never change. So I'll often come back
to similar themes that my crusade messages, but I might
drop from cultural things happening. I might do my version
of quoting a secular philosopher. I might say this person

(09:24):
said this famous rock star said this, showing the emptiness
of life. So in the beginning of my message, I'll
often make cultural connections. So if you're a nonbeliever, you
know what I'm talking about. I'm not speaking a foreign
language to you. I'm beginning to make my case, not
using the Bible yet, I'm making my case with other sources.

(09:45):
But then ultimately I recognize that the power of my
message is in scripture, not in quoting secular sources. So
that's just a bridge to get to the main message.
And the power of the message is in the Gospel.
I want to ask Billy Graham when I was having
lunch in this home, if an older Billy could speak
to a younger Billy, what would you tell yourself to

(10:08):
preach on more? He said, I would preach more on
the Cross and on the blood of Christ, because that's
where the power is. And I think that's so true.
I know that there's power in the simple message of
the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, and I know
when I get to that part, there's just, you know,
there's something special there. That's why Paul said, I'm not

(10:30):
ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the
power of God under salvation. Paul uses the Greek word dunamus,
which means explosive dynamite power, so it's a recognition of that. C. H.
Spurgeon once said he always tries to make a beeline
to the cross, so I think that's very important. And
coming back to Billy again, I once saw him being

(10:52):
interviewed by British interviewer David Frost, and Billy made a
really important statement. He said, I studied to be simple.
So the job of an evangelist is to strip away
anything that would come implicate your message, anything that would
clutter your message, avoid you know, peripheral issues that are important,

(11:16):
but their secondary to the message of the Gospel. And
so you wanted to be understood by your listener. And
you know, when I think about the audience of you know,
the seventies when I first started preaching, compared to the
audience of today, very different and far more biblically illiterate. Oh,

(11:37):
I would say, almost completely biblically illiterate. So I recognize
that when I use, you know, a statement like well,
Adam and even the garden, or Noah's arc or sin
or you need to accept Christ? Okay, great, But does
a person know what I mean when I say you

(11:58):
need to accept Christ? Does a person need to know
what I mean when I say you're a sinner? And
the answer is yes. So I find that nowadays, kind
of following billies advice studying to be simple, I explain everything.
I don't assume my listener understands anything I'm saying. So
I'll say, and tonight, I'm going to give you an

(12:19):
opportunity to put your faith in Christ. What does that mean?
And I'll break it down, and I'll often weave my testimony,
even though you know it happened a long time ago.
I still weave my testimony how I came to Christ,
and because that's a way to kind of put myself
in the shoes of my listener, because I think they think, oh,
you're some preacher, you were raised in a Christian home,

(12:41):
you live in a Christian bubble. And when I tell
him my mother was married and divorce seven times, I
came from an alcoholic comb I myself used drugs for
a time, it shows them that I'm from the same
world that they're from. And success builds walls, failures build bridges.
So by that, I mean, if my life looks so perfect,

(13:05):
that's so successful, that doesn't relate to anyone failure. Where
I talk about my own struggles, my own challenges, how
I came to faith. That builds a bridge to the
person I'm speaking to. Very long answered to your question, No,
it's great.

Speaker 3 (13:20):
That's so I want to kind of shift a little
bit and talk about senior pastors in churches and how
they can do evangelism. So going back five decades, were
you from the very beginning giving some type of invitation
every week or was it every other week, or was

(13:43):
it hey, i'm looking out, Hey, I know everybody. I've
been in everybody's home. Was there a stage where you said, hey,
I don't know everybody here. I need to make sure
that I'm giving people an opportunity to know Jesus.

Speaker 2 (13:54):
I pretty much always have given invitations, but we have
always sought to build an evangelistic culture. So speaking to pastors,
you need to build an evangelistic culture in your church.
And that doesn't happen automatically. So what does that mean?
I would say, first be sharing your faith yourself. You know,

(14:16):
just you as a pastor, you're first to Christian So
when you're out and about just living your life doing
what you do, look for opportunities to share your faith.
And I like to share those stories and the pulpit.
So in effect, I'm modeling for people what I do.
And I don't just tell them my successful stories. I
tell them about my failures. Yeah, I had this conversation

(14:37):
and the guy wasn't interested or I didn't have the
right answer for his question. You know, so they understand
that I don't always do it perfectly because I don't,
you know, so I think start first to do that.
But then also I emphasize the importance of sharing our
faith to our people, and I encourage them to bring
people to church that don't know the Lord. And so

(15:00):
when you give an imitation and maybe one of your
congregants brought someone who accepts Christ, they get very excited
about that. And I know that invitations, and by an invitation,
I mean giving an opportunity for a person to come
to Christ can be risky. But hey, you know, if
you're going to take a risk, what a great thing

(15:20):
to take it on. And when people do come to Christ,
that is going to be a blessing. New converts are
the lifeblood of the church. Show me a church that
does not have a constant flow of new believers coming in,
and I'll show you a church that's stagnating. So we
have a choice. We can evangelize or fossilize. We must evangelize.

(15:42):
It's part of the calling of the church. I see
the purpose of the church as threefold. We're here for
the glorification of God, We're here for the edification of
the saints, and we're here for the evangelization of the
world upward, inward outward.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
So we're here to.

