All right, in Acts chapter 1, a very familiar chapter, really the only verse that I wanted to draw from this,
and I love the chapter, that's probably the reason why I read it,
but in Acts chapter 1 verse 8 the Bible says,
But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you,
and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria,
and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
Now that sentence is phrased as a command.
He says, after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you, he says, ye shall be witnesses.
That's the same kind of a command as thou shalt, have no other gods before me.
He's saying, thou shalt be a witness unto me.
He's commanding us to go solo in here.
He's not commanding one person or a select group here.
These are the disciples, these are his followers,
these are the men that are going to carry the torch to the next generation,
and not only that, they're assembled together later in the chapter with women,
with the mother of Jesus, with his brethren, with the women,
praying and begging God for his power, making supplication to God.
Then that power comes upon them that they were praying for,
and they receive power from the Holy Spirit upon them,
and they obey God and their witnesses like they ought to be,
and those 120 witnesses in chapter 2 see about 3,000 people saved and baptized.
Pretty amazing story.
Now, what I want to talk about tonight, though, I want to give you,
and I do this from time to time, and I do this periodically,
and I don't feel like I could do this too often,
because it's so important what I'm going to talk about tonight,
and that's tips for soul-winning.
I don't want to just be one of these rock-a-roll, ah, you know, kind of a preacher.
You need to learn how to win a soul.
That's the best thing that you could learn in your whole life.
I mean, if you came to this church and learned one thing,
and that's how you personally can win people to Christ by yourself,
hey, that's the greatest lesson that you could learn in the entire world.
I heard about a church recently, somebody was talking about a church,
and they were listening for me, how great this church was on this, this, this, and this,
and they said there's just one problem with that church.
They don't have door-to-door soul-winning.
Then that church is worthless.
You say, well, there's other ways to win, so that church didn't have any soul-winning.
I mean, good night, if they want to walk up and down the street getting people saved,
that's fine, I'm all for that, although the Bible does say house to house.
But a church that doesn't have an aggressive, soul-winning ministry,
where people are daily or weekly going out and opening their mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the Gospel,
is a church that's worthless.
Yes, it is.
Because what's the point of it all? Is it a social club? Is it a Bible study group?
Hey, the local church was established by Jesus Christ to prevail against the gates of hell.
The local church was empowered by the Holy Spirit to be a witness.
It wasn't empowered by the Holy Spirit to roll around in the aisle like some charismatic freako.
Hey, the Holy Spirit's empowerment of the local church was to be a witness.
What good is a church that's not a witness?
And I'm sorry, but a Christian who is not a soul-winner is not following Jesus,
because Jesus said, follow me and I'll make you fishers of men.
And so this is the most important thing you can learn.
And the sad thing is, first of all, if we were to narrow down churches that believe the Gospel,
you know, that's not every church in America, right?
Most of these denominations believe in work salvation, right?
So if we narrow down churches that believe and preach the Gospel, we've just narrowed it down.
Then let's narrow it down further.
Churches that actually go soul-winning,
that actually have a soul-winning program that's not, I talk to my friend or coworker once in a blue moon,
which is every 18 months, okay?
That's not what we're talking about.
We're talking about churches that actually have a legitimate program
where their people are out winning souls constantly.
Daily, weekly, monthly, whatever the case may be.
They're seeing people saved.
Boy, that narrows it down, doesn't it?
So we have churches that actually believe and preach the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Then we're going to narrow it down further to churches that have soul-winning, okay?
And then let's narrow it down even further.
Within that church that has soul-winning,
a lot of the people in that church are just like door-knocking salesmen.
You know, they don't actually win souls.
They're just inviting people to church, hanging something on the door, being friendly and kind.
And, you know, more power to them for inviting people to church,
but they're not a soul-winner because they invited somebody to church, okay?
So then we narrow it down to people who actually are presenting the Gospel at the door.
Then we can narrow it down further by people who actually know how to effectively get somebody saved, okay?
