202: How to Naturally Share Your Faith with Dr. Jerry Root

Have you ever considered how a simple conversation could ignite a journey of faith and transformation? In this episode, Carole talks with Dr. Jerry Root on the topic of evangelism.

Dr. Jerry Root shares his early days of faith-sharing, the unavoidable mistakes made along the way, and the profound realization that love and forgiveness are at the core of the Christian message. His personal anecdotes serve as a beacon for those hesitant to share their beliefs, affirming that our unique gifts can make evangelism an authentic and personalized endeavor. Evangelism isn't merely about proclaiming faith; it's about grappling with the tough questions that can either shake or solidify our beliefs.

But how does one intertwine the rhythm of everyday life with the calling to share the gospel? With stories of casual yet impactful conversations with strangers and integrating faith dialogue into parenting, this episode reveals the subtle art of asking questions that matter. Through these exchanges, we uncover the joy and purpose at the heart of evangelism. Join us, and be inspired to live out the great commission with grace and authenticity!

RESOURCES

Read Dr. Root's book, Sacrament of Evangelism

Get our FREE ebook: 5 Essential Parts of a Great Education.

Attend one of our upcoming seminars in 2024!

Click HERE for more information about consulting with Carole Joy Seid!

CONNECT

Help us share the message of homeschool made simple with others by leaving a rating and review. Thank you for helping us get the word out!

Carole Joy Seid: 0:23

Well, today I'm sitting in the cozy what do you call this place? The angle nook of your house, in Jerry Root's house, dr Jerry Root, professor at Wheaton College, emeritus, he's been at Wheaton about 41 years, I don't know. You think you're going to last. He's kind of a fly by night.

Jerry Root: 0:44

When I retired, the archaeology department told me they had shelf space to display me. Now I feel like I have a place of honor right there with all the other mummies and stuff like that.

Carole Joy Seid: 1:00

So Dr Jerry Root is a very well known CS Lewis scholar. He has taught all over the world on Lewis, but what we're going to talk about today is what he primarily taught at Wheaton College, which is evangelism. Jerry was a huge influence on my son's life and all of his friend's lives and my daughter in law's life, and I just wanted to share him with you all and the riches that he has really mined in this area of evangelism. So how did evangelism really kind of birth in your life, jerry? When did it start?

Jerry Root: 1:35

None of us would have become a Christian if somebody wasn't willing to break out of their comfort zone and share Jesus with us. So we've all had it as a model for us from the very beginning. And the question is, what did the gospel message do to us? I don't know about you, carol, but I am overwhelmed by the message that the God of the universe loves me unconditionally, and I think anybody who's lived a moment of honest life longs to be loved unconditionally. And I think human love is great as far as it goes. I'm convinced I've never been loved perfectly by another human being, and what convinces me of it is I'm convinced I've never loved another human being perfectly, but we long to be loved unconditionally.

Jerry Root: 2:17

Here's the message. Not only that we are messed up. I don't know a person who's lived a moment of honest life that doesn't know they fall short even to their own standards. We all believe in the high ideal of love, but we've had sharp words with the people we say we love most in the world. There are times we've had convictions that we've stated to others and then find ourselves living beneath them. We're messed up, and the message that this God who loves us also forgives us is overwhelming. And not only that if we acknowledge that we've messed up, then we've acknowledged that we have been bad custodians of our life, and he's willing to enter our life as Lord and begin the process of bringing order out of the chaos we make of things. That's at the heart of the message. Somebody shared it with us. We responded and if you're not moved by that to want other people to be brought into the circle and other people to experience this love and forgiveness and wardship in their life.

Jerry Root: 3:17

Then what happened? Where did the stutter come from? And so I, as a brand new Christian, I don't have the gift of evangelism. A lot of people think that because I've led a lot of people to Christ I must have the gift of evangelism. They use that as an excuse to not evangelize because they say I don't have that. I had a pastor one time and he said to me he said to me oh, jerry, we really like to encourage the people with the gift of evangelism to do it in our church. And I said great, I want to come speak at your church so I can tell all the people that don't have the gift of giving they don't have to give anymore. And I don't want to go to the church where only those with the gift of mercy are being merciful. That'd be a cold hearted place.

