October 21, 2024 • 40 mins
It’s Not our Job to Convert Anyone!
Jesus’ last words on earth was to go into all the world and share the good news (Matt. 28:18-20). But at the same time, we know that it’s not our job to convict, convert or save anyone! The Holy Spirit alone works in people’s hearts and we should never try to control or coerce another person’s choices. So how does this work in practise? What role does the Holy Spirit play in evangelism?
These days, evangelism doesn’t have such a great name. Whether it’s the image of the Bible-thumping, money-seeking TV evangelist or the fire-breathing angry preacher on the street corner, no-one seems to be listening. Perhaps we’ve forgotten what our job is? What should evangelism look like when the Holy Spirit is working with us?
Our guest Dave Shepherd is here to offer some insights. Dave is a Baptist preacher from Adelaide who had a spectacular God conversation in his teens that changed his life. His insights point us to a way of working with the Holy Spirit that is powerful and beautiful. And it takes the pressure off!
On this episode of the show, you’ll hear about:
- Dave’s back story – how Dave grew up serving the “God of sport and basketball,” and how a God-encounter at age 16 changed the trajectory of his life.
- Dave’s reflections on being raised in a church family and dealing with the questions that confronted him as he grew into adulthood.. Is this real or fake? Is Jesus the one? Why should I follow Jesus?
- How God answered Dave’s questions through a powerful God dream.
Jesus was literally standing right in front of me and he had tears in his eyes and he looked at me and he said, “this is why.”
- The role of the Holy Spirit – who speaks to draw people closer to God as they posture their hearts to seek him.
- The motivation for evangelism. The first disciples shared their faith because Christ’s love compelled them. No specific “program” was needed because they operated out of relationship.
- Our role in sharing faith. The Holy Spirit is already at work in the world – our role is to discern and co-operate with what the Holy Spirit is doing. This is incredibly freeing as it takes the pressure off!
I cannot change anyone no matter how convincing I am, how great my theology is or how wonderful my apologetics are – none of that can make faith come alive in a person’s heart.
Next Steps
Join the journey to hearing God’s voice. Start your free 7-day God Conversations devotional today!
Pray, promote and give. God Conversations is donor-funded and made possible through the generosity of people like you! Become a partner today.
Equip your church to hear God’s voice. Join our community of ministry leaders for monthly insights and a free preview of 50 Days of God Conversations resource.
About Dave Shepherd
Dave Shepherd is the Lead Pastor of Hills Baptist Church (www.hillsbaptist.com), a multisite church community in Adelaide with a vision to see Jesus glorified, lives transformed and the hope of the Gospel revealed throughout the world. Dave is a co-founder of Ignite Ministries and the One Church podcast, where he works with other believers and church leaders to call the Church to unity, prayer, and worship. Dave’s heart and gifting is to fearlessly proclaim the truth of the Gospel, to raise up the next generation of leaders, and to plant churches that plant churches. Dave is married to his wife Jo and together they have three children, Bailey, Mabel and Benji.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Good conversations with Tanya Harris.
Let me ask you that question. What does God tell?
Well, you know, Thunder light is.
Mother Teresa? Someone asked her.
When did God speak to you? And she said whatever he wants.
So essentially the Bible is a collection of God conversations
if you like. I had a vision of a car
accident. And I'm sitting on the couch
(00:20):
thinking, why have I just. Seen this?
How could I? Know if God was speaking.
To me how? Could I know that that dream or
that thought was actually just me thinking about how I said the
bad thing? Jesus said we'd recognise his
voice. It was never meant to be a one
way conversation. Jesus's last words on earth were
(00:42):
to go into all the world and share the good news.
But at the same time, you and I both know that it's not our job
to convict, convert, or to save anyone.
It's the Holy Spirit alone that works in people's hearts, and we
can't ever control or coerce another person's choices.
(01:02):
So how does this work in practise?
What role does the Holy Spirit play in evangelism?
Hi and welcome to the God Conversations podcast.
My name is Tanya Harris and I'm a pastor, practical theologian,
author and founding director of God Conversations, a ministry
that equips you to recognise andrespond to God's voice.
(01:24):
Well, today on the show we're talking all things Holy Spirit
and evangelism and I have to say, these days evangelism as a
concept doesn't have such a great reputation.
Whether it's the image of the Bible thumping, money seeking TV
evangelist or the fire breathingangry preacher on the street
(01:44):
corner, no one seems to be listening.
Perhaps we've forgotten what ourjob is.
What should evangelism look likewhen we're working with the Holy
Spirit? Here on the show today, we're
talking with a friend and fellowminister, a Baptist preacher
from Adelaide in Australia, who had a spectacular God
(02:05):
conversation in his teens that changed his life.
His wisdom and his insights point us to a way of working
with the Holy Spirit that is powerful, profound and
beautiful. And the pressure is off.
I can't wait for us to get into the conversation.
But before I introduce our guest, let me just share some
(02:28):
really great feedback with you. God Conversations has been
releasing podcasts now for several years and it's just so
great to hear the feedback from around the world.
One particular show that we did a while back with Lynn Packer on
Hearing God and Mental Illness has had real traction with
people, particularly who are on the edge of ministering in
(02:50):
places where mental illness is an issue, on where people have
struggled with emotional development.
It's had really great resonance and I think it's a super
interesting podcast. So I encourage you to have a
look at the different ranges of topics.
We're covering so many differentangles about Hearing God's
voice. Hey, we also appreciate your
reviews and your comments on iTunes or on Spotify.
(03:13):
It really helps us to get our ratings up, helps to get the
podcast out there. We really need to hear the voice
of God. And don't forget, can I
encourage you subscribe to our fortnightly updates?
Yes, you can unsubscribe at any time, but they just give you a
little update of what resources are being released, the new
podcasts and articles and videosthat are coming out.
(03:36):
And we would really love to get the word out to help people hear
the voice of God and follow. So let's get into our topic for
the day. Let's meet our guest all the way
from Hills Baptist Church in Adelaide, Pastor David Shepherd.
Dave, it is so great to have youon the show today.
(03:57):
Thank you so much for coming on.Thank you for having me, it's
exciting to be here. We met at a Queensland Baptist
Pastors Conference. I think it was, what, two months
ago now, yeah. And I just remember having such
great conversations and loved the sound of what you are doing
over there in Adelaide and beyond.
(04:17):
So it's so good to have someone who's passionate about
evangelism and the Holy Spirit. So good to have you on the show.
Yeah, thank you. Now it was, it was a great time
over there and loved getting to know you as well.
And yeah, excited about where this conversation might lead us.
So Dave, how about you give us alittle bit of the Dave Shepherd
(04:40):
story? You're from Adelaide.
We won't hold you against that. Holding against that.
For those of you who are not Australians here, Adelaide is
the sleepy town in the middle ofAustralia.
Somewhere over W, yes. Tell us a little bit about
yourself, Dave. Yeah, so born and raised in
Adelaide and base, where do I begin?
(05:03):
But basically raised in a Christian home, beautiful
Christian family, Christian parents, but my God was sport,
basketball. That's where I spent a lot of
time in my younger days. I got saved at the age of 16 is
when I sort of had a, a God encounter, which we'll talk
(05:23):
about in a little bit, which really changed the trajectory of
my life and really shaped me from that point on.
So that, yeah, led me to on a, on a journey of kind of
exploring who God is, how Jesus moves in people's lives, hearing
(05:44):
his voice and just wanting to follow him all the days of my
life. And so I ended up weirdly, I
went did a medical science degree and I sort of thought God
was leading me into medicine. And then that got to the end of
my medical science degree and had lost all passion for
medicine, but had her at that stage was doing youth leading,
(06:04):
was coaching sport, was working,doing primary school sport
clinics. And so I just was doing a lot of
stuff with young people and, andjust thought, oh, maybe
teachings where God's leading me.