And I'm telling you, there aren't a whole lot of bona fide soul-winners in Phoenix, Arizona,
or in the state of Arizona, or in the United States.
I mean, there are a lot, but you know what?
Compared to the harvest that's so plenteous, there are very few true laborers.
I mean, it's seldom that you meet people who are a bona fide soul-winner,
who know how to personally win somebody to Christ.
Not, you know, they won one person in the Lord in the last five years.
Or, well, you know, I'm a silent partner.
I mean, somebody who knows how to do it is a rare thing.
And I want the people of Faithful Word Baptist Church to have the skills
and to be equipped with the skills that they need to do this.
The greatest blessing that you'll ever enjoy as a Christian.
Hey, the greatest blessing that you'll have in your life.
John said, I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.
And he was talking about people that he'd won to the Lord.
He wasn't talking about a physical child there.
He was talking about Gaius, a man that he had won to the Lord.
His convert.
Hey, nothing was a greater joy to him than to know that Gaius was living for God.
His convert.
You'll never experience anything greater than winning somebody to Christ, watching them grow,
watching them get baptized, watching them live for God.
There's nothing like it in the world.
It's so much more exciting than the Super Bowl that's going on right now.
And so we're going to talk about something much more exciting than all that hoopla that's going on in Phoenix tonight.
But let me put it to you this way.
If I'm going to spend my time on something, if I'm going to spend hours a week on something,
go out for several hours knocking doors, I want to know what I'm doing.
I want to do it.
I want to be the most effective I can be.
You can be a terrible soul winner.
You have no skill.
You're not smooth.
You're stumbling all over yourself.
You're dropping your Bible, fumbling through everything.
And you know what?
You'll still get some people saved because God's going to bless you for trying and going out there
and working hard and praying and going forth and weeping, buried in a precious seed.
Hey, you'll doubtless come again rejoicing and bringing your sheep with you.
But don't you want to be the best that you can be for Jesus?
I mean, don't you want to have the best skill that you can possibly have?
I mean, think about it.
The athletes that are down at the Super Bowl, they put in a lot of training.
I mean, I'm sure there's some natural talent involved,
but even the person with the greatest talent down there has spent months and years and years
and day in and day out training.
Everything that they ate, every minute of their schedule was just pointing them toward
Super Bowl, Super Bowl, Super Bowl, Super Bowl.
And it's all just vanity of vanities.
It means nothing.
But I'm going to tell you something.
Winning souls is huge.
I want to spend the same kind of aggressive training, okay?
Don't you think that it would be worthy of your effort to train and become the best somebody you can be?
Or do you think that Jesus would be pleased if you say,
Well, I'm going to win souls, and you just haphazardly, sloppily go out there.
You don't know what you're doing.
You haven't tried to train yourself or be prepared.
Obviously, God wants you to do your best.
And part of doing your best is going to be to be trained
to know the ins and outs of how to effectively preach the gospel and win souls.
Now, first of all, let me say this.
Before I even get into the points of my sermon,
you know, it would do everyone well to memorize the verses that you're going to use for the plan of salvation.
I mean, that would be, to me, that would be a minimum of preparation
if you want to be the best soul winner that you could be.
Now, I'm not saying that you're going to quote it to them.
You know, you're still going to turn in your Bible,
but you're going to do a far better job presenting the gospel
if you memorize the plan of salvation.
Whatever, whatever verses you're going to use,
whatever plan you lay out to preach the gospel,
and you ought to have a plan.
Well, I'm just going to let the Spirit lead.
You know, you ought to have a plan of how you're going to show somebody that they're a sinner,
how you're going to show them that Jesus died for their sins,
what it takes to be saved,
and if you don't have a plan, you're going to leave things out by mistake.
And so it's good to have a plan.
At a very minimum, take, well, I don't have time.
Look, you don't have time to go out and knock a bunch of doors and be unprepared,
is what you don't have time for, to waste time.
What you ought to do is maximize your time out soul winning
by knowing what you're doing, memorizing the plan of salvation.
