Donuts, Garbage, & the Gospel: Revelations of a Rescuer

Have you ever had one of those unforgettable conversations? We definitely did as we sat down with Dr. Jerry Root, Wheaton College Professor Emeritus and longtime C.S. Lewis scholar. 

Fear too often makes even the most faithful followers of Christ go silent. We feel the pressure to “say it right,” we worry about rejection, and one awkward moment can convince us we are not cut out for evangelism. Listen in and hear us talk about a better way: sharing Jesus from a heart shaped by love, gratitude, and quiet courage. 

We unpack why evangelism is less about having a special gift and more about building real trust with real people. Jerry tells unforgettable stories from a pipeline crew, a donut shop regular who took nine months to say 'yes', and an airport delay that turned a simple survey into a surprising opening for grace. Along the way, Jerry gives a practical framework you can use today: ask public questions, listen closely, and let the answers earn you permission to go deeper.

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Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome everyone to Go Mad with Doug and Brad. We have got a special guest with us today. We're going to give a quick introduction and then dive right into what we believe is going to be just an awesome time together. Jared Root is Professor Emeritus at Wheaton College. He has also been a visiting professor at Biola University, Talbot Graduate School of Theology, and Moody Bible Institute. He and his wife, Claudia, have been married for 51 years, and together they have four children, 15 grandchildren. Dr. Root has studied C.S. Lewis, and I can tell you, after getting some time with him the last couple days, he has studied C.S. Lewis and related topics for 56 years. He's lectured on Lewis alone, not counting other topics, at over 80 universities in 22 countries and is a best-selling author. And I can tell you just from things I've seen personally, he has impacted countless young people's lives for the Lord, uh, with the gospel, with training them up. And uh not only that, he loves conquering fear through experiencing adrenaline-inducing activities, including skydiving, splunking, swimming with sharks, roller coasters, and he's adding to that list today being on this podcast. So there we go.

Where Evangelism Passion Begins

SPEAKER_00 1:16

That is the I'm so excited to have uh Dr. Jerry Root here today. Um, you know, we're all about on this podcast, um, making the most of every opportunity uh in and um and being ambassadors for Christ. Uh he's making his appeal to people who need him through us. We're plan A um for getting the gospel to the people we love. Uh Jerry, I gotta ask you this. I mean, so many questions. You if you go to Jerry's uh his page at Wheaton College, taught so many amazing places, um, so many prestigious things, but to me, what gives you a greatest qualification to be professor emeritus of evangelism is you just live it. You have a passion for sharing the gospel with people who need Jesus. Um, where does it come from? Where does your passion for evangelism come from?

SPEAKER_02 2:11

Well, wouldn't everybody, if they knew Jesus loved them and forgave them, want other people to know it? And for me, I didn't come to Christ because of some slick apologetic argument. I like apologetics, I've taught it, I've written books on it. But I came to Jesus because I knew I was a sinner and I needed I knew I needed forgiveness. Frederick Biekner says, before the gospel could be good news, it's got to be bad news. I knew the bad news, I didn't know the good news. And when I heard the gospel, I have never stopped being grateful for what Jesus did for me. I also know that he loves me, and I think evangelism begins in the love of Christ. It's easy to talk about things you love. So cultivate the love of Christ and let it ooze out of you from there. And also begin to love what Jesus loves. He loves the world. You've never seen a person unloved by Jesus. And so begin to try to be a voice for Christ, expressing God's love to that person he loves and love them to the cro to the kingdom.

SPEAKER_01 3:16

My wife, Sarah, she I got to have you as a professor, as a teacher, um, her senior year at Wheaton. And I know that one of the things that really impacted her were some of the stories you shared specifically about what you're saying, because I I wish I could say that I always acted in line with what you are sharing that we should feel that way. We should see people and say, I want them to have what I have. Um, and she got that from you. Uh, she had kind of her heart had turned from maybe the sociology side of things, uh, which she majored into missions. And there was a pivotal time in her life. And one of the things were the stories, some of the stories you shared about the practical way that you've lived that out. We know there's that need, but how does that play out in your life as far as just some of the practical ways you go about sharing Jesus with the world around you?

