Today on the Evangelist Podcast, we're concluding our look at Evangelistic Speaking.
SPEAKER_00The Evangelist Podcast from Revival. Find out what's new in telling people the good news about God, the world, and you. With Andy Brinkley and Glenn Scrivener.
SPEAKER_01Welcome back to the Evangelist Podcast. We're going to be looking, Glenn, at uh the last in our series of evangelistic speaking.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. We started thinking about uh 2 Corinthians, and then we started to think about what actually evangelistic speaking was, and then a bit more of a how-to last time.
SPEAKER_01So this time we're just gonna uh there's a little bit of feedback that we're gonna cover. It won't be the last time that we speak about evangelistic speaking. This is the end. Because this is kind of the the core of the the podcast anyway. Absolutely. But before we go on, I just want to tell you about the free daily prayer bulletin that we produce. It's a small twenty-four-page booklet that tells thirty-one stories of what God is doing around the world. Did you know that teenage drinking is dropping sharply? Or that Syrian refugees are finding Christ? Or that seventeen per cent of US scientists are evangelical. Well you can hear more about it in our prayer bulletin. Get it free of charge by going to revivalmedia.org slash bulletin. I wonder what the other eighty-three per cent are.
SPEAKER_02Strongly atheistic.
SPEAKER_01That's quite a big evangelical. You know, you could imagine it being Christian, but uh seventeen percent of space is big for evangelicals.
SPEAKER_02Yes, is it 30 to 40% would identify in the general population in the in the States as evangelical?
SPEAKER_01I think probably, yeah. Write in and let us know. Okay, so Glenn, we've got a listener question off the back of last time's podcast. So last time we were talking about the Ten Commandments of Evangelistic speaking.
SPEAKER_02Yep. And a listener wrote in and said how uh Michael said, how would this process differ for when you do a normal sermon in church? He said, It seems like these steps that I spoke of could just as easily be applied to a church sermon just regularly as well as for an evangelistic talk. So yeah, what's what's special about those ten points? Uh which is a very very good question to ask, and the answer is there's n there wasn't anything specifically evangelistic about that. Which is deliberate. There was lots that was about the gospel and how you preach the gospel. And uh in a sense, I I'd love those ten points to be taken up by all preachers of the gospel, no matter who they've got in front of them. So I would what I'd really love is for Sunday sermons to be more evangelistic and more full of the evangel, more full of the good news. So that's one hope for all our speaking, that all our speaking would be full of the evangel. But the listener, Michael, raises a a very good point, because you know, at times I was a bit harsh on the use of jokes and illustrations and that kind of thing. I think I suggested that those who went searching for jokes should be stoned without mercy, or something something like that. Now that might be a bit harsh, especially if you're trying to hook people in an evangelistic setting. You're in the middle of a a pub quiz. Quite often I'm asked to speak in the middle of a pub quiz, you know, how do you grab people in the middle of a student union bar, people just sort of fighting over the baguettes trying to get a trying to get a sandwich, how do you grab them? So there definitely is more scope in those situations for using stories and jokes and illustrations and that kind of thing to hook people into into your speaking. Um because in a lot of those situations they're not there to hear you. And if you do open air evangelism, people aren't there to hear you, and so it's it's very, very important that you get a hook, that you, you know, in the open air you pick up a newspaper and you point to the headline and you and you say something. And you know, when I was at uh St. Paul's Cathedral, surrounded by the um Occupy London protest, I had copies of Romans in hand. And uh and I said, uh ladies and gentlemen, I have a uh a release, St. Paul's statement. We have St. Paul's statement for the public. This is to be declared to all the world. Here is St. Paul's statement. And then I just started reading from from Romans. Because it's St. Paul's statement. Um, so you know, you need a hook. And uh sometimes evangelists are a bit desperate. So I I used that as a as a hook once, and and yeah, absolutely, you need you need people to be listening. Uh, and so by hook or by crook, you need to lift up something as an illustration. So the the things that I spoke of in terms of don't you dare go looking for jokes and that kind of thing, that's more for your regular Sunday preaching. Because if you're looking to illustrations in order to give you warmth and colour, that's brilliant. If you're looking for illustrations because without them your talk is very dull, your talk doesn't need illustrations. Your talk needs the gospel. Because if you're preaching the gospel, then it it that should be radical, that should be engaging, that should be exciting. So illustrations can be a crutch that people lean on when they have not very much to say. That should never be our case. We should never be looking to illustrations because we've got nothing interesting to say. So that that's just a a word of warning about that.
