Amongst Evangelical Christians there is an awkward gap
between one's understanding of evangelism in theory, and the actual practice.
What I mean is that Evangelical Christians sense that they should all be able to obey the great commission.
By that, I mean going into all the world and making disciples of Jesus, from people of all nations.
Nevertheless, most of them haven't got a clue how they would actually go about doing such a thing.
In my opinion, the real cause of the confusion is that even the experts don't really have a clue.
They've learned a little strategy for bringing people under the umbrella of mainstream Christianity
and they use it with reasonable success.
But they know that the strategy itself is so contrived and so complicated
that they cannot really afford to express it openly
because, amongst other things, it has no basis in Scripture.
It's not how Jesus or the early Christians did it.
They also know that the strategy works best in a room full of people who are kind of willing the new recruit
into a certain series of steps that will culminate in him or her into thinking that they have, in fact
been truly turned from non-believers into believers, and that their eternal destiny
has been totally reversed from one of eternal torment in hell, to one of the endless heavenly bliss.
Just because they went through the various steps in the strategy.
But has their eternal destiny been totally reversed?
Have they really been born again, as they call it?
Unfortunately, in the vast majority of cases, they almost certainly have not been born again at all.
I could almost say in every case, but I also know
that God looks on the heart and he judges each of us by how much we know.
If someone is earnestly seeking to know God
even this insipid, unscriptural formula can result in a change in such a person's life.
God will meet each of us at the limits of our knowledge and experience
so long as we are seeking him with all our heart.
Are you such a person?
Do you want to know the truth more than anything else in the world?
Are you hungering and thirsting for more of God and for more purpose in your life?
In this video, I'm going to Introduce you to Jesus Christ
and I'm going to show you how you can introduce others to Jesus Christ.
It may shock you, and even offend you that I've started by saying that I'm going to introduce you to Christ.
I say it because I can be fairly confident that you have not previously meet him.
What you have met have been watered down and twisted counterfeits
that are referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus or Christ.
But they've been almost totally dreamed up by the various organizations all over the world
that call themselves Christian.
They are, in reality, false Christs. Just as the real Jesus predicted would arise in the last days.
Imagine just how incredible this prediction that Jesus made was, at the time that he made it.
When Jesus made his prediction about everyone pretending to be him
it was against the law to follow him...there was a price on his head.
So why would anyone want to pretend he was Jesus?
Yet he was predicting a day when he said it would be so popular to be a Christian
that religious scoundrels of many sorts would pretend to be promoting him
when in fact they would promoted false Christs.
So let me just ask you this.
Off the top of your head, could you tell me 10 or 20 things that Jesus told his followers to do?
Surely if you've been following the Christ from the Bible--if it's only been for a few months
you would have a pretty good idea about the kind of things he taught his followers to do, wouldn't you?
For example, if you had a job as a night watchman, and I asked you
to tell me 10 to 20 things that you did in the course of your job, it would be easy wouldn't it?
In your mind, you would just walk through the day (or through the night in this case)
and you would tell me the various things that you do: turn certain switches on, turn things off, unlock, lock
check certain areas, make reports and then repeat it all over again at set intervals.
So, if you've been following Jesus, then that would be all that you would need to do.
You just walk in mind through the various things that Jesus tells his followers to do
recalling how you went about doing each of them, at each step along the way.
But you can't, can you?
Why? Because you have not been taught to follow the Jesus of the Bible.
You may have asked him into your heart, you may sing songs of praise to him
you may even work yourself up to tears over it all
with an organ in the background, laser lights, and artificial smoke.
You may pray to him, asking for help with the various problems in your life.
But if you don't know what he told his followers to do
then I have to tell you that you've never met him...not the real Jesus.
You were introduced to a counterfeit. Do you see what I'm saying?
Now, let's say that you now see the truth in what I'm saying.
That is, that you have never really met the real Jesus of the Bible, but you want to meet him.
Now, if you really wanted to meet this real Jesus, what would you do?
Can you tell me?
I think most of you can, right now, without me saying a word.
Where would you go if you wanted to listen to and learn from the real Jesus?
It's simple, isn't it?