Speaker 2 (15:57):
Glorify God, build one another up, but also to evangelize
and so develop an evangelistic culture is in your church.
And then yes, give invitations, and it won't always work.
And sometimes a lot of people will come forward. Sometimes
only a handful of people will come forward. And there

(16:17):
might even be a time when no one comes forward.
And by the way, there's a lot of ways to
skin a cat, so to speak. You know a lot
of ways to give an invitation. You can have people
get up out of their seat, walk forward and pray.
I do that in every crusade, but I don't do
it in every church service. You can have a person
raise their hand and lead him in a prayer from
the pulpit. You can say, go to a room over

(16:40):
to the side if you would like to accept Christ.
I don't think that's as important as giving people an
opportunity to give their life to Christ. I was in
New York once listening to a very well known preacher.
He gave one of the best messages I've ever heard
of The prodigal son. It was literally just flawless, and
it was the perfect message to give an invitation. But instead,

(17:03):
when he was done, he just prayed and walked off
the stage, and I thought, what a missed opportunity. I
believe people would have accepted Christ right there on the spot.
So I say, develop an evangelistic culture. Newcombers are the
lifeblood of the church, and give invitations. I have one
friend who's a pastor. He's in heaven now, but he said,

(17:24):
I never really felt called to be an evangelist, but
I wanted to do it more. And I literally listened
to your messages and I copied what you said and
said it for batim for the first few weeks, and
then it became more natural to me and I started
just doing it on my own. That's a good thing
to do. I did the same thing with Billy Graham,
you know, because I had the opportunity to spend a

(17:46):
lot of time with him, because as he was ending
his crusade ministry, I was beginning mine, and so he
wanted to sort of freshen his messages with illustrations that
were more relevant to the culture of that day. And
so I started writing illustrations for Billy's sermons. I spent
a lot of time I'm with him, traveling with him,

(18:07):
and I constantly was asking him questions and I just
sat on that stage and I analyzed everything that he did.
You know, he gave the message, I watched him pray,
I watched him come back and give a second or
third appeal. I was with him after it was over with.
I was there when he was going in and I
once asked him, what are you feeling when you're giving

(18:29):
an invitation? And as response was, I feel like power
is going out of me. And I understood that because
you know, what's a really blessed moment for people in
the stadium or arena or wherever you're having your event
is a moment of battle for the preacher because you're
literally in the epicenter of the spiritual battle. The devil's

(18:51):
attacking you, but the Holy Spirit is at work. And
I think people don't realize that, and that's why they
really need to pray for the preacher, you know, because
I've had people say, well, it must be really gratifying
egotistically to stand up in front of all those people
and preach. I would say, it's the opposite, because I
feel a great responsibility to get it right, and I

(19:13):
feel like, I don't you know, this may be the
one time that person comes to an event like this
to hear the gospel. I just I'll say, I don't
want to blow it. And so I feel a lot
of pressure to do it right and a lot of
responsibility to get it right as well.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
So I was here this past Sunday and when we
talked for a bit, and I met a guy named
Larry who who attends here has come to know Jesus
a few years ago.

Speaker 1 (19:39):
And is he an older guy? Yeah, yeah, I know
that's Larry, Yeah, eighty eight years old.

Speaker 3 (19:44):
He is so fired up for evangelism. He has made
it his personal mission to bring every human being he
comes to contact with to bring them to hear the gospel.
And I see that as a direct result not only
of his conversion personal testimony, but being part of this culture.

(20:05):
And you know, sitting in the service on Sunday, and
I think it was your children's pastor who came out
and said, hey, we did VBS this week. Two hundred
kids made a profession of faith. So can you talk
a little bit about it? And I know you mentioned
it about creating a culture. How does a pastor and
I know this might be a little difficult because you
do have such a strong gift of evangelism, But how

(20:28):
does a pastor create an evangelistic culture when he doesn't
see himself as an evangelist?

Speaker 2 (20:32):
Well, I think you know, here's the genius of Chuck Smith.
Chuck Smith wanted to be an evangelist, and God called
him to be a pastor, and so he found other
people who were gifted at evangelism and empowered them. It
started with Lonnie Frisbee. So if you saw the Jesus
Revolution film, here's Lonnie, who couldn't be more different than Chuck,

(20:57):
but an electric personality, a clear gift of evangelist. He
was the guy who was preaching when I accepted Christ
on my high school campus. So Chuck gave a platform
to Lonnie, and the two of them together were like
Nitro meeting glycerin. You know, we kind of came for
Lonnie and we stayed for Chuck. So I would say,
if you're a pastor and you don't feel you have

(21:17):
the gift of the evangelist, fine, you still should evangelize,
You still should give invitations in your messages, but try
to find someone who is gifted in that way and
help him. And by the way, there's a lot of
gifted evangelists that are not preachers. Like take Larry as
an example. Larry runs a luxury eyewear store and so

(21:41):
he comes into contact with very affluent people that buy
his product. He uses his platform to talk about his faith.
I would say Larry is an evangelist. He doesn't preach
from a pulpit. He preaches from behind a counter filled
with sunglasses and other things. But he uses his position,
his platform to do that. And so some of the

(22:03):
best evangelists that I've met are just good at one
on one preaching. There are people that I've met that
do it far better than I do one on one,
you know, because they have a natural way of talking
to people. So it's not just people preaching from a pulpit.
Evangelism is just sharing your faith in whatever place you
do that well, you know, I mean coming back to Philip,

(22:25):
we see Philip sharing the Gospel with the men from Ethiopia.
That's one on one, and so we have that form
of evangelism. Then we appear in the da Pentecost one
guy speaking to thousands, because sometimes people build a false dichotomy.
In other words, they say, well, I'm not into mess evangelism. Well,

(22:46):
God's into mess evangelism. What do you call the da pentecost,
I'm into personal evangelism. Well I'm into that too. God's
in the pot. God wants both. And if there's one
thing that makes God happy, it's when people come into
the kingdom. Because Jesus said, I say to you, there's
joy in the presence of the angels over one sinner

(23:08):
that comes to repentance. And you know, Jesus was in
Luke fifteen. He talks about a woman who lost to coin.
He talks about a shepherd who lost the sheep, and
he talks about a father who lost a son. And
the reoccurring theme that he comes back to over and
over in those parables is and I say to you,
there is joy in the presence of the angels over

(23:30):
one sinner that comes to repentance. So it's just showing
the joy of heaven and the pleasure it brings God
when we win people to Christ. The Bible says he
that wins souls is wise, and so I believe it is.
Bob life giving not only for the person who's coming
to Christ, but it's life giving for the person that

(23:52):
is sharing Christ. Because the Bible says, given, it shall
be given unto you, pressed down, shaking together, running over
the same measure you give, it will be measured back
to you. And proverb says the generous soul will be
made fat, which is sort of a King James version
of just saying when you give out it, it's going
to replenish you too. And that's the important thing. It's

(24:14):
a blessing for us to do it. And then the
other thing I would say is celebrate evangelism. So, like
you mentioned that at church, our youth pastor talked about
all the people that came to Christ. We celebrate conversion.
We also showed a video that day that we played
right before the offering and we shared with the folks.
You know, when you give it harvest, this is one

(24:35):
of the things we do. And so we were always
celebrating stories of people coming to Christ. That's how you
create an evangelistic culture.