SPEAKER_01So you would alter it a little bit for for a church setting.
SPEAKER_02When I'm preaching in like a guest service for non-Christians being invited into church, I don't preach that much differently. I still I still work my way through a passage. I uh you know, the the form of what I say is is pretty much the same. I'll talk in a second about some of the things I might do a little bit more of in a specifically evangelistic sermon. Obviously, if you're speaking in an after-dinner setting, it might be slightly different again, but again, even in an after-dinner setting, I'm still trying to, you know, have a look at a passage, and I'd love if people have the scriptures uh in front of them to speak from. If I'm in a pub, then that is quite different. If I if I'm in a student bar or something and I'm getting up, at that stage I'll I'll make a couple of jokes, and and just just because you're changing gear from a different kind of environment into now you're gonna listen to a talk.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And and something needs to make that shift. When you're in church, obviously you're all doing quite scripturally kind of things, and so there's not much of a gear shift to happen.
SPEAKER_01I did something uh quite risky when we were in uh Malawi and uh we were sort of taking it turns to preach, and it was my turn to preach in a prison. So I told them stories of America's dumbest criminals. Some of the criminals, you know, they couldn't get out of the bank because they'd opened the door the wrong way, or one guy, you know, put all the loot on the top of a police car as he was trying to escape. It was a bit risky, I knew, because I thought I didn't want to relate they were necessarily dumb. No. But um they loved it. I could see the funny side and it really went down my own, but uh you do have to be careful.
SPEAKER_02Yes, you do. I was at uh an evangelistic event at which uh my wife was giving the testimony and Roger Carswell spoke. And uh so Roger Carswell spoke to to Emma for best part of half an hour, and then there was a musical item, and then Roger Carswell began his talk, um, kind of picking up on some of the issues that Emma was talking about and talking about suffering. He began his talk. His talk was an evangelistic sermon for thirty-thirty-five minutes on the book of Job. And he opened his talk by reading Job chapter one in its entirety. And actually, actually that change of gear was really arresting. Cause here we'd we'd gone from a you know, a story with lots of colour and life to it, and we had some music, and then all of a sudden there he was, reading Job chapter one, and and it, you know, it's a it's it sounds like a fairy tale, Job chapter one, and and you've got you know stuff going on in heaven, and Satan comes up unannounced and has this sort of wager with God almost, and you're sitting there thinking, gosh, this is this is bold, but but Roger Carswell did a brilliant job of uh of actually making that difference to the scriptures actually be the arresting point. Yeah. A contrast. Yeah, which just goes to show you don't need to get some interesting whizbang illustration to arrest people. The scriptures will do that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So what specifically would you do differently if you're speaking more to non-Christians?