SPEAKER_02 4:15

Well, let me undergird it with a little prep. Um, I don't have the gift of evangelism. I've had pastors say to me, Oh, Jerry, we like to encourage the people in our church who have the gift of evangelism to do the evangelism for our church. I said, I want to come speak at your church so I could tell the people who don't have the gift of giving they don't have to give anymore.

SPEAKER_00 4:35

No.

SPEAKER_02 4:36

They don't want to go there. And I don't want to go to the church where only those with the gift of mercy are being kind to each other. Uh we don't all have the gift of evangelism, but all of us come under the great commandment or the great commission to go to the world and preach the gospel. So true. So I don't have the gift. I'm not doing it naturally. I'm learning from my mistakes, as any of us could. You're married. Have you ever made a mistake in your marriage?

SPEAKER_01 5:02

I had several just today. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:05

So the question is: do you give up on your marriage because you made a mistake? Or do you learn from that so you don't make that mistake and maybe do better next time? Same thing with work. You make mistakes at work, and so you learn from that. We we don't bail on any other area of life when it doesn't go so well. Why is it that we bail so quickly on evangelism? So I want to keep learning from my mistakes and I watch. I remember when I was a freshman in college, I became a Christian my freshman year. There was a guy who worked at our college, he was an electrician, and and he he had a rough edges, but he went to my church. When I would see him on campus, it was like an oasis. But he was always complaining about the jerks he worked with and how terrible they were and all this stuff. And one day he was talking to them about Jesus, they made fun of him and he colcocks the guy and got fired. And I go, I don't think that's the way you should do it. You know, and so I thought, okay, what do you do? So I'm a freshman in college that summer. I had to pay my own way through college. I got a job working pipeline construction, and I could make enough to pay my tuition for the whole year of that summer. And I start working there, and these guys go, You're a college guy? Wow, you could be shacking up with women, you could be out getting drunk, you could be doing all this stuff. I go, I I don't do that stuff. Well, why's that? Are you gay? I said, No, I love Jesus, and they were on me like flies to stink for two weeks, rap razzing me and everything. And I remembered what that other guy did in that environment, and I just kept my mouth shut and worked harder. And sometimes they'd tell jokes at my expense, and they were funny, and I laughed. And after two weeks, I was one of them. And throughout the rest of the summer, I had chances to share with them. At the end of the summer, I said, What do I have to do to share Jesus with you before I go back to school? They said, You bring us a case of beer and you could talk to us about Jesus as long as you want. I didn't know if that was legitimate to do or not, and I was too young to buy the beer. But I got my roommate to buy the beer and I took it, and they each threw one can in the cooler, divided up the rest to take home. They weren't alcoholics and stuff like that. And and they popped a can after work, laid out on the grass and said, You can talk to us about Jesus as long as you want. Wow. Wow. You learn credit by not reacting to people when they're upset. So good. And you and you love on them, and the doors open up. And it's amazing. So I think that's something, but something else I learned too. I I I would go to a donut shop. I said, okay, I was a right there, you got me.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

I'm I'm good with that.