Jerry Root: 3:58

Now, if you have the gift of hospitality, you do your evangelism around the table. If you have the gift of service, take your toolbox, go help the widow down the street, fix her car and share Jesus with her. If you have the gift of whatever, you mediate your evangelistic ministry through that gift. I have the gift of encouragement. If I see a Christian, I want to encourage them to get involved in God's program. If I see a non-Christian, I can encourage them better. Let them know they're loved by God, they could be forgiven and God's willing to be Lord of their life to help them make sense and discover purpose in their life.

Jerry Root: 4:31

So I started sharing my faith right away and I made a boatload of mistakes. I'm an old football player. You have to take it by faith now, but I was, and all football players have to watch your game films the day after the game and you have to see where your mistakes are. So you're not laying on the field for the next week because you're just soaking in your self-pity. No, you learn from your mistakes. If you've made a mistake towards somebody, go back and ask their forgiveness and say to them you know what? I realized. I was overbearing, I did too much here and I want to ask your forgiveness for that because I wouldn't want anything that I did to keep you from seeing how deeply you're loved by God. And I think you could say the same thing if you see somebody who doesn't want anything to do with Jesus because some Christians treated them badly. Say tell me the story. I want to hear your story because you matter, and not only that, after you hear their story you say to them I'm a Christian. Would you let me stand as a surrogate in the place of the person who hurt you and ask your forgiveness, because I wouldn't want anything anybody ever did to keep you from seeing all the great things that Jesus did for you in his death and resurrection. Okay, so I started sharing and I started learning from my mistakes. I also started growing when I shared my faith.

Jerry Root: 5:46

There's a passage it's actually in Colossians 1 and in Philemon 6, I've translated it myself from the Greek, but Philemon 6, niv 1984, is the best English translation of that verse. It says I pray that you will be active in sharing your faith so that you'll have a full understanding of every good thing you have in Christ Jesus. The phrase full understanding is one word in the Greek, it's epigenosco. It's the most intimate word for knowledge. It's the word that's often used as a carnal knowledge between a husband and wife. It says there's a level of intimacy you can't have with God if you're not involved in God's mission to the world. The same word is used twice in Colossians 1, where it's talking about these things. So there's a level of intimacy I'm going to have with Christ if I'm sharing Christ with others.

Jerry Root: 6:35

How is that? And I could think of a thousand reasons, but let me just give you three quick ones. Number one I found people will ask you questions. I had no understanding of the answers these questions. I'm a brand new believer myself. Yeah and I. They asked me the question of God's good and all powerful. Why does evil exist in the universe? And I had never asked that question before as a Christian. That's how stupid I am. I've since written a book on it. It's a question that matters to me.

Carole Joy Seid: 7:04

Right.

Jerry Root: 7:05

But? But the thing is, if my friends ask the question, I go that's a good question. I don't know the answer, but if that's a matter to you, if that's the obstacle for your coming to faith, I won't leave a stone unturned until I find out. And I started digging. You can come up with answers to these questions. You may never get to the bottom of some of them or see the width of all the applications, but you can come up with some substantive answers that are helpful. And I started finding answers and I found that I was growing. In some cases I'd go back and I'd say you know that question you asked the other day. No question has to end the conversation. Do you remember that question you asked the other day? Will you matter to me? And I went and dug and this is what I found. Let me share with you what I found. Many cases they came to Christ. In some cases they just asked another question, yeah. And so I said, okay, I'm going to go dig and I'll come back. And some of them just kept asking questions and they use that as an excuse to coming to faith. But I'm just growing like a weed and it's good when a root grows like a weed Right. So I'm just growing and in my faith and I also learned don't be afraid of questions.

Jerry Root: 8:13

If you have no doubts about your faith, you're delusional. You think you've achieved omniscience. It's okay to have doubts. Every time I read through the Bible and I'm in my 53rd read through the whole Bible, 37th time through the New Testament. Besides that and I've read the Greek Bible twice Every time I read it I see something I never saw before. Yes, and it takes my breath away. Yes, every time I read it I see some conundrum and I don't know how to resolve that. The next time or two through it, I go oh, I see how that works. When somebody, somebody talks to me and they say oh, the Bible, it's full of contradictions and stuff like that, I say you know what? I've sailed my ship a little further out on that sea than you have and I still find there's an answer.