SPEAKER_02One thing that I I always try and bear in mind more and more in my evangelism, is is not just to point to the solid rock of Christ, but to also to point to the sinking sand of the world. And uh it was Rico Tice who sort of put me onto that, and uh he was giving feedback on a talk that I gave and said, Yep, I like what you do with the solid rock of Christ. But he sort of passed on what he had learned from other evangelists, that that pointing to the sinking sand of this world, that all the satisfaction we go for in this world just ends up crumbling beneath our fingers and then between our fingers. And and I think I try to do that a little bit more in evangelism. Because they're not certain whether Christ is solid rock. They need convincing about that, but one of the ways you can do that is undermine their confidence in whatever they're standing on currently. And s and so, you know, the meaninglessness of a of a life without God, or how do you handle your mortality, or you know, the fleeting nature of pleasure, and all those sorts of things point to point to that. So I'd I'd probably highlight the sinking sand of the world a bit more if I know that there's lots of non-Christians in front of me. Another thing to do differently if I'm speaking specifically to non-Christians, is is really be ruthless with churchy language. Obviously, you know, in a Sunday sermon you can talk about justification and propitiation and and these sorts of things, but you need to explain your language. Doesn't mean you don't use technical words, but it always means you explain them. Yeah. What I quite like to do, if if there's non-Christians in front of me, go on a journey in the talk from in the first half of the talk, start talking about wouldn't it be amazing if the God of heaven came down and and opened his arms wide to you and wanted you? Wouldn't it be amazing if? And so you're just sort of painting a picture and and you're sort of trying to create desire and aspiration for that. And then towards the end of the talk, what you're trying to do is is you talk about Jesus and he's risen from the dead, and you can say, Well, that's the assurance you can have because Jesus is risen. Do you want it? Do you want it? So you you you move, you you're you're always trying to move people from saying, Wouldn't it be amazing if this were true, to this is true, what are you gonna do about it? So that's and that's that's more what I do with non-Christians than with Christians, because hopefully the Christians in front of me always already believe that this stuff is true. Another thing to do, I think it would be easy if in an evangelistic setting it always sounded like you, you're in trouble. Us Christians, we've got it made, come over to our side, sort of thing. And very much kind of putting ourselves in the safety zone, putting them in the danger zone. And there's there's a lot of truth to that. But I think what you want to do, making a connection with your listeners, is you wanna you want to say that listen, I'm in the same mess as you, I face more my mortality too. I also grasp after false gods and go after things that end up d not satisfying and end up disappointing me in in huge ways. You know, I'm mortal, I suffer, I frustrate myself all the time, I sin, I don't know what to do with it, I don't know what to do with the past, I don't know what to do with regrets either. And actually one way of convicting other people of sin is to confess your own. And I think I I probably do that more with non-Christians than with Christians. I should probably do it more with Christians too, but but sort of say, you know, I I am my own worst enemy. Are you the same? You know? I can say such cruel, harsh-cutting things to my wife. Are you the same? So I think putting yourself in the midst of the mess that you're describing, in the midst of the fallen state that you're talking about. I think that's that's something I really strive to do, especially in in uh evangelistic settings. Uh another thing to do in specifically evangelistic settings is is sort of describe journeys to faith. So that's what was brilliant about Saturday night when I heard Roger Carswell speak. He'd been speaking to Emma for half an hour and she'd been telling her story, and so you've got sort of flesh and bones on what it looks like to go from an unbeliever to a believer, and what it looks like lived out to be a Christian. And that really helps in evangelism. I think that's why Roger Carswell's model of interview and then talk is really, really powerful. Testimony. The testimonies are so powerful because people are sitting there thinking, oh, I've once sat where Emma sat, or I once thought I or or I currently think what Emma once thought, and she went to being a Christian, and y and you start to see what the move would be like for yourself if you became a Christian. So whether that's through testimonies or or you just you know, you talk about people coming to faith, you talk about your own journey to faith, uh that's really important, I think, in evangelism, so that people see what it looks like to come to Christ. And then maybe one one last thing to think of in terms of speaking specifically to non-Christians. I believe in in sort of inviting people to pray to Christ at the end of the talk. I I believe in a prayer of commitment, not that those words are magic, and not that this is definitely the date that so-and-so became a Christian, and they should write it in their Bible and that and underline it because that's when they became a Christian, because I don't know when people became Christians, and I d I don't have a date myself. But I do believe in offering Christ and saying, Do you want to respond? Do you want to call on the name of the Lord now? I believe in that because even if people are not ready to do that, you are modelling to them what it looks like to become a Christian, and you're modelling to them that there is a line to be crossed to go from death to life, you're modelling to them that that the gospel is an event that can happen, and you're showing people that actually you can become a Christian not by jumping through six different churchy hoops or going on a long pilgrimage or anything like that, you can become a Christian simply by calling on the name of the Lord. And even if someone's not ready to do that at that event, the fact that you've shown them this is this is sort of how you start a relationship with Christ, the fact that you've shown them that models to them something of what the gospel is. So as I'm speaking to non-Christians, I I if I'm going to pray at the end, I will I will usually drop that thought in earlier on in the talk and I and I'll I'll say and later on this evening I'm going to give you an opportunity to say yes to Christ, to say yes to the invitation to Jesus. And and just sort of drop that in at the beginning, the middle, and the end, so that people are kind of ready for that. So th those are all sorts of things that I I would do specifically in evangelistic settings.