Speaker 3 (24:45):
I want to shift a little bit and talk about
evangelism as it relates to preaching. Yeah, you have given
sermons that include evangelism and you've given evangelistic sermons, Can
you talk about the difference in your preparation to do both.

Speaker 2 (25:03):
Yeah, Actually, there's a very big difference. It's between a
message on a text and even but my evangelistic messages
are based on the text too. But there's a difference. Okay,
here's the mean difference simplified. In an evangelistic message, I'm
preaching for a decision from the beginning to the end.

(25:25):
I'm going to challenge people to come to Christ. In
a message an exposition, I want to develop what the
text is saying, you know, I want to understand it culturally,
original languages, in context of course, and then apply it.
I think we're too quick to want to hit the application.
Make sure you're understanding it in context. So I do

(25:48):
all of that and then I apply it to the listener.
But you know, I'm wanting to encourage people, regular people
and their Christian life. The housewife, the businessman, the young person,
the older person. How does this apply to you? But
I'm also going to think about the non believer that's
present and have something for them as well. But I
can't sit around every Sunday and evangelized Christians, you know,

(26:10):
because my job as pastor. It's like two cats. My
job as pastor is to feed the flock of God
and equip the saints to the work of ministry. That's
what I'm Ephesians for says, God has raised up apostles, prophets, pastor, teachers,
evangelists for the work of the ministry, for the equipping
of the church. So I'm there to quit them and

(26:31):
to feed the flock of God. Now, in evangelism, I'm
a herald. I'm proclaiming a message, and as they said,
I'm preaching for a decision, and believe it or not,
it's a lot more work to write an evangelistic message
because I write it and I start whittling it down
in simplifying it. And then the funny thing is, even

(26:53):
when i'm preaching, I'm editing on the fly, and it
takes me a lot more time to write those messages.
And I've had people comment on how utterly simple they are.
Almost I wouldn't say, but like, why did all those
people come forward? Because it seems so simple, And I
think what they may not understand is that's the idea.

(27:15):
Back to Billy's statement, I study to be simple. That's
That's the key is I have to make it understandable.
So I start from a completely different premise in writing
an evangelistic message, and they're more work and I never
know quite how they'll turn out. But I mean I

(27:36):
could just get up and share the Gospel very simply
without any preparation. But in these messages in particular, I
work on them more than I do a regular teaching.
But I spend a lot of time in that too.
But I love it, you know, of all the things
that I do, I love to study right and deliver sermons.

Speaker 1 (27:57):
I love it.

Speaker 2 (27:58):
I love it more now than I have ever loved it.
You know, other things that come maybe if a church grows, administrating,
you know, taking care of all the other elements that
you need to take care of. Those are not my
favorite parts, you know. I still just love the challenge
of even coming to a text maybe I haven't preached

(28:19):
on before and seeing it come together. That's a blessing
to me because I'm fed and I'm blessed as I'm
preparing it. And I hope that that passes on and
blesses people do.

Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah, I totally agree with that, it seems to me.
And once again I've been a student of your sermons forever.
I mean, I've been pastoring for twenty five years, and
I don't think that there's any text that I teach
that I don't check to see if you've taught it,
and I want to hear how you've done it. But
there seems to be a moment. There's two things that
I've noticed in your messages, and this is where I

(28:52):
want to know if it's you know, strategic or intuitive.
But there's a moment where you're teaching as just a
normal senior pastor would teach through a text. But there's
a moment that you stop teaching and you start preaching.
And then there's the other thing I've noticed is is
that and even on Sunday you were talking about being
salt and light about and you spoke as this is

(29:13):
what we need to do as believers, this is as Christians,
this is what our call is. But then when you start,
you kind of made a move. You transition to the invitation,
and that is kind of the the Okay, the teaching
portion is done. Now I'm preaching where it got very personal.
If you were not speaking in generalities, you were speaking
to the individual, and so can you talk about that

(29:34):
a little bit. Is that like a strategic thing or
is that just intuitive or is something else?

Speaker 2 (29:40):
A little of both, but it is very intentional. And
so when I'm writing a message, I always think, when
I get to the end, I want to have something
a non believer can understand. So I write something just
for them, and I do make it personal, because it's
interesting when you ask people who come to christ in

(30:00):
your service says what got your attention? Well, it's when
you told this story, you said this one thing. You know,
you have to not assume coming back to something I
said earlier, not assume they understand what you've been saying.
So I think that even as a nunbeliever, you come
to church and you're listening and whatever the topic is,

(30:22):
it's interesting because you're hearing a Christian worldview. You're hearing
someone that believes in the book. You're hearing someone that
puts the authority of scripture above their own. You're hearing
how it works in real life. But you don't really
know how that applies to you necessarily, but you're interested,
maybe you're drawn to it, maybe you like what you're seeing.

(30:45):
But I now I have to make it real to
that person. And I think our people know that I'm
going to do that, and they want me to do that.
Now I'm going to change it, and I'm gonna make
it personal, and I'm going to apply it to a
person who's never heard it before. I'm not going to
assume they understand anything that I've said prior to that,

(31:06):
and it's going to be personal. So that is very intentional.
But then I do believe the Holy Spirit will lead you.
And I found myself saying things like, there might be
a person here today that recently was so despondent they
thought of taking their own life. I'm not basing that
on anything. In fact, if people do tell me stories

(31:27):
about people they brought to church, I would never use
what they told me in a sermon because they never
make it personal. I've had people say, you were staring
at me the whole time. I don't stare at anybody.
I'm kind of looking at them, but in a way
I'm looking past them a little because I'm thinking, you know,
but I do believe the Lord will We'll give me
little illustrations that sometimes sometimes are literally describing a person's situation.

