John 3:30

He Must Increase, I Must Decrease

Grace

MSU@OSU Outreach Report

by

November 11, 2017: 12 evangelists gathered at the Ohio State University to read the lost with the gospel. We preached for 2-3 hours on two corners, so there were 2 preachers going most of the time. We had no less than 8 people handing out tracts at any time. I am grateful if only one person desires to accompany me on an outreach. And I agree that it is not about numbers, but the more laborers there are the more work we can get done.

For today’s post I want to look at some photos and talk about the human strategy surrounding out evangelism.

If you look at this photo below, you can see where our people are positioned (the 6 red arrows point to our folks). In the background, on the right side of the photo, you see Dan Carr and Alayna Hoop. They are standing on either side of a walkway which is a high foot traffic area. That walkway leads back to much of the parking to the north of the Ohio Stadium.

In the foreground, you can see Elaine and Rachelle Holman standing in the wide sidewalk area in front of the preacher in the maroon sweatshirt. This areas is where all the people from the West travel across in order to get to the game. Their location is also a blessing because they get to head the Word of God preached while tracting folks.

The team.

Kurtis Gould is the one preaching and next to him is Joshua Richards. We try to always have a person near the preacher. This is not only for protection if needed, but also so there is something there to give people a Bible or help in any way that the preacher needs.

If you traveled to the right from this photo, you would begin walking across a bridge toward Ohio State. On that sidewalk, but not pictured, were Alexandra Coughlin and Kenton Gould. Anyone who slips past Rachelle, Elaine, Alayna and Dan without getting a tract will still be offered a tract as they travel down Lane Ave to the east.

Looking below, we are now across the street from the photo above. So if you imagine in this photo you are looking Northwest toward the Schottenstein Center. The photo ABOVE this one would be across the street to the right from the photo below. As you can see, Kurtis is preaching about the Way, the Truth and the Life beneath a sign that reads “The Undisputed Way.” We love this.

The Undisputed Way: Jesus Christ!

As I pointed out, it would be very hard for people to walk past the northeast corner of this intersection without encountering my team, but people could bypass that corner by coming south and then crossing the street to the left of where Kurtis is preaching in this photo. By having multiple men preaching, we are able to ensure that no matter which route people take they will hear preaching. At this corner, we preach to the people on the left (across the street) until the light changes and then we preach as they walk toward us. After the people have walked toward us and are going past us (to the right), we turn and preach to them and then we preach to the people waiting to cross from the north. While Kurt preached I passed out tracts, but down the way to the east (the direction most people walk), Nicholas Coughlin and Chase Vendley were on either side of the sidewalk tracting.

So you can see that with a team of 12 people, we were able to have 4-5 full hours of preaching, and covered both sides of a major street with tracts. If you can imagine that we could easily cover 4 corners of the stadium with teams like this, you can see how many more laborers for the gospel could be useful to the ministry! My understanding is that Ohio State games attract approximately 200,000 people: half inside the stadium and half outside. That’s 2% of the population of the state of Ohio.

Think about that. 1 person out of every 50 people in Ohio has the chance to hear the life-saving gospel of grace on gameday. Yet I doubt we reach more than 30,000. Pray for more laborers!

So you see, we are spiritual minded people. We preach the Word and we give out gospel tracts, but we also try to be wise and strategic from a material perspective. Let me give you one more example.

When we go to the game, any parking anywhere near the stadium costs 20-25 dollars. With 7 home games that really adds up! One of the things I do is drop the team off, because with a large box of tracts and other equipment it would be very hard to walk! But they would wait a very long time for me to park my car a mile away and walk back to them. It really seems like a waste of time. So I began bringing my bike. Now I can park another quarter mile away and park for free on a side street, and ride my bike to the location much quicker than walking. So we are saving $20/week and some valuable time we can use for evangelism.

I want to commend my team and tell you a little of what it took this week to be there. First of all, my team ranged in age from 13 to 56. We had at least one person who it was their first time trying contact evangelism, praise the Lord!

We arrived and were ready to start about 9am. It was less than 30 degrees outside and the wind chill factor apparently made it feel like 16 degrees. I coached my team to do smart things, but to labor for our Lord without rest or complaining. We gave everyone a couple handwarmers, too. But it is hard to hand out tracts with gloves and it’s hard to hold a Bible and preach with gloves so many of us just get cold hands. No one on my team complained. I was so grateful for their kind spirits. It was funny because at noon I called my wife and one of the things I told her was it had “really warmed up.” She told me it was 32 degrees. But compared to what we’d stood in all morning, that seemed balmy!