SPEAKER_01And how does it sort of at the end of a talk do you go from concluding to sort of walking out the door? Do you say to people, if you want to come and talk to me afterwards, or you know, do you offer a book or raise their hand or come to the front?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, there's lots of ways that different evangelists do things. I I just sort of took advice from from Roger Carswell and pretty much do what he does, which is to sort of pray a prayer and then have a book and say, Well, this this will really help you in your Christian life. If you prayed that prayer, come and speak to me afterwards. I'd love to give you that book and pray with you. Um so that that tends to be what what I do.
SPEAKER_01What book do you give them?
SPEAKER_02It's probably for sentimental reasons, as much as anything, but I I give them John Chapman's uh A Fresh Start, which I read when I was fourteen. It was very significant for me. But there's lots of books that you could give to people. Um a Bible or a you know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02But just something to say I want to go on with Christ. And what the book does is is it sort of says, Okay, today's a first step in an ongoing journey with Christ. So you're gonna need help. So, you know, they don't come up to the front to receive a certificate with my seal on it to say, Yes, you have become a grap, you really are. But I do know that if they've started to call on Christ, then they'll need help. So that's that's kind of the the the terms in which I frame it.
SPEAKER_01So Glenn, if if someone at the end of your talk comes up to you and says, Glenn, would you pray with me? What what do you just kind of ask them, you know, their background and Yeah, and what they make of Jesus?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Um that's sort of the the the key question. What are they responding to? Um somebody came up to me sort of in bridge end and and very much just had the sense they needed to sort their life out, but had no real understanding of who Jesus was, despite my best efforts in the in the previous half hour. But um and and so that that sort of shaped the conversation and and you will get that. You will get people who just just want to sort their life out and they're not quite sure who Jesus is and actually what the gospel is. Like I say, in in spite of your best efforts. So yeah, talking to them about who Jesus is and do they want j this Jesus? Well, this Jesus is offered to them, and and why don't we start talking to him? And you know, you have to play it by ear a little bit, but a good rule of thumb is to try and and say, Well, tell you what, why don't I start us off? And I'll say uh a couple of things and and and thank God for a couple of things. And whatever you want to say in the middle, why don't you just say one or two two words um to God, He's listening, and then I'll say I'm in at the end. And then you know, and if there's a big silence and they don't they're not sure um how to pray, that's cool. You know, don't don't try and make a big deal out of it. But you are wanting to get them to, you know, start calling on the name of the Lord because that's that's almost the sort of the definition of salvation in in Romans ten. So yeah, absolutely, it's it's a privilege to then pray with people. A again, not that the prayer is magic, but that this is the very essence of what you're inviting them into, a relationship with with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And also last time we were talking about Luke 14, where you gave a sermon, so we'll link that on the uh show notes along with some YouTube talks to students uh at a lunch bar. Yeah. And uh you've got a sermon on hell.
