{"id":685,"date":"2016-07-11T11:01:53","date_gmt":"2016-07-11T15:01:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/?p=685"},"modified":"2016-07-11T11:01:53","modified_gmt":"2016-07-11T15:01:53","slug":"start-off-on-the-right-tract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/2016\/07\/start-off-on-the-right-tract\/","title":{"rendered":"Start off on the Right Tract"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tract and Witnessing Tips<\/h3>\n
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A warning– when I try and write a blog post, I end up writing a chapter in a book. The following was never intended to be a blog post.\u00a0 I had wanted to write a short handbook for soulwinning tips to encourage Christians to share their faith.\u00a0 The following is a rough draft of a\u00a0future book perhaps.\u00a0 This means that it will be longer than my usual posts, but a bit shorter than “War and Peace”.\u00a0 I do pray though that it is a blessing.\u00a0 I can’t cut and paste yet with just the laptop we have, but once I get a desk top it will be easier to organize my posts and this can be in chapter form.\u00a0 If this is something you find helpful, my longer posts usually work well printed out.\u00a0 Good luck!<\/p>\n

Here is a blog post mostly on lessons I learned from giving out tracts.\u00a0\u00a0 In later posts I can share more witnessing tips.\u00a0 First, know that I am not writing this to show off but to be a blessing to share what God taught me.\u00a0 I chicken out or am too busy to witness far too often but it is God who put this desire in me and 500 years from now I want my life to matter.\u00a0The Bible says\u00a0for it is God which worketh in you to will and\u00a0to do of his\u00a0good pleasure.\u00a0 Before I was saved, my Friday night desires were to\u00a0find a bar\u00a0or go to a hockey game to watch it or do\u00a0something wicked.\u00a0 Now that I am saved, my desire is to go\u00a0to a Friday night NHL hockey game or rock concert and preach at it.\u00a0 \u00a0I want my family to love Jesus and serve him and enjoy God.\u00a0 Training a family to love God and reaching the lost are 2 ways you will make an eternal impact.\u00a0 Fall in love with Jesus and grow as you go.<\/p>\n

If you are a Christian that is your duty.\u00a0\u00a0 Love God and love your neighbor.\u00a0 Our neighbors are headed for hell if they are not born again, and true love means you want them not to perish in hell.\u00a0 God made both heaven and hell, as well as this entire universe.\u00a0 He has thus the power and authority to define the criteria for who enters either place.\u00a0 Ignoring this fact will not save you on judgment day.\u00a0 Telling the God of the Universe who is so holy that he cannot be in the presence of sin about our good works is trying to bribe the God of the Universe.\u00a0 The only hope we have is to have our sins paid for which God did at Calvary 2000 years ago.\u00a0 Jesus is God, but is he your God?\u00a0 If he is you will be saved from the wrath to come.\u00a0 If you are not saved, I urge you not to put it off.\u00a0 God will begin to draw you and as he woos you he will shed light on your sin.\u00a0 You need to repent of a sinfull lifestyle and trust Jesus Christ.\u00a0 He will save you if you come to God HIS WAY.\u00a0 His way is the narrow way that few find.\u00a0 His way though is a wonderful way, and it leads to life, it leads to deliverance from sin which really only brings diseases, misery, and hangovers anyway.\u00a0 Is there any sin worth going to Hell over?\u00a0 When you get saved, Jesus moves in and changes your direction, desires, and destiny.\u00a0 You only have to repent, and change your mind about yourself, your sin, and the Savior, and God will change your life from the inside out. Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature promises the Bible.<\/p>\n

The Prince of Preachers Charles Spurgeon said “if you don’t care if others be saved, you are not saved yourself, be sure of that.” Atlanta Evangelist Mark Cahill says it is not a gift but a command.\u00a0 Two people die every second, Christian do you care?\u00a0 Do you care enough to do something about it?\u00a0 Because it is a command, and not a gift, the only way to get good at it is to practice.<\/p>\n

I likely can share what not to do and save you some time.\u00a0 The hardest thing I would say is getting started.\u00a0 We usually are either intimidated, too busy to bother, feel it is a lost cause, or are not prepared with always having tracts on us.\u00a0\u00a0However, everytime\u00a0I open my mouth and God opens that door it is easy once the ball is rolling.\u00a0 However in our minds that ball often feel like a 10 ton boulder.\u00a0\u00a0 Witnessing makes our Christianity come alive.\u00a0 The devil makes you think you don’t know enough.\u00a0 The problem is just sitting and soaking in church will never be enough because if you “don’t use it, you lose it.”\u00a0 You need to exercise your faith.\u00a0 There is no greater work out than getting OUT and getting the GOSPEL OUT.\u00a0 Just going to church will cause you to be what evangelist Bill Fay\u00a0called “spiritually constipated”!<\/p>\n

