One night I had a dream. A woman clutched a little girl, struggling to hold her child's head above the water. Nearby, a wave plunged a man into its salty depths. He choked for air as he thrashed his arms against a ceiling of water. All around, the ocean churned with drowning people, gasping for air and desperately trying to push their heads above the surface. Their screams were doused by the roar of the relentless waves. Their cries caught the wind, but only in vain. They were alone in their terror, with no help in sight.
Then a huge rock appeared, and a voice called into the darkness. People began crawling up the rock's craggy sides to safety.
But when they got to safety, something happened that drove me almost goofy. The people who emerged from the waves got busy. They got involved in building rock gardens, rock lives, rock jobs, listening to their rock music, and going to rock meetings where they talked about the people who were still drowning in the ocean. But nobody went back to the water's edge to help.
Have you ever tried to run or yell in a dream? In my dreams, I can do neither. Yet I tried to run; I tried to yell at the top of my lungs, “How could you have forgotten you were once in the sea?”
As I watched the “saved” scurry about their rock work and as I listened to their rock talk, I realized the rock was the cross of Calvary. The voice they heard was Jesus, calling by the power of the Holy Spirit, inviting them to come join him. He's never high up on the rock where it's safe; he's calling from the ocean's edge, where the dead, the diseased, and the lost are found, and as you might recall, that's where he found you.
Did you know that as few as 5 to 10 percent of the people in an average church have shared their faith in the past year? That means 90 percent of us have chosen the sin of silence. Just like in my dream, those who were drowning have gotten so busy and involved with the safety of “The Rock,” they've forgotten to reach out to those who are still drowning.
The Sin of Silence
Debate has flourished about which of the wounds inflicted on Jesus actually caused his death. Among the many wounds he received were lacerations, punctures, abrasions, and contusions. In a sense we can say that none of these killed Jesus. The wound that killed him was silence. No one spoke up for him.
When Jesus was arrested by the Roman soldiers, his loyal disciple, Peter, did not run away but followed at a safe, silent distance as Jesus was marched to the high priest's house. The soldiers took Jesus inside, and Peter joined a group of people warming themselves by a fire. Several people in the crowd recognized Peter as one of Jesus' followers. They questioned him. “Weren't you with Jesus?” But Peter denied it. “Sorry, I don't know him.”
Before morning, before the first crow of the rooster, Peter had denied Christ three times. As we read this account, we shake our heads saying, “I'm glad I never did that.”
And though most of us have never said, “I don't know him,” we've still found a way to deny him. We deny Jesus by never opening our mouths. We deny him with our silence.
We should be excited about sharing our faith. We are living in a time when biblical prophesies are being fulfilled right and left. Yet most of us remain silent.
In the meantime, one hundred thousand churches will close their doors this decade. Why? Because those church members chose the sin of silence.
Watch out for the signs of a dying Christian life. Ask yourself, Am I sharing my faith? Do I have only Christian friends? Do I hang around the dead, the diseased, and the lost? If you and the members of your church have forsaken your duty to reach back into the world, I can promise you your church will start to divide, to backbite, and to fight over nonessential Christian issues like hymnal selection and carpet colors. You will become keepers of a Christian aquarium instead of fishers of men. Your church will be on the way to spiritual death. In fact, I can prophesy to any church or to any believer without fear of being in error that if you choose not to evangelize, individually or collectively, your church will fossilize.
Perhaps we have forgotten what happens to those who have not been born again. Before I made my commitment to follow Christ, I lived what I now call the “lie of the middle.”
Somehow I believed I wasn't that bad, that I was in the “middle” and therefore deserved to go to heaven. That was a lie. The Bible states that either God is your father or Satan is your father. Either you are in a relationship with Christ, or you're not; either you are born again, or you're not. You are either God's child, or you are God's enemy; you are either storing up wrath, or you are storing up mercy; you are either heaven-bound, or you are hell-bound. No one is in the middle. No one is “almost there.” Those who have chosen to reject Christ are condemned. It is wrong to believe a loving God will not send unbelievers to hell.