Some people find it helpful also to draw a map in their Bible,
which would be, let's say the first verse that you're going to start with is Romans 3.23.
You could write next to that what the next verse you're going to turn to.
My personal, typical soul winning plan goes Romans 3.23, Romans 6.23.
So next to 3.23, I could write in my Bible, say in my early days,
and I'm just getting good at this or learning how to do it,
write next to Romans 3.23, I'm going to write Romans 6.23.
And then next to Romans 6.23, I'm going to write Revelation 20, 14, and 15.
And then next to, this is my plan that I use, my basic plan.
And then right next to Revelation 20, 14, and 15, I could write Revelation 21.8,
just to remind me where to go next.
But I'm also going to memorize those verses so that they roll off the tongue,
so that I'm not misreading them or stammering and stuttering.
And so then I could write, I'm sorry, Revelation 21.8.
From Revelation 21.8, I go to Romans 5.8.
From Romans 5.8, I go to Acts 16.31.
From Acts 16.31, I go to John 3.16 and John 3.18.
And from John 3.16 and 3.18, I go to Romans 6.23.
Now, that might be a little bit different than some people's plan or the same as other people's plan.
There's what a very typical plan is known as the Romans Road,
which goes Romans 3.10, Romans 3.23, Romans 6.23, Romans 5.12, Romans 5.8, Romans 10.9, Romans 10.13.
Now, I think that's a great plan.
Personally, I think that the list of scriptures that I gave is better, okay?
Because I think it explains more and it emphasizes more the most important part about salvation, which is believing, faith.
That's why I've changed it up a little bit, is to emphasize faith.
That's why I like to go to John 3.16, John 3.18, and Acts 16.31, which I've added in.
But Romans 10.9 and Romans 10.13 can convey that same truth.
So, if you like to use the Romans Road, use the Romans Road is fantastic.
I've added some other verses in that work to help people understand the truth of these matters,
but you can get the same thing from the Romans Road.
Now, whatever plan you choose to use, you can draw a map in your Bible,
but memorize the verses. I'm telling you, it's important.
Sometimes you might fumble, you can't find it, you can just quote it.
Sometimes people, I've been at doors and I'll try to give somebody the gospel,
and I'll start to open my Bible and say, no, no, no, no.
But they'll talk to you for 20 minutes or a half hour.
But as soon as your Bible opens, nope.
And so, I'll just give them the plan of salvation verbally.
Quote all the verses to them, and I've gotten people saved like that,
that would not listen when I opened the Bible,
because they would just add something about, some kind of a hardness toward the Bible,
but as I preached the gospel to them, their heart was softened by the word of God,
and they got saved.
But let me give you my actual points of my sermon.
Those are just some introductory thoughts.
Number one, this is what you need for soul winning.
Boldness.
Look at, are you in Acts chapter 1?
Look at Acts chapter 4.
Acts 4 31.
The Bible reads in Acts 4 31,
And when they had prayed, the place was shaken,
where they were assembled together,
and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost,
and they spake the word of God with boldness.
So what was the effect of that power,
what was the power that came upon them in Acts 1,
that enabled them to go out and be a witness,
to win soul, to get people to say, hey, it was boldness,
when the Spirit of the Lord was upon them,
when they were filled with the Holy Spirit,
the result was that they spake the word of God with boldness.
Look at Acts 9 27.
While you're turning there, I'll read another scripture,
1 Timothy 3 13,
For they that have used the office of a deacon well,
purchased to themselves a good degree and great boldness in the faith,
which is in Christ Jesus,
saying a deacon ought to be bold.
Why?
Because one of the qualifications of a deacon,
according to Acts 6, was that he's filled with the Holy Spirit.
And a man who's filled with the Holy Spirit is a man who's bold.
Those two things go hand in hand.
One is the byproduct of the other.
And so that's why he's talking about a deacon having boldness,
and being filled with the Holy Ghost, preaching the Gospel,
being a soul winner, like some of the first deacons were,
Philip and Stephen, in particular,
out of the first seven deacons listed in Acts 6.