And yeah, so I went down that line, studied teaching at a
place called Table Adelaide, which is a Bible college over
here, and ended up getting a jobas an educator for and worked
(06:29):
there for 10 years in a Lutheranschool.
And whilst I was doing that, I was also doing some itinerant
preaching. And that itinerant preaching
kind of grew and grew and grew. And Long story short, ended up
moving over from education into planning a campus within what
(06:50):
was Allgate Baptist Church. It's now Hills Baptist Church.
And yeah, that was, gosh, eight years ago when that first
happened. And doing some great things in
the community from what I hear to Dave, I, I think that we
connected a little bit because we had both grown up in a kind
of a church environment and had heard the good news.
(07:12):
And I'm super curious now. You have a passion for sharing
the gospel, sharing the good news with people.
Some might say that you are an evangelist, that you have that
ministry office, that gifting toevangelise and equip the church
to evangelise, but really curious as the role of the Holy
(07:34):
Spirit in that process in bringing people to know God, to
know who Jesus is and what does that look like?
And for someone who's been raised in church, you've been
hearing about this stuff all your life.
I know how I felt. I I've heard before, but tell me
a little bit about that process for you.
What was where do you see the work of the Spirit in terms of
(07:56):
your own faith journey? Yeah, that's such a great
question. I so I was raised in the Uniting
Church, really beautiful, faithful, as I said, faithful
family. But then I went to a Pentecostal
school. And when I say Pentecostal, I
mean like Pentecostal. We had Monday morning devotion,
(08:20):
which we called assembly, but itwas like it was church.
And if the Spirit was moving, lessons were cancelled.
And regularly it would be, you know, you start at 8:30 in the
morning and we'd go through to recess like 11:00 sometimes it
went through 20 months. And we, yeah, regularly had
these, these moments where God was just moving really, really
(08:42):
powerfully in people's lives. And me as a Uniting Church kid
was sitting there thinking, whatthe heck is this?
Like, I remember seeing people raising their hands and sort of
going, 0 What's that? And then I'd see people fall
over. I'd hear people get up and
they'd, they'd be talking about prophecies they had and, and a
real like move of God's presence, which was confronting.
(09:06):
And that was a big part of me saying, well, is this like, what
is this? Is this Jesus?
How come I have never seen this before?
Is there more to God than what Iknow and what I have experienced
in my small Uniting Church bubble?
(09:29):
What's this all about? And so I really began exploring
that and asking those questions.And the big question I was
probably asking was, was the whythe why?
Firstly why is why is this happening?
But then secondly it was around OK if this like is Jesus the one
(09:50):
why should I follow Jesus? Why should I seek the Holy
Spirit? Like, is all of this real or is
it all just fake And then. I had asked the same question
when I hit 21. It took me a bit longer, I
think, is this real? Is it just belief system?
Does it have and what differencedoes it make in my life?
(10:12):
Like, you know, I, it was like aframe of reference or a way of
thinking, but it, it didn't seemfor me to have any impact, at
least for me. Yeah, I think, and I think it's
something that when you've grownup with it, you sort of you're
like, yeah, I believe. But then we all have to have
this, this moment, you know, we have to go through that Crucible
(10:34):
where it either is real to us and we own our faith, or it
just, it just sort of becomes a part of our foundational
upbringing. But it isn't something that
becomes the driving foundationalforce of who we are and how
we're going to live. And so that for me, I started
(10:57):
asking those questions and then just one night had a really
profound, what I call a God dream.
And I know you talk a lot about God dreams, but it was a
powerful moment where I, I'll share the dream.
I in my dream, I was walking along this grassy field and
beautiful green grass, like perfect kind of grass.
(11:19):
But I was walking up a hill and as I crested the top of the
hill, I could just hear the onlyword I can use to describe it is
wailing, like just the most horrible sort of tears and
crying and people calling out toGod.
And I came over and I could justsee multitudes and multitudes of
people. And I walked up to someone, as
(11:41):
is often the case in a dream, there's someone you know.
And so within the multitude, I walked up and I tapped this
person that I knew on the shoulder and I said, what's
going on? And she said to me, look up.
And as I looked up, I could see Jesus on a cross and all those
people there, they're all just weeping and wailing over him.
(12:04):
And so I kind of joined the multitude and fell on my knees
and started crying. And as I was there, the question
I was, I just said, why? Like because I think that had
been that thing, Like why the gospel?
Why the death on the cross? I knew the stuff, but I just
needed something to come alive within me.
So I was saying why, why, why. And then the next thing I knew
(12:28):
in my dream, I was no longer on my knees on the ground, but I
was up on my own cross, hanging there.
And as I was hanging there, I looked to the left and that
whole multitude that had been onthe grass now were just each on
their own cross, littered as faras the eye could see.
And Jesus was literally standingright in front of me, one of the
(12:50):
most incredibly profound, like tangible moments I've ever had.
And he had tears in his eyes andhe looked me and he looked at me
and he just said, This is why. And then I woke up.
And when I woke up, I had the anold song in my just running
around in my mind. And it said, I will rise from
(13:12):
waters deep into the saving armsof God.
I'll sing salvation songs because Jesus Christ has set me
free. And it was like when I woke up,
it was something was different. There was just this awareness of
freedom, like something of the the price that Jesus had paid so
(13:33):
that I could truly be free, freefrom the curse of sin and death,
free from my own stuff, free from having to perform a work to
achieve grace and favour. Like just free like and whom the
sun sets free. They're free indeed.
(13:54):
And it just changed everything. Like it just changed everything
for me. So when you ask that question,
the work of the Holy Spirit, like I just say he, he woke me
up, like physically and spiritually, metaphorically, he
woke me up and he, he just brought the gospel teaching that
(14:18):
I'd heard for many, many years and he brought it to life, which
changed me forever. Yeah, and made it real for you
so that you're identifying. It wasn't somebody else.
There wasn't others before. It was for you.
I find it a profoundly moving dream.
And you know, it reminds me whenJesus was on earth, He said, I'm
(14:40):
going to leave, but I will send you my Spirit and my Spirit will
remind you of everything that I have established.
And it's almost like in that moment, the Spirit reminded you
or made it came come alive or actualized it so that you
identified with it so that it was your faith.
It wasn't the faith of everybodyelse that was on the grassy.
(15:04):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. He took the truth of the gospel.
And I love the idea that that seed, you know, the soul went
out to sow the seed. The seed gets scattered all over
the place. And the seed had been scattered
in my heart from the time I was one year old.
But it was in that moment that that as God had been watering
(15:25):
that and helping like Aegis, theroots went down and the shoots
came up. And that's only the Holy Spirit
can do that. Only he can make faith come
alive in someone's heart. That's why faith comes by
hearing and hearing the word of God.
But no one can confess Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.
So the word can be sown. And that's what's necessary for
(15:47):
faith is the teaching and preaching of God's Word.
But only the Holy Spirit. His role is to is to make that
that word germinate and produce faith in our hearts that we
would confess that Jesus is Lord.
You know, Dave, we were talking just before about we don't feel
like we're experts in this area,but it's, it always makes me
(16:10):
curious because I, I listen to atestimony like yours and I think
isn't that interesting? Because it, there would be
revelation of the Holy Spirit. And then there was Dave saying
God, I don't understand why, whyJesus, why, why this death, why
this crucifixion? And you're asking God.
So you're posturing your heart towards God, seeking God.
(16:31):
And then the Holy Spirit comes along and makes this revelation
come alive that in a way that's quite profound, that sets you
free. And I, I, I often wonder and
observe when we talk about people, you know, coming to
these places of faith and understanding revelation.
It looks a bit different for everyone, doesn't it?
