Militant Evangelism! (34 page)

Robert Louis Stevenson said, "Keep your fears to yourself but share your courage with others." This was so clearly illustrated in the lives of Joshua and

Caleb. They had a positive, hopeful, valiant courageous, optimistic spirit, often called "faith."

If we can't say something positive, we should take a leaf out of the book of Joshua and keep our mouths shut. The children of Israel were told not to speak as they walked around the walls of Jericho. What they were doing was foolish, opening themselves to the ridicule of the enemy. It would have been hard to say anything positive, but when they did say something, it brought the downfall of the enemy, not their brethren.

Recognize that if you are going to do something for the Lord,
satan
will be aiming his fiery darts at you.

Enemy Propaganda

The devil is the progenitor of falsehood. He is a compulsive liar. He is the master of deception, and a major tactic is to tell the Christian that to witness for Christ is difficult. He would have us believe that it would be less fearful to be a dentist for hungry ferocious lions,
before
the days of injections.

With all the years I have had preaching to hardened, anti-Christian, blasphemous, foulmouthed sinners, one would think I have conquered fear, but I still have to fight the fear of man when it comes to personal witnessing. But when I speak "as I ought to speak," I have found that my fears were totally unfounded and realize that once again, I have entertained enemy propaganda. Multitudes of Christians suffer from this disease—they know that they should be true and faithful in their witnessing, yet day after day passes by, and so do sinners on their way to Hell.

The fear of man in our lives is nothing more than a compromise with the enemy. We are listening to his perversions. To say that I am unable to witness is to say that God's promise of help is nothing but an empty lie. If I say, "I can't" when God's word says, "I can do
all
things through Christ who strengthens me," and I choose the former, I am choosing a lie, rather than believing the truth.

Ecclesiastical Locomotive

I make no apology for the length of the following quote from a sermon by that mighty soldier of the turn of the century, Billy Sunday:

"I believe that lack of efficient personal work is one of the failures of the Church today. The people of the Church are like squirrels in a cage.
Lots of activity, but accomplishing nothing.
It doesn't require a Christian life to sell oyster soup or run a bazaar or a rummage sale.

"Many churches report no new members on confession of faith. Why these
meager
results with this tremendous expenditure of energy and money? Why are so few people coming into the Kingdom?

I will tell you—there is not a definite effort put forth to persuade a definite person to receive a definite Savior at a definite time, and that definite time is now.

"I tell you the Church of the future must have personal work and prayer. The trouble with some churches is that they think the preacher is a sort of ecclesiastical locomotive, who will snort and puff and pull the whole bunch through to glory.

"A politician will work harder to get a vote than the Church of God will work to have men brought to Christ. Watch some of the preachers go down the aisles. They drag along as if they had grindstones tied to their feet.

"No political campaign is won solely by a stump speaker or spell-binder on the platform. It is won by a man-to-man canvass.

"Personal work is the simplest and most effective form of work we can engage in. Andrew wins Peter. Peter wins three thousand at Pentecost. A man went into a boot and shoe store and talked to the clerk about Jesus Christ. He won the clerk to Christ. Do you know who that young man was? It was Dwight L. Moody, and he went out and won multitudes to Christ. The name of the man who won him was Kimball, and Kimball will get as much reward as Moody. Kimball worked to win Moody and Moody worked and won a multitude. Andrew wins Peter and Peter wins 3,000 at Pentecost. That is the way God works. Charles G. Finney, after learning the name of any man or woman, would invariably ask: 'Are you a Christian?' There is no one here who has not drag

"Personal work is a difficult form of work, more difficult than preaching, singing, attending conventions, giving your goods to feed the poor. The devil will let you have an easy time until God asks you to do personal work. It is all right when you sit in the choir, but just as soon as you get out and
work
for God, the devil will be on your back and you will see all the flimsy excuses you can offer for not working for the Lord. If you want to play into the hands of the devil begin to offer your excuses.

"There are many people who want to win somebody for Jesus and they are waiting to be told how to do it. I believe there are hundreds and thousands of people who are willing to work and who know something must be done, but they are waiting for help; I mean men and women of ordinary ability. Many people are sick and tired and disgusted with just professing religion; they are tired of trotting to church and trotting home again. They sit in a pew and listen to a sermon; they are tired of that, not speaking to anybody and not engaging in personal work; they are getting tired of it and the church is dying because of it. People should wake up and win souls for Jesus Christ.

"I want to say to the deacons, stewards, vestrymen, prudential committees, that they should work, and the place to begin is at your own home. Sit down and write the names of five or ten friends, and many of them members of your own church and two or three of those not members of any church; yet you mingle with these people in the club, in business, in your home in a friendly way. You meet them every week, some of them every day, and you never speak to them on the subject of religion; you never bring it to their attention at all; you should be up and doing something for God and God's truth. There are always opportunities for a Christian to work for God. There is always a chance to speak to someone about God. Where you find one that won't care, you'll find 1,000 that will.