It is like the bed room my two 4-and-5 year old boys share.\u00a0 We try and teach them to pick up but once every toy is everywhere except where it belongs, and you can’t see the floor, it is a lost cause.\u00a0 Not only the floor but the bunk bed is now in the middle of the room and toys baracade it there.\u00a0 The shelves are bare, the bed is stripped, and they now have to trash the rest of the house because there is no room to play in the room.\u00a0 While my wife is sick, I am in charge of running the\u00a0house.\u00a0 Instead I blog.\u00a0 Actually\u00a0with my 4 boys I work from Son up to Son\u00a0down, but at the end of the day I am not that much ahead of the game.<\/p>\n

Their room is where I don’t know where to begin.\u00a0 It will sit like that for weeks, then my sister in law will\u00a0come over\u00a0and sit herself down on the floor and just start putting things\u00a0back where they\u00a0go.\u00a0\u00a0An hour later it will be spotless.\u00a0 Until\u00a02\u00a0days later when you\u00a0can’t see\u00a0the floor.<\/p>\n

That is like that in\u00a0witnessing.\u00a0 The hardest part is getting started.\u00a0 Here are some tips to get that ball rolling.<\/p>\n

First, here are some baby steps for beginners.\u00a0 You can start by concistantly leaving tracts where you go.\u00a0 I leave tracts in every bathroom stall at stores or whereever.\u00a0 I leave them usually above the toliet paper holder flat against the wall so they are wedged in there.\u00a0 I also always put one in the diaper changing station in the tract box they all have on the inside.\u00a0 Once when I was traveling during a dry spell in my walk with God, I found someone left\u00a0their testimony\u00a0tract at a stall at a rest stop.\u00a0 It was a great encouragement to me.\u00a0 I leave them at gas pumps wedged in behind the pump.\u00a0 I put them in bills. I leave one in the shopping cart on the way out and sometimes in some carts on the way in. I have stuffed them in cases of beer and soda.\u00a0 I have put them in pockets in clothing at stores.\u00a0 I put them in between the food trays at fast food restaurants.\u00a0 I put them in newspapers.\u00a0 When I get a credit card application and a self addressed envelope I kindly put a tract inside and return the envelope minus the application.\u00a0 There are a lot of fun ways you can just leave tracts. Once my friend Will entered a catholic church and put them in the church bulletins.\u00a0 My preacher would unroll toilet paper and hide a tract in there.\u00a0 I did that with the big napkin dispenser at Burger King.\u00a0 I try and pray for whoever finds it.<\/p>\n

Once your feet are wet, it is good to find some ice breakers<\/span><\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0\u00a0 They are like favorite lures regular fishermen just grab by instinct.\u00a0\u00a0 Whatever you pick, do them enough until you know which lure for what situation and things will be pretty natural.\u00a0 I find ice breakers are the easiest thing to get a conversation going.\u00a0\u00a0 There are several kinds.\u00a0 The first is simply handing people tracts and wait for someone to ask about it or stop and pause to read it.\u00a0 Another is to use a question that gets people to open up.\u00a0 Another is to use something to make them laugh and then switch gears to the spiritual realm.<\/p>\n

Another is to use a gimmick.\u00a0 I had a lot of fun with the trick Bible I ordered a while back but ended up giving it away to a boy when we were witnessing at Delaware Park.\u00a0 It was the size of an 8 x 10 notebook and if you flipped through it one way it was blank pages, another black and white pictures, and another full color pictures.\u00a0 This represented atheism, religion, and Christianity in order.\u00a0 I also had the red scarf you could make vanish in your thumb to show you can’t trust everything you see.\u00a0 I was amazed to see my witnessing tool being used in the movie “Night at the Museum” but I don’t think it was for the same reasons.\u00a0 I had fun regardless, and\u00a0tricks bring\u00a0instant attention and could draw a crowd.\u00a0 I have seen evangelists give out money to answer silly questions.\u00a0 They will ask silly questions and give dollars to those who give the right answer.\u00a0 Then they offer $50 to whoever can prove they are a good person.\u00a0\u00a0 Good invitation to take someone through the law and prove there is none righteous, no not one.<\/p>\n