And so look at Acts 9 27.
But Barnabas took him, speaking of Paul,
and brought him to the apostles and declared unto them
how he had seen the Lord in the way,
and that he had spoken to him,
and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus.
And he was with them coming in and going out of Jerusalem,
and he spake boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus,
and disputed against the Grecians,
but they went about to slay him.
Boldness, in spite of being threatened,
in spite of having people wanting to kill him,
he preached boldly because he was filled with the Holy Spirit,
which is what's going to make you a great soul winner.
Look at Acts 19 verse 8.
Acts 19 verse 8.
And he went into the synagogue,
and spake boldly for the space of three months,
disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God.
No need to turn there, but Philippians 1 20.
According to my earnest expectation and my hope,
that nothing I should be ashamed,
but that with all boldness, as always so,
now also Christ shall be magnified in my body,
whether it be by life or by death.
He said, with all boldness, I want Christ to be magnified in my body.
Ephesians chapter 6, I believe, where he says,
and for me that utterance may be given unto me,
that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the Gospel.
Boldness.
He says, wherein I am an ambassador and bonds,
that therein I may speak boldly as I ought to speak.
Even in jail, he says, I don't want to go soft,
I want to preach the Gospel boldly.
Now, you say, how am I going to incorporate boldness into my soul winning?
What's a practical way that I'm going to be bold in my soul winning,
like Paul was, like John was, like Peter was?
I want to have people say I want to be bold.
Well, let's start with the very beginning of your soul winning.
Now, I would say that the two most important parts of your soul winning,
and obviously it's very important that you get the plan of salvation across.
I mean, that's the most important part.
But as far as the delivery, the most difficult part, I guess,
would be a better way of putting it.
All of it's important or else we wouldn't be doing it.
But the most difficult part is the beginning and the end.
I mean, that's going to be the toughest part, as a soul winner.
And so, let's talk about the beginning.
You get to the door, and we're being very practical.
We want you to know how to do this.
You knock on the door.
Hi, my name is Steven Anderson.
I'm from Faithful Word Baptist Church.
Just wanted to give you an invitation to church.
Right?
And I hold out the invitation and put it in their hand,
and I say, do you go to church anywhere?
Now, when I ask that question, I don't care where they go to church.
No matter what they say, it doesn't affect what I do next at all.
Okay?
I just say, so, I say, do you go to church anywhere?
It doesn't matter whether, whatever church they list,
whatever, or no church, or used to go to church,
whatever they say, it doesn't even matter.
Because no matter what they say, the next thing I say,
well, more important to go to church.
Okay, that's just kind of an icebreaker.
And then I just say, well, more important to go to church, though.
If you were to die today, do you know for sure that you'd go to heaven?
Now, I ask that question, they're going to give me either a yes, no, I hope so, maybe not.
Now, here's the thing.
If they say, yes, I know for sure I'm going to heaven,
this is going to be the most difficult person to win the Lord.
Unless they're already saved, and that's great, praise the Lord.
But, you know, they're a Roman Catholic, or a Mormon, or a Lutheran, or whatever,
and they're like, yes, I know for sure that I'm going to heaven.
This is going to be a tough one, okay?
Because they already think they're on their way to heaven,
they don't need you to give them the Gospel in their mind, okay?
So, that person who just says, yes, I know for sure,
I just say, well, how do you know that?
And then, whatever they tell me, if it's the right answer, the wrong answer, whatever,
I basically, if they tell me, this is why, and let's do this.
Let's say they're going to some goofball religion, you know they're not saved,
I mean, they're a Mormon Catholic, whatever.
And they say, yes, I know for sure, because I've been saved.
So, it sounds like the right answer.
Okay, well, then the next thing I'm going to do is,
I'm going to try to get them to expose the fact that they're not really trusting Christ as Savior.
So, I'll say to the next, well, you know, is there anything that you could do to lose that?
Like, let's say you quit going to church, or sometimes I'll say this,
well, what would happen if you just quit going to church,
and you got into sin, and you even got to the point where you just, you murdered somebody?