"If it is beneath your dignity to do personal work then you are above your Master. If you are not willing to do what He did, then don't call Him your Lord. The servant is not greater than the owner of the house. The chauffeur is not greater than the owner of the automobile. The servant on the railroad is not greater than the owners of the road.

"Certainly they are not greater than our Lord Jesus Christ.

"It requires an effort to win souls to Christ. There is no harder work and none brings greater results than winning souls.

"You will need courage. It is hard to do personal work and the devil will try to oppose you. You'll seek excuses to try and get out of it. Many people who attend the meetings regularly now will begin to stay at home when asked to do personal work. It will surprise you to know some lie to get out of doing personal work.

"Personal work is the department of the church efficient to deal with the individual and not the masses. It is analogous to the sharp shooter in an army so dreaded by the opposing forces. The sharpshooter picks out the pivotal individual instead of shooting at the mass. The preacher shoots with a siege gun at long range. You can go to the individual and dispose of his difficulties. I shoot out there two or three hundred feet and you sit right beside people." (
from
, "Billy" Sunday by William T. Ellis)

We often disguise the fear of man so that his presence is less convicting. We call it "embarrassment," "shyness," or we "don't want to seem offensive." If we are "self-conscious" rather than God-conscious, we are not "free indeed."

When I was once asked to take a three day crusade at a university, I was told by a member of the committee that the Christian Union "had a good name in the university." I soon found out why. They preferred that we didn't use our literature, which exposed the demonic aspect of heavy rock music, touched on the abortion issue as well as stating the Scriptural attitude to homosexuality. I was told that homosexuality was a "touchy issue." I unwillingly submitted myself to their authority and had the three days of meetings. At the end of the third day, I asked the crowd of about 200 people how many they knew the Lord
and found that almost all of them were

Christians.
I left that meeting determined never again to submit myself to such a committee.

A month earlier I was at another university, and this time there was no committee. A group of Christians had given out our literature, and by the time I appeared, the students were so angered, they were tearing down posters advertising my visit.

Just before I was due to go into the main hall, I was shown a letter written by the local chaplain. He stated that as university chaplain, he wanted it to be known that he had nothing to do with the invitation for me to speak at the university. He stated that he thought that I would turn people away from "true Christianity," then he listed a number of points of contention. My immediate thought was no one would turn up to the meeting. When I tried to find a "closet" to encourage myself in God, I couldn't even find one.

I was then called for, and ushered into the auditorium. To my delight, there were about 500 students packed into the room. For the next forty minutes I had the joy of preaching sin, righteousness and judgment, and can say that over the years I thought I'd seen an anti-Christian spirit, but I hadn't seen anything compared to that day. I had never seen such a unified spirit of hate. If there had been stones handy, I am sure I would have followed close on the heels of Stephen. There were homosexuals, lesbians, pro-abortionists, dope-freaks, all soaked in the most blasphemous, foul language imaginable. Here were our future doctors, lawyers and politicians.

The next day at least 800 students (and one chaplain) packed into the hall, and I had another opportunity to preach God's Word to those precious people, and they were there because the young Christians had the guts to make an uncompromising stand for the Gospel. They shook off the shackles of fear of rejection. What a
colorful
contrast to committees of cowering, cringing Christians! The "fear of man brings a snare," and is a victory for the enemies of righteousness. But those who fear God enough to obey
Him,
will not only find that He opens doors for them, but they will also find an oil of joy above their fellows.

At another so-called learning institute, I told the Christian Union that I would be speaking on the subject of "The Perversion of Homosexuality."

Two days before the meeting, the person in charge called and said that the committee had told him that if I spoke on that particular subject, they would stop any financial grants from getting through to the Christian Union. We decided that we would go ahead as planned, and as far as we were concerned,
the whole lot of them could go to Heaven!

Look at this further quotation from the publication about the ministry of Billy Sunday:

"Mr. Sunday reached a powerful climax when he described the possibilities of the Judgment Day, and the efforts of the evil one to lead in to the dark, abysmal depths, the souls of men who have been popular in the world. To those who have accepted Christ, the Savior will appear on that Day as an advocate at the Heavenly throne and the saved ones can turn to the devil and say:

'Beat it, you old skin flint. I have you skinned to a frazzle. I have taken Jesus Christ and He's going to stand by me through all eternity.'"

It takes courage to bring up the subject of Judgment Day when witnessing or preaching, but we have the help of God, and if we really care we will warn the world.