Donut Shop Friendship And Better Questions

SPEAKER_02 7:44

But I was a pastor, a college pastor in Southern California. And I said, There are people out there, Lord, who who who you love and you want them to know about you. I'm available. What could I do? I said, I'll go to a donut shop. You know, and and so I went at 10 o'clock. Nobody's in donut shops at 10 o'clock. You want to reach people in donut shops, you've got to be there between six and eight in the morning. I said, Lord, I'll give you Tuesday and Thursday mornings between six and eight. And I went to this donut shop. The room was about as big as this, had a few tables around. And I noticed people sat at at the same table, same ones, every every day. And and I didn't have any strategy. I was stupid, but I was willing. And so I decided I'll take my Greek Bible and I'll be reading my Greek Bible, and somebody will come in and say, What's that? And I say, It's a Greek Bible, and they'll sit down and say, Can I ask Jesus in my heart? That's how stupid I was. So I would say hi to people when they'd come in, and there's this one guy he looked like Walter Mathau, grumpy old man, you know, he looked like his he was baptized in lemon juice, or you know, he you know, it was it was crazy. And he would sit at this table right next to me, and I'd say hi to him, he'd just give me a scowl and sit down. And one day I was reading my Greek Bible, and all of a sudden I hear this guy say, Can I sit here? And I look up, and it's the grumpy guy. And and I say, Sure. I look over. Somebody was sitting at his table, they came in and didn't know the rules. They weren't supposed to sit there. And I and I said, What's your name? And he said, Gene. I said, What do you do for a living? Gene. He says, Why? You write in a book. And at that moment, Gene taught me something. I didn't have the right to ask him about his business. That's a little too personal. I could write, ask public questions and listen to the answers, and the answers gave me permission to go deeper. So I would do that. So it ended up that we developed a friendship. He would sit with me every day for nine months before he finally became a Christian. But he became a Christian at that donut shop. And so it worked out real well because years later, I was coming back from giving lectures on C.S. Lewis in Bratislava, Slovakia. I'm at the Vienna airport to fly back. It was over spring break when I was at Wheaton College. And I'm sitting in the waiting room, I go through check-in, passport control, and I get in the waiting room, I find out the flight's delayed three hours. Well, I love that stuff. I pull out a book and read it. I like the anonymity of airports. And I see this young woman come walking in, she's got a lanyard, a clipboard, and I see her going up to people talking German, right? It's Vienna. And I assume she's doing a survey for the airport. Sure enough, a few minutes later she comes up and she says, in perfect English, gives me insecurity. What am I wearing that gave it away? I wasn't Viennese. And she said she's doing a survey for the airport. And I said, sure, sit down. What's your name? She said, Allegra. I said, Allegra, are you from Vienna? She's in Vienna. It's not an intrusive question. She said, No, I'm from Southern Austria. What can I ask her? What brought you to Vienna? Oh, I'm a student. I got a million questions. Where do you go to school? What are you studying? Each of those opened up more opportunity to discuss. Within a few minutes, I found out that she was from Southern Austria. Her father was still there. She told me he was a bitter and peevish guy. Each time I ask her a question, she gives me more. The mother had run off with her lover to Canada. She had a brother and she didn't get along with him, too. He was also at the University of Vienna. And her boyfriend, I said, Man, you've got a lot of sadness in your life. She says, It's even worse than that. I said, Tell me about that. She said, My boyfriend went to Florence to study art for six months, told me to wait for him. I've waited for him dutifully. He came back yesterday to tell me he met somebody better in Florence. She's told me all of that stuff, and all I've done is asked her public questions and then got deeper when she gave me information, and I asked her about that information. I said to her, Allegra, you need to ask me the questions. Twenty minutes I know her whole life. Twenty minutes. And I haven't asked an intrusive question at all because it built off of things, she said. And I said, Um, I know you need to do your survey, but I've been sent here to tell you something. Then she thought I was a plan at the airport to see if she was doing her job. I said, No, it has nothing to do with that. I said, Go ahead and ask your question. She asked me, How long did it take me to check in? How long it take me to get through passport control, the things you'd think. And then she said, What were you sent here to ask me? And I said, Allegra, I've been sent here to tell you this. 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, he loves you. She burst into loud tears. Everybody in that waiting room is looking at me like I'm torturing this poor woman. And she said, But I've done so many bad things with my life. I didn't have to point out her sin. I bring her into the light of God's grace, and she's willing to acknowledge it herself. And I was able to say, Allegra, he knows all about that, and that's why Jesus died on the cross for your sins. You open the door by asking public questions, listen to the answers, and the answers give you permission to go deeper.

SPEAKER_01 13:11

I the things I'm hearing just from those answers alone are I love the gaining credit. Uh, I love that that talking about the construction guys, the pipeline guys, and everything, just that you gained credit with them uh along the way just by being there with them, interacting with them, and then those knowing what questions to ask. That's really important. So I I uh to our listeners right now, make sure you're get that notepad out because they this is this is gold uh and great tips to be able to take those next steps.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

Jerry, we a lot of believers in this country around the world know deep down that they are supposed to be sharing about Jesus. They've heard it at some point. Um and and you look at the polls, you don't have to look at polls to know what the number one thing is keeping us from doing it, and it's fear. Um fear, I'm not gonna have the right answer. Uh that they're gonna reject me, they're gonna laugh at me. You share the gospel all the time. Do you still get those little pangs of fear before you do it? And if you do, or if you don't, what what do you do to overcome that? Because there's a lot of folks that know they're supposed to do it, but it just it they just can't quite do it because they can't get over that fear hurdle. The scriptures say perfect love casts out fear.