But you always get the dynamic, I think, of a human heart
(16:54):
posture towards God, asking the question, asking, you know,
praying for understanding or seeking God or you know, we were
just talking. I was reading an article again
this morning about people in Iran receiving visions of Jesus
right now. And I always ask myself, why
them, you know, is it? And I'd be so curious, is it
(17:15):
because they've been asking the question, Who are you God?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think. Sure what you'll like, and then
perhaps being open to receive that revelation such that it
wakes you up and changes you. Yeah, absolutely.
You know, I was actually teaching our church on this the
(17:36):
other day and going through the book of Acts, especially looking
at the work of the Holy Spirit. We're looking at the the purpose
of what he achieves. I think that's one of the first
things is that he's not an IT. The Holy Holy Spirit is a, is a,
(17:56):
is the third person of the Trinity, is relational and
therefore we would. Expect that I'm I'm writing
another book at the moment on the Holy Spirit and I keep on
sometimes I say that Holy Spiritand sometimes I say Holy Spirit
drop the that yeah, no. Is it a title?
Is it a person and then attempted to go it, but I can't
go it's and then I go he, but Holy Spirit's not a he so say
(18:20):
that it's something because HolySpirit is personal, right and
not just a force and anyway, I didn't mean to interrupt, but I
just. No, no, no, I'm totally,
totally, yeah. And I'm loving exploring that
more and more, but just realising that Holy Spirit is at
work in the world relationally to draw us to the the Father
(18:47):
through the Son. And so we were just teaching
this idea that like, how does the Holy Spirit work?
How did, and this idea that he'she's with us, drawing us towards
salvation. So that idea that the Holy
Spirit is at work in the world drawing all people to Christ.
(19:10):
And that's what you were talkingabout before.
You know that he'll bring to remembrance.
He's there just out like a fisherman, just, you know,
drawing people towards anyone who's got that soft hearts like
the eyes of the Lord, room to and fro about the earth, looking
to whom he can show strong favour, whose hearts are set
towards him. I love that idea that when
(19:31):
there's a heart that's postured towards God, that's actually
Holy Spirit is, is drawing that out of people.
And that's the idea that he's atwork in the world.
But then also we see Holy Spiritin us as the assurance of our
salvation. So at that moment of faith, that
moment of testifying that Jesus Christ is Lord, that too is a
work of Holy Spirit. And we have Holy Spirit within
(19:55):
us, as the Bible says, as that, yeah, assurance of salvation,
that deposit in a way. But then we also see Holy Spirit
comes upon us. It comes upon the apostles to
empower them for the work of themission, the Great Commission of
going and making disciples of all nations.
(20:17):
And I love that picture that theHoly Spirit is at work in all
three of those areas, drawing people, assuring people, but
then empowering people to say goand proclaim this good news.
And I can't help but think perhaps a part of that
proclamation and that empowerment is him leading us to
(20:39):
others who he's already drawing.I think you're right.
And, and, and it looks kind of different for everyone, doesn't
it, that there's, there's some similarities in terms of
revelation, but the process could be very dramatic for one
or very slow for another. But there's, there's this
revelation moment, these encounters, these connections
(21:00):
with God that, that, that us that can be cerebral, but tend
to go here. It's, it's a spiritual
revelation. It's supernatural.
And and then understanding that we can't make, we can't
manufacture that, I can't. So we know people when they talk
(21:23):
about evangelism, there's this idea I've got to make.
I've got to preach the gospel and make people listen.
Or you know, our role. Then what is our role if the
Holy Spirit does the work? I'll ask the expert.
Yeah. I don't know about expert Tanya,
but I think our role is to is toproclaim truth again, because to
(21:48):
because if again, faith comes byhearing and hearing the word of
God. Our role is to be the hands and
feet of Jesus. Otherwise he wouldn't say go and
make disciples. And we trust that in our
obedience. Perhaps there's a better way of
saying that as we obey the commands of Christ, we trust
(22:11):
that he will do what only he cando.
And so in lots of ways, I know personally, I find that
incredibly freeing when it comesto evangelism because all the
pressure is gone. I, I cannot, no matter how
convincing I am, no matter how charismatic I am, no matter how
(22:36):
you know, great my theology might be or my apologetics might
be, none of that can make faith come alive in someone's heart.
It's only the work of Holy Spirit taking that truth and
bringing transformation. And so I just, I, I don't know
(22:58):
about you. I just find that so incredibly
freeing. It's like, all right, all I have
to do in this moment is be obedient to this, this exact
moment in time. If God has brought a person and.
And your eyes, keep your eyes open, too.
Yeah. What is going?
What is? How can I watch and see and
(23:20):
discern what Holy Spirit is doing in this moment with this
person? Yeah.
Oh, absolutely. Great with that.
You know, that's so important. I was at a conference with a
couple of mates and this is such, your point is so spot on.
And we'd had this awesome session with this amazing
speaker. Like, you know, go and take the
hill kind of thing for Christ. So we walk out in the city of
(23:42):
Melbourne and it was just, we'reall fired up and we're walking
along and we're just walking talking about the session.
And then one of the guys, he just stops and he turns around
and well, like, what are you doing?
And he goes, oh, I'm just going to go talk to that person right
there. And we just walked straight
past. This must have been 1314 year
(24:03):
old kid who was clearly homelessand just sitting there.
And it's amazing how like you just said, like we were fired up
about evangelising but because our eyes weren't open, like we
weren't actually looking and therefore we couldn't be
obedient because we were so caught up in what we just
(24:25):
learnt. Whereas he just had eyes to see.
And I was so convicted in that moment.
He just turned around and knelt down and he was like mate, like
what's going on and just startedrelationally and just met him
where he was at met his need in that moment and then shared the
gospel with him. I don't know what came from
(24:46):
that, but I remember going ah, like eyes open is huge.
It's. Beautiful Dave.
We are talking with Pastor Dave Shepherd all the way from Hills
Baptist Church in Adelaide aboutthe role of the Holy Spirit in
evangelism. We'll be back in just a moment.
When Jesus walked the earth, He said His people could recognise
(25:08):
His voice and follow it, and that we've been given His Spirit
to speak to us wherever we go. That means hearing the voice of
the Spirit is even better than having a coffee with Jesus.
Yet so many of us do not experience His voice that way.
What does God sound like and howcan we know if it's Him
speaking? That's why my team and I have
(25:29):
developed a whole range of online resources that will help
you in your God Conversations journey.
There's blog articles, podcasts,videos and an ebook designed to
equip you to recognise God's voice.
And they're all available free at godconversations.com.
Become a part of the growing community that hears God's voice
and follows it by signing up to the blog today and receiving
(25:51):
fortnightly updates straight to your inbox.
God wants to speak to you today,clearly and personally.
It was never meant to be a one way conversation.
Hey, thanks for tuning in today.It's so great to have my friend
Dave here from Adelaide talking about evangelism.
You know, it's interesting, Dave, I've been reading a book
(26:13):
called The Patient Ferment of the Early Church.
I think I mentioned to this to you when we're having a
conversation. And I was fascinated because
back in the early days of the church, the first few 100 years,
they didn't have specific mission or evangelism
programmes. They, they didn't actually do
anything called evangelism. They were still passionate about
(26:37):
the call, but they had this deepconviction that the Holy Spirit
was already at work in the worldand that as they lived their
lives in a way that brought light and that was salty, that
actually improved the flavour ofthe world around them, that the
Spirit would work in that. So if that is true, then what is
(27:02):
the calling of an evangelist? I mean, I think you've you've
touched on that a little bit about presenting truth, but what
does that look like in your life?
Yeah, great question. I would again, it's that, well,
the question fundamentally is what is a disciple, right?
Because as you were just saying,they didn't have this word, this
(27:25):
idea of evangelism. That was just what disciples
did. Disciples shared their faith.
And the reason they shared theirfaith was because they it, it,
Christ's love compelled them it,it flowed out of them.
And there was no programme and no strategy, because why do you
(27:45):
need a strategy when we're a human being and we're all in
everyday relationships? Well, the the strategy is the
human beings. That's right, like the strategy.