Think of the cross, where Christ laid himself down and bore our sins. This act demonstrates the unbelievable love of God. But what about the justice of God? When Christ, the spotless Lamb of God, became the bearer of the sins of the world on the cross, he cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46). He said, “I am counted among those who go down to the pit…. I am set apart with the dead, … whom you remember no more” (Ps. 88:4–5).
Scripture makes it clear that God turned his back on Jesus Christ. He heaped all of his waves of wrath on his own spotless Son. Why? Because a holy God cannot look at sin, whether it is committed by you or placed on his only Son.
We must quit believing the lie that you or anyone you know who is not born again is not damned. We must refuse to believe God will allow our unbelieving friends to bypass hell and join us in heaven.
There are only two kinds of people reading this book:
My concern is not who you are now. My concern is who you will become after reading this simple approach to evangelism. Perhaps you have been a member of the first group. My hope is that by the time you have finished this book, you will have joined the second group. But, still, some of those in the second group are only willing to throw hints, instead of life preservers, to those drowning in the sea.
Many Christians tell people they love the Lord. They offer hugs and tell people they'll pray for them, yet they only share hints of gospel truth. Sometimes they put those silver fish and “Honk If You Love Jesus” bumper stickers on the back of their cars. And if they are made of braver stuff, they go to football games and hold up posters with the words “John 3:16” painted in large red letters.
These Christians don't share enough information to allow the Holy Spirit to effect a heart change. They fail to tell their friends how to go from the state of death to the state of life!
Were you ever really hungry at a sweet hostess's home? As your stomach growled louder, you were relieved to notice a lace-covered table in the corner. The table bore an elegant silver platter covered with microscopic sandwiches. You smiled and walked across the plush carpet to stand beside this exquisite table. But once there, you discovered that no matter how long you sampled the wares off the lovely platter, you simply couldn't get filled.
The same principle applies to those Christians who offer their friends only spiritual tidbits. Their friends will go away hungry, wishing to be filled with life.
These same Christians say, “Bill, I go to church, I live a good Christian life, but I never share my faith.”
But the problem is, if you aren't sharing your faith, you are not living a good Christian life. Romans 10:14 says, “How, then, can they call on the one in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard?”
We must realize if we don't explain our faith, our friends may never understand it and, therefore, never have an opportunity to be led by the Holy Spirit to believe it.
Marnie, a young mother of two, prayed God would make her sensitive to those who were lost. Later, she visited an elderly friend in the hospital.
“I wanted to share my faith with Jim, but I didn't know what to say. All I could think of was to tell him God loved him. He was receptive, and I wanted to say more, but I was at a total loss for words.
“When Jim was feeling better, he called me on the phone. As he was hanging up, he said, ‘Oh, be sure to tell God hi for me.’
“That got to me. I decided it was time to learn how to share my faith. I went through Bill's material, marked my Sharing Bible/New Testament, then went to see Jim. Although he still had questions, he was so receptive to what I shared. I had no idea it could be so easy. Now I am looking for more opportunities to witness.”
Some Christians say, “Yep, witnessing can happen through my pastor, Bill Fay, or a TV evangelist, but God can't do that through me.” If this is how you feel, then you forget that “God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise” (1 Cor. 1:27).
But if you, like Marnie, share the gospel with a friend, you can release the power to change that person, and perhaps the power to change history.
If you need proof of this truth, look in the mirror, because when you heard the gospel, your life changed. If your life has not changed, then you've never met him. It is time you did! Please turn to the review at the end of chapter 6 to find out how your life can be changed.
Chain Reaction
When we seize opportunities, they can grow into chain reactions. One afternoon I visited one of my favorite restaurants, the Black-Eyed Pea. After the lunch rush was over, I asked the waitress, “Where are you from?”
“Ohio,” she responded.
“How did you get from Ohio to Denver?”
She sounded wistful. “I came to get married.”
I looked into her sad eyes. “Didn't happen?”
She hung her head. “No.”
I leaned forward. “If you're interested, I have a solution for your pain.”
She looked up. “Can I bring a friend?”
I said, “No problem.”
And so we met in downtown Denver, at the Sixteenth Street Mall, the next day at high noon. With the lunch crowd's chatter and clinking glasses, it was probably the worst location we could have picked.
Yet despite the chaos around us, these two women, with many tears, gave their hearts and lives to Christ.