Airport Survey Turns Into Gospel Moment

SPEAKER_02 14:32

I dig down deeper in the love of Jesus and let that love come out of me, and it takes away fear. And I also learn uh nobody's very life skilled. You know, we're all awkward. A toddler learning to walk falls down and gets bruised, a five-year-old taking the training wheels off the two-wheeler falls down and gets abrasions, the adolescent picking up a skateboard falls down and sprains an ankle, breaks a wrist. He went from that one-room school experience in elementary school into middle school, where you had six rooms you had to navigate and a locker that never seemed to work, and you were on the threshold of adolescence, the most purgatorial period of human development. And and and you just you're not very skilled. But you stick with it by the time you're a senior, you could do those six rooms blindfolded. Yeah, you gain skill by doing, you don't gain skill by trying and finding it doesn't go so well, and then bailing. What keeps you motivated when you got married? What keep you kept you motivated when you made mistakes? You love this person, and you wanted to do that which would please them and show them that you love them, and you keep engaged. Why do we bail when it comes to evangelism? I don't understand. We need to dig down and fall more in love with Jesus and then develop the habits by observing, learning from your mistakes. I made a lot of mistakes along the way, but I didn't let any of those mistakes be wasted. I learned from each one.

SPEAKER_01 15:59

You know, that was hard for me uh personally because uh my family's heard this story and some others that I've shared it with. But um, I was about seven years old, and uh the I had a friend over, we were playing, and I had given my life to Jesus when I was six. Uh and I wanted to share with him, and you know, I'd heard mom and dad talk about Jesus and everything. And I just said, I I won't I won't use real names here. I'll go with Steve, not his name. Uh I just said, Steve, um, I I just want you to know that I love Jesus. I have this relationship with him. And when you there's two options. We when you have Jesus, you go to heaven. When you don't have Jesus, you go to hell. Steve, right now I think you're going to hell. That perfect. And that that because of his reaction, we we didn't really play together anymore after that. I kind of I saw him at school, but I basically lost him as a friend. And and that that stung for a while. I I didn't want to talk about Jesus for a while because I'm like, I I didn't learn from the experience. I never, I didn't tell my parents about it at the time or whatever. It was just that shutdown mode. And I think that happens to us throughout life. So that's why a lot of what you're sharing is so important for people to take to heart because it is learning from our mistakes. We do, we're we're not perfect. We're going to say the wrong thing at times, but it shouldn't keep us from sharing the good news because God's going to use that in some way in someone's life.

SPEAKER_02 17:35

No mistake, no mistake that we make shuts down the conversation unless we let it stay like that. So I've made mistakes before and I've gone back to people and I've said, you know what I realized? I was overbearing when I was sharing with you, or I was insensitive, or something like that. And I want to ask your forgiveness. Because I wouldn't want anything that I did to keep you from seeing how much Jesus loves you. Or if I talk to somebody else who's sour about Christianity because somebody mistreated them, I say, tell me your story. I hear the story and I say, it breaks my heart to hear that. I'm a Christian. Would you let me stand as a surrogate in the place of that person who hurt you and ask forgiveness for what he he or she did? Because I wouldn't want anything to have anything that anybody else did keep you from seeing how much Jesus loves you. So I think that becomes important. No question ends the conversation either. They ask a question, you don't know the answer. Say, I'll get back to you. I'm gonna go dig. And then you go dig for the answer. You're never gonna get to the bottom of these questions, but you can get a substantive answer that's significant. And you go back to him, he said, You asked me this question the other day. I've been digging because you matter to me. And this is what I've discovered. And they can't refuse you because they asked you the question. Opens up the conversation.