Mark Cahill said you are not sharing a presentation, but a conversation.\u00a0 Today we think if we don’t give them a 5 minute plan and they get saved in 2 more minutes we are failures as as evangelists.\u00a0 We are called to preach the gospel, not lead them in a prayer.\u00a0 The\u00a0Sinner’s prayer does not save, but\u00a0people like it because it\u00a0gives them numbers so they\u00a0look spiritual or worse\u00a0so they get offerings for their amazing conversion percentage.\u00a0 \u00a0We are called to confront people with the truth, make them think and plant a seed.\u00a0 If you take credit for your converts, that is all they are.\u00a0 Yours.\u00a0 Not God’s.<\/p>\n

Ice breakers are often catch phrases you use at various places and they open the door for you talking to them.\u00a0 Sometimes it leads no where but usually you will get them to open up.\u00a0 Picture everyone having this concrete wall up over their heart.\u00a0 You can not get through\u00a0it.\u00a0 You preach to them and it bounces off.\u00a0 You\u00a0need to get that wall down.<\/p>\n

If I walk into a gas station or at a toll booth, I\u00a0will at times ask\u00a0“Are you good at directions?” Then\u00a0if they say\u00a0Yes, I will ask “Do you know how to get to heaven?”\u00a0 That is not an original one, but it leads to an original conversation.\u00a0 They smile and it gets them to let down their guard.\u00a0 The ground is now plowed to plant a good seed.\u00a0 Have some good verses memorized as well, as the Word of God is what needs to take root and is the only thing powerful enough to change our stubborn human thinking.<\/p>\n

I don’t really bring up heaven after that, I get right into the law as soon as I can, but that original question 1) Humbles them a bit because they don’t know.\u00a0 2) peaks their curiosity 3) is something many are interested in 4) gets them to drop their guard.\u00a0\u00a0 If I find a group of teenagers I might ask some trivia questions.\u00a0\u00a0 These are the kinds of questions you can give out dollar bills for correct answers if trying to gather a crowd on the street.\u00a0 What is the number one thing people hit and get killed by in cars?\u00a0 Answer: Trees.\u00a0 What is the number one food item people choke on in restaurants? Answer: Hard boiled eggs.\u00a0 How many of each animal did Moses bring on the ark? Answer: it was Noah.\u00a0 What is the name of the raised print deaf people use? Answer: deaf people don’t need braille.\u00a0 Imagine you are driving down a mountain and your brakes fail.\u00a0 Your door won’t open, your seatbelt is stuck.\u00a0 What do you do?\u00a0 Answer: Stop imagining.\u00a0 Final question, what was the number one killer in America in 2012?\u00a0 Answer: Death.\u00a0 And it will kill you too.\u00a0 Do you know why people die?\u00a0 Answer:\u00a0 The Bible says because of sin, the soul that sinneth it shall die. Let’s see if you will die too some day. Ever told a lie?<\/p>\n

It is a little formulaic, but you never get the same conversation twice, and you never get the same response.\u00a0 You are asking questions, not going through a 5 point sales pitch and have them repeat a flimsy sinner’s prayer.\u00a0 I like the law approach. I had first seen it with Way of the Master and Evangelist Ray Comfort.\u00a0 A word of caution though is it still offers a short cut to salvation. Men in the 1800’s were exposed to week long revival meetings where men prayed for weeks beforehand and men prayed for the week during the service.\u00a0 There was no invitation often until the last week. I am still studying out these differences, but there seemed to be back then longer exposure to the convicting hand of God.\u00a0 It seems most of humanity needs to be under a lot heavier conviction than you see today to repent of their ways and turn to Christ. Relgion is men’s attempt to save themselves, and man continually reinvents Biblical Christianity to allow them to still live unregerate and do as they want but still “go to Heaven”.\u00a0 I say use the law by all means.\u00a0 The Bible says the Law of the LORD is perfect converting the Soul.\u00a0 But I think there needs to be radical convincing of the disease, which the Law does, plus REDEFINING their false religious Christ’s they tend to hold on to and look to, plus ROOTING out their false humanistic theories like evolution and their indoctrination that the Bible is just a good book written by man.\u00a0 If someone has been brought up in the American school system, the Bible and the real Jesus Christ is just as foreign to them as the deepest native of Papau New Guinia.\u00a0 All I am saying is take your time.\u00a0 We haven’t sown much in the last 100 years in our evangelism, but we are decision making factories and we think we are doing wonderful because of so many decisions.\u00a0 The true test of our evangelism is whether our decision affect the moral climate of our community and our country. That is not happening and our country is getting worse while the church is falling into deeper slumber.\u00a0 The church needs to wake up if the country is to ever turn around.\u00a0 True Biblical evangelism will wake the sleeping and sluggish saints up first.\u00a0 If people are sleeping in church, Charles Spurgeon said, wake up the preacher.\u00a0 Leaders, we set the standard.\u00a0 We need to look around, turn a deaf ear to our multitudes of decisions, and go back to what brought true revival and dedication.\u00a0 Not just decisions.<\/p>\n