Yeah, the little Christ is the word Christian means, isn't it
little? Christ.
That's right. Yeah.
And so for me, I think it's something that I've been
learning about is, I guess, trying to communicate.
(28:09):
How do I communicate that principle to people?
And this idea, the Greek word oikos, oikos meaning household.
And I think where we've got it wrong, particularly in the West,
is we have turned household intoa particular square meterage of
a block with high fences. And we call them good neighbour
(28:30):
fences, which literally means I don't want to see you like
they're tall and they're blockedout.
It's not good neighbour at all. It's like anti neighbour
fencing. So I can just live in my
isolated little world. But that is not what was the
case of, you know, ancient GrecoRoman world and and in many
(28:50):
cultures around the earth at themoment.
And Oikos, you literally live inyour community.
Your household is much more thanthe few people sleeping under
your roof. But it is the it's that
community in which God has put you.
And we all have an oikos. Every one of us have an oikos
where our workplace, our universities, schools, our, you
(29:11):
know, sporting clubs, there's there is an oikos everywhere and
recognising that, actually communicating that and say open
your eyes in your Oikos. What is God doing?
Who is who is a person of peace?You know, Jesus said to his
disciples like go and if if my peace is there, then stay with
(29:36):
them and share with them, do life with them maybe.
Whose heart is open to God? Yeah, yeah.
Absolutely to the Kingdom. But is that what you're asking
then, isn't it? Yeah, that's, that's what I'm
asking. Yeah.
Who here is someone who is like,it's very easy for me to break
(29:56):
the ice because one of the firstquestions we ask is what do you
do? Well, I'm a pastor.
And so either that leads to, oh,get away from me, or I, I knew
it. I try and leave it at the end
till the end of the conversation.
I try and get them to work, listen then before I blow up the
conversation. You know, but I think, yeah,
(30:19):
who's who's got a heart that's thinking beyond the here and
now, who's open to a conversation about the bigger
picture, the bigger things in life.
And if their heart is soft, thenbuilding a relationship first
and foremost build relationship because God's a relational God
(30:40):
and. And and, and perhaps build a
relationship, not because you'retrying to control someone's
choices, but you're just fulfilling the call of God to
love others. And if those actions of loving
you are facilitating the work ofthe Spirit, because where where
God's love is, God's Spirit is present and working in people's
(31:03):
hearts, what what about this andwhere have you seen the Spirit
working or speaking in the process of evangelism?
Do you have any examples of where you've seen that?
Yeah, well, I guess using that Oikos example, so my wife's one
(31:23):
of her best friends who was not a Christian person we just did
life with. And literally she was at our
house all of the time where and not holding back, not Bible
bashing, but just being us. And it was probably two or three
months down the road when she first presented this openness,
(31:48):
this person of peace concept. And we were talking about
healing, we were talking about things that God was doing.
And then one night her and Joe were just hanging out and she
just leant over junk. She she'd never ever talked
about God ever. She just sort of sat there in
the background listening and shejust said to Joe, she was like,
how do I have a personal relationship with Jesus?
(32:10):
And so I said, like, that's HolySpirit.
He's been like the fact that shearticulated it that way, she
distilled all these different conversations and interactions
and said, I want a personal relationship with Jesus, which
then led to a sharing of the like a very intentional,
deliberate sharing of the gospeland her giving her life to
(32:32):
Christ and getting baptised. So that's one way, like one
really simple way through the Oekos and through the
relationship, but an openness tojust being real and letting Holy
Spirit use our everyday lives toreveal truth and purpose and
hope to that person. Other ways that I've seen Holy
(32:56):
Spirit movies, like there's probably another conversation,
but around the prophetic opportunities for me that I have
as as sort of a speaker to go and preach various places and
having people who are maybe not Christian, but are seeking and
come to these events and they come to pray.
(33:16):
And the Lord will give you a, a picture or you just share boldly
and in faith. And one thing I would say is I
never say God has said, unless I'm talking about the Bible and
say, Hey, there's this this picture that God's potentially
bringing to mind. I don't know if this resonates
and just being able to share that.
And when you see something like that land on someone and you
(33:38):
just see them like breakdown as God's taken this this image or
this word and just slammed them,it's like God.
It's like Holy Spirit just coming and crashing through the
walls and banging the hearts open to him.
It's very first Corinthians, I think Paul wrote when he was
writing to the church at Corinth.
(34:00):
He says when God speaks and there's an unbeliever among you
and they all freak out and realise, Oh my gosh, that's God.
Can you give us an example of one of those, Dave?
Oh. Yeah, there's.
So I was speaking at a youth camp not long ago to just, yeah,
a bunch of high schoolers and had a particular word for
(34:24):
someone or a picture really of for someone who was standing.
They were standing by an ocean. And they were behind them was a
ploughed field. So you had, you know, cut right
down. And in front of them was an
ocean. And they were standing gazing at
the ocean. And I just shared, I said, look,
I got no idea what this means. I just think God is sharing
(34:45):
something with. And they just broke into tears
and they turned around and said,Dave, like, I've just had an
offer to go overseas and I've been in this place, right?
You know, where I've been at home for 5-10 years and I just
feel like my job there is done. And I've been asking God what
the next, the next chapter is and is it time like to take this
(35:11):
leap of faith and go overseas? And I was like, all right, well,
that's pretty cool. Like just that connection moment
for them to be able to go, Oh, God, like there's no way that he
could know that I've been thinking that because we'd never
met before. But then to be able to go, well,
I think that might be the Holy Spirit just speaking.
And that just led to a trust. And that trust then leads to a
(35:33):
conversation about you can trustin God.
He's got you. And then that leads to, yeah, a
beautiful conversation about Jesus.
Let me introduce you to this God.
I often think about evangelism as.
Let me introduce you. Yeah, you have some ideas about
what this God is like, but hey, here's some more clarity.
(35:53):
You know what, I think it's really reassuring, Dave, around
this is really reminding ourselves that God by nature is
a missionary God and that the Spirit is already out what you
said before, looking for people and restoring and drawing people
towards him. And I think if we have that
understanding, then it it does take the pressure off, doesn't
(36:14):
it? It does the the heart of God to
reach people that Jesus died forall people.
And, you know, I think back to that vision that you had with
you on the cross and you are identifying with that.
But then everybody else. So experiencing something
similar as well. I don't know if they were in the
(36:35):
dream and to be Christians or people who weren't Christian.
Who do you think they were? I don't know.
That was probably the last time we chatted.
One of the most helpful. I've never really thought about.
You were the one who pointed that out to me and I went, oh, I
need to think and pray on that alittle bit more.
And I mean, what you said, you mentioned that around evangelism
and that maybe that's just a part of God's call for your life
(36:59):
is to go and proclaim that reality to all of those people
that they too need to know that there is a cross who has
suffered and died for them so that they could be free.
Which just resonated like so deeply to say, yeah, that's why
that burns within me because that's I love that idea that the
(37:23):
church doesn't have a mission. Jesus mission has a church, and
I think that's a really important distinction because
like you said, we don't the pressure's off like it's his
mission. He is the missionary.
He is the one who's going to build his church and the gates
of hell won't prevail against it.
I don't build his church. I serve his mission, trusting
(37:48):
him to build his church, and I just have the joy and privilege
of being a vessel through which he chooses to work.
It's so great. It's a privilege, isn't it?
It really is. Yeah.
And I wondered too, just as we close Dave, the thought comes to
mind. There's the the human activity
(38:09):
that we do to participate in God's mission, but there's also
the role of prayer, isn't there?That Spirit will find those
places and not be obstructed by things that in the way.
And I think perhaps that when wetalk about evangelism, we talk
about your Kingdom come on earthas it is in heaven, your
revelation come, your understanding come, that imagery
(38:34):
of blinded eyes being lifted. I think prayer because it is a
spiritual experience, a spiritual encounter.