The thing is, lost souls were out there braving the cold weather: some of them out of love for their team, some out of idolatry, and others just for the fellowship of being with friends or family. Vendors were making money selling tickets, buckeyes, wool caps and other OSU paraphernalia. Why shouldn’t a Christian be there for his God? Why shouldn’t a Christian stand and bear those elements for the sake of the elect? As I told the team, “we’re all going to be cold, we might as well get the work done.”

After the game, we went to a local fried chicken restaurant called Raising Canes and enjoyed some time together and some hot food. Here are a couple team pictures.

Nicholas, Kenton, Chase, Alexandra & Kurtis (l to r)

I want to thank my lord Jesus Christ for a wonderful day which was largely made possible by several dear saints from my church, some of whom donate large sums of money to pay for things like our gas and our meals, and also for Peter & Alyssa Wilson who loaned me their Honda Odyssey for the day so that I could fit a full load of people in it and also my bicycle.

Rachelle, Elaine, Caleb, Alayna, Joshua & Dan (l to r)

2017 Penn State @ Ohio State Outreach Report

by

6 men were able to labor October 28 for the Lord and lost in Columbus Ohio. Caleb Davenport, Kurtis Gould, Travis Jackson and I preached while Chase Vendley and Kenton Gould handed out tracts. It was a sub-40 degree day which started out rainy. But we prayed earnestly that God would keep the rain away and He graciously answered the prayer. We drove to Ohio State at 11am with windshield wipers on, and by the time I parked my van the rain had stopped and didn’t restart. I want to publicly thank the Lord for his kindness to us that day. It was the first cold day, but that is something we are used to in Ohio. The way I see it, if fans will go to the game, I will too. Although I immediately ordered a box of 40 hand warmers when I got home for future games!

On the way there, I asked Kurtis, “Why would you to want to go evangelize in freezing rain?” He responded, “The same reason as when the weather is nice, the get the gospel out.”  <<–Praise the Lord for that faithfulness!

Here are some pictures and commentary about the day, with a special providential surprise at the end. If you click the pictures it will open larger versions of them in a new tab which you can close to return to the article. We started, as always, with the singing of gospel hymns and prayer.

Above you can see a photo of Caleb preaching with Kurtis standing by him. We like to have someone near the preacher, not only in case of an type of physical incident, but also to help if needed. For example, if a person is clearly trying to obstruct the preaching, that person can distract a person who is just causing the preacher problems. Or if the preacher decides to stop preaching to talk to someone who is responding to the gospel, that person can begin preaching. We only have a few hours to preach so we try to fill it up.

Above you can see a picture of the crowd. Basically from 2-3 hours prior to kickoff until 15 minutes before kickoff there is a constant stream of people like this. Every 5-7 minutes the crowd moves along as the police operate the stoplights.

In the below picture you can actually see Chase handing out tracts. There is a teeny tiny arrow pointing to Chase. Click to picture to see it. You can also see just to the right of the middle of the photo there is a street vendor selling knit caps. His set up for the caps is in the shape of a cross. He was mocking the gospel and shouting “Be saved…from the cold!” But in his mocking many people heard “Be saved!” and we rejoice that God may use that to cause His elect to think about their need of salvation. And we also know that this man was in earshot of several hours of preaching, and Travis made sure he received a tract. May Jesus receive the reward!

In this photo, Caleb is preaching and you can see the man on the right reading a tract he was give by Chase or Kenton. It has become rare in my experience to see people actually stop to read the tracts (although I still hope some read them just not in my sight). So I told Travis, “Why don’t you go try to talk to him?” Below you can see Travis engaging the man with the gospel. At one point the man was actually weeping. Travis has a kind heart and a peaceful spirit. Pray that this man might receive Christ or if he already has that he would maybe come back and join us in reaching others!

In the photo below this man came up while Kurtis was preaching and asked Kurtis for his favorite Scripture. As men, we can only judge outward appearance, and not hearts, but this man appeared oppositional to Kurtis in his tone and posture. When Kurtis didn’t immediately tell him his favorite passage, the man said something like “There are a lot of false prophets out here. If you’re going to do this, you need to know the Word.”

I’m protective of my team, maybe to a fault, and Kurtis is only 17 years old, so I stepped over and tried to reason with the guy. I told him that Kurtis not having a favorite scripture off the top of his head was no indicator that Kurtis is a false teacher or doesn’t know the Word of God. The man was unkind and made some more comments which could only be construed as rude, while telling us he was just trying to inspire Kurtis. It was odd, but I was bothered that the preaching was interrupted for such a strange encounter.

