witnessing - Stone The Preacher

The Horrible Incident at Stripes

Aug 7, 2017Steve SanchezEvangelism, Evangelism Gone Wrong, PERSECUTED!evangelism, gospel, living waters, persecution, preach, ray comfort, sharing the faith. proclaim, way of the master, witnessing

SOMETHING HORRIBLE happened at our local Stripes convenience store: I gave the Gospel to three teens.

One of the teens went home and told his mom that I said he was going to Hell. This is something I rarely say, and I didn’t say to these teens. 99.9% of the time I ask this question: “If you died today, would you go to Heaven or Hell?”

Here is a similar conversation I had with a gaggle of giggling girls a few years back:

Well, the mom got mad and posted my name on Facebook saying that I told her son that he was going to Hell, among other untrue things. Locals in our small town read the post and made all sorts of false accusations against me. Here’s a sample:

“He told me the same thing, too.”

“He doesn’t like gays.”

“He hangs out at the high school three or four times a week and evangelizes.”

“He scolded me for wearing my cheerleader outfit, saying that men will lust after me.”

Why the Atheist Mocked My Blog

Jun 19, 2017Steve Sanchez2 CommentsEV Articles, Famous Lost Wordsatheist, bill bright, evangleism, hells best kept secret, ray comfort, witnessing

On this day, five years ago, I wrote this…and nothing has changed!

I got an email recently from an adolescent atheist mocking my decision to make “Atheist Tuesday” posts an occasional blog item instead of weekly. Here it is:

SUBJECT: Laughter

Wish you could hear mine. [Presumably his own laughter]

Quitters never win and winners never quit, Steve.

I like the fact that your “Evangelism Schedule” and “Evangelism Training” posts have received no comments, not even from Christians, while your “atheists are bad” post has received over fifty.

Keep up the good work.

Yes, it’s a sad fact that this blog will never be popular.

If I wanted to pander to atheists, I suppose that it would be more popular, but why would I want that? I will end up having to answer over and over again the same Googleable questions that are found ad nauseum on Christian apologetic sites’ comments sections. You know, questions like these:

What makes your story of creationism fundamentally different from all the others that exist now, have existed before, and will exist in the future?
Why is there at least some evidence for our scientific theories, but none at all for your creationism?
Why does your God support slavery, murder, etc.

Remember, this is an evangelism blog “written to be an encouragement to those who share their faith and a motivation to those who don’t.” (Steve’s note: The emphasis of this blog changed in 2013.)

I found I was getting off-track and wasting my time answering questions that never lead to salvation. That is, I can try and answer all those questions, but really, atheists will not believe the truth by my answers, only if they have been called by the Holy Spirit.

So, back to the adolescent atheist’s email….

Arresting Truth

Mar 10, 2017Steve SanchezEvangelism Gone Wrong, Open Air, PERSECUTED!bible, evangelizing, gospel, michael overd, mike stockwell, open air preaching, preaching, truth, witnessing

A FRIEND OF MINE WAS ARRESTED IN ENGLAND AND FOUND GUILTY for a heinous crime. Was it robbery? Assault? Murder? Nope. None of those. Mike Stockwell got busted, along with his compatriot Michael Overd, for speaking the truth!

I met Mike Stockwell back in 2008 when I was leading a team for The Ambassador’s Academy, an evangelism ministry started by Ray Comfort that teaches normal Christians how to share their faith simply and biblically by handing out Gospel tracts, having personal conversations and by street preaching.

I didn’t know it then, but Stockwell would continue to preach the gospel in streets around the country and the world as a calling and vocation for the next nine years. Jesus said, “Go into all the world and preach the good news”—and he obeyed!

Now he’s paying the price.

Evangelistic Tipping or Giving Gospel Gratuities

Sep 2, 2016Steve Sanchez2 CommentsEV Articles, Ev Tips/Tools, TRACTSevangelism, gospel, gospel tracts, gratuities, kirk cameron, living waters, million dollar bill gospel tracts, ray comfort, tipping, trillion dollar bill gospel tracts, University of Texas, UT, way of the master, way of the master kirk cameron, witnessing

I received an email from a University of Texas student who complained about finding a Teddy Trillion Dollar Bill Gospel tract on the ground. Here’s what he wrote:

Subject: Fake Trillion Dollar Bills

Hello! I’m a student at UT Austin, and I was walking around the library when I saw a dollar bill on the ground with Teddy Roosevelt’s face on it (obviously fake, because he’s never been on a bill). Curious, I picked up the bill and saw it was a Trillion Dollar Bill (wahoo, I’m a trillionaire!), with a statement on the back about the trillion dollar question being “Will you go to heaven when you die?”.

If I had not seen a similar thing before this would have just seemed like an odd outreach program by the church to get people’s attention, but sadly I’ve seen bills like these be put in tip jars, used as a tip for waiters, and given to homeless people in lieu of valid tender.
Seeing this, I have to ask, what is the reasoning behind using these bills? It’s definitely not going to get any converts.

A waiter/waitress whose just spent 30 minute waiting on a table that didn’t even pay for the service definitely isn’t going to appreciate what would seem like a snide comment from a holier-than-thou person.

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Evangelism Gone Wrong, Part 1: Mistakes Were Made

Feb 15, 2011Steve Sanchez55 CommentsAtheist Tuesday, Ev Tips/Tools, Evangelism Gone Wrong, PERSECUTED!atheists, evangelism, gospel, living waters, open air preaching, preaching, ray comfort, sharing faith, unbelievers, way of the master, witness, witnessing

Those unbelievers out there can be so darn difficult.

They don’t understand the Gospel message—or don’t care; they’ll try to get the evangelist off his game by ridicule, loud shouts of disapproval or verbal abuse; they’ll mock you and the God who made them, sometimes even blaspheming his name. And it’s possible they may even try to get you to stop preaching that message of eternal life by using force.

What’s a Christian to do? We’re called to be gracious, gentle, respectful, loving, kind, helpful and prayerful, especially to our enemies. But what happens when things go wrong—desperately wrong—and the witness for Christ is totally blown? And what about those other guys; you know, those who call themselves brothers but don’t represent Christ at all in action and attitude when witnessing about him? What should you do? What about Gospel tracts that don’t tell the full story of the Gospel, are imbalanced, giving a skewed picture of the Savior?

This is the first part of a series that will offer some perspective when evangelism goes wrong. I’ll be sharing a few missteps on my part in a moment, but first let’s read about what happened to Ray Comfort long ago:

He tells the story about a woman who was heckling him so badly, using filthy language and caustic comments, that he blew it. She asked him a question that went something like this: “I’m a lady, but I don’t agree at all with you about what you are saying about women.”

Ray flippantly responded with, “You may be a woman, Ma’am, but you certainly are no lady…”

He then explained how the “lady” proceeded to beat him up.