Prayer has such a big role to play.
Any last words of advice, Dave, as each one of us is called to
be on mission and to to really see what Holy Spirit is doing
and cooperate with it in in drawing people close to God.
(38:57):
Yeah, I think exactly like you said.
Pray, pray, pray. Love people and open your eyes
to your oikos. Sometimes I feel like we stress
out or we we feel like we have to go looking for someone to
share with. Those people are already in your
(39:18):
life. God has already put them there.
So simply just look up, look outand say, Lord, open the door and
you'll be shocked as to what comes from that posture of
openness and that desire to say,you know, it's the classic here
(39:39):
I am. It's like Isaiah encountered the
Lord's glory. What did he do?
He said, here I am, send me. We're all called to be
missionaries right where we are.And he builds his church.
So be bold, be strong and courageous and it's good news.
We have good news. Absolutely.
(40:00):
Well, thanks Dave, thank you, thanks for the good chat, the
good conversation. I love it and we wish you all
the best in beautiful Adelaide in your ministry.
May it go far and wide. May many people on those other
crosses identify with the revelation of Jesus as well.
Thanks for having me, Tanya. Thanks for listening to God
Conversations with Tanya Harris.Don't miss the next episode by
(40:21):
subscribing to the show on your favourite podcast.
And remember, the Holy Spirit was given so we could all hear
God's voice. It was never meant to be a one
way conversation.
Good conversations with Tanya Harris.
Let me ask you that question. What does God tell?
Well, you know, Thunder light is.
Mother Teresa? Someone asked her.
When did God speak to you? And she said whatever he wants.
So essentially the Bible is a collection of God conversations
if you like. I had a vision of a car
accident. And I'm sitting on the couch
(00:20):
thinking, why have I just. Seen this?
How could I? Know if God was speaking.
To me how? Could I know that that dream or
that thought was actually just me thinking about how I said the
bad thing? Jesus said we'd recognise his
voice. It was never meant to be a one
way conversation. Jesus's last words on earth were
(00:42):
to go into all the world and share the good news.
But at the same time, you and I both know that it's not our job
to convict, convert, or to save anyone.
It's the Holy Spirit alone that works in people's hearts, and we
can't ever control or coerce another person's choices.
(01:02):
So how does this work in practise?
What role does the Holy Spirit play in evangelism?
Hi and welcome to the God Conversations podcast.
My name is Tanya Harris and I'm a pastor, practical theologian,
author and founding director of God Conversations, a ministry
that equips you to recognise andrespond to God's voice.
(01:24):
Well, today on the show we're talking all things Holy Spirit
and evangelism and I have to say, these days evangelism as a
concept doesn't have such a great reputation.
Whether it's the image of the Bible thumping, money seeking TV
evangelist or the fire breathingangry preacher on the street
(01:44):
corner, no one seems to be listening.
Perhaps we've forgotten what ourjob is.
What should evangelism look likewhen we're working with the Holy
Spirit? Here on the show today, we're
talking with a friend and fellowminister, a Baptist preacher
from Adelaide in Australia, who had a spectacular God
(02:05):
conversation in his teens that changed his life.
His wisdom and his insights point us to a way of working
with the Holy Spirit that is powerful, profound and
beautiful. And the pressure is off.
I can't wait for us to get into the conversation.
But before I introduce our guest, let me just share some
(02:28):
really great feedback with you. God Conversations has been
releasing podcasts now for several years and it's just so
great to hear the feedback from around the world.
One particular show that we did a while back with Lynn Packer on
Hearing God and Mental Illness has had real traction with
people, particularly who are on the edge of ministering in
(02:50):
places where mental illness is an issue, on where people have
struggled with emotional development.
It's had really great resonance and I think it's a super
interesting podcast. So I encourage you to have a
look at the different ranges of topics.
We're covering so many differentangles about Hearing God's
voice. Hey, we also appreciate your
reviews and your comments on iTunes or on Spotify.
(03:13):
It really helps us to get our ratings up, helps to get the
podcast out there. We really need to hear the voice
of God. And don't forget, can I
encourage you subscribe to our fortnightly updates?
Yes, you can unsubscribe at any time, but they just give you a
little update of what resources are being released, the new
podcasts and articles and videosthat are coming out.
(03:36):
And we would really love to get the word out to help people hear
the voice of God and follow. So let's get into our topic for
the day. Let's meet our guest all the way
from Hills Baptist Church in Adelaide, Pastor David Shepherd.
Dave, it is so great to have youon the show today.
(03:57):
Thank you so much for coming on.Thank you for having me, it's
exciting to be here. We met at a Queensland Baptist
Pastors Conference. I think it was, what, two months
ago now, yeah. And I just remember having such
great conversations and loved the sound of what you are doing
over there in Adelaide and beyond.
(04:17):
So it's so good to have someone who's passionate about
evangelism and the Holy Spirit. So good to have you on the show.
Yeah, thank you. Now it was, it was a great time
over there and loved getting to know you as well.
And yeah, excited about where this conversation might lead us.
So Dave, how about you give us alittle bit of the Dave Shepherd
(04:40):
story? You're from Adelaide.
We won't hold you against that. Holding against that.
For those of you who are not Australians here, Adelaide is
the sleepy town in the middle ofAustralia.
Somewhere over W, yes. Tell us a little bit about
yourself, Dave. Yeah, so born and raised in
Adelaide and base, where do I begin?
(05:03):
But basically raised in a Christian home, beautiful
Christian family, Christian parents, but my God was sport,
basketball. That's where I spent a lot of
time in my younger days. I got saved at the age of 16 is
when I sort of had a, a God encounter, which we'll talk
(05:23):
about in a little bit, which really changed the trajectory of
my life and really shaped me from that point on.
So that, yeah, led me to on a, on a journey of kind of
exploring who God is, how Jesus moves in people's lives, hearing
(05:44):
his voice and just wanting to follow him all the days of my
life. And so I ended up weirdly, I
went did a medical science degree and I sort of thought God
was leading me into medicine. And then that got to the end of
my medical science degree and had lost all passion for
medicine, but had her at that stage was doing youth leading,
(06:04):
was coaching sport, was working,doing primary school sport
clinics. And so I just was doing a lot of
stuff with young people and, andjust thought, oh, maybe
teachings where God's leading me.
And yeah, so I went down that line, studied teaching at a
place called Table Adelaide, which is a Bible college over
here, and ended up getting a jobas an educator for and worked
(06:29):
there for 10 years in a Lutheranschool.
And whilst I was doing that, I was also doing some itinerant
preaching. And that itinerant preaching
kind of grew and grew and grew. And Long story short, ended up
moving over from education into planning a campus within what
(06:50):
was Allgate Baptist Church. It's now Hills Baptist Church.
And yeah, that was, gosh, eight years ago when that first
happened. And doing some great things in
the community from what I hear to Dave, I, I think that we
connected a little bit because we had both grown up in a kind
of a church environment and had heard the good news.
(07:12):
And I'm super curious now. You have a passion for sharing
the gospel, sharing the good news with people.
Some might say that you are an evangelist, that you have that
ministry office, that gifting toevangelise and equip the church
to evangelise, but really curious as the role of the Holy
(07:34):
Spirit in that process in bringing people to know God, to
know who Jesus is and what does that look like?
And for someone who's been raised in church, you've been
hearing about this stuff all your life.
I know how I felt. I I've heard before, but tell me
a little bit about that process for you.
What was where do you see the work of the Spirit in terms of
(07:56):
your own faith journey? Yeah, that's such a great
question. I so I was raised in the Uniting
Church, really beautiful, faithful, as I said, faithful
family. But then I went to a Pentecostal
school. And when I say Pentecostal, I
mean like Pentecostal. We had Monday morning devotion,
(08:20):
which we called assembly, but itwas like it was church.