Ask folks what they believe and why they believe it.\u00a0 Ask if they have a church backgroud or ever read the bible or ever thought they were about to die.\u00a0 I often tell people there are no coicidences and there is a reason we are talking.\u00a0 Often there was a lot of events leading up to our meeting.\u00a0 I have had multiple people tell me they received a tract earlier that day or one that week or a coworker had just been telling him about church or something else that proves it was not a coincidence we met.\u00a0 Yesterday I went to give a guy a tract at the supermarket on the way inside.\u00a0 He said, “remember me?”\u00a0 I often get that, but I usually don’t remember me.\u00a0 It is a great encouragement they do though.\u00a0 I had given him the same tract at the Noco gas station a few days ago.\u00a0 They remember and you can pick up where you left off.\u00a0 Ask if they read the tract, if they had any questions, if it made sense.\u00a0 Then try and get another seed in.\u00a0 I will try to get them to church or to my website or get them something with more meat than one tract.\u00a0 On the street I usually will have a $5 dollar general King James Bible with me to preach with and then I usually give it away to someone I witnessed to that didn’t have a bible.\u00a0 Put some follow up information in it.\u00a0 One afternoon when I was street preaching and passing out tracts near a bus station in Buffalo, NY, a man went up to me and thanks me sincerely.\u00a0 He said he now knew what bus to take.\u00a0 The original bus he was going to take was to go somewhere to commit suicide. It only makes me regret even more the ones I chickened out over.\u00a0 What was their story?\u00a0 Or the times I was too busy to bother.\u00a0 Or when I forgot tracts.<\/p>\n

In a grocery store, I will go up to a guy sometimes\u00a0my age or younger and ask if they are good at finding things.\u00a0 Then I will ask if they can find God.\u00a0 This usually opens up a conversation and I try to be brief so they don’t get in trouble.\u00a0 If I go thru a drive-thru I ask them if they ever heard of a Burger King Christian.\u00a0 I explain that is having it your way and not God’s way.\u00a0 It is fun to challenge the McDonald’s cashier or Arby’s worker to make sure they especially are not Burger King Christians.\u00a0 I will also use things like pizzas or submarines to challenge people.\u00a0 I often have went up to workers at a pizzaria or sub shop and say, “Do you know you can use a piece of pizza (or a sub) to prove God?”\u00a0 Then I will show them my pizza and ask them to prove someone made it.\u00a0 I will say Pizzas prove a Pizza Maker.\u00a0 Your school teaches you that this pizza made it self out of nothing but that defies common sense.\u00a0 The big question now is who made it?\u00a0 If you look at the evidence and follow the trail, you will see Papa John’s made this pizza.\u00a0 Now if the pizza came out burned and had anchiovies instead of pepperoni, you wouldn’t bring it to Pizza Hut to fix it.\u00a0 You would find the original pizza maker.<\/p>\n

That is a lot like God.\u00a0 Creation proves a Creator.\u00a0 I will quote Romans 1:20.\u00a0 The Bible teaches and evidence backs it up that Jesus made us in his image.\u00a0 We have burned hearts (where I can throw the law in) and we need to be rebaked.\u00a0 Going to Budda or Mary or a Priest or Allah instead of Jesus is not going to fix it.\u00a0 Kids today are told from the media, the education system, and the government that evolution has all the facts and they are the smart ones.\u00a0 You won’t convince a skeptic with evidence, but when I became a Christian I did not have to leave my brain at the door.\u00a0 You will have to do that to be a Mormon for example, as there is not one shred of archeological evidence for Joseph Smith’s claims about American history or giants on the moon.\u00a0 You will have to do that with evolution where you simply believe because someone with a degree told you so.\u00a0 When you become a Christian you merely go with the weight of the evidence and make a small leap of faith in the direction of the evidence.\u00a0 A thief won’t seek a police man, and if we are speeding we aren’t going to be looking for one either.\u00a0 Most of the time our love of sin clouds common sense.\u00a0 But when you know what you are talking about, are prayed up, and pray to care about sinner’s like God cares about sinners your words will open some eyes.\u00a0 Because they will be God’s words coming through.<\/p>\n