Jerry Root: 8:54

There's an answer to all of it. Don't be afraid of doubts and questions, and I learned that by sharing my faith, and it gave me confidence. If there's a problem, just dig. Yeah, god wants to meet you at that place and reveal more of himself to you. Cs Lewis said in the the Cermony Preach called the weight of glory. If our religion is objective, then we must never avert our eyes from those elements in it which seem puzzling or repellent. For it's precisely in the puzzling or repellent where we begin to learn what we did not yet know and need to know, and evangelism will take you there. It's interesting too. Theology grew out of evangelism as people were sharing their faith in the early church and they had questions and they had conflicts and stuff. They were trying to clarify this so they could be more effective in their evangelism. So just enter into the whole process. It's wonderful. Second way you'll grow People ask questions is for a second way you'll grow They'll scrutinize your life.

Carole Joy Seid: 9:51

Oh dear.

Jerry Root: 9:52

It's tough. Socrates said the unexamined life is not worth living. My experience is, if I'm not examining my life and working on it, everybody else will feel it's their responsibility to help me do it. And it's amazing to me, and I've learned not to be afraid. I got my life's a mess. I need Jesus. My need for Jesus is not casual, it's constant, and if I'm discovering the places where he has not yet formed me the way he wants to form me, that is not a threat. That means he wants to go deeper with me and he wants to meet me in those places. My own understanding of faith will grow, my understanding of the applications of grace will grow and my sense of the vitality of this message will increase and I'll have deeper desire to want to share it with people. Because remember my gifts encouragement, and I want to encourage people to be all they could be, and you can't be all you could be if you're, that's exactly right Okay.

Jerry Root: 10:47

Well, I had a man once and he told me I would never put a Christian bumper sticker on my car. If I did, I'd have to drive better. You share your faith and people are going to want to say is it real?

Carole Joy Seid: 10:59

Yes.

Jerry Root: 11:00

And they'll know and, matter of fact, do the things for others that demonstrate that it's real. Now, unfortunately, we've got all these people who are concerned about social justice. Every Christian should be concerned about social justice, but the concern about social justice has grown so large that the interest in evangelism has atrophied and Jesus never bifurcated. It's like asking which wing of an airplane is more important, the right one or the left one. Jesus never bifurcated.

Jerry Root: 11:26

I've been going through the Gospels and I've studied. Actually he teaches and proclaims the Gospel about 6040. It's more than the social. He's concerned about social justice, about healing all that stuff. I don't think we should back away from that. But when that starts to eat up, the other or the other begins to atrophy, we're not walking a Christian life. That's their life, modeled for us in Christ, action towards us. He wants to lead people to himself, and you. It's interesting too that at the church I attended years ago there was a man who was giving a testimony. And you know how some people say preach the Gospel, and if you must use words, and they say they're quoting Francis of Assisi. We had researchers check that out. He never said it.

Jerry Root: 12:11

He never said it all. It's never even a tribute attempt till 260 years after he died, which is longer distance than America, is long, okay so. So anyway, this guy, this guy at our church, he gave a little testimony and he said yeah, francis of Assisi, you know, preach the Gospel. If you must use words, I decided I would not talk about the Gospel. I've just lived an exemplary life and I've win people my by my exemplary life. And this guy said there was a guy at his work who was a rounder, just a bad guy, yeah, always. So he just started living exemplary life. He was kind to him and stuff like that. Pretty soon he saw this guy starting to change a bit. Pretty soon he saw this guy going to the little Bible study they had at their work. The guy from our church didn't go to the Bible study because he didn't want to use words. You know, he's just gonna live an exemplary life. Finally, this guy comes to him, the rounder guy, the guy that was a troublemaker. He comes to him and he says I want to share Jesus with you. And the other guy says I'm already a Christian. He says you are, you're the reason why I didn't want to become a Christian. And the guy said what do you mean? He said well, I saw you living this exemplary life. You never talked about Jesus. I thought you were doing it on your own steam. Oh, my Silence is not clarity. Silence leaves room for any kind of interpretation a person wants to project on it. So, anyway, the life we live is important, but it also has to be accompanied by words. And so there you go. People will examine your life.

Jerry Root: 13:47

I remember when I was a new Christian, I'd been a Christian about a year and I prayed Lord, discipline me. Lord, discipline me. The next three months were the worst months of my life. Everybody in my life felt that they needed to come and tell me how messed up I was. But some of them told me I was messed up because I was sharing the gospel and my life was so counter to the gospel message I was sharing.