After a minute, Kurtis told the guy he likes Philippians. We explained to the man that although he said he was trying to help us it just didn’t come across as supportive. These are the kinds of things you encounter regularly. Questions weigh on your mind with each encounter like “Should we have just had another person start preaching and let Kurt engage the fellow?” “Should I have kept out of it and let Kurtis handle it?” “Was I kind in my responses to him or too accusatory?”

As I said earlier, I do not want the preaching to stop and even a seemingly honest question from someone can interrupt the preaching to the point where many walking by will not hear the gospel. At the same time, the soul in front of us matters also, we we try to be strategic and wise and we hope that God will grant us wisdom and discernment! Pray for us, will you?

One thing that was notable to me that day was that I did not see a particular ticket scalper who I usually see. I have been going to the same corner for years now, and I have gotten to know various vendors and scalpers. One of them I even recognized when I was at a different event where he was selling tickets and he recognized me too and hugged me. Well, I did not see him this Saturday and it actually disappointed me.

But that evening, I went to a local place called Wingstop to get my wife and I some wings. As I got out of my car, I saw that same scalper! He said hello and hugged me and I asked him where he was that day and he said he was at a different location. We chatted for a moment and I found out his name and that we have at least one mutual friend from his church. Then as I was getting ready to pick up my order, he stepped up and paid for my chicken wings. I thanked him and he said, “You bless a lot of people, so I’m blessing you right now. Keep it up.” Praise the Lord for his providential timing and the gift of chicken wings for my bride and me!

One thing you can consider is that when you watch the games, you can look at the faces of the fans and know that many of them received the gospel. As I watched fans storm onto the field after OSU’s comeback victory, all I could think was “that’s my mission field.” Pray for a harvest, dear Christian!

Finally, I uploaded this video to give people an idea of what it is like preaching. There are distractions galore: sirens, people periodically shouting, and a constantly moving crowd at sporting events.

We ought pray for preachers of righteousness that the Holy Spirit would give them wisdom and unction to preach as He would have them preach.

 

Preachers of All Ages – Maryland @ tOSU Outreach

by

The God we serve is infinitely amazing. He graciously gave us a wonderful day to minister the gospel of Jesus Christ before Ohio State trounced overcame a tough Maryland football team! Here is a photo of the men who joined me Saturday except for Mark Seward who had already left by the time the photo was taken.

We began our ministry at 1pm by singing a couple hymns together and then praying for our time. I really believe the corporate worship benefits each of us before (and after) the ministry time.

LtoR Kurtis Gould, Chase Vendley, Caleb Davenport, Joshua Richards, John Rataczak, Joe Conkle, Fred Triplett & Michael Coughlin

One of the neat things that God does here in Central Ohio is pull people together to this ministry from all ages and walks of life. On Saturday, Oct 7, 2017, we had a preacher in his teens, thirties, forties, fifties and sixties.

But what a joy it was to see so many people take turns preaching. One of my hopes is that for several hours there will never be a break from people hearing the preaching. With so many willing men, that’s a possibility!

Along with preaching, we handed out at least 1,000 tracts and held up a wooden cross

This day brought more vocal opposition than usual. A man came up to me as I was preaching and told me to preach about love, not sin. He said that’ll attract more people.

I cannot read another person’s heart, but his eyes and his spirit appeared haughty to me. It is impossible for me to say for sure, of course, but it was the impression I got. I told him to stick around and listen a little (because I do, in fact, preach the love of God demonstrated in the crucifixion of His Son), but he sorta patted me on the arm and said, “just preach love,” while smirking. I asked him if he was offering me correction, and he said yes, not seeing the irony in the encounter.

Caleb Davenport preaching.

Another piece of new of note is that someone from one of the other church groups came up to Fred and told him no one could get saved from reading our tract. Fred asked why not, and he told Fred, “It doesn’t contain the gospel.” Rather than confronting the man, we chose to continue our ministry. Nevertheless, if this man cannot see the gospel in our tract, we are left to wonder what he thinks the gospel is, which makes us fear for his soul! Imagine showing up at Buckeyes games week in and week out, peddling a message to people, suffering shame, and not yourself being born-again! Pray for this man that his eyes may be opened.

While I was preaching a young woman approached me and engaged me. It is important to know that I was preaching the righteousness of God found in Jesus Christ, the sinfulness of man, and the exclusivity of faith in Jesus Christ for salvation. This woman comes up to me and says, “All I hear is you’re [me] such a good person and we are not.”