Fear, Skill Building, And Repairing Missteps

SPEAKER_00 18:57

Lots of uh um uh Barna has has done a ton of research on church and uh young people in church and and in different congregations, and there's a lot of fascinating information out there. I was reading through it, and one thing really hit me over the head that that I couldn't shake. And Jerry, we were talking about this a little bit last night, and and it it jarred it back to my memory here. But according to their data, only one percent of pastors say their churches are very effective at evangelism. 1%. So you got a hundred pastors there, one is saying, yes, my congregation is good at evangelism. So that means so 99% of pastors believe that their congregants are not effective at sharing their faith. What do pastors got to do to give their congregation um to give them confidence and and to help them know how important it is? Because there's some, if the pastor knows that, there's some disconnect there, and I I kind of want to ask the pastor, well, what are you doing about that?

SPEAKER_02 20:14

Well, the first thing the pastor needs to do is make sure it's a reality in his own life. And then he needs to, on occasion, give an illustration in a sermon about when he was sharing Christ with somebody last week. Oh, that's good. And then also he needs to have a person once in a while give a testimony of how they came to Christ last week or last month or last year. Wow. So they keep it in the mind of the person You almost never see that in a church. Huh?

SPEAKER_00 20:40

I've almost I don't know how many times I've ever seen that in a church where I'm sorry to interrupt you, but that's so that's jarring to me. And I'm thinking, how many times have I actually seen the pastor say, here's someone who has become a believer through our church or through a conversation I had, and and you need to hear from them. I don't think I ever.

SPEAKER_02 20:58

So here's one for you. I became a Christian, I led my two roommates to Christ. One of them became captain of the wrestling team, the other one became captain of the football team. We led a lot of people to Christ. I led about 15 guys a year on my football team to Christ. They weren't all there at the same time, but that's 60 people, right? They weren't all there because they graduated at different times. We started a pregame Bible study, pre-game chapel. We started a team Bible study. I'm teaching that was probably full of heresy because I didn't know Jack Squat. You know, I'm doing the best I know how. But but my my two roommates and I, we we decided we want to go to this Bible study, and and it was taught by kids at a Christian college. Well, we're involved in evangelism all the time at a secular college. I don't think they had much contact with the outside world. The music was great, the Bible study was deep, and then it came to the prayer time. And this one person said, I want you to pray for my dog. My dog is sick. I want you to pray I can. Find the lost keys to my car. Could you pray for Aunt Gertrude in Freeport, Maine? She's going to have gallbladder surgery in two weeks, you know. And my roommates and I are looking at each other and we go home. We said, nobody asks for prayer for a dying world without Jesus. What's going on here? So we decided we would make sure we pray, we we shared Jesus with somebody every week, and we would ask prayer for particular people we were talking for. Next week, prayer time. And I said, Please pray for Bob. He works as a checkout guy at the liquor deli store where I buy my groceries down the street. And then and then uh Chris said, Please pray for this other guy on the football team. Gary said, Please pray for this guy in my fraternity. And then it went to Aunt Gertrude, the sick dog and the lost keys. The next year, next week, I've got an appointment with Bob. Please pray for Bob. Chris gave his, Gary gave his. And then it went to the sick dog and the lost keys and that sort of thing. Then the next week, we gave our prayer request, please pray for Bob and so on. And then another guy, a fourth guy, said, You know what? I'm talking to somebody too. Could you please pray for this person I'm talking to? Now we're getting some traction. The next week, this is a fifth week now. I said, You guys know how I've been asking you to pray for Bob? Bob, this is a group I said, we're praying for you. Oh my gosh. Oh, wow. Tell them what happened in your life this last week. He said, I gave my heart to Jesus. The place exploded. Everybody wanted to be a part of where God was at work in their world. They just said, resign themselves to sick dogs and lost keys and so on. You can change a culture not by shaming the culture. You can change the culture by modeling something better.

SPEAKER_01 23:53

And I think that's how you do it. Can you I I I've not heard that story about Bob before. I love um that practical just someone shows up, all of a sudden the answer to prayer is sitting there. Um and I know you have countless stories you could share, but um because I think this one, and I haven't heard it directly, but I think this is one that models the person that's in our everyday world uh side of things. You and was it the trash guy? Oh yeah.