(31:52):
And I've had people say that to me, and I
think of sermons I've heard where I'm listening to a
podcast that was recorded when ten years ago, and yet
it speaks personally to me, as though it was written
from me. I believe the Holy Spirit directed that preacher
when he gave that many years ago, to yes, be
relevant to the people he was speaking to, but knowing

(32:14):
it would eventually reach me down the road and others.
That's what the Lord can do. So I try to
stay really open. That's where the spontaneity comes in. But
the other part, I will structure it where yes, I'm
shifting gears and I'm aiming it toward the numb believer.

Speaker 3 (32:33):
So one of the things that I think we do
as preachers, I know I do this not because I
want to, but because it's just what I do. We
don't just listen to preachers. We listen at preachers. So
we're we're listening and we're like, oh, that was good.
Oh maybe I do that differently. Oh that's way better
than I would do it. And so I was sitting
I was listening to your message on Sunday, and I

(32:56):
was thinking myself, I want to see how he makes
the transition to the evangelistic component of the message, and
I just got so into the message I totally forgot
uh that I was waiting for that. And then we
got to the invitation, I'm like, oh, I missed it,

(33:16):
And so I re listened to the message last night,
and I'm like, because I have to ask this question.
And so I had to. I was listening to the
message before I went to bed last night, and when
the teaching component was coming to an end, you kind
of you bridged it with that Titanic story at the end,
that part where I don't know if it was the
helmsman or someone you know, shut up, shut up, I'm busy. Yeah,

(33:39):
And and that's where you made the turn and you said,
maybe you think that you're too busy for God. You
just started listening off things that people do when you
were And I remember when we talked before the service,
you said, oh, I'd watched this documentary. I'm really excited
about this, this this Titanic piece of you think I
know I could use it at the end. So can
you talk about some of the intentionality of making the

(34:02):
switch to say, hey, I need to I want this
to be a smooth landing and not a crash landing.
As we go into an evangelistic right portion, well.

Speaker 2 (34:11):
The two most important The two most important moments of
flying when the danger is the highest is take off
and landing. The same is true of a sermon. We
should never be boring. And when a preacher is boring,
that to me is the worst thing you can do.
Maybe you should do something else, because there's nothing boring

(34:33):
about the word of God. There's nothing boring about the
message we're bringing. And I have seen people take the
action packed word of God and make it so dull.
Listening to them as like watching paint dry. It's like unbelievable.
So you I think when you begin a message, you
want to capture the attention of the audience. I often

(34:56):
start with an illustration or a joke sometimes or something
that will get them to WHOA, I want to hear
this right, that's take off, landing, That's very important. I've
seen messages fall apart at landing, especially when it comes
to an invitation. I think the biggest problem that pastors
have an evangelist that closes is not necessarily in content,

(35:20):
but it's actually in the clarity of what they're asking
people to do. So I find myself going over it
a few times. So I'll do something like this. Maybe
you've joined this today and you've never given your life
to Jesus Christ. In a moment, I'm going to give
you an opportunity to do that. So if you need
to ask Christ to come into your life, if you

(35:42):
want to have your sin forgiven, if you want to
know that when you die you will go to heaven,
if you want to fill that hole in your life,
respond to this invitation. I might eve going to repeat
that another time in a slightly different way. Then we pray.
Then I say, you know, if you want to ask
Christ in your life, pray this prayer or whatever it

(36:03):
is I do. Now, if I'm going to give an invitation,
this is where I have to really be clear. And
by invitation I mean ask them to come forward. I'll
say it like this. In a moment, I'm gonna ask
you to get up out of your seat, come out
into the aisle, and walk to the front and stand
here making your public professional faith. Why am I asking
you to do this because Jesus said, if you will

(36:26):
confess me before people, I will confess you before the
Father and the angels in heaven and if you deny
me before people, I'll deny you before the Father and
the Angel. So I'm gonna ask you to get up
and come forward in just a moment, and so I
might say something else, and then I'll come back and say,
so right now, if you raise your cant, even if
you did not during the last moment of prayer, get

(36:47):
up out of your seat, step into the aisle, walk
down to the front, and make your public step for Christ.
So I'm telling him, I'm telling them again, and I'm
telling them again. Here's what happens with some preachers. I'll say,
I'm gonna ask you to get up and come forward,
So come forward. Now, the band comes out, start singing.
They don't know what you're telling them, and then thinking, wait,
did I hear it right? Does he want me to

(37:08):
walk up there? Or maybe that's not what he meant.
So everyone freezes. So sometimes it takes one person who
got it to walk forward. That's fine, and then it
will kind of I've had it where no one will
come forward, then one person will come, then two more
will come, and then they'll start flooding forward. And then

(37:29):
maybe sometimes in the middle of an invitation, I'll love
the band play a song, they break, maybe they're just
you know, strumming through it, and I'll say, in a moment,
the band's going to do this chorus one last time again.

Speaker 1 (37:43):
Maybe you want.

Speaker 2 (37:44):
Christ to come into your life, and I'll reiterate it
and invite them again. I certainly do this at the Crusade.
I might even do it four times in a crusade invitation,
because it does take longer for people to come down
in the field and make that profession of faith, depending
on on what venue were in. But in Angel Stadium
it takes quite a while, and I want to give

(38:05):
them the time to do that. So it's something that
it's the mechanics. Sometimes people don't understand what it is
you want them to do again. It's not about walking forward,
it's about making a profession of faith. Because we don't
know how they did it. In the Book of Acts,
we just read three thousand believe. Wait, how was Peter

(38:26):
strumming a guitar in the background or what?

Speaker 1 (38:29):
Would you know?