Get in the habit of using some ice breakers and see conversations open up.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It is like the Red Sea.\u00a0 There is nothing going on until you take that first step into the water.\u00a0 Then the waters part.\u00a0 Ice breakers get the ball rolling because you are acting on faith but it takes the hardest part away.\u00a0 The first step into the Red Sea is the hardest step.\u00a0 Then the waters part and you see God’s hand once you are obedient to do your part.<\/p>\n

I tend to now mostly witness on the go, meaning when I am shopping or running errands until my wife gets a bit healthier.\u00a0 You can find ways to witness even when you aren’t out “witnessing”.\u00a0 Witness to the telemarketer. You can go thru any drive thru and pay for the car behind you. Make sure and tell cashier why or they will think you just thought the person behind you was cute. You can ask how much the car behind you is first. Better if you pay with cash as you can honestly say all you had on you was $10 if their order turns out to be $56. Usually coffee places are cheap and work well. But if you pray first, you usually are not in front of the family of 12 all getting supersized Double whopper value meals.<\/p>\n

However, I strongly recommend\u00a0to fit in your to do list for the week to get out and witness. \u00a0An even better\u00a0time than just waiting for divine appointments is when you schedule a block of time just to go soulwinning. \u00a0Just Go fishing at your favorite fishing spot and make time to fish.<\/p>\n

It is funny when we start to go, how unexpected “have to’s” creep up and you have to cancel.\u00a0 Keep going.\u00a0 If you can’t go this week, go next week.\u00a0 If you are out for a season, jump back in as soon as you are freed up.\u00a0 Have the determination of unsaved men who hunt and it is opening day of deer season.\u00a0 Nothing will stop them from going.\u00a0 If there is a funeral, they will go in there camo and fly there after it is over.\u00a0 Men will spend hours sitting in a boat to catch one fish and throw him back in the water.\u00a0 It is the nature sport version of the exercies bike.\u00a0 A lot of energy to go accomplish nothing.\u00a0\u00a0 So to go fishing for men when there are potential eternal consequences for going should make this the greatest sport possible.\u00a0 If someone can spend their entire life training to earn an Olympic medal the size of a donut hole, we should be able to get out to do a true activity that will count 500 years from now.\u00a0 Who\u00a0won the Superbowl 10 years ago?\u00a0 Who knows? Who cares?\u00a0 Yet how much time to we devote to that?\u00a0 Think the devil is trying to distract us and steal our time?\u00a0 \u00a0Or are we just lazy?\u00a0 Go fish!<\/p>\n

The second\u00a0greatest reason for this is mostly a guy thing.\u00a0 Us guys do not multi task really well.\u00a0 Women can do eight things at once and pay attention to each task and\u00a0 each kid where I can’t switch gears quickly.\u00a0 I can be out to dinner with my family and it is a challenge to switch from making sure I have all the kids one second and then how to get a witness in to the waitress.\u00a0 I can’t stop writing when I am all alone– a 2 sentence blog becomes a 2 part book.\u00a0 When my wife is in the same room talking on the phone a 2 part book becomes 2 sentences.\u00a0 I could give out a tract and forget I had 3 kids with me.\u00a0 Hence, actual scheduled soulwinning is a great idea.\u00a0 Especially when in our busy day to day, what sometimes keeps me from giving out the gospel is not fear of rejection — it is fear they will entangle me in a conversation for 30 minutes and my wife will wonder where I went.\u00a0 Right now, having a family and children and demands and every minute accounted for. I think being too busy is the biggest threat to my soulwinning efforts, and perhaps others as well.\u00a0 Don’t quit, just make sure you keep polishing up on your fishing so you don’t just boast about the good old days.\u00a0 I find when you start basking in your past accomplisments, you are like the 2nd string quarterback who wasn’t quite ready to retire.\u00a0 You sit on the bench and feel useless but it has been so long since you called a play deep down you hope you won’t have to risk making a fool of yourself.\u00a0 You used to before thrive on facing the oppostion.\u00a0 Now you are finding the bench is conforming to your behind and getting rather comfortable.<\/p>\n

How often you can get out will depend on your circumstances and how far sinners are from your home.\u00a0 You will do better in the city than the suburbs in all situations.\u00a0 If I knock door to door in an upscale neighborhood they are about to call the police because it looks bad for the community. If I am downtown I get invited inside.\u00a0 Granted, the challenge in the city today is you tend to see that welfare mentality and that the government owes me something.\u00a0 This translates to their view of God and they think they are entitled to heaven and God owes them too.\u00a0 God does not owe us nothing.\u00a0 Again, the law will help humble the proud and reveals to them that they offended God by their actions.\u00a0 It should shut the mouth of the proud.<\/p>\n