You see, I'm telling you that I'm going to lead you to Christ in this video
and yet my task is so simple, I hardly need to do a thing.
You already know where to find him.
The trouble is that you just never made the effort.
In fact, the hardest part of what I'm doing now
is just convincing you that you have not already been led to Christ.
What you had been led to is complicated and confusing, because it's not the real Jesus of history
and we both know where you can find the real Jesus, don't we?
Now, some of you may say, "In the Bible'.
Yes... But also, no.
This may be part of what I most need to explain. You won't find the real Jesus just anywhere in the Bible.
Much of the problem with the counterfeits have come from this mistake.
People will turn to any page in the Bible and assume that it's all about Jesus and it's all the same.
Millions of sermons all over the world are preached every week from various passages in the Bible.
But they still miss the mark.
So where in the Bible are you going to meet the real Jesus? Do you know?
Once again, I think most of you do already know.
But once again, the most difficult part of my job
is just getting you to let go of all the other parts long enough to go there.
Those same teachers who taught you about the counterfeit Christs
did so by quoting to you, verses from the Bible.
Verses from every part of the Bible except the all-important Cornerstone, as Jesus called it.
He said that the builders would leave out the Cornerstone.
They would not build the teachings on the rock of his teaching
and as a result, when they stand before God, he said that their building will be destroyed.
All of your hopes of eternal salvation will be dashed, because they were not built on the all-important piece.
So, tell me, where precisely are you going to look in the Bible if you want to meet the real Jesus?
The four Gospels, of course. Four different writers telling essentially the same story.
Not necessarily word perfect in every detail, but with greater unity and greater wisdom
then you'll find anywhere else in the Bible or anywhere else in the world.
This wonderful savior of the world has been gagged for 2,000 years, and now it's time
to rip off the gag and let him be heard.
Open that Bible and read those four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
Despite all the ignorance in the world about what Jesus actually said
his teachings have been miraculously preserved by God in those four books.
They're now available to you in virtually every language in the world.
For those who cannot read, they're available in an audiobook format
for young children they're available in very easy English, if not other languages.
There are illustrated versions, even motion picture versions of Jesus saying all those things
that are recorded in the four Gospels.
But is anyone reading it, or listening to him?
As you read, listen, for you're being addressed by the Word himself.
John says, in the opening passage of his Gospel, that this one who became flesh and came to tell us
what God wants us to hear--this Word was there at the start of creation.
John tells us that by him everything that has ever been made was created.
So listen to him like you've never listened to anyone else before.
And ask yourself after every line, if you are prepared to do what he asks all of his disciples to do?
Read all four Gospels. When you finish, read them again.
Each time you do, you will discover new things that you missed in the previous read through.
See what I'm saying here?
In this video, I have shown you that you have A) not been introduced to the real Christ.
B) I have shown you that you already know how to meet the real Jesus.
It has just never occurred to you to do it before and there has never been anyone prompting you to do it either.
Oh, and I did promise at the start of this video that I would also show you
how to lead someone else to Christ.
But now I don't really need to tell you, do I?
Do you see why Jesus described evangelism as witnessing? Because it's as easy as that!
Does a witness in court need someone else to write out for them what to say? No! Of course not!
People would seriously question the authenticity of any witness who needed someone else
to prepare exactly what they're going to declare to be truth, when they stand up there in the witness box.
True witnessing is just sharing your own experience.
If your experience was all mixed up with emotional music and rants from the pulpit
pleas from friends and relatives
weird carrying ons all around you, and laser light shows, and then still more emotional music
well, you would never be able to pass it on to someone else, would you?
But now all you need to do is just open those same pages that you read
and share what you found there, and how it has changed your life.
Witnessing is just easy as that. You have heard what he said.
You have practiced it, and you have witnessed a change in your own life.
Now you know everything you need to do to point others in the same direction.
But just imagine when we all start doing that
when that dusty old Cornerstone that has been collecting dust in cobwebs in a dark corner somewhere
all these years, is put back up where it belongs.
We're going to start seeing something taking shape that is actually going to turn the world upside down.
Just like it did the first time around.
Please, listen to him so you can be a part of this great revolutionary kingdom
that he preached about, both now and forever.
Amen.