Speaker 2 (38:29):
Probably not, obviously we don't know the mechanism of it,
but we know it happened, and we know they counted them.
Because sometimes people say, well, I'm not in the numbers.
People that say they're not in the numbers are people
that often have very low numbers. So they have to
develop a theology that justifies that. Sure, and I'm not

(38:50):
saying it's all about numbers, because whatever size of your flock,
you want to be a faithful shepherd of that flock.
Someone once asked the H. Spurgeon, while you preach to
a lot of people, I wish I'd preached to as
many people as you did. Spurgeon said, how many people
are in your congregation? The pastor said around one hundred.

(39:11):
Spurgeon said, I think that's enough people to give an
account of on the day of judgment. So, but now
coming back to what I was saying, you say you're
not in the numbers, Actually God is, because we do
read three thousand believes, five thousand belief. Coming back to
Paul and Marseill, A handful believe. That's important too, because oh,

(39:32):
here's the great apostle, Paul, one of the greatest orators
of his time. I handful believe and they named them.
It was such a small group. They give the names
of the people that believe, and so so that means
Paul failed. Right, No, because God will not judge us
for success in quotes, but for faithfulness. My job, your job,

(39:54):
our job as preachers is to proclaim the Gospel and
leave the results in the hands of God. You know,
it's his harvest, it's his work. Jesus said those will
come or called by the Father, you know that. I
like that verse in the Book of Backs that says,
as many as were ordained undo eternal life believed, and

(40:17):
so it's in the hands of God ultimately. But I
want to make sure I do my job, make it clear,
make it understandable, and give them the opportunity to respond
in some way, shape or form.

Speaker 3 (40:30):
Yeah, you mentioned Spurgeon a moment ago. One of the
things that he says in his book The Sole Winner,
is that it is the business of every Christian minister
to win souls for Christ. So why do you think
we see so little pulpit evangelism in particular in churches today.

Speaker 1 (40:49):
What do you think?

Speaker 3 (40:51):
I think some of it might be a pastors feel
a lack of gifting. It could be I think some
of it is a lack of training. I think sometimes
there is a theology that it's like, Hey, if God
wants to reach them, he's going to reach them.

Speaker 2 (41:06):
Yes, well, though those are all true, you know, coming
back to that statement in Acts, as many as were
ordained under eternal life. Believe I believe in predestination. The
Bible teaches predestination, but the Bible also teaches free will
and the need to appeal to people for.

Speaker 1 (41:25):
God's love the world.

Speaker 2 (41:26):
He gave his only begotten said whosoever believes in him
should not perish, but have everlasting life. God is not
willing that any should perish, but that all should come
to repentance. Now, I don't believe in what some call
double predestination, meaning God shows some people to go to
Heaven and God shows other people to go to Hell.
I don't believe that. So I do believe that God

(41:48):
shows us how he does that, what that's based on,
I don't have the answer to it, nor does anyone else.
So my job is to appeal to the person and
leave the results in the hands of God. So if
you have a theology that says, well, if they're predestined,
they'll believe you're miss I've seen that part that appeals
to the free will of man. I think of a said,

(42:09):
who was it? Was it spurgeon? Someone you know where
they said, how do you reconcile predestination and free will?
He says, I don't have to reconcile friends, right, so
we don't have to worry about that. That's in the
hands of God. Like dal Moody, the great evangelist once said, Lord,
save the elect and election more so, you know, I

(42:31):
think if you have a theology that says it's all
in the hands of God, you're missing the part where
you're called to appeal to people. But I would add
one other thing to your list, which I thought was
very good. I think it's a fear of failure. It's
a fear that you will say come to Jesus and
they won't come. And I have to be honest. You

(42:51):
may fail, But is it a failure because I've heard
stories that people like in our Crusades as an example,
who did not come forward in the invitation, but then
pray to accept Christ in the parking lot or a
day later or a week later. My job is to
sow the seed, like Paul says, one sows the seed,
another waters that God gives the increase. So I have

(43:15):
to do my job. So but the fear is I'm
going to say come forward and no one will come
forward again. That could happen. Frankly, it's not the end
of the world. Okay, you'll get over it. But what
if people do come forward? So if you want to
have success, you have to take risks and you have
to put yourself out there, and it is a risky thing.

(43:35):
But I would say, you know, you know, you need
to understand a proper theology on the topic. Like you
are saying I wrong theology can affect you. But just
be willing to take the risk for the kingdom of God.
Jesus said to Peter, throw your net on the other
side of the boat. Well, what would have happened if
he didn't throw his net on the other side of
the boat. I don't think he would have had to

(43:57):
catch up great fish. He had to do what Jesus
told him to do. We've got to throw our net
and pull it in and see what we pull in,
you know, and it maybe a lot, it may be
a little, it may be somewhere in the middle. The
results are in the hands of God. Success in evangelism
is faithfulness in giving the message. Though numbers do matter,

(44:19):
it's not all about numbers.

Speaker 1 (44:20):
Sure.

Speaker 3 (44:21):
One of the things that I've seen certainly experienced it here.
We see it at Harvest Crusades, and I think I
mean going back to Billy Graham, and you know, just
as I am. You know it was just in the
early days of the Harvest Crusades. It has come just
as you are. Can you talk about the importance of
music in evangelistic invitations?

Speaker 1 (44:44):
Very good question. I think music is very important. Of course.

Speaker 2 (44:49):
Dial Moody had his song leader, Iris Sinki, and he
had a song that I've never heard before called the
ninety and nine. Apparently when Sinki would sing this song,
something supernatural happened and it really moved people. Billy Graham

(45:09):
he had, just as I am. His worship leader was
Cliff Barrows. I've worked with a lot of people over
the years that have sung while people are coming forward.
I believe there can be power in music when it's
harnessed in the right way. Remember when King Saul was
tormented by a demon, David would come and play a

(45:32):
stringed instrument in sing songs of worship and sol would
find temporary relief. God created music. Now it's been hijacked
by our culture, our world, used for evil purposes, but
used properly, it can be really used by God. I
think it was Martin Luther who said, and he said
this to me personally, because I'm old none he said.