Jerry Root: 14:11

I needed to hear that I didn't need to stop sharing the gospel. I needed to fix my life, and it seems to me that both these are important. The next area where we'll grow is that people will start coming to faith and we'll see God show up. I don't think it's miraculous. I don't think that we take Jesus to anybody. He's already there, he's more interested in that person than you or I will ever be, and we get to go and engage with that person and find where God's already pulling at the heartstrings and share Christ at that level. And there are protocols for that and we can talk about that later. But maybe have another question.

Carole Joy Seid: 16:45

My next question is okay, I'm sitting on an airplane with Joe and Harry and I want to share the Lord with them. I have them there sitting captive. How do I start? What do I say? They're strangers.

Jerry Root: 16:59

You have the complete freedom to ask public questions. You could be on a plane. You pray Lord, you've got me on this flight. I'm sitting in this seat. You engineered who would be sitting next to me. I believe this and and maybe you want me to sleep, Sometimes he does, and so you initiate a conversation.

Jerry Root: 17:18

There's no response. Go to sleep, read a book. That's a gift from God to you too, but it might be you're especially appointed to be in that spot. So you engage. You can ask public questions. Don't ask questions that are deeper than public questions. Initially that's intrusive.

Carole Joy Seid: 17:35

Like explain that. What are public questions?

Jerry Root: 17:37

What's your name? Everybody has a name. That's public. Okay, you know they had to show their ID card to get on the plane okay and and another public question might be Are you from?

Jerry Root: 17:49

no, you wouldn't ask that on the plane Because you don't know really. But you could say oh, you're on a plane, you're going somewhere, are you going home or you're heading out? That's a question you could ask okay, public, they're on a plane, traveling, so you're not intrusive. And then they start to answer your question and you listen to the answer.

Jerry Root: 18:08

What one time I was in Chicago and I met a guy and I said what's your name? He said Peter. I said Peter, are you from Chicago? That's public question. He's in Chicago. He said no, I grew up in Albuquerque. But when I was 12 years old my parents divorced and I moved to Albuquerque. I moved to Chicago with my mother.

Jerry Root: 18:23

He gave me all that information and he also, with that information, gave me the liberty to ask questions about that. Now he could have just said I grew up in Albuquerque and moved to Chicago when I was 12. I got a million questions. I could ask that. I say you grew up in Albuquerque and you had these elementary school friends and at the threshold of adolescence, that most purgatorial moment in human development, you moved to Chicago, away from your network of friends. How was that for you? You just think about what it is to be human and ask questions that would connect with what they've given you the information. Yeah, that's good, you know.

Jerry Root: 18:57

I remember I was in an airport in Vienna, so I was in Bratislava, slovakia, giving some lectures on CS Lewis over spring break. When I was done, the people dropped me off the Vienna airport to fly back to Chicago, got to get back to classes and I'm sitting. I checked in, checked in my luggage, went through passport control, got to the gate area. When I got to the gate area, I found out my flight had been delayed three hours.

Jerry Root: 19:23

Okay so I'm sitting in there reading a book, all of a sudden I see this young woman come in. She's got a lanyard, a clipboard and she's going up to people and asking, in German, certain questions. I figured she was doing a survey for the airport. About ten minutes later she comes to me and speaks in flawless English and I'm feeling insecure. What am I wearing that? Gave it away. But she might have noticed that the book was in English, but flawless English. And she tells me she's doing a survey for the airport. So I said to her what's your name? She said Allegra. I said Allegra, are you from Vienna? She's in Vienna. She said no, she grew up in Southern Austria. Oh well, what brought you to Vienna? Public question she said I'm a student. I said oh, where do you go to school? Then I asked her what her major was. We had a discussion about that and I asked her if she had other family in Southern Austria. She said only a father, and he's a bitter man.

Jerry Root: 20:21

Wow and I said why is he so bitter? Yeah, why is he so bitter? You can ask questions about what they tell you. Well, my mother left him to go with her lover to Canada, and she had good reason to do it he was so toxic. I go, do you? Do you have a relationship with you? Said no, I have a horrible relationship with him. Well, what about any other family member? She said I have a brother. Where's he? Also at the University of Vienna, but we, we don't see each other much. And I said wow, allegra, you, you sound so alone, so abandoned. And she said it's worse than that. I said tell me. She said I had a boyfriend who went to Florence to study art for six months and he told me to wait for him. I waited dutifully for him. He came back yesterday to tell me he found somebody better in Florence. So obviously the rules didn't apply to him, you see. So I know where this woman's at.