Then the friend looked at her watch.
I asked, “Did I keep you too long?”
She said, “No, Bill. I gotta go back to my office and tell everybody they can get their sins forgiven, just like I did.”
There is a problem in the church today; it is subtle, but it is there. It is people like us telling people like her, “Wait! Hold it! You don't know enough. You haven't been to the beginner's class. You don't even have a Bible, and you haven't learned to pray! You can't share your faith with someone. You're not ready!”
But what about the woman at the well? After she heard the good news, she ran into town to tell her friends. So did this lady. Twenty minutes later, I got a phone call from a woman in her office who said, “Would you come back down and meet with me?”
I did. I found out that she had, for thirteen months, been active in adultery. The last two months, she had been living away from her own husband.
The next thing I knew, she gave her life to Christ. Two days later, I heard from her husband. He called me and said, “Something's happened to my wife. She came home. She asked me to forgive her. Bill, whatever's happened to her? I want it to happen to me.”
He came, he heard, and he received. The next Sunday, he sat in the front row of the church with his wife, giving God credit for their restored marriage.
Two weeks later, I got a call from the adulterer. He called to find out how his former lover could have possibly left him.
I invited him down for a chat. He came, he heard, but to my frustration, he didn't receive. But you know what? He's not my problem. I had the privilege of choosing obedience to share the gospel of Jesus Christ. I didn't fail; I obeyed, and that was success.
Don't Trade Tidbits for Truth
Success is not forcing someone to make a commitment to follow Christ. And often when I share my faith, the person with whom I've shared may not seem to respond.
When Dr. Grant and his wife, Kathie, first shared the gospel with me, I rejected it. But I did not forget it. Their work was an important factor in my eventual decision a year and a half later.
Nonbelievers must hear the gospel an average of 7.6 times before they receive it. So if anyone walks away from you when you share the gospel with him, remember: the Word of God never returns void. Maybe the person you shared with has never heard it before. Maybe this is only the second time he has ever heard it, or maybe this is his 6.6th time. Your obedience to share may bring this person to a turning point. That is why we must walk by faith and not by sight. So if a woman walks away from a gospel presentation, that presentation may still be the seed that eventually produces fruit. She may count the encounter as the turning point to following Christ.
What kind of encounters does the Holy Spirit use most often to produce fruit? He uses a witness whose heart is motivated by love. A survey from the Institute of American Church Growth showed that 75 to 90 percent of new believers come to Christ through a friend or acquaintance who explains the good news on a one-to-one basis. Only 17 percent of all conversions come through what is called an “event”—a pastor giving his Sunday morning message, a Billy Graham crusade, or a Friendship Sunday. Yet, most churches denote the majority of their time, energy, and money to these kinds of events.
Can you imagine a businessman investing the majority of his resources in opportunities he knew would produce the least profits? Of course not. He would try to concentrate his resources on profitable opportunities. We need to follow his example when it comes to investing our time and resources into sharing our faith. As we see the importance of sharing our faith on a one-to-one basis, we must be ready to offer more than mere tidbits of truth. We can't just say to someone, “God loves you,” or “I'll pray for you,” or “I go to church.” We must be prepared to share the whole gospel. “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Pet. 3:15).
This book will encourage you to realize that when you share your faith, you can't fail. It will show you a fresh and dynamic way you can use to tenderly and fearlessly confront people with the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can feel like a success, knowing God has a special place in his heart for people who are obedient to his Word.
A forty-year-old computer programmer from Boulder, Colorado, agrees. Wayne says, “The witnessing technique Bill teaches has helped me live a lifestyle of sharing my faith naturally. When I use the questions Bill recommends, my friends not only know I care about their needs, they know I care about their deepest need: their relationship with God. They know I will listen to what they are saying. They need that. Then, because I have listened, I am granted the opportunity to use the power of Scripture to show truth in a nonthreatening way.”
Are you, like Wayne, willing to be obedient to Jesus' call to share your faith? Perhaps it is time to leave the safety of the rock fortress and venture to the ocean's edge. Perhaps it is time to use his words of truth as life preservers for those who could be rescued from the depths of sin. Jesus is already standing on the shore, and he is calling you to join him in his work. The question remains: will you go?