I like the city better because there are more poor people and more black and spanish people!\u00a0 Yes, I said that.\u00a0 Us\u00a0 upper class white crackers\u00a0who are usually are often a waste of time, sad to say.\u00a0 You will hear “I’m good” or “I’m all set” a large percentage of the time. We are too self righteouss\u00a0to need God and too full to want God.\u00a0 \u00a0That being said, the LAW will bring out the sin in the richest of folks.\u00a0 Ask them if they love money more than God.\u00a0 That is idolatry and no idolator can enter heaven.\u00a0 Ask if they hated anyone. That is murder by God’s standards.\u00a0 Ask if they commited adultery or lusted.\u00a0 The Law is for sinners according to Timothy.\u00a0\u00a0 Rich and poor alike.\u00a0 However, when it comes to giving tracts and getting started, that is not your easiest fish to land.<\/p>\n

They would call this racial profiling, but I find a black man my age or younger regardless of how rough he looks is almost always respectful, will listen to me present the law, will often be convicted and honest about their sin, and will have some respect for God and some church background.\u00a0 I find most black guys trust either their church membership or their baptism to get them to heaven, especially if they attend\u00a0 a black baptist church.\u00a0\u00a0 Spanish are very open to receive tracts, but you need to have spanish tracts on you.\u00a0 I will give them a tract and ask if they read english or spanish, then I will say “Muy importante. Jesus Christo y la camino, la verdad y la verde.”\u00a0 Jesus is the way the truth and the life.\u00a0 That is true no matter the language.<\/p>\n

Also, if you go to Chick.com you can order chinese tracts when you go\u00a0to order some General Tso’s and pork fried\u00a0rice.\u00a0 They appreciate your thoughfulness.\u00a0If you are fishing you would go where the fish are biting.\u00a0 And use the right lures.\u00a0 You wouldn’t use a worm to land a whale shark.\u00a0 The general rule is the older the less interested, and the richer the less interested.\u00a0 I would also say the “whiter” the less interested.\u00a0 Look at Europe for example, they are stuck up white European snobs and they rarely want anything to do with God.\u00a0 I will witness to\u00a0a black guy over someone white like me anyday.\u00a0 You also want to be careful in public places to avoid the “red flags”.\u00a0 Not to be mean, but I usually don’t give tracts to the Muslims dressed all in black like SandTroopers from Star Wars or two guys holding hands or grumpy middle class white folks.\u00a0 These are more likely to turn you in.\u00a0 My sons are bolder than I am.\u00a0 I\u00a0gave my 3 year old a couple tracts to hand out to customers at Wal Mart.\u00a0 He immediately went\u00a0up to a Muslim couple dressed in their black attire with the eye slits.\u00a0 He was braver than I was!<\/p>\n

Kids are a great asset to have when you soulwin.\u00a0 This is when it is easier to give a Why is Mary\u00a0Crying to a 65 year old grandma.\u00a0 45\u00a0I also have no complaints giving black children tracts with their parents right there, but the whites will sometimes have a fit you dare to push your religion on their kids.<\/p>\n

On a side note, you will often get asked about slavery whenever you get on a college campus and start witnessing.\u00a0 Note it is usually white folks who ask.\u00a0 I have never had a black person bring up slavery.\u00a0 Most of the time it is a defection tactic.\u00a0 They don’t want God to tell them what to do, so they find excuse after excuse to not obey God.\u00a0 You will learn over time about the difference between a sincere question and someone who just wants to argue.\u00a0 I don’t waste time arguing, but I will answer their questions.\u00a0\u00a0 Sometimes one question may be pivotal about their belief in the Bible.\u00a0 Where did Cain get his wife?\u00a0 may be a hostile argument or an honest objection.\u00a0 As far as slavary, I too wondered how could there be great revival in America and people loving God yet see slavary still active?\u00a0 I did some soul searching and research and that is something I would share with someone who had concerns like I did.<\/p>\n

I don’t know all the answers, but here are some things to think about.\u00a0 First, those who came on the Mayflower faced grueling conditions too.\u00a0 Granted, those coming from Africa weren’t coming by their own free will.\u00a0 But if you knew the conditions they left in Africa, how many would have voluntarily put up with horrible conditions to get here?\u00a0 Mostly other Africans sold them to the Europeans.\u00a0 Other Africans were killing them and EATING them. Once in America, not everyone was cruel and hard taskmasters.\u00a0 Many slaves loved their masters and the fact so many choose BIBLE names instead of AFRICAN names proves that.\u00a0 Also, if it was so horrible to be in America why did so many Africans embrace the American Christianity and help form the BIBLE BELT?\u00a0 The respect for God and the gratitude for finding the true and living God has produced fruit that still impacts blacks today.\u00a0 If it didn’t I would not be looking for black people to give gospel tracts to and trying to get them to heaven.\u00a0 Finally, why didn’t they grab the earliest ship back to Africa once Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclaimation?\u00a0\u00a0 You had Africans who were enslaved in their country and only knew about their false pagan relgion.\u00a0 Many were being tortured and killed.\u00a0 Many made it to America, but were still enslaved.\u00a0 Yet, many found true freedom in Christ in true Christianity.\u00a0 And their ancesters were free to enjoy the blessings of America and the God of America.\u00a0 And 200 years later they embraced being slaves once again, though this time to the government, by someone of the same race to boot.\u00a0 If it is biblically correct, it will not be policially correct.<\/p>\n