And if the Spirit was moving, lessons were cancelled.
And regularly it would be, you know, you start at 8:30 in the
morning and we'd go through to recess like 11:00 sometimes it
went through 20 months. And we, yeah, regularly had
these, these moments where God was just moving really, really
(08:42):
powerfully in people's lives. And me as a Uniting Church kid
was sitting there thinking, whatthe heck is this?
Like, I remember seeing people raising their hands and sort of
going, 0 What's that? And then I'd see people fall
over. I'd hear people get up and
they'd, they'd be talking about prophecies they had and, and a
real like move of God's presence, which was confronting.
(09:06):
And that was a big part of me saying, well, is this like, what
is this? Is this Jesus?
How come I have never seen this before?
Is there more to God than what Iknow and what I have experienced
in my small Uniting Church bubble?
(09:29):
What's this all about? And so I really began exploring
that and asking those questions.And the big question I was
probably asking was, was the whythe why?
Firstly why is why is this happening?
But then secondly it was around OK if this like is Jesus the one
(09:50):
why should I follow Jesus? Why should I seek the Holy
Spirit? Like, is all of this real or is
it all just fake And then. I had asked the same question
when I hit 21. It took me a bit longer, I
think, is this real? Is it just belief system?
Does it have and what differencedoes it make in my life?
(10:12):
Like, you know, I, it was like aframe of reference or a way of
thinking, but it, it didn't seemfor me to have any impact, at
least for me. Yeah, I think, and I think it's
something that when you've grownup with it, you sort of you're
like, yeah, I believe. But then we all have to have
this, this moment, you know, we have to go through that Crucible
(10:34):
where it either is real to us and we own our faith, or it
just, it just sort of becomes a part of our foundational
upbringing. But it isn't something that
becomes the driving foundationalforce of who we are and how
we're going to live. And so that for me, I started
(10:57):
asking those questions and then just one night had a really
profound, what I call a God dream.
And I know you talk a lot about God dreams, but it was a
powerful moment where I, I'll share the dream.
I in my dream, I was walking along this grassy field and
beautiful green grass, like perfect kind of grass.
(11:19):
But I was walking up a hill and as I crested the top of the
hill, I could just hear the onlyword I can use to describe it is
wailing, like just the most horrible sort of tears and
crying and people calling out toGod.
And I came over and I could justsee multitudes and multitudes of
people. And I walked up to someone, as
(11:41):
is often the case in a dream, there's someone you know.
And so within the multitude, I walked up and I tapped this
person that I knew on the shoulder and I said, what's
going on? And she said to me, look up.
And as I looked up, I could see Jesus on a cross and all those
people there, they're all just weeping and wailing over him.
(12:04):
And so I kind of joined the multitude and fell on my knees
and started crying. And as I was there, the question
I was, I just said, why? Like because I think that had
been that thing, Like why the gospel?
Why the death on the cross? I knew the stuff, but I just
needed something to come alive within me.
So I was saying why, why, why. And then the next thing I knew
(12:28):
in my dream, I was no longer on my knees on the ground, but I
was up on my own cross, hanging there.
And as I was hanging there, I looked to the left and that
whole multitude that had been onthe grass now were just each on
their own cross, littered as faras the eye could see.
And Jesus was literally standingright in front of me, one of the
(12:50):
most incredibly profound, like tangible moments I've ever had.
And he had tears in his eyes andhe looked me and he looked at me
and he just said, This is why. And then I woke up.
And when I woke up, I had the anold song in my just running
around in my mind. And it said, I will rise from
(13:12):
waters deep into the saving armsof God.
I'll sing salvation songs because Jesus Christ has set me
free. And it was like when I woke up,
it was something was different. There was just this awareness of
freedom, like something of the the price that Jesus had paid so
(13:33):
that I could truly be free, freefrom the curse of sin and death,
free from my own stuff, free from having to perform a work to
achieve grace and favour. Like just free like and whom the
sun sets free. They're free indeed.
(13:54):
And it just changed everything. Like it just changed everything
for me. So when you ask that question,
the work of the Holy Spirit, like I just say he, he woke me
up, like physically and spiritually, metaphorically, he
woke me up and he, he just brought the gospel teaching that
(14:18):
I'd heard for many, many years and he brought it to life, which
changed me forever. Yeah, and made it real for you
so that you're identifying. It wasn't somebody else.
There wasn't others before. It was for you.
I find it a profoundly moving dream.
And you know, it reminds me whenJesus was on earth, He said, I'm
(14:40):
going to leave, but I will send you my Spirit and my Spirit will
remind you of everything that I have established.
And it's almost like in that moment, the Spirit reminded you
or made it came come alive or actualized it so that you
identified with it so that it was your faith.
It wasn't the faith of everybodyelse that was on the grassy.
(15:04):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. He took the truth of the gospel.
And I love the idea that that seed, you know, the soul went
out to sow the seed. The seed gets scattered all over
the place. And the seed had been scattered
in my heart from the time I was one year old.
But it was in that moment that that as God had been watering
(15:25):
that and helping like Aegis, theroots went down and the shoots
came up. And that's only the Holy Spirit
can do that. Only he can make faith come
alive in someone's heart. That's why faith comes by
hearing and hearing the word of God.
But no one can confess Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.
So the word can be sown. And that's what's necessary for
(15:47):
faith is the teaching and preaching of God's Word.
But only the Holy Spirit. His role is to is to make that
that word germinate and produce faith in our hearts that we
would confess that Jesus is Lord.
You know, Dave, we were talking just before about we don't feel
like we're experts in this area,but it's, it always makes me
(16:10):
curious because I, I listen to atestimony like yours and I think
isn't that interesting? Because it, there would be
revelation of the Holy Spirit. And then there was Dave saying
God, I don't understand why, whyJesus, why, why this death, why
this crucifixion? And you're asking God.
So you're posturing your heart towards God, seeking God.
(16:31):
And then the Holy Spirit comes along and makes this revelation
come alive that in a way that's quite profound, that sets you
free. And I, I, I often wonder and
observe when we talk about people, you know, coming to
these places of faith and understanding revelation.
It looks a bit different for everyone, doesn't it?
But you always get the dynamic, I think, of a human heart
(16:54):
posture towards God, asking the question, asking, you know,
praying for understanding or seeking God or you know, we were
just talking. I was reading an article again
this morning about people in Iran receiving visions of Jesus
right now. And I always ask myself, why
them, you know, is it? And I'd be so curious, is it
(17:15):
because they've been asking the question, Who are you God?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think. Sure what you'll like, and then
perhaps being open to receive that revelation such that it
wakes you up and changes you. Yeah, absolutely.
You know, I was actually teaching our church on this the
(17:36):
other day and going through the book of Acts, especially looking
at the work of the Holy Spirit. We're looking at the the purpose
of what he achieves. I think that's one of the first
things is that he's not an IT. The Holy Holy Spirit is a, is a,
(17:56):
is the third person of the Trinity, is relational and
therefore we would. Expect that I'm I'm writing
another book at the moment on the Holy Spirit and I keep on
sometimes I say that Holy Spiritand sometimes I say Holy Spirit
drop the that yeah, no. Is it a title?
Is it a person and then attempted to go it, but I can't
go it's and then I go he, but Holy Spirit's not a he so say
(18:20):
that it's something because HolySpirit is personal, right and
not just a force and anyway, I didn't mean to interrupt, but I
just. No, no, no, I'm totally,
totally, yeah. And I'm loving exploring that
more and more, but just realising that Holy Spirit is at
work in the world relationally to draw us to the the Father
(18:47):
through the Son. And so we were just teaching
this idea that like, how does the Holy Spirit work?
How did, and this idea that he'she's with us, drawing us towards
salvation. So that idea that the Holy
Spirit is at work in the world drawing all people to Christ.
