BBXtra: October- Tactics

Contact us-

Ask a Question
Send Encouragement

Take a Next Step-

SOAP Bible Study Method.
Bible Reading Plan.
Free Weekly Newsletter.

Socials-

Facebook.
Instagram.
X.
YouTube.

The More We Dig. The More We Find.

Scripture quotations taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation (NLT).
Copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation.
Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Purpose
• 0:27 Monthly Extras And Engagement
• 1:28 Introducing Tactics By Greg Koukl
• 2:27 Facing Fear In Faith Conversations
• 3:28 Called To Be In The World
• 4:16 Diplomacy Not D‑Day
• 5:05 Game Plan And Book Invitation
• 6:28 Put A Stone In Their Shoe
• 8:18 Gardening Over Harvesting
• 10:07 From Combat To Conversation
• 11:20 Ask Questions And Be An Ambassador
• 12:09 Stay Calm And Confident

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:01

Hey everyone, and welcome to the Bible Breakdown Podcast. In this podcast, we will be breaking down the Bible one chapter a day. Whether you are a new believer or have been following Christ for a while, we believe that you will learn something new and fresh every single day. So thank you for joining us. Let's get into breaking down the Bible together.

SPEAKER_01: 0:23

Well, hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, Pastor Brandon. And today is one of those Bible breakdown extras. It's one of those opportunities where we kind of take a break a little bit and just talk through the things of God's Word. And one of the things I love about doing these, we do these once a month. We take that break, gives us a chance to talk about how to engage with God's word, how to engage with other people. And we've walked through all these different things. And what I want to do starting today is I want to walk through a book called Tactics. Because here's the thought process is as you start to read God's Word, and God's Word starts to change your life and you start to do this, you're going to talk to people who you agree with, other Christians, and you're going to be encouraged by them. You're going to encourage them. It's going to be wonderful. But at some point, and I'm praying this happens to you, you're going to come across somebody who doesn't know Jesus. And here's the thing: they may be one of those wonderful people who are just one step away from becoming a Christian. They may be those people who are hostile. Not only do they not believe in Jesus, they don't think you should believe in Jesus. And they're just as much an evangelist for their atheism or their secularism or their hedonism as you are for Christianity. What do you do? Well, can I tell you when I was younger, I would run away. I was not confident at all on being able to talk to people about my faith. And then to still to this day, I know a lot of people who are confident to talk about their faith, but they're terrified of conflict. So what do you do? Because God has called us to be in the world while not of the world. I love how uh Jesus said he was praying to his father and said, Father, I pray that we take them not out of the world, but that you will protect them while they are in the world. So we've been called to be givers of the light. And what I love about this is the the author, Greg Kokel, he takes this book and he really helps us to understand and take away some of the fear, some of the antagonism that we see. And so we're gonna walk through this one chapter at a time, and we're gonna call chapter one diplomacy or D-Day. So is it gonna be like a moment where we're gonna have a conversation or are we gonna get on our battle battle lines and just start swinging at each other? Can we talk about that? And once again, the idea of this whole book is to create a game plan for discussing, you know, discussing. If we were doing this live at church somewhere, I would say, say it with me, discussing your Christian convictions. Because here's here's the thing. I have noticed this in my own life, and I want to give this to you as maybe a moment of encouragement, and that is this that many, many, many, many, many people, they look online and they see these different things that happen online, and they think that every conversation with every non-Christian is a yelling match. And here's the thing it could be, but most of the time it doesn't have to be. Most of the time, it shouldn't be. It should be a wonderful conversation between friends because we're supposed to be developing, sorry about that, developing a relationship with these people and helping them see the love that we have before we try to tell them about the love that we have. And that's what Greg Kokel's book does is he helps us to realize that God is wanting these people to find salvation just like he wanted us to find salvation. There's nothing different between them and us except we found the love of God. And so he wants to take away some of the silliness, take away some of the angst, you know, and the fear, and help us to get back to the place where we are now in the position of if I can say of authority or the position of not feeling like we have to defend ourselves, but rather we're on the offense. And so we're gonna look at chapter one. And what I really want to do is is I want to encourage you to go get the book. Okay. I want to encourage you to go to Amazon, wherever, and buy the book Tactics. Greg Kokel is the name of the guy. And what my hope is is for this, is I want to give you enough reason for you to say, yes, I need to go get this book. This is very, very helpful. You can also go on YouTube and you can look up Tactics by Greg Kokel. And by the way, I can't spell his last name either, so I'm gonna spell it for you right here. That's his last name. First name is Greg or Gregory Kokel. So first and last got that backwards. But you need to get this book because he is going to help you take away some of the fear and get you excited. Here, here were six takeaways I have from the first chapter. And I want to know down in the comments below if you've read this or once you start to read it, what were your main takeaways? Here's my first one. I love this idea, and that is to put a stone in their shoe. The thought process is have you ever have you ever been walking along and you got a little rock in your shoe? It it doesn't like debilitate you. You can't not walk around anymore, right? But it's just a little annoyance, something that you you are constantly thinking about. It's constantly there, it's just in your mind. He's saying that our goal of any conversation about Jesus should not be that they get saved. That's the hope. But you, if you walk away and they don't get saved, you didn't fail if you put a stone in their shoe. Something for them to think about. That when they walk away, they're thinking about what was said. And so, once again, don't mishear me on this, and and I get this. You would love for them to get saved, but if you can just give them a thought, that's a win. Because we are gonna think of evangelism, let's skip down to my last one here, as gardening, not harvesting. I heard someone say one time that the