If you are not sure how long to go soulwinning, just imagine applying\u00a0 to your actual fishing.\u00a0 The key to any fishing is to take your time.\u00a0 Wait for the fish to come to you.\u00a0 Find out when they are more likely to bite.\u00a0 Spend hours getting the boat ready, pack all the fishing gear, drive hours to the lake, get the boat down the ramp and unhitch everything.\u00a0 Then get the boat to the middle of the lake, hook up the lure, cast the line, and then go home.\u00a0 You likely didn’t catch anything.\u00a0 And I\u00a0am sure that I am not the only one.\u00a0 Americans are too busy for anything.\u00a0 You hear of people in NY City who walk by murder scenes and rapes and wonder how someone could be that evil.\u00a0 I don’t think they were being cold, just too busy to do anything.\u00a0\u00a0 We are like levite in the good samaraitin parable.\u00a0\u00a0 Too busy to help.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have to get to church.\u00a0 My mother in law did that once.\u00a0 She didn’t know it was another church member, but she passed a lady who flipped her car in the snow. My mother in law is the piano player so she had to get to church on time!<\/p>\n

I like this the best but things will come up to keep you from doing this regularlly.\u00a0 If you can though, schedule in a time once or twice a week to just go somewhere where people are and start by passing out tracts.\u00a0 We have been to flea markets, college campuses, door to door, downtown, sporting events, street corners, rock concerts, and festivals.\u00a0\u00a0 Some places will try to kick you out.\u00a0 Other places you will have amazing liberty.<\/p>\n

Hand them a tract and just say something simple, “here you go”\u00a0“did you get one of these”, “merry christmas”, “good day”, “good evening,” etc.\u00a0 I try to be genuine, but it is always better if you can give them some truth with it.\u00a0 I might say something like, “I wanted to give you something I wrote.\u00a0 It can change your life if you let it.”\u00a0 I might challenge them, I might try and just be friendly, I might say here is a gift.\u00a0 I also might apologize for the fact christians are at home watching TV while the JWs are out knocking doors so I felt I should do something.<\/p>\n

You are fishing, just looking for someone to bite.\u00a0 If they pause, God may be drawing them in.\u00a0 If they start talking just let them talk.\u00a0 It is important here to gain experience, to know who is an honest seeker and who just wants to get in an argument.\u00a0 I walk away from the guy who wants to argue.\u00a0 You want to win that JW but he will tie up your time for an hour and you are going head to head intellectually here.\u00a0\u00a0 Meanwhile, 20 seekers you passed by in that time.\u00a0 The devil loves to get us on rabbit trails or get us tied up.\u00a0\u00a0 Don’t ignore a sincere seekers questions either.\u00a0 He may be stuck on something that he can’t get past.\u00a0 Most of the time evolution is a time waster.\u00a0 But say there is a guy who grew up in church but never was saved and then entered college and heard all the evolution propaganda.\u00a0 He might sincerely listen when you tell him that dinosaurs and man were on earth at the same time and they find things that evolutionists refuse to look at.\u00a0 Human footprints fossilized with dinosaurs. Human artifacts below rock layers they claim are\u00a0billions of years old.\u00a0 T Rex bones still with blood cells intact.\u00a0 All over the world are cave drawings of dinosaurs and rock carvings with humans and dinosaurs.\u00a0 They were on the ark and didn’t survive\u00a0the post-flood conditions, were hunted, and weren’t as fast after the flood.\u00a0 Before the flood the earth was mostly land, and had huge trees and plants all over the earth.\u00a0 A brachiosaurous has the nostrils of a horse.\u00a0 It could not breath in the reduced oxygen levels of the post flood.\u00a0 Evolution is not science.\u00a0 True science is 100% in sync with the Bible.\u00a0 A sincere seeker will be interested in knowing there is evidence backing him up if he embraces the bible.\u00a0 A true Christian is not afraid of the truth.\u00a0 And that makes him dangerous to everyone else because no one else is sure of anything but is so insecure they will defend what they are not sure of to their grave.<\/p>\n