Jerry Root: 21:16

I have been asking questions that have taken me to the place where God's already pulling on the strings of her heart. When I share the gospel, I'm not gonna share the gospel like shooting a shotgun, hoping something lights. I'm gonna share the gospel in a manner where I can craft the presentation so that it speaks to what is on her heart. I've talked with her for 20 minutes. She hasn't asked me a single question. And I said Allegrette, you need to ask your questions, but I need to share something with you, because I've been sent here to talk with you. And she said she thought I was a plant at the airport to see if she was doing her job. And I said no, no, no. But I have been sent here and all of us have been sent.

Jerry Root: 21:55

Jesus said go. And he said we won't go alone. He's gonna send us another helper, the Holy Spirit, who will go with us, who will bring to our mind what we should say, and so on. Supernatural things happen and we're participating. You got that, john 3, 8. The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it is coming from and where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit Follow the prompts of the Holy Spirit. God's with you, and so on.

Jerry Root: 22:23

So anyway, and maybe it doesn't go well, sometimes it goes horrible, but you don't know if you're number five to share with that person or number 12 to share with that person. God, who's engineering this thing, has you in a place for purposes he has. So step in line with those purposes and don't worry about it, be gentle, don't be obnoxious, and all that other stuff. So, anyway, allegra goes through the survey. How long did it take you to check in? How long did it take you to get through the pastor? Everything you'd think she'd wanna say. Then she said what were you sent here to tell me? Oh, I said, allegra, the God of the universe knows you and he loves you, allegra, he loves you. Sometimes you have to say it three times for it to sink in. I said Allegra, unlike others, he would never abandon you. He loves you. She, carol, she burst into loud sobs.

Jerry Root: 23:20

Everybody in that gator is looking over at me like I'm torturing this poor woman. And she says to me but I've done so many bad things with my life, and how easy was it then to segue to? His love is so great and so unconditional. He knows about every bad thing you've ever done and that's why Jesus died on the cross to forgive you of those sins and he loves you. And how easy was that? But you started with public questions. Listen to the answers and finding in the answers the permission to go deeper and go there and try and connect them with the deep felt need. God's already there. We don't bring him to anybody. We go to make explicit what he might be doing implicitly as we listen to their life. Yes, that makes sense.

Carole Joy Seid: 24:07

Yeah, and just that you take an interested people, that you are a listener, that you're listening to the Holy Spirit. Years ago I heard Corey Timbo, when she was alive, talk about when she preaches. She would say to us there at Calvary Chapel She'd be like now while I am speaking. I want you to be listening horizontally and vertically. Listen to the Holy Spirit while you're listening to me.

Jerry Root: 24:29

That's very good, I'm gonna steal that. Well, that's, that's really important, and I I think I was gonna say something else about that, but it just slipped me. My wife says my mind's like lightning one flash, then total dark. Oh, I know a lot of this stuff I put out in a book called the sacrament of evangelism. So in sacramental theology it's believed that God shows up in the sacraments to mediate grace. Well, god showing up in evangelism and he's mediating grace and you're an ambassador of that grace, so you go participate with what he's doing in that person. But anyway, sacram evangelism it's. It's basically a book that comes out of a course I taught for 25 years on evangelism, but also comes out of them the stakes I've made and the things I've learned. Yes, so if I, if I made the mistakes, I could save people a lot of pain. They don't have to go through the same mistakes. That could still benefit from this.

Carole Joy Seid: 25:26

I love it yeah.

Jerry Root: 25:29

Moody moody press. Well, you know my books. Most of people that buy them are anesthesiologists. They found they're cheaper to prescribe in the drugs and they hold people in a deeper sleep longer and and it's nice and I have the gift of healing. You know, I it's. I don't make the blind see or the lame walk or anything, but I can cure them and saw them yet, and so you know my talks and my YouTube videos and all that stuff. People listen to them to go. It's like I used to pass through a church and this couple came up to me and they said you know, our baby at night Won't go to sleep unless we have one of your tapes playing. I said, oh well, let me give you some others. They go, no one is enough that that conversation actually happened, so that's good. I think it's good for us not to take ourselves too seriously. We take God seriously. We recognize that our need for him is, again, not casual but constant.

Jerry Root: 26:25

Yes but it's good for us to be able to not take ourselves too seriously.

Carole Joy Seid: 26:31

Well, I would love you to.

