Month: March 2020

Evangelism Resource: Living Waters Youtube Channel

19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Matthew 28:19-20 (NASB)

On the 15th of March 2020, the president of Ghana took the unprecedented step of ordering all religious services to be suspended for a month as a countermeasure against the spread of the COVID-19 disease. Most schools are out, social gatherings are discouraged, Ghanaians’ ‘favourite’ funerals are limited to 25 persons maximum.

These are strange and confusing times to be sure, but the larger numbers of housebound folk, smaller gatherings and scared friends posting all kinds of dire messages on WhatsApp all mean greater opportunities for witnessing and evangelism.

But what do you say, and how? How do you make sure you are sharing the true gospel and not confusing people or, worse, giving them a false sense of assurance? There are many helpful resources online and offline about how to evangelize. Here is one I highly recommend: Living Waters on Youtube and its accompanying website Living Waters.

According to their “About” page, ” Living Waters seeks to train the members of Christ’s Body in the principles of biblical evangelism and to provide them with practical tools to proclaim the gospel.”

To that end, they provide many, many examples of founder Ray Comfort talking to people of all backgrounds about the gospel of Christ, from your everyday person on the street to others with a wide variety of beliefs, including atheists, agnostics, Satanists and Hare Krishnas. Some encounters go well, others not so well. Some people are open, others are not so welcoming.

Either way, the videos along with Ray Comfort’s penetrating article “Hell’s Best Kept Secret” present a simple and effective approach to evangelistic encounters. First share the bad news and help others understand how God sees them. Then share the news that Jesus died to take away the penalty we deserve as guilty sinners, so that in Him we can fulfill God’s standards for righteousness and be acceptable in His sight.

There is no guarantee the people we speak with will accept the message in faith, but that is not our command. Ours is to share the full, true message and leave the rest up to the Holy Spirit.

BTW, in addition to videos about evangelism, the Living Waters channel also has resources discussing contemporary issues such as the coronavirus, celebrity news (!), politics and evolution. Plus they also have a many short movies on topics like Christmas and Hollywood which are far more interesting and profitable to our souls than the latest telenovelas and juju movies.

Together with Scott Gilchrist’s sermon expositions that I recommended some years ago, you should have plenty of material to keep you busy until the president’s directive is lifted approximately a month from now. May God be with us all.

You cannot “connect to God” without Jesus Christ

For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus

1 Timothy 2:5 (KJV)

I went to the funeral of a very dear aunt this past weekend. The preacher of the funeral sermon had a very engaging and interesting style and shared plenty of memorable and hilarious anecdotes. What he did not share, however, was the full gospel of Jesus Christ.

I don’t want to pick on this pastor alone, because this is a problem shared across Ghana. Perhaps across Christendom in total. So many preachers, so interesting sermons, entertaining but utterly devoid of the life-saving truth.

In this particular sermon, the preacher repeatedly called for the congregation to “connect with God” and have a “relationship with Him.” He spoke about the importance of living a meaningful life and doing good deeds, then at the end he did the usual “Repeat this prayer after me” gimmick where he led members of the congregation in praying that they wanted to “connect with God.”

A false message and a failed presentation of the gospel. His message wasn’t one that was deliberately trying to lead people astray, but nevertheless it was false by reason of omission. Unlike the apostle Paul in Acts 20:27, he failed to declare the whole counsel of God.

At the end of the whole sermon I imagine that thinking members would have been baffled, not by what he said but by the many things he didn’t say.

Why must man connect to God? As His creations, why aren’t we connected by default? The preacher failed to explain that God created man in perfection, but Adam sinned, and in him we all sinned (1 Corinthians 5:22). We live every day in open rebellion to a holy God who cannot look upon evil and must judge sin.

Left to our own devices, we are doomed to be punished as we deserve for our sins.

But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Ephesians 2:4-9 (NASB)

Why Christ? Because as God, He lived a sinless life on our behalf, fulfilling the laws of God that we could not do due to our sinful nature. Then, as the sinless lamb of God, He paid for our sin debt through the sacrifice of His life, becoming sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God through him, as 2 Corinthians 5:21.

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.

John 14:6

In other words, we cannot become righteous on our own, and we cannot be accepted by God without that righteousness. Thus God Himself prepared a substitute for us to take away that sin so that He can both punish sin as He should and redeem sinners as He desires (Romans 3:26). We cannot come to God in any other way but in the one way He has prepared for us: faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Long story short, it is not enough to talk about “connecting with God” without explaining why and how in a biblical fashion. I am saying this not to put one preacher down but to keep us all alert whenever we try to share the gospel with others. Instead of trying to amuse or simplify, we should focus on sharing the full truth and nothing but the truth of about Christ. Anything less is a great disservice to our listeners. May God help us to make the most of every opportunity.