(45:55):
He said that worship is the handmaiden of theology. So
I think that would apply to art in general. I
would apply it to music, applied to movies, visual art, paintings, etc.
If it's subservient to the truth of scripture, it can
be powerful. When you go and visit a lot of
the churches in Europe and you see those amazing paintings,

(46:18):
that is all A lot of people were exposed to
the Gospel before the scripture was accessible. They would look
at images and they would see the story of the
crucifixion or the story of certain miracles. So there's a
place for all of that. Now the power is in
the preaching. So art needs to sort of submit itself
to the discipline of scripture. Handmaiden of theology, servant of theology,

(46:43):
we might say. So when music is used right, kind
of preparing the hearts. I think when you walk into
a gathering of thousands of believers singing worship songs, that's
pretty powerful because the world doesn't have anything like that.
When do people in the secondar culture even sing together anymore?
You know, it's pretty rare. I went to a Paul

(47:04):
McCartney concert while ago, and you know, when he was
singing let it Be, everyone was singing, and I thought,
this is kind of as close as this world gets
to a worship experience. But it's still not the same,
because the Bible says God inhabits the praises of his people,
and so for me personally, Bob. When I first was
exposed to the gospel on my high school campus, I

(47:26):
was walking across the campus and there was a group
of Christians sitting on the front lne singing songs about Jesus.
And I always dismissed them as crazy and stupid and foolish.
But the problem was I did know a few of
them previously, and I used to party with some of them,
and I knew they were intelligent people and they weren't

(47:47):
weird fanatical people. And I saw them singing as Christians,
and so I sat down and there was something about you.
And this was the simplest song, like three chords and
a guitar, nothing profound, But there was something about the
fact that people would sit in public and sing songs
about into Jesus. That kind of move me. I thought

(48:10):
that's interesting, you know, because I've never seen anything like that.
So that's music being harnessed and used for a good purpose.
So coming back to the crusade, you know, I'll I'll
say something like, in a moment, Phil Wickham is going
to sing this song, and if you want to come
to Christ, make this stand for him. Get up out

(48:31):
of your seat and come forward. And then I'll say
to Phil ahead of time, Phil, I need a break,
so I wait for a natural break in the song.
He'll sort of step back from the pulpit, maybe just
play the chords through, and I'll step step up to
the microphone give a second appeal.

Speaker 1 (48:45):
I might do it a third and a fourth time.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
So I will kind of work that out with an
artist or the worship leader ahead of time. But I
do believe God uses the music and when it's harnessed
in the proper way, it combined with the preaching of
the gospel, these can be powerful tools.

Speaker 3 (49:03):
That's so good the handmaid of theology. I'd never heard
that quote before. Fantastic well.

Speaker 2 (49:09):
I was having a conversation with Rick Rubin recently, so
Rick Rubin is, like many consider him the greatest producer
alive today. Rick Rubin was there, and you know, he
was with the Beastie Boys and with hard rock bands.
He brought Johnny Cash back to a new audience, you know,
when Johnny's career was waning. Rick went and heard him

(49:31):
in a small little theater he was playing in. Said, Johnny,
want to help you, you know. And Johnny said, what
are you going to do for me that no one
else has done? He says, I just want to hear
your songs. So we went into Rick's front room. They
set up some recording equipment and he just played his
favorite songs. And from those recordings, Rick, you know, brought
that music to a huge audience and Johnny had a

(49:52):
resurgence at the end of his career. So Rick is
this genius guy, and he had me on this podcast
and so Rick says, tell me about Christian music.

Speaker 1 (50:02):
They said, okay.

Speaker 2 (50:03):
So I told him about what I experienced the Jesus
Movement days and how the music often spoke to the audience.
I said, it didn't start out as an industry. It
started out as a message to visitors, like we would
tell them what we were experiencing. As an example, there
was a song back then by Ben called Love Song

(50:24):
and the lyrics where we're all gathered here because we
all believe. If there's a doubter or in the crowd,
we ask you not to leave. Give a listen to
the story, hear the message that we bring. Let the
faith swallop inside you, lift your voice with us and sing,
accept them with your whole heart, and use your own
two hands with one, reach out to Jesus with the other.

Speaker 1 (50:46):
Bring a friend.

Speaker 2 (50:47):
Well, what was so cool about that is we just
explained what we're doing to a visitor. So and I said,
you know, music today, Christian music doesn't do that like
it used to. And I've challenged my friends who are artists,
Christian artists, musicians to write songs more for the number.
A lot of our music today is wortshap And Rick's

(51:08):
observation was, it all sounds the same to me, and
it sounds too perfect. And I think they need to
talk more about the challenges and struggles of life. I said,
I agree with you. And so Rick, who was not
a part of Christian music but really knows music intuitively,
was understanding one of the problems, right now, and I

(51:32):
think it's something we need to do more of explain
what we believe to this secular culture. And music was
very different, you know when I was a kid, because
we actually looked to musicians as messengers foolishly. On my
add it was the blind leading the blind. We were
influenced by the Beatles, Bob Dylan, Jimmy Hendrix, Jim Morrison

(51:55):
and the Doors and others. But the problem is, all
of our rock icons started dying on us, you know,
Jimmy Hendrix dead of a drug overdose, Jim Morrison dead
of a drug overdose, and on the list goes. So
but we were looking to these people to direct us
and guide us. I don't think people are looking to
music so much for that today, but I do believe

(52:17):
there's a place to use music as a way to
reach people that would not otherwise be reached. And so
I think we have sort of drifted a bit in
that way, but it can be a powerful tool. Again,
forgot your initial question, which was really good.

Speaker 3 (52:32):
The role of music in invitations.

Speaker 1 (52:35):
Yeah, that's it.

Speaker 2 (52:36):
Well, that was my very long answer to that question.

Speaker 1 (52:40):
That was great.

Speaker 3 (52:41):
I've listened to some Rick Rubin podcasts obviously, in my
fifty two years of life, have purchased many albums that
Rick has produced. And the thing that I find interesting
about Rick, this has nothing to do about evangelism, but
just as a musician, he doesn't play any instruments, he
has no training in on the production side, and yet

(53:03):
he brings an intangible to music in the albums that
he has produced that bring out something original, even within
established bands that he's worked with. So that that is
such an interesting observation about Christian music from a guy
who isn't a Christian but is a lover of music.