What is this?\u00a0some would ask when you hand them a tract.\u00a0 And when they say something besides “I’m all set” or “get away from me!”\u00a0explain what you are giving them. I\u00a0start simple, and say\u00a0it is a gospel tract.\u00a0 Ask questions, don’t just go into shoving\u00a0a presentation down their throat.\u00a0 Get them to dig themselves into a hole, ask why do you believe that?\u00a0\u00a0 If you ask what they believe first, then you open the door to them letting you talk.\u00a0 You basically earn the right to tell them the gospel when you get them to empty their resources and realize they don’t have much backing up what they believe.\u00a0 I am confident\u00a0in the\u00a0gospel not\u00a0only because the truth is on our side and it is the\u00a0power\u00a0of God unto\u00a0salvation, but because the evidence is on our side as well.\u00a0 It is not a religion where you have to leave your brain at the door\u00a0and\u00a0believe things that defy common sense like\u00a0you would have to do if you were a mormon, or Hindu, for example.<\/p>\n

Ask them some interesting questions, such as what do you think happens when you die?\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Do you have a christian background?\u00a0 If you died today where would you go?\u00a0 If what you believe isn’t true, would you want to know?\u00a0 That is a very good question and inoffensive one for Catholics, etc.\u00a0 I have seen some good one one one preachers do simple things to get people to not trust themselves and I will use them from time to time.\u00a0 One time I was going through the tolls and it was a bad storm.\u00a0 I asked her if lightening stuck the booth and she died, where she would go?\u00a0 I find that when someone is confronted with the reality of death, they are open because they are scared.\u00a0 Fear is a good thing.\u00a0 Fear is why people agre to chemotherapy. Fear is why poeople put on seatbelts.\u00a0 Anyway, she said she would be ok because she thought in her heart that God would let her in.\u00a0 I said you can’t trust ourselves because we can be wrong.\u00a0 I asked her to spell the word SILK.\u00a0 She did.\u00a0 What do cows drink I asked?\u00a0\u00a0MILK she said.\u00a0 I said, Nope, they drink water.\u00a0 See you can’t trust yourself. And if you are wrong about eternity you are wrong forever.<\/p>\n

I planted a seed, and it made her think.\u00a0 That is a successful witness.\u00a0 Now we should pray for God to send someone to water that seed.<\/p>\n

Use tracts but\u00a0be creative, selective, and remember them.\u00a0 I tend to have some in every jacket.\u00a0 It is neat when you find Christmas tracts from a year ago\u00a0when you finally dig out your winter jacket and think you are out of ammo when you reach in your pocket while talking to someone, but then you discover you had the right in season tract.\u00a0 I usually use my own tracts I write because I find few tracts deal strongly on repentance, and most look boring, and most\u00a0have some sort of sinner’s prayer to pray.\u00a0 My take on that is we are born lost and we offended a holy God.\u00a0 Just as reading a Hallmark card will not forgive a spouse who’s husband committed adultery on her, God is not impressed by a flipant prayer.\u00a0 Prayer doesn’t save yet that is what these tracts both imply and teach.\u00a0 The law should bring about conviction, and the law should birth a natural apology that God will hear.\u00a0 God runs to a repentant sinner, but most soulwinning fall’s on God’s deaf ears because they leave off repentance.<\/p>\n

A challenge is when you can’t remember if you gave them a tract already, and worse if they rejected you. Examples are places you frequent, the coffee drive thru, McDonalds down the street, the local pizza joint.\u00a0\u00a0 What I will do is ask, “Hey did you get my Christmast tract?”\u00a0 Or if I just got new Chick tracts or just wrote a new one, I will say, “Here’s something new for you!” If you gave them one already you can follow up but do not put pressure on them.\u00a0 Did you happen to read the tract I gave you last time?\u00a0 If they say no, I will try and use the law and explain what it said a bit, and often they will take it the second time.\u00a0 How many times did God need to get through to you??\u00a0 Often our flesh says Go to Hell if we know they rejected us the last time.\u00a0 But we likely did the same thing.\u00a0 Often God will be working on them or they are in a different place than last time.\u00a0 Maybe this week they were just at a funeral.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tract and Witnessing Tips A warning– when I try and write a blog post, I end up writing a chapter in a book. The following was never intended to be a blog post.\u00a0 I had wanted to write a short … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=685"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":686,"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685\/revisions\/686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/etvfc.org\/wp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}