Church Based Strategy for Church Based Strategy for Persuasive Evangelism Persuasive Evangelism

I. Reaching Out

• CONTACTCONTACT

How do you meet How do you meet

non-Christians?non-Christians?

• CONNECTCONNECT What do you have What do you have in common?in common?

• COMMUNICATECOMMUNICATE

What do you have to say? What do you have to say?

II. The Open Door he Open Door

• The Philosophical The Philosophical Marketplace.Marketplace.

• Witness through Witness through Work. Work.

• The Whole Christ to The Whole Christ to

the Whole Person. the Whole Person.

III. The Means of Grace?

• The Bible.The Bible.

• Prayer.Prayer.

• The Church.The Church.

IV. Questions:

• To what extent do To what extent do you think the you think the members of your members of your church have an church have an adequate adequate understanding of the understanding of the Gospel – how Gospel – how equipped are they to equipped are they to communicate it? communicate it?

IV. Questions:

• How do you think How do you think you could equip you could equip your church to your church to be evangelists? be evangelists?

IV. Questions:

• What are the What are the dangers you can dangers you can see in see in encouraging encouraging people to “go people to “go into all the into all the world“? world“?

IV. Questions:

• What are the What are the dangers in the dangers in the Christian ghetto Christian ghetto mentality? mentality?

Engaging PersonallyEngaging Personally

Our Aim?Our Aim?

• “Since the heart of God’s revelation of himself is the figure of Jesus Christ, and since the heart of the Christian story of salvation is the career of Jesus Christ, Christian apologetics – like everything else in the Christian religion, from worship to mission, from prayer to almsgiving – rightly focus’s on Jesus Christ. The heart of the Christian religion is personal relationship with Jesus Christ, and it is this to which apologists hope to point their neighbours. Whenever we can, therefore, we aim to focus on Jesus Christ: not on Christian metaphysics, or Christian morals, or Christian church membership – although each of these can help the case as Christ is truly known through them”.

• JOHN STACKHOUSE

Engaging with the GospelEngaging with the Gospel

• “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

• ROMANS 12:2

Evangelism Starters

BEAUTY

Evangelism Starters

COMMUNITY

Evangelism Starters

FAMILY

Evangelism Starters

EQUALITY &SOCIAL JUSTICE

Magnificent Obsession• “The name of Jesus is not only light but food: it is also oil, without

which all food of the soul is dry; it is salt, without whose seasoning whatever is set before us is insipid; finally it is honey in the mouth, melody in the ear, rejoicing in the heart, and at the same time medicine. Every discourse in which his name is not spoken is without savor” (Bernard of Calirvaux cited in Institutes 2:16:1).

• “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus” (Pascal, Pensees).

How do we know? • There are three ways to believe: reason, habit, inspiration. Christianity which alone

has reason, does not admit as its true children those who believe without inspiration. It is not that it excludes reason and habit, quite the contrary, but we must open our mind to the proofs, confirm ourselves in it through habit, while offering ourselves through humiliation to inspiration which alone can produce the real and salutary effect. Less the Cross of Christ be made of none effect” Pascal

• “It is possible to know the great truths without feeling the truth of them. That’s where the problem lies. In my case” - Robinson

• “We know the truth not only through our reason but also through our heart” “The organ for seeing God is the heart. The intellect alone is not enough”

Jesus is the Reason• - “The greatest disappointment (and resulting pain) you can feel is

when you have just experienced that which you thought would bring you the ultimate in pleasure – and it has let you down. Pleasure without boundaries produces a life without purpose. That is real pain. No death, no tragedy, no atrocity – nothing really matters. Life is sheer hollowness, with no purpose” Ravi Zacharias, The End of Reason, p.41

•What is Mans Chief End?

The Source of my Forgiveness.• “Why do we presume so much on the ability of human nature? It is

wounded, battered, troubled, lost. What we need is true confession, not false defence.” Calvin, Institutes Book 2:11:11

• “When I look at my sins (and if I think they’re sins, then they are sins), I can see the appeal of born again Christianity. I suspect that it’s not the Christianity that is so alluring; it’s the rebirth. Because who wouldn’t wish to start all over again?”

• Nick Hornby

Jesus is my Freedom• Man is born free but everywhere he is in chains – Rousseau

• The human will does not obtain grace by freedom, but obtains freedom by grace – Augustine.

• Know the truth and the truth will set you free…..I am the truth…- Jesus Christ

Jesus is my Hope• What is your only comfort in life and in death?• That I am not my own,• but belong body and soul,• in life and in death• to my faithful Saviour, Jesus Christ.• He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood,• and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.• He also watches over me in such a way• that not a hair can fall from my head• without the will of my Father in heaven;• in fact, all things must work together for my salvation.• Because I belong to him,• Christ, by his Holy Spirit,• assures me of eternal life

Jesus is my proof • Why did you not give me sufficient evidence? - Bertran Russell

• I want a personal God who loves us all in a way that goes beyond words. A God who fills us with a sort of reassuring and magical light. A God who is the very expression of love so perfect that to feel all of it at once would be to lose yourself for ever in a place of sublime happiness. Marcus Brigstock

Jesus is my Everything• “outside Christ, there is nothing worth knowing, and all who by faith

perceive what he is like have grasped the whole immensity of heavenly benefits”

Calvin

Jesus is my Identity• “I am not, in my natural state, nearly so much of a person as I would

like to believe; most of what I call ‘me’ can be very easily explained. It is when I turn to Christ, when I give myself up to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own”.

• “By understanding many things, I have accomplished nothing. Grotius

And so? Lord Jesus Christ, •there are many things I do not understand, •grant me your light; •there are many things I fear, •grant me your love; •there are many sins I have committed,•grant me your forgiveness;

Prayer• take my life, • all that I am, • all that I have, • all that I dream;• and create in me a new life, • a new spirit, • a renewed mind. • baptize me with your Holy Spirit, • create in me a clean heart,• forgive my sin.

Prayer• welcome me into your church, • your family, your bride• From now on enable me to live as your child • seeking your kingdom, • serving your people,• saving your world.• and when my time is come, • take me to be with you• in the new heavens and the new earth;• where suffering, sin and sorrow,• shall be no more. • For Jesus sake, Amen.

Media

• https://theweeflea.wordpress.com/

Suggested Reading• Why Trust the Bible by Amy Orr Ewing (IVP, 2005)

• The Book that made your World by Vishnal Mangalwadi (Thomas Nelson)

• God’s Undertaker by John Lennox (Lion, 2009)

• Is God a Moral Monster by Paul Copan (Baker 2011)

• Is God Anti-Gay by Sam Alberry (Good Book Company, 2009)

• Mere Christianity by CS Lewis

• Reason for God by Tim Keller (Hodder and Stoughton)

• Magnificent Obsession (CFP)

• The Dawkins Letters (CFP)

• rzim.org• bethinking.org• euroleadership.or

g• solas-cpc.org