Why Churches Struggle And How To Model It

SPEAKER_02 24:26

Yeah, can you can you share that with us real quick? Yeah. I used to have Fridays off, and I was sitting at home and and I was having my quiet time that Friday morning, and I said, Lord, there's somebody on your radar screen who's not on my radar screen yet. And just then the garbage guy pulls up. And I go, Wow, that guy comes to my house every week. I don't even have to look for him. So I put on my prayer list right then, the garbage guy. And then the next week I anticipated him coming. He usually came about 10 o'clock. And so I had a glass of iced tea in the refrigerator ready for him. It was the hot part of the year. And I rushed out there when he pulled up the truck, and it was one of those ones where they came behind and threw the garbage in the basket in the back and then put the stuff in. He comes around the back and I'm already standing there. And I go, You look like you'd use a break. Here's some tea. You drink the tea, I'll throw the trash. I threw the trash and he's looking at me strange, you know. Can I taste this? He takes a taste sip, you know, it's not poison, is it, or something? And I said, What's your name? He said, Mike. I said, Mike, he has a name. I erase garbage guy and I put down Mike on my prayer list. And every week I'm out there during the hot part of the year with something cold to drink, during the cold part of the year with something hot to drink. And I'm talking to him and I'm developing a relationship. He started to like me. I know he did, because he sometimes would say, I found this perfectly good toy in the trash today. You got those kids, they might like that. Oh my god. You know? And so I'm having a casual conversation with him. One day he comes by at noon. I said, Mike, you're a bit late today. Yeah, I had troubles on my route. I said, Well, did you eat lunch yet? Because I can make you a sandwich. He goes, Okay. I he came in to have a sandwich. I didn't know those guys could do that. So he came in, I made him a sandwich. He changed his route the whole time. Came by at noon every week after that. And I made him lunch every week. Oh my God. It was in that context. We had a conversation, and I found this about Mike. When he was a little boy, about eight years old, some dear woman in his neighborhood had a heart for the kids in the neighborhood. She started a backyard Bible club. And he remembered praying the prayer when he was about eight, and his parents moved away two weeks later, and he was never followed up. So I did follow-up with him at lunch and took him through Bible study and stuff like that. He and his wife started going to church, and his two little girls came to Jesus and so on. And then not long after that, he was traded off the route, and I had a new garbage guy, Mick, and I was able to do the same thing with Mick.

SPEAKER_01 26:59

Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_02 27:00

There was also the mailman who came to my house every day. And I got to know him. His name was Steve, and in time I was able to share Jesus with him. Steve came to Christ. I said, Steve, you got to go to go to church with us. He said, Well, I would, but I'm divorced and I have my kids on the weekend. I don't think my boys would like it. I said, Our church has great stuff for kids. You'd love it and come to dinner afterwards. They came and I got on my knees next to those boys after lunch and shared Jesus with both of them. They both came to Jesus. Then there was the bank teller. He knows a lot of personal things about me. He knows how many moths I've got in my bank account and stuff. His name was Kevin. I said, Kevin, do you ever go to I got to know him. I'd always go to his counter. I wouldn't go to the ATM. I'd go to his counter. If there were other people in line, I would wait till I could get Kevin. And then I said, Do you ever go to lunch with any of your clients? He says, Well, I'm open to it. We went to lunch. It was over lunch. After getting to know him, I was able to share the gospel of Kevin. There are people in our world everywhere. When you get gased, you go to the same gas station, go in, and don't pay at the pump, pay at the at the counter. Get to know those guys. Every once in a while, bring them a bunch of cookies. They'll remember who you are, and there'll be doors that you could open. You know, when you get off work, would you like to go for a cup of coffee or something?

SPEAKER_01 28:16

You said, God, there's someone on your radar that's not online right now that is that that in of itself is powerful.