SPEAKER_02A sermon on hell. That was another recent evangelistic uh sermon which unusually for me is was not sort of based on a scripture but based on the topic of how can Christians believe in hell. So I guess those those three different talks of recent ones that I've given that might give you a a hint as to the the kind of things that I do in those different evangelistic settings.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So you can find those at revivalmedia.org slash tepfifty, and uh the details will repeat at the end of the programme. So what have you been up to recently, Glenn? What's what's been going on in your calendar?
SPEAKER_02My calendar, there's been uh passion for life has been the big uh mission initiative uh with hundreds of churches up and down the country. So I've been uh kept busy with things like that. So uh across to Wales to Bridge End did a did a wonderful Well it was wonderful that were eight churches in Bridge End coming together. Some very conservative independent churches, uh a couple of Pentecostal churches and and a big sort of range of churches in between that really, and and so eight different churches coming together to proclaim Christ, and we did we did more of the Roger Carswell kind of model of of testimonies and then talks. Um I prayed with an 84-year-old to receive Jesus and a couple of twelve-year-old girls. So on the Friday there were a couple of twelve-year-old girls who were too nervous to pray with me, but they said they had prayed and come to know Christ, and and a couple of other people as well who um responded to Jesus that that weekend. So um that was really encouraging. What else have I been doing? So some more Passion for Life stuff. I'm going up to Market Harbor this weekend, and uh in preparation for a long weekend of of mission, which I'm gonna do up there in May. Um I've been doing other Passion for Life things as well.
SPEAKER_01And Passion for Life is sort of like uh uh a mission uh leading up to Easter and getting the Easter part of the story, the Easter message um in front of people.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And um I mean we did Passion for Life at at um my home church of all Souls Eastbourne and uh really loved doing their evening meals and just opening up the uh back of church and and we got in a Chinese, we got in an Indian on different nights, and had a tea another day, and and just very relaxed, low-key kinds of events uh at which you know people give their story and and you and you preach. So yeah, I've been enjoying Passion for Life.
SPEAKER_01And what what have you got coming up, Glenn?
SPEAKER_02You got uh big sleeves, what's I got big sleeves coming out my sleeves is uh a big video. I've had a couple of ideas for videos. One of them will take so long it might just about be ready for Easter 2015. Um we're gonna we're gonna get some good animation going on for for that video. But another video uh coming out uh this week will be uh the bread of heaven. So it's another spoken word thing. Uh the Israelites in thirsty lands trod burning sands with desperate craving, no longer slaving for Egyptian masters. Now by grace they're free to face this fresh disaster, starving in a barren place. That's all I'll do. That's all I'll do. To whet your appetite. Um but actually my job's been taken by an eight-year-old girl. So um I'm I'm not doing I'm not doing the voiceover because an eight-year-old girl did a much better job than me. But uh look out for that one.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, have a job safe.
SPEAKER_02I know, she'll write the words next.
SPEAKER_01Good. Okay, well uh we'll uh catch up next time. Thanks to you for listening to the Evangelist Podcast. If you like listening each week, we'd really appreciate a rating and review on iTunes. It helps us to get seen by more people. We've had twelve five star reviews so far.
SPEAKER_02Wow.
SPEAKER_01And how many one star reviews?
unknownNone.
SPEAKER_02None? Okay, they're all been five stars.
SPEAKER_01They've all been five stars. Wow. And uh we've got a review here from El Queso. It says great stuff, keep it coming, fun and informative, definitely worth checking out. So thank you very much, El Queso. So if you'd like to give us a rating and review, just go to revivalmedia.org slash iTunes. That will take you directly to the page where you can leave us a rating or review. And the web address for this episode is simply revivalmedia.org slash tepfifty, and on there you'll find the sermons and also the links to give us a rating review as well that we very gratefully received. So revivalmedia.org slash tepfifty. Thanks very much, and see you next time. See you later.