Speaker 1 (53:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (53:21):
And I would say Rick is very open spiritually. And
we had I did this podcast that we'll be coming
out soon with him. We talked for over two hours
and he said he would like to do another one,
and he had a lot of questions. Still, I think
that Rick is a real seeker of truth, and he
had excellent questions about the Gospel, about the Bible and

(53:46):
so but he also, you know, is coming at it
from a different perspective.

Speaker 3 (53:52):
Do you feel like part of I think part of
what happens as pastors is we're like two steps removed
from reality. Many times we're around, we're on a church
staff with Christians all the time, and then we're at
church and it's mostly Christians and just you talking about
being Hey, I got interviewed by Rick Rubin. I'm guessing

(54:15):
that is your experience and evangelism. That and what the
Lord has done in your life evangelistically that led to
that opportunity. But do you feel like pastors need to
get out more? They just need to talk to you
got to talk to somebody who's not a Christian.

Speaker 1 (54:32):
Yes, I do believe they should.

Speaker 2 (54:34):
And you know, one way to do that is podcasting
is a great way to listen in on other people's conversations.
I want to know what people are thinking insane, I
want to know the questions are asking. The problem is
pastors are sometimes asking, they're answering questions. No one is asking,
and they're not answering the questions that are being asked.

(54:55):
You know, for years atheism was making sort of a comeback.
They called it the new atheism. That is, I wouldn't
say it's dead, but it's not on the rise. It's
a whole different time now. Now everybody's spiritual. People want
spiritual experience as they think they're having spiritual experiences and

(55:15):
indeed they are, but not necessarily with God. So we
have a different role. We have to help them sort
these things out and bring a biblical perspective. But I
did a long form podcast with Jordan Peterson and the
very intelligent man, and I admitted to him after we
were done, Jordan, there were times you were saying things
I didn't understand. I thought I probably shouldn't admit it,

(55:39):
but it is true. I didn't know what he meant
by certain terms. I just sort of nodded along. He's
a very kind man, very gentle man. And it's so
funny because after we were done, he said, do you
like music? And I said I love music. He goes,
I'm going to go to a honky talk we were
in Nashville. I'm going to a honky tonk later and

(55:59):
listening to music. Would you like to join us? And
we said yes, and so we ended up sitting in
this little honky tonk. Why a country western band was
playing these old country type songs with Jordan Peterson. So
it was cool because someone said to me, Jordan never
asked his guest to go do anything with them socially,
So you know, I think we may be a little

(56:21):
bit of a connection there. But you know, be a
friendly person, be interested in people, and listen to them.
And my objective is not to win the argument, it's
to win the soul. So when I'm talking to people,
let me have a different worldview than I have. I
won't interrupt them, i won't cut them off. When they

(56:42):
say something I don't agree with, I'll hear them out,
let him say it, then I'll give a response. Jesus
with the woman at the Well is a perfect biblical example.
You know, she's riffing talking about things she thinks and
Jesus is listening, but then he draws on what she's
saying and then applies truth to what she is saying
as well. And I think that, you know, we want

(57:05):
to be good listeners, we want to observe culture, and
we want to have biblical answers to what people are thinking.
And so as I passedor I try to just engage
with and have relationships with people that are not believers
and so I can know what they're dealing with. But
I do find that that's the first step to helping

(57:29):
them become believers. Some people you can reach very quickly.
Others it takes years. Hey, my mother, it took decades
to reach her. You know, people who saw the Jesus
Revolution film asks did your mother ever become a Christian? Yes,
she did, basically at the age of seventy, and tragically
she died not long after that. So I prayed for

(57:51):
her for decades. But yes, do have relationship with non believers.
Be a friendly person, be a person that they want
to talk to, and that's very important. Get out of
your bubble. I was joking, you know, my last message
about we want to live in a Christian bubble and
we want to isolate you know. I remember my son Jonathan,

(58:12):
was talking about his childhood and he said, it's funny.
You know, all my friends are from Christian homes. And
then he went to a Christian school and he said,
and so they can only watch veggietails and they could
only listen to Christian music, he said, but my dad
would sit and watch The Simpsons with me, and on
the way to school we would listen to Jimi Hendrix

(58:32):
and the Beatles. And I thought of us listening weit
did I do something wrong? But I think what I
was wanting to do is say it's okay to appreciate
good art, good music. Not that I think The Simpsons
is good art, but he liked it. I found it
a musing At times. I would watch it with him,
and when I saw things that were wrong, I would

(58:54):
explain it to him. I was trying to help Kim
learn how to interpret culture and not just put him
in a little bubble, because I think, you know, we
can put a person in a bubble like Katy Perry.
A well known artist out there used to be Katie Hudson,
and she was a Christian singer. In fact, she played
at some of the services we did in her early days.

(59:16):
But she was raised by her own you know, she's
talked about it publicly. In a very legalistic Christian home,
her mother and father wouldn't let her listen to any
second of music. She couldn't watch anything on television, and
so they kept her in the bubble. So they came
a point where Katie rebelled and went out to see

(59:37):
what it was that she was being kept from. I'm
not saying you should encourage your Christian kids to do
things that are sinful. The very opposite is what I'm encouraging.
But what I'm saying is enter into their world, helped
them to interpret it, interpret it and prepare them for
it so they can live as a Christian. The most
challenging time for kids is the time when when they're

(59:59):
out of the house, you know, when they're home, going
to elementary school and junior high in high schoo Well,
we still have influenced when we send them up to college.
We send our kids off to these secular universities where
they're in ductrine eating kids into Marxism and anti Semitism
and all this woke ideology today and it's like insane.

(01:00:21):
So you know, our job is not done. But I
kind of got off on another subject. But no, we've
got to get out of our Christian bubble and we
need to get out there and talk to real people
in the real world.