SPEAKER_00 28:24

Jerry, I I want to ask you about persistence in sharing the gospel. Um there there are people listening, watching right now who are heartbroken for a family member. They have shared the gospel a thousand times. They've tried to show it. They have a child wandering from the faith that they thought was was serious about Jesus. My uh wife uh is Navajo and has uh a very large family, many of them who don't know the Lord. But she, her mom, for example, she prayed for her mom for decades. And every time, no, no interest, no interest. And then one day, she said she wanted to hear more. And Anna had the opportunity to to lead her to Christ. Um love that that parable of the widow and the judge, just keep going, keep going, keep going. And there's something about that that brings God glory. Um, and if the judge will give her what she wants, how much more will your father who loves you? Um so pray and don't give up. And that's all wonderful, but there's still there's someone listening that's brokenhearted that their family member just won't seem to listen. Persistence. Can you talk with us about that?

Everyday Relationships That Open Doors

SPEAKER_02 29:48

We've all got them in our life. I know people I've shared Christ with and they come to Christ right there. Others, it's weeks and months, like Gene at the donut store. It was nine months. I have people I've been praying for for decades like you, and they haven't come to Christ yet. I don't understand how this works, but I love Jesus, and I believe Jesus does understand how it works. And our responsibility is to go. So I had a buddy I played football with in college. He was in my fraternity and I'd share Christ with him all the time. He was never off putting, but he wasn't interested. And and he didn't come to Christ. And he was on his deathbed. And my my uh one of my other fraternity brothers, uh, he he died, and he said, I want you to do um a celebration of life for him. I didn't know if he became a Christian. To my knowledge, he didn't. So you do a celebration of life. Eulogy means to speak well about a person. I've I've given funerals for people that everybody knew they had some chumpy features in their life. You don't emphasize that. You just say, you know, so-and-so is a complex person. We all know some shortcomings in their life, but let's celebrate the good. And so you share what you can, and I did that about my friend Danny. Afterwards, I sat down at the table, and and his brother Doug was there just bawling, bawling his heart out. I hadn't seen Doug since I was in college. This was just a couple of years ago. And and and Doug is bawling, and Doug says, You know, um, I was concerned about my brother not knowing Jesus. And I said, Doug, I didn't know you knew Jesus. He said, Yeah, I went to college and guys led me to Christ. I've been following Christ all these years, and I've been praying for Danny for years. So while Danny was on his deathbed in a coma, I got a pastor to come and talk with him. And the pastor shared the gospel with him. And when the pastor, Doug had been in a coma, and when the pastor was done praying with Doug, I mean with Danny, Danny opened his eyes, put out his hand, shook the pastor's hand, and went like this and died. And the thing is, you don't know where it's going, you don't know what the person's thinking in their mind before they die. You just don't know you're called to be faithful. And that's why it says in in Corinthians 50 2nd Corinthians 50, is it 2 Corinthians or 1 Corinthians 15, 51? Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord. He calls us to be faithful, we're faithful, and then he leaves the results up to him.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

I have to say that is that story is remarkably similar to how um Anna's mom came to know Jesus. Remarkably similar. One quick thing.

SPEAKER_02 32:40

What does it tell you though? It tells you God's at work in the world.

SPEAKER_00 32:43

That's the Anna Anna had a grandfather also who wanted nothing to do with the gospel, completely traditional. One day she's driving home to visit her mom, and he has been sitting at the side of the road, doesn't have a phone, doesn't have a cell phone, very old school, and he waves her down and says, I got a bad report from the doctor. Can you tell me more about this Jesus that you know? Sitting there for hours waiting for her to come by after after no interest at all. Exactly. You don't know where people are coming, you don't know what they're thinking, you don't know where they're at in their life. Um that's an amazing story.

SPEAKER_01 33:26

I know that uh I mean this is this has flown by and uh we could talk for hours. Uh what I I I want to encourage uh those who are watching right now, those who are listening, uh if you're wanting to know more as far as practical tools to maybe take next steps in sharing with people, first of all, go check out your hope story.com. Your hope story.com. You'll find a lot of helps for how to just share your story with others. And we always talk about the three open prayer. It is a great place to start, but it's a prayer that uh God will answer, so be ready. Uh, it is Lord, open a door, Lord, open their heart, and Lord, open my mouth. Do that, do that with the people around you and look for those opportunities, as Jerry was sharing here to who's on God's radar that's not on our side. I'm gonna be looking for that. I'm gonna be praying that in my own life, God, who's on your radar that maybe isn't on mine yet, but needs to be, because there are people all around us, and we need to be being an ambassador, a key part of that, being a representative of Christ is talking about him and sharing the good news.