(19:10):
And that's what you were talkingabout before.
You know that he'll bring to remembrance.
He's there just out like a fisherman, just, you know,
drawing people towards anyone who's got that soft hearts like
the eyes of the Lord, room to and fro about the earth, looking
to whom he can show strong favour, whose hearts are set
towards him. I love that idea that when
(19:31):
there's a heart that's postured towards God, that's actually
Holy Spirit is, is drawing that out of people.
And that's the idea that he's atwork in the world.
But then also we see Holy Spiritin us as the assurance of our
salvation. So at that moment of faith, that
moment of testifying that Jesus Christ is Lord, that too is a
work of Holy Spirit. And we have Holy Spirit within
(19:55):
us, as the Bible says, as that, yeah, assurance of salvation,
that deposit in a way. But then we also see Holy Spirit
comes upon us. It comes upon the apostles to
empower them for the work of themission, the Great Commission of
going and making disciples of all nations.
(20:17):
And I love that picture that theHoly Spirit is at work in all
three of those areas, drawing people, assuring people, but
then empowering people to say goand proclaim this good news.
And I can't help but think perhaps a part of that
proclamation and that empowerment is him leading us to
(20:39):
others who he's already drawing.I think you're right.
And, and, and it looks kind of different for everyone, doesn't
it, that there's, there's some similarities in terms of
revelation, but the process could be very dramatic for one
or very slow for another. But there's, there's this
revelation moment, these encounters, these connections
(21:00):
with God that, that, that us that can be cerebral, but tend
to go here. It's, it's a spiritual
revelation. It's supernatural.
And and then understanding that we can't make, we can't
manufacture that, I can't. So we know people when they talk
(21:23):
about evangelism, there's this idea I've got to make.
I've got to preach the gospel and make people listen.
Or you know, our role. Then what is our role if the
Holy Spirit does the work? I'll ask the expert.
Yeah. I don't know about expert Tanya,
but I think our role is to is toproclaim truth again, because to
(21:48):
because if again, faith comes byhearing and hearing the word of
God. Our role is to be the hands and
feet of Jesus. Otherwise he wouldn't say go and
make disciples. And we trust that in our
obedience. Perhaps there's a better way of
saying that as we obey the commands of Christ, we trust
(22:11):
that he will do what only he cando.
And so in lots of ways, I know personally, I find that
incredibly freeing when it comesto evangelism because all the
pressure is gone. I, I cannot, no matter how
convincing I am, no matter how charismatic I am, no matter how
(22:36):
you know, great my theology might be or my apologetics might
be, none of that can make faith come alive in someone's heart.
It's only the work of Holy Spirit taking that truth and
bringing transformation. And so I just, I, I don't know
(22:58):
about you. I just find that so incredibly
freeing. It's like, all right, all I have
to do in this moment is be obedient to this, this exact
moment in time. If God has brought a person and.
And your eyes, keep your eyes open, too.
Yeah. What is going?
What is? How can I watch and see and
(23:20):
discern what Holy Spirit is doing in this moment with this
person? Yeah.
Oh, absolutely. Great with that.
You know, that's so important. I was at a conference with a
couple of mates and this is such, your point is so spot on.
And we'd had this awesome session with this amazing
speaker. Like, you know, go and take the
hill kind of thing for Christ. So we walk out in the city of
(23:42):
Melbourne and it was just, we'reall fired up and we're walking
along and we're just walking talking about the session.
And then one of the guys, he just stops and he turns around
and well, like, what are you doing?
And he goes, oh, I'm just going to go talk to that person right
there. And we just walked straight
past. This must have been 1314 year
(24:03):
old kid who was clearly homelessand just sitting there.
And it's amazing how like you just said, like we were fired up
about evangelising but because our eyes weren't open, like we
weren't actually looking and therefore we couldn't be
obedient because we were so caught up in what we just
(24:25):
learnt. Whereas he just had eyes to see.
And I was so convicted in that moment.
He just turned around and knelt down and he was like mate, like
what's going on and just startedrelationally and just met him
where he was at met his need in that moment and then shared the
gospel with him. I don't know what came from
(24:46):
that, but I remember going ah, like eyes open is huge.
It's. Beautiful Dave.
We are talking with Pastor Dave Shepherd all the way from Hills
Baptist Church in Adelaide aboutthe role of the Holy Spirit in
evangelism. We'll be back in just a moment.
When Jesus walked the earth, He said His people could recognise
(25:08):
His voice and follow it, and that we've been given His Spirit
to speak to us wherever we go. That means hearing the voice of
the Spirit is even better than having a coffee with Jesus.
Yet so many of us do not experience His voice that way.
What does God sound like and howcan we know if it's Him
speaking? That's why my team and I have
(25:29):
developed a whole range of online resources that will help
you in your God Conversations journey.
There's blog articles, podcasts,videos and an ebook designed to
equip you to recognise God's voice.
And they're all available free at godconversations.com.
Become a part of the growing community that hears God's voice
and follows it by signing up to the blog today and receiving
(25:51):
fortnightly updates straight to your inbox.
God wants to speak to you today,clearly and personally.
It was never meant to be a one way conversation.
Hey, thanks for tuning in today.It's so great to have my friend
Dave here from Adelaide talking about evangelism.
You know, it's interesting, Dave, I've been reading a book
(26:13):
called The Patient Ferment of the Early Church.
I think I mentioned to this to you when we're having a
conversation. And I was fascinated because
back in the early days of the church, the first few 100 years,
they didn't have specific mission or evangelism
programmes. They, they didn't actually do
anything called evangelism. They were still passionate about
(26:37):
the call, but they had this deepconviction that the Holy Spirit
was already at work in the worldand that as they lived their
lives in a way that brought light and that was salty, that
actually improved the flavour ofthe world around them, that the
Spirit would work in that. So if that is true, then what is
(27:02):
the calling of an evangelist? I mean, I think you've you've
touched on that a little bit about presenting truth, but what
does that look like in your life?
Yeah, great question. I would again, it's that, well,
the question fundamentally is what is a disciple, right?
Because as you were just saying,they didn't have this word, this
(27:25):
idea of evangelism. That was just what disciples
did. Disciples shared their faith.
And the reason they shared theirfaith was because they it, it,
Christ's love compelled them it,it flowed out of them.
And there was no programme and no strategy, because why do you
(27:45):
need a strategy when we're a human being and we're all in
everyday relationships? Well, the the strategy is the
human beings. That's right, like the strategy.
Yeah, the little Christ is the word Christian means, isn't it
little? Christ.
That's right. Yeah.
And so for me, I think it's something that I've been
learning about is, I guess, trying to communicate.
(28:09):
How do I communicate that principle to people?
And this idea, the Greek word oikos, oikos meaning household.
And I think where we've got it wrong, particularly in the West,
is we have turned household intoa particular square meterage of
a block with high fences. And we call them good neighbour
(28:30):
fences, which literally means I don't want to see you like
they're tall and they're blockedout.
It's not good neighbour at all. It's like anti neighbour
fencing. So I can just live in my
isolated little world. But that is not what was the
case of, you know, ancient GrecoRoman world and and in many
(28:50):
cultures around the earth at themoment.
And Oikos, you literally live inyour community.
Your household is much more thanthe few people sleeping under
your roof. But it is the it's that
community in which God has put you.
And we all have an oikos. Every one of us have an oikos
where our workplace, our universities, schools, our, you
(29:11):
know, sporting clubs, there's there is an oikos everywhere and
recognising that, actually communicating that and say open
your eyes in your Oikos. What is God doing?
Who is who is a person of peace?You know, Jesus said to his
disciples like go and if if my peace is there, then stay with
(29:36):
them and share with them, do life with them maybe.
Whose heart is open to God? Yeah, yeah.
Absolutely to the Kingdom. But is that what you're asking
then, isn't it? Yeah, that's, that's what I'm
asking. Yeah.