Jerry Root: 26:33

And one more thing about sharing Jesus is fun.

Carole Joy Seid: 26:36

Amen to that.

Jerry Root: 26:37

It's not intimidating nothing more exciting. Yeah, and perfect love. Perfect love casts out fear. Yes so if you're afraid of this, go lather up in his love for you, that out of that love and out of that rich reservoir You'll let that love spill over to you, to others. Perfect love casts out fear.

Carole Joy Seid: 26:54

Anyway, I'm sorry I love that, would you pray for our listeners and particularly, I think, the millennials, that a lot of millennials listen to this podcast and their young parents and they've been told maybe that evangelism is socially awkward or obnoxious or rude, or you know all the excuses and and the things that they've been taught and to really usher them into the joy of evangelism? Because John said I have no greater joy than to know my, my children walk in truth and we have spiritual children Coming forth into the kingdom. There is no, I used to say to my son JJ, there is no nothing more exciting than leading someone to Christ. It's better than going to Europe on vacation. There is nothing more exciting than leading someone to Christ.

Jerry Root: 27:49

Let me say a word before I pray. So if you have young parents and they're watching their children grow, they need to learn from what they observe. So nobody's life skilled and all of us operate at levels of awkwardness. So nobody's ready to get married. If you waited till you were, you'd miss out on those joys. Nobody's ready to have children. If you waited till you were, the whole human race would end this generation.

Jerry Root: 28:17

Yeah, we, we, we go through life awkwardly. A toddler learning to walk falls down and gets bruised. The the five-year-old taking the training wheels off the two-wheeler falls down and gets abrasions. You're in that one-room School experience and you went from that to middle school. That awkward period of life. You have six classes you have to navigate and a locker that never seems to work. By the time You're a senior in high school. You could do it blindfolded, but remember how awkward that was. You go to college, you get married. Remember how awkward that was. You have your first job. Remember how, if you're not awkward someplace in your life, you're just not growing. So if we avoid awkwardness in our life, we're avoiding the opportunity to grow.

Jerry Root: 28:59

When I was a football player, I I would make a mistake. It was awkward, but I didn't have to make the mistake again. I could learn from it and grow, and I don't think people need to be afraid of what God is Allowing us to do for Kingdom, joy and purposes. And so don't be afraid. Let me pray, father. I pray for every person within the sound of our voices, that they would hear your voice, just as Carol said. Corey Timboom used to say that you would be speaking vertically to them, even as they hear this podcast, and that you would reveal to them the places in their life where you specifically, specifically want to work to encourage them to be your ambassador in this world. We thank you that your word says we're ambassadors of Christ, that you've given to us the word of Reconciliation, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, and that you made him, who knew no sin, to be Sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in him. I pray that each of the people listening, if they have small children, would sense their Responsibility to nurture those children to know you and to love you. I pray that you had helped each of the people who are listening to this voice, if they have small children, that they would see that their children connect them with other families naturally, because their children have friends and the friends have parents and that they would have opportunity to extend the borders of their relationships with others and begin to see how you have strategically placed them for kingdom purposes, and I pray that it would. It would give them joy and I pray that they would be the ambassadors of joy of the gospel to those around them. We ask this in Christ's name, amen.

Jerry Root: 30:56

You know, one time I had a man say to me Two times actually, I had men come up to me. I say, jerry, you got to pray for me. I'm the only Christian at my place of work and I'm miserable. And I put my hand on their shoulder. Both times I said Lord, look at the misery of my brother. Please just take them home to heaven, get them off this earth, just take them home right now. And both times they knocked my hand off their Shoulder and said what are you praying? I said well, you could see that you're the only Christian there, so you're miserable. Or you could see I'm the only Christian there. I must be strategically placed.

Jerry Root: 31:28

Paul and Philippians, chapter 1, verse 12, while he was under house arrest with a chain to Praetorian guard said my circumstances have turned out for the greater progress of the gospel. He didn't see the limitation of his circumstances is inhibiting his being able to minister the gospel by the end of Philippians, chapter 4 he says the saints and Caesars household greet you. How was it he had his fingers on the pulse of the Roman Empire Even in these limited sets of circumstances because he was watching for what God was doing with him there.

Carole Joy Seid: 32:00

Amen, whoo, wow. Thank you, jerry,

Homeschool Made Simple

202: How to Naturally Share Your Faith with Dr. Jerry Root

Listen to this podcast on