average person has to hear a presentation of the gospel seven times before they actually hear it for the first time. And then who knows how many times they have to hear it before then they're willing to receive it. So therefore, let's say they have to hear it three times before they receive it. I don't, I don't know. That means they're going to have to hear a presentation of the gospel for 21 times. Well, if you are presenting it to them once, statistically, you have a one in 21%, 201 in 21 chances that you're going to be the one that actually leads them across the finish line. That means the odds are not stacked in your favor that today's the day. It might be. Only the Lord knows. So instead, don't think that every time you have a conversation, you have to harvest. Instead, you're gardening, planting seeds, you're watering those seeds, you're being patient. What does that look like? Maybe you start talking to someone and you start talking to them about your faith, and they go, you know, I was actually just watching a video about that the other day. Well, someone's already planted the seed. Now you get to water that seed. Or maybe they say, you know, I never really thought about faith. Well, let me tell you about it. Now you're planting seeds. Someone else is going to come along, they're going to water. And if you look at it as just gardening, just slowly planting more seeds, slowly watering more seeds, eventually God is going to harvest. And so the first takeaway I got from it was the goal is not for them to receive salvation that day, even though that's the ultimate goal. The goal is one thing that's going to stay with them. Thinking of it as a gardening and not harvesting. Here's another one. And that is shift from combat to conversation. Can I tell you, this is this is the generation we're living in right now. We live in a generation that wants to constantly watch videos of people getting just decimated, you know, verbally. Oh, he got her, you know, right there, or she got him right there. Boy, he told him off. You know, kind of wherever people love debate videos as long as their side's winning. But what you can do is you can refuse to be in combat, but in conversation. Therefore, what that means is that if somebody comes at you, well, if you're a Christian, then prove it. You know what your answer can be? No. What do you mean? Prove it. Well, I can't prove anything to you. I can tell you my story, but I don't really want to argue about it. Well, tell me your story. Well, yeah, but I don't want to argue about it. You want to have some coffee and sit down and talk about it sometime? So you're putting yourself in that driver's seat. And so you're saying, I would love to talk to you about my faith, but I'm not going to argue with you about my faith. So you stay calm and you shift from combat to conversation. You and one of the ways you do that is by asking questions. One of the things that that he is going to talk about over and over again is you always go back to asking questions because we are an ambassador for Christ. That was my third takeaway. Is that that means we're going to combine knowledge with wisdom and have good character. We're going to have a tactics mindset, which means we're going to have a game plan. Like when conversations turn up to faith. You don't have to be afraid because you got a game plan on what you're going to do. And that's what this book is going to teach us is what it looks like to have that game plan. And then finally, one more is to stay calm and confident. Stay calm and to be confident. Because we have the hope of salvation. And so we can stay confident in all things. And you know what I've found? I have found so many times that people have a lot of one-word statements. They know how to say one thing. But as soon as you call them on it, they don't really know. And so, for instance, like I've had times before where as a pastor, immediately I have a target on my back. You know what I mean? That kind of thing. And that's fine. But, and we all do as Christians, to be honest with you. And I don't mean target is in a really bad way. It just means, oh, well, you know, I can test them. Yeah, kind of thing. And I've had people come up to me and say, well, how in the world can you believe the Bible? The Bible is corrupted. It's full of scriptures that aren't really there and it's just full of corruptions. You know what? I do because I'm staying calm and confident. Instead of going, oh no, is there? Instead, I go, wow, I didn't know that. Can you show me one? Uh, because most people, they can't show you one. They just have heard somewhere that the Bible is not confident, they can't be confident in the Bible and it's corrupted. They have no idea. Say the same thing. It'll be like, well, if the Bible's real, then blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, can you show me? No, no, they can't. And so you can, so in other words, you put it back on them. The burden of proof is on you. You just made an extraordinary claim that billions of people over all of history have put their faith in the God who said he wrote this book. And you are telling me that you, you person, have discovered that it is not true. That's an extraordinary claim which requires extraordinary evidence. Can you show me? No, you can't. Okay, well then let's start over again. Let's have a conversation. And so you stay calm, you stay confident, because here's the final thing, and that is this that the Holy Spirit is also at work. I love how Greg ends his chapter by saying to never forget that the Holy Spirit is also more interested in their salvation than you and I are. Therefore, we never talk to them as though it's all on us. Instead, we talk to them realizing that the Holy Spirit is moving, the Holy Spirit is active, and the Holy Spirit wants to move in their life. We just get to be part of the process. I love this book. I love this so much because he helps us to find our footing so that we can have conversations. And I here's something I believe, and I would love to know if you agree with me down in the comments. I believe more people would share their faith if they felt confident to do so. Because here's the thing the primary person to share their faith is not your pastor. Your pastor is supposed to be equipping you, like I'm trying to do right now with tactics so that you can share your faith. The primary person to share faith with your family, with your friends, is you. So let's let's get let's get equipped so that we can. I would encourage you to get this book and then to think through these six things. So I've got like all of my stuff all over the place here, but I'm gonna look one more time at it so that we can see this together. You ready? Here we go. The goal is to put a stone in someone's shoe, to shift from combat to conversation, to realize you're an ambassador for Christ. The tactics mindset is what we want to have, to stay calm and confident and to think of it as gardening, not just harvesting. I want to hear what your takeaway is from tactics chapter one, and I look forward to seeing you for chapter two coming in the future.