SPEAKER_02 34:50

Heart full of love for him.

Persistence With Family And Final Moments

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Amen. It it does all start there, doesn't it? Yeah. It all starts there. We we um uh we throw the word honor around a lot. Truly an honor having you on the podcast. Do you have any parting words? Any anything uh that boy, that sounds so final. That's terrible. But anything else, anything you'd like to leave us with here?

SPEAKER_02 35:11

I just say keep keep up, be be persistent, keep loving people, and and and don't be dissuaded by something that seems to go wrong. Learn from it and and and learn from the people around you as you watch them as well. And then I could tell you a lot of stories, but just be persistent. And it's joyful. You'll see God show up. Yes, yeah, and you feel like I'm involved in something supernatural. This is really cool.

SPEAKER_00 35:37

Wait till it happens to you once. If you've never led someone to Jesus, um keep it up. When it happens for the first time, you something happens in here and you're gonna want to do it again.

SPEAKER_02 35:49

Can I tell you one more quick story? Yes. Please do. Okay, so when I was a pastor, I used to have this thing on Friday nights, not on Saturday, because I was usually panicked about Sunday morning. But Friday nights, I'd meet with people at my church, as I lived in Santa Barbara at the time, and I'd say, come out Friday night at 7:30. I'll give you a 10-minute thing on evangelism. The cumulative effect was week after week, there were many, so they got to grow on how they could share their faith. We'd pray for 10 minutes, and it took 10 minutes to get to State Street, which was a street in Santa Barbara where people were milling around. There were restaurants on the street and stuff like that. And we'd go up to people and we'd talk to them about Jesus on the street. There are protocols for contact evangelism like that, versus protocols for people you get to know and so on. And so we would just go and tell them we're here talking to people about Jesus. Could we talk with you? If they said no, we'd move down the street. And I usually found if you approach 17 people or uh 20 people like that, 17 would say yeah, I'd be willing to talk. It was amazing how frequent would. But if I had somebody who had never done it before, I'd say, Come with me and I'll share the first time and open it up and you watch. The next time I'll start the conversation and I'll ask you to give your little testimony. Next time you're gonna start, and I'm here to back you up. Okay, so this one night, five guys came up to me and said, We've never done this before. Could we go out with you? And I go, Okay, but I'm thinking to myself, that's me as six. How do six people walk up to somebody on the street and say, Can we talk to you about Jesus? And you got these, all these guys. And so I'm saying, Lord, this is a condition you gave me. You're in this event. I try, I'm trusting you. Help me to see what to do here. So we're out of the car, walking down the street, and I see five guys walking towards us. And I assume they were University of California, Santa Barbara students. And in fact, they were. Five young guys walking down the street, and I go, You guys, you guys, I'm the pastor of this church up on the hill. I got these five guys with me. They have never shared their faith before in their life. They're as scared as can be, they're really nervous. And I'm wondering if you'd let them practice on you. Oh, wow. And these five guys say, Yeah, yeah, we're not doing anything. That'll be okay. I say, okay, if you're willing to do it, you got to push back a little bit. If they say something that's not clear, make sure they make it clear for you. And they say, Oh, yeah, okay. Four of the five guys came to Christ. These other five guys are freaking out. One of them was a guy named Dan, who is a captain of the fire department. I was a chaplain for the fire department. He later becomes the chief of the fire department. He had the gift of evangelism and it awoken in him that night. He led all kinds of people in town to Christ. And whenever the Christian firefighters would get together, he started teaching a seminar on how to lead people to Christ. And it was a blast. But you just say, okay, let's go, let's go hit it.

SPEAKER_00 38:48

Harvest is plentiful. People just waiting for someone to tell them.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

An incredible conversation with incredible stories with a make a difference person. So you know, if you've listened before, you know that our challenge to you. Until next time, go mad.