What???  Is that really what she heard? Yet we are not surprise because the Word of God tells us

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
(1Co 2:14)

and

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
(1Co 1:18)

So we do not lose heart (2 Cor 4:1), but we continue! This same woman told me she wasn’t a bad person after I corrected her and told her we are all bad people, and then she proceeded to proclaim her own goodness (Prov 20:6). She told me she had never stolen or murdered anybody. I asked her if she’d ever hated anyone and she said she had not. So I asked her if she was pro-choice, and she replied yes.

Then I informed her that by being pro-choice she is approving of murder and is a murderer at heart. She immediately played the “what if someone was raped” card and tried to convince me that killing Hitler or Stalin when they were infants would have been a good thing. This is the irrationality of the godless worldview, nothing makes sense, so anything makes sense. She told me I had a blind faith and it was stupid to believe God talked to Abraham…then told me she was Jewish. I guess she meant that was her nationality? 🙂

John preaching with Joe standing by.

Eventually, I chose to just keep preaching instead of let her distract me from preaching any longer. Like I said earlier I want someone on the box at all times, and I didn’t feel like getting off to talk to her would have served the mission. But my favorite part of the whole encounter was when she said

You’re just one of those preachers who wants to say what you want to say, but you don’t want to listen to what anyone else has to say.

Since I was already on the defensive with her a little, I was getting ready to retort, but then I just said, “Exactly. Yes, that is exactly my goal here. I’m here to proclaim the truth today.”

For many people that sentiment will seem wrong, or, at the very least, impractical. But that is the nature of preaching, is it not? Are we to be ashamed of the method prescribed by God for spreading His Word because his enemies loathe it? Shall ambassadors for Christ be concerned with the opinions of those with whom we are sent to command to make peace with our King? God forbid! May the Lamb of God receive the reward for His suffering! I am actively recruiting people to join me for the Super Bowl in Minnesota, click here to see how you can help!

Kurtis preaching to the crowd!

I Tried Friendship Evangelism and You Won’t Believe What Happened Next!

by

This is my report from the pre-game evangelism at tOSU on 9/23/2017. If you are only interested in the friendship evangelism part of the story, scroll down until you see “Finally.”

Sept 23, 2017 was another day of fruitful ministry for the Lord Jesus Christ at Ohio Stadium. The Buckeyes took on the UNLV Running Rebels, but before that, my team ministered to those attending and generally hanging around.

For the game on the 16th, I reported that I had a team of 13 people preaching and tracting. For the 9/23 game I only had 5 people! One of the team members was a total surprise that morning, a woman named Debbie whom I had never met before. And my friend Jeff came with me very last minute. I was also grateful for the old faithful, Joshua & Rachael Richards. We were not many in number, but Joshua and I managed to preach for about 90 minutes apiece while Rachael, Debbie and Jeff passed out at least 1,000 tracts!

We sang a few hymns to get started. The sound of the female voices mixing with mine of Joshua’s was very pleasing to my ears and I trust to our Lord’s as well. We had the usual batch of folks who encouraged us and folks who were indifferent with a small number of dissenters.

I want to share 3 things about this outreach which I find remarkable.

First, after years of preaching there, I was approached by one of the traffic cops because he wanted to encourage me. He said he is praying for the people who hear and sent me his really great testimony. He was saved and ended up forgiving his father’s murderer and sharing the gospel with him. If you are interested in that story leave a comment or go to the contact me page and let me know you’d like to read his testimony.

Secondly, I think I finally found an application for a passage of Scripture that has always escaped me.

Mark 9 38 John said to him, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.”39 But Jesus said, “Do not stop him, for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. 40 For the one who is not against us is for us.

I have never felt I understood the application of those verses. Every time I heard someone refer to that passage, they were referring to heretic prosperity preachers! I knew this verse couldn’t possibly mean that we support false teachers, just because they say Christian things.

But Saturday I noticed something. For the second week in a row, a large group of people from another church in town were there passing out tracts and holding signs. And another group of believers were there most weeks last year and all 3 weeks of this year too. You see, these people go to churches where I have enough doctrinal disagreement that I doubt I’d ever partner with them in an evangelistic outreach. But, I did have sweet fellowship with them in just a few minutes of conversation. And then it hit me, they may not be with me, but these folks are not against me either. They are fighting the same battle for souls, but from a different understanding of Scripture.

Finally, I had a chance to practice friendship evangelism {GASP}. Observe.

A young man approached me carrying a bicycle (I always find that decidedly odd). I was handing out tracts and I offered him one. He gave me the kindest smile and said no thank you and walked past me.

As providence would have it, the light changed and he was ‘stuck’ at the intersection with me, but there was no more traffic, so I struck up conversation.