Speaker 3 (01:00:32):
I appreciate the diversion. I feel like a great dad
now because my kids are musicians and I expose them
to all kinds of music and you know, obviously nothing
that I would think is sinful. But and you know,
same thing with television. I mean that's one of the
things that you know, we love Doctor Who at our
house and so but there's been moments where we've had

(01:00:53):
to pause it and say, okay, what's the worldview that's
being expressed here?

Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
Good?

Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
And these have.

Speaker 3 (01:00:58):
Become really teachable moments for our family. But you know
we love vegietails too.

Speaker 2 (01:01:05):
I don't like veggietails, never did. I'm against animated characters
without arms and legs. They just sort of floated around.

Speaker 3 (01:01:15):
Okay, So last question, how would you encourage a pastor
to fan his evangelistic gift into flame?

Speaker 2 (01:01:27):
Yes, well, Paul said to Timothy Stirrup, the gift that
is in you by the lane on of hands, and
a better translation would be fan it into full flame.
So sort of like if you're sitting in front of
your fire and the fire begins to die, you put
another log in the fire, so you have to feed
the fire. And the same is true of evangelism. You

(01:01:50):
got to feed it. You know what can happen to
a pastor with evangelism as we can say, well, I
just preached a sermon Sunday, I'm off duty, But Paul says,
be on duty at all time, you know, be instant
Andiasians out of season, preach a gospel, you know, always

(01:02:11):
be ready and opportunities will open up for you. And
I think as you look for those opportunities to share
your faith, you'll find they're out there all the time.
I think the reason we don't see them is we're
not looking for them, or literally, we don't want to
do that because we see it as our job. I
am a Christian and as a follower of Jesus, I've

(01:02:32):
been given the great commission, which is to go into
all the world.

Speaker 1 (01:02:35):
And preach the Gospel.

Speaker 2 (01:02:37):
Yes, I have a job as a pastor, but I
would still do this even if it wasn't my quote
unquote job, because it really is my calling. And I
think if your calling turns into a job, Houston, we
have a problem. It must remain your passion. And maybe
there's some I would say, as Jesus said to the

(01:02:59):
church of Fesis, return to your first love, you know,
get back to the you did when you were a
younger believer. And your congregation will get passionate about what
you're passionate about. So if they see that from you
and the pulpit, they'll emulate that as well. You model

(01:03:19):
it for them. And when they're with you outside of
the pulpit, you're having lunch with people from your church
or whatever, they see that these things are important to you,
just as a Christian. So we have to avoid becoming jaded,
avoid becoming professionals. I don't want to be a professional.
I want to be someone that is faithful in that

(01:03:42):
calling to the very end. You know when Paul said,
you know in his last epistle, I fought the good fight,
I kept the faith. I finished the course. Henceforth there
is later from you a crown of righteousness, which the Lord,
the righteous Judge, will give to me in that day,
and not to me only, but to all who love.
As a period, I fought the good fight, I kept

(01:04:02):
the faith. I finished the course. You just keep doing
it every single day. I don't recommend anyone goes into
ministry who has not called. It's not a profession, it's
not a good career choice. I heard one preacher, Alan
Redpath say, a preacher needs the mind of a scholar,
the heart of a child, and the height of a rhinoceros.

(01:04:26):
You're going to be second guest. You're going to be challenged,
you're going to be light about. You're going to be
attacked throughout your entire life. However, if you're called to
do this, you've got to do this, and you have
a responsibility to use the gift that God has given you.
But if you could be happy doing anything else, do that.

(01:04:47):
Be a Christian businessman, be a Christian. Whatever it is
you're doing, do that for the glory of God, and
use that platform like my friend Larry who sells luxury eyewear.
Do that for the glory of God. And you can
be an evangelist and be a faithful congregant and be
involved in your church. We need a lot of people
doing that. But if you have this calling of God,

(01:05:09):
you must pursue this calling of God. Otherwise it's disobedience.
But don't let your calling become a profession. Don't let
that calling become your job. It is a privilege, and
I recognize it's I'm privileged to do what I do.
It's not always easy. Other times it's it's just so

(01:05:31):
incredibly fulfilling, it's so much fun, it's such a blessing.
And other times it's really hard. But that's it just
goes with the turf, you know, He goes with the turf.
And if that's what you're called to do, that's what
you gotta do.

Speaker 3 (01:05:45):
Yeah, I think there is a and I wish that
every Christian could experience this. Pastors for sure that they
could experience this. There is such a joy in leading
someone to Christ. Yes and so and what you know?
Once again, at our church, I've personally led so many
people to Christ that church from the pulpit, certainly, but
just like my next door neighbors just came to know

(01:06:07):
Jesus a few weeks ago and they've been they just
started attending our church. They came forward when I gave
an invitation, and I started crying. I was, I was
a hot mess when I when I was leading the
group that had come forward. But Greg, I'm to I
don't even think my feet touched the ground the rest
of that day as I was as I was going home,

(01:06:27):
and there is just there. This is probably a bad
way to say it, but something just addicting about this,
just this incredible joy of leading someone to Christ. And
I think if everyone could experience that at least once,
they would share the Gospel with everyone they came into
contact with.

Speaker 2 (01:06:45):
I agree, and the stats tell us that most Christians
never shared their faith. That makes the devil very happy,
and that makes God unhappy, because, as they said earlier,
you're in partying life by telling someone about Jesus.

Speaker 1 (01:07:01):
But it's life giving. You just illustrated it.

Speaker 2 (01:07:05):
We're touching the ground, you know, so it and then
like you're doing something that every Christian should do, not
just what every pastor should do, and every Christian can
do this and you know, take the risk. You ask
me why pastors don't give invitations? Why do Christians not
say to people, would you like to accept Jesus Christ?

(01:07:25):
Fear of failure? Same thing. You know, you're you're afraid
they'll say no. But the thing is, take the risk.
It's worth it. And if they say yes, ah, great
blessing is in store for you and for the person
who you're praying with.

Speaker 1 (01:07:40):
Absolutely great. Thank you so much, thank you. This is
awesome