Who here is someone who is like,it's very easy for me to break
(29:56):
the ice because one of the firstquestions we ask is what do you
do? Well, I'm a pastor.
And so either that leads to, oh,get away from me, or I, I knew
it. I try and leave it at the end
till the end of the conversation.
I try and get them to work, listen then before I blow up the
conversation. You know, but I think, yeah,
(30:19):
who's who's got a heart that's thinking beyond the here and
now, who's open to a conversation about the bigger
picture, the bigger things in life.
And if their heart is soft, thenbuilding a relationship first
and foremost build relationship because God's a relational God
(30:40):
and. And and, and perhaps build a
relationship, not because you'retrying to control someone's
choices, but you're just fulfilling the call of God to
love others. And if those actions of loving
you are facilitating the work ofthe Spirit, because where where
God's love is, God's Spirit is present and working in people's
(31:03):
hearts, what what about this andwhere have you seen the Spirit
working or speaking in the process of evangelism?
Do you have any examples of where you've seen that?
Yeah, well, I guess using that Oikos example, so my wife's one
(31:23):
of her best friends who was not a Christian person we just did
life with. And literally she was at our
house all of the time where and not holding back, not Bible
bashing, but just being us. And it was probably two or three
months down the road when she first presented this openness,
(31:48):
this person of peace concept. And we were talking about
healing, we were talking about things that God was doing.
And then one night her and Joe were just hanging out and she
just leant over junk. She she'd never ever talked
about God ever. She just sort of sat there in
the background listening and shejust said to Joe, she was like,
how do I have a personal relationship with Jesus?
(32:10):
And so I said, like, that's HolySpirit.
He's been like the fact that shearticulated it that way, she
distilled all these different conversations and interactions
and said, I want a personal relationship with Jesus, which
then led to a sharing of the like a very intentional,
deliberate sharing of the gospeland her giving her life to
(32:32):
Christ and getting baptised. So that's one way, like one
really simple way through the Oekos and through the
relationship, but an openness tojust being real and letting Holy
Spirit use our everyday lives toreveal truth and purpose and
hope to that person. Other ways that I've seen Holy
(32:56):
Spirit movies, like there's probably another conversation,
but around the prophetic opportunities for me that I have
as as sort of a speaker to go and preach various places and
having people who are maybe not Christian, but are seeking and
come to these events and they come to pray.
(33:16):
And the Lord will give you a, a picture or you just share boldly
and in faith. And one thing I would say is I
never say God has said, unless I'm talking about the Bible and
say, Hey, there's this this picture that God's potentially
bringing to mind. I don't know if this resonates
and just being able to share that.
And when you see something like that land on someone and you
(33:38):
just see them like breakdown as God's taken this this image or
this word and just slammed them,it's like God.
It's like Holy Spirit just coming and crashing through the
walls and banging the hearts open to him.
It's very first Corinthians, I think Paul wrote when he was
writing to the church at Corinth.
(34:00):
He says when God speaks and there's an unbeliever among you
and they all freak out and realise, Oh my gosh, that's God.
Can you give us an example of one of those, Dave?
Oh. Yeah, there's.
So I was speaking at a youth camp not long ago to just, yeah,
a bunch of high schoolers and had a particular word for
(34:24):
someone or a picture really of for someone who was standing.
They were standing by an ocean. And they were behind them was a
ploughed field. So you had, you know, cut right
down. And in front of them was an
ocean. And they were standing gazing at
the ocean. And I just shared, I said, look,
I got no idea what this means. I just think God is sharing
(34:45):
something with. And they just broke into tears
and they turned around and said,Dave, like, I've just had an
offer to go overseas and I've been in this place, right?
You know, where I've been at home for 5-10 years and I just
feel like my job there is done. And I've been asking God what
the next, the next chapter is and is it time like to take this
(35:11):
leap of faith and go overseas? And I was like, all right, well,
that's pretty cool. Like just that connection moment
for them to be able to go, Oh, God, like there's no way that he
could know that I've been thinking that because we'd never
met before. But then to be able to go, well,
I think that might be the Holy Spirit just speaking.
And that just led to a trust. And that trust then leads to a
(35:33):
conversation about you can trustin God.
He's got you. And then that leads to, yeah, a
beautiful conversation about Jesus.
Let me introduce you to this God.
I often think about evangelism as.
Let me introduce you. Yeah, you have some ideas about
what this God is like, but hey, here's some more clarity.
(35:53):
You know what, I think it's really reassuring, Dave, around
this is really reminding ourselves that God by nature is
a missionary God and that the Spirit is already out what you
said before, looking for people and restoring and drawing people
towards him. And I think if we have that
understanding, then it it does take the pressure off, doesn't
(36:14):
it? It does the the heart of God to
reach people that Jesus died forall people.
And, you know, I think back to that vision that you had with
you on the cross and you are identifying with that.
But then everybody else. So experiencing something
similar as well. I don't know if they were in the
(36:35):
dream and to be Christians or people who weren't Christian.
Who do you think they were? I don't know.
That was probably the last time we chatted.
One of the most helpful. I've never really thought about.
You were the one who pointed that out to me and I went, oh, I
need to think and pray on that alittle bit more.
And I mean, what you said, you mentioned that around evangelism
and that maybe that's just a part of God's call for your life
(36:59):
is to go and proclaim that reality to all of those people
that they too need to know that there is a cross who has
suffered and died for them so that they could be free.
Which just resonated like so deeply to say, yeah, that's why
that burns within me because that's I love that idea that the
(37:23):
church doesn't have a mission. Jesus mission has a church, and
I think that's a really important distinction because
like you said, we don't the pressure's off like it's his
mission. He is the missionary.
He is the one who's going to build his church and the gates
of hell won't prevail against it.
I don't build his church. I serve his mission, trusting
(37:48):
him to build his church, and I just have the joy and privilege
of being a vessel through which he chooses to work.
It's so great. It's a privilege, isn't it?
It really is. Yeah.
And I wondered too, just as we close Dave, the thought comes to
mind. There's the the human activity
(38:09):
that we do to participate in God's mission, but there's also
the role of prayer, isn't there?That Spirit will find those
places and not be obstructed by things that in the way.
And I think perhaps that when wetalk about evangelism, we talk
about your Kingdom come on earthas it is in heaven, your
revelation come, your understanding come, that imagery
(38:34):
of blinded eyes being lifted. I think prayer because it is a
spiritual experience, a spiritual encounter.
Prayer has such a big role to play.
Any last words of advice, Dave, as each one of us is called to
be on mission and to to really see what Holy Spirit is doing
and cooperate with it in in drawing people close to God.
(38:57):
Yeah, I think exactly like you said.
Pray, pray, pray. Love people and open your eyes
to your oikos. Sometimes I feel like we stress
out or we we feel like we have to go looking for someone to
share with. Those people are already in your
(39:18):
life. God has already put them there.
So simply just look up, look outand say, Lord, open the door and
you'll be shocked as to what comes from that posture of
openness and that desire to say,you know, it's the classic here
(39:39):
I am. It's like Isaiah encountered the
Lord's glory. What did he do?
He said, here I am, send me. We're all called to be
missionaries right where we are.And he builds his church.
So be bold, be strong and courageous and it's good news.
We have good news. Absolutely.
(40:00):
Well, thanks Dave, thank you, thanks for the good chat, the
good conversation. I love it and we wish you all
the best in beautiful Adelaide in your ministry.
May it go far and wide. May many people on those other
crosses identify with the revelation of Jesus as well.
Thanks for having me, Tanya. Thanks for listening to God
Conversations with Tanya Harris.Don't miss the next episode by
(40:21):
subscribing to the show on your favourite podcast.
And remember, the Holy Spirit was given so we could all hear
God's voice. It was never meant to be a one
way conversation.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!