Me: So, do you go to school here or work here?
Eli: I go to school here.
Me: What’s your name? I’m Michael.
Eli: Eli.
Me: Oh, that’s a good Bible name.
Eli (visibly bothered sorta grumbles without making a sound)
Me: Where you from?
Eli: Urbana.
Me: Oh, my friend lived there. Her son is XXXX.
Eli: I know him. He graduated a year ahead of me.
Me: And Buck Nut is from there too, right?
Eli: Yeah, Larry Lokai! I just saw him.
Me: That’s cool. So can I give you one of my cards now (extending a tract).
Eli (smiling): No, thanks. I still don’t want one.
Me: Even after this friendly conversation you still won’t take one?
Eli (still smiling, this guy had charisma): Nope.
Me: Ok. I’m going to write about this encounter. You’ve helped me prove a point I want to make to some folks.
Eli: Perfect, glad I could help.

Then the light changed and he walked off toward the sunset carrying his bicycle. Ok, that was a bit dramatic. It was 9:30am and the sun was still in the east, but I digress.

You see, dear reader, the point is that this was the exact situation friendship evangelists claim is required to get the gospel to people. Friendship evangelism, in its common practice can be loosely defined as not giving folks the gospel but doing good works so that people will see Jesus in you and ask you about the hope you have. People need to be warmed up to the gospel by our good works, kindness and godly behavior, without bashing them over the head with the Bible or talk of sin. You must adorn the gospel to make it palatable to them.

Many people, and maybe even you, my friend, use the concept as friendship evangelism as your excuse to not give out the gospel to people. Some twist scripture enough to the point where they practically have their mouths taped shut waiting for a non-believer to drop to their knees and say “What must I do to be saved?”

But on September 23, friendship evangelism failed to live up to its billing. Eli simply had no more desire to take a tract after my kindness toward him than before. In fact, he laughed at the implication that he would. And that is because friendship evangelism is a made up thing which is antithetical to the biblical explanation of how evangelism is done, even “personal evangelism.” You see, the gospel is a proclamation that the King of kings and Lord of lords has accomplished on the cross and in His glorious resurrection all that was needed to atone for His people’s sin. And that each and every one of us must repent of our own sin and trust Jesus Christ as our only righteousness before a holy and just God. And it is only in hearing this message that man can truly be drawn to Christ, and it is only by faith in this message that a man can be saved.

So withholding the gospel from someone whose heart is darkened by sin and waiting for them to ask you to give it to them is analogous to a medic waiting for a knocked out person in an ambulance to request CPR. No, my friend, we who are living must be giving the life-giving words to those around us who are dead and trust God to quicken all those whom He has chosen from before the foundation of the world.

Thank you for reading this post. I try not to ‘break dry bread’ with you, but at the same time I like to paint the picture of how things went that day. Please pray that God would grant salvation to those who heard the Word preached or received tracts!

Preaching to the Choir?

by

Dear reader, the question this article proposes to answer is, “Why would I go to a Christian worship event to preach?”

Do I just want to start trouble?

Is this literally a form of preaching to the choir?

Do I believe only that only I and 14 other Calvinists on the internet are the “true church?”

Please join me along with my friend Brandon Hines as we lay out a case for why Christian street preaching and evangelism is not only acceptable outside a Christian worship event, but why in fact, it is necessary outside many events designated as Christian worship events.

Click here to read the rest of the article.

2017 Arnold Report – 1

by

The Arnold Classic is an annual athletic event held in Columbus, OH which attracts a large number of people from all over the world. For several years in a row we have gone to the central location for the event and preached Christ crucified, handed out tracts and engaged people in conversations.

Here is a multi-part post where I will share with you some of the stories from this weekend’s evangelistic outreach. I am hoping to make this series educational for others.

Allow me to introduce you to our team of evangelists. From left to right in the front row Pam, Kenton, Alexandra, then me. In the back row are Dave, Luke, Nick and Kurtis. You will notice that our team has 4 teenagers and one almost teenager! Praise the Lord for giving these young people a desire to see souls hear about Christ.

The day started long before March 4. We spent days and weeks praying, announcing the event at church and studying the Bible so that we would be ready. The night before and morning of the event I was charging my speaker, packaging tracts, finding DVD movies and watching the weather report!

We met at our church at about 11am on March 4. Due to there being 8 of us, we borrowed a generous brother’s van which seats 8. Right before leaving the church for downtown Columbus, our pastor prayed that the Holy Spirit would go before us and change hearts, something we cannot do.

On one sad note, two dear brothers who were scheduled to go with us could not make it due to illness. One of them was sick and the other couldn’t come because of how that affected him. This is very common! Pray for your outreaches and those of folks you know.

Click to read part 2..