Would you still go to heaven then?
And then usually, if they're not saved, you know, they're going to say,
well, no, I mean, you know, you can't kill somebody and go to heaven, you know.
And they say, well, you know, you got to live right, you know,
you got to follow the commandments, you got to try and live right.
See, that's where they start exposing the fact that they're trusting in works.
So, if they give the vehement yes, you try to go further to expose that they're not saved
by using eternal security, and saying, can you lose it
if you go out and kill somebody, or commit adultery, or quit church, and whatever.
But sometimes, with those people that are just really vehemently, they just know for sure,
sometimes you're going to try, and you might just say, all right, see you later,
go to the next door, you know, because they're not open to it, they're not receptive to it.
You know, you want to try to give them the gospel,
you want to try to give the gospel to everybody.
But if they're not open to it or receptive to it, sometimes you just say, all right, see you later.
Now, if they say, I'm pretty sure,
Now, if they say, you're looking for any doubt, okay?
So, if they say, I'm pretty sure, that's not 100% sure, is it?
If they say, well, I think I would, okay?
If they say anything like that, I think I would, I hope so, probably, I'm pretty sure,
I say this, well, can I just take five minutes and just show you how you can be 100% sure?
So, I'm trying to contrast being 100% sure with their slightly watered down answer.
If they say, well, can I just take five minutes and just show you how you can know 100% for sure, okay?
And then, also, if they say, you know, I hope so, I'm trying, you know, obviously,
you know they're not safe, you say, well, look, can I show you how you can know for sure?
If they say, no, I don't know that for sure, again, it's just,
can I take five minutes and just show you how you can know 100%?
Yeah, are you really going to take five minutes? It might be more like 10, 15, you know?
But you're saying five minutes because that's what you want them to give you
and once you get the five minutes, they'll probably give you a little bit more
so you can continue and finish it off.
Because once you get five minutes into it, what you're saying is so powerful,
it's so interesting, it's so powerful that they're going to continue to listen
for the 10 minutes or 15 minutes or whatever it takes.
Now, really the only way that you're really having a struggle here
is when they say, yes, I know for sure.
Most people aren't going to say, yes, I know for sure.
Most people are going to say, I hope so, probably, I think so, I'm not sure,
I don't know, I'd like to think so, no, I'm not.
And those are all great answers because then you just say,
well, can I show you 100%?
Now, let's bring in the boldness element.
One way that I mean by bringing boldness into your soul is
you want to expect them to want to listen to you.
Don't expect them to say no. Don't be like this.
Well, I mean, you wouldn't want to let me show you this now, would you?
I mean, is it all right if I just show you this in five minutes?
You don't want to be weak like that because that's not boldness.
The opposite of being bold is being timid.
Can I show you this?
They're going to say, no, I don't have time for this, no, see you later.
But see, when I ask somebody, I say to them, I say,
can I just take five minutes and just show you this?
Yeah, huh? Can I show you this?
And to be honest with you, a lot of it's psychological.
I mean, when I ask that person if they want to know,
I'm expecting them to say yes.
Let me put it to you this way. It's called faith.
It's like you're believing that God has sent you here.
You're believing that God wants you to be here preaching the gospel
and that God's going to help you and that God is going to work in this person's heart
and you're going to be surprised if they don't listen.
That's the attitude that I try to have also.
I want to have a boldness that doesn't say, wow, somebody's actually going to say yes to me?
I'm just expecting them to say yes.
And if they say no, I'm surprised about that. Does that make sense?
And so I want to have the confidence of saying, can I show you this?
Take five minutes, can I show you this?
I'm expecting them to be like, okay, sure, yes.
It's funny, I was talking to my sister and
she went out soul winning with somebody who'd never been soul winning before.
She was telling me some of the stories. It was great.
She took out this new soul winner and somebody got saved.
Whenever you take somebody new out, you always want somebody to get saved
to help excite that person so that they'll want to keep coming
and keep being involved with soul winning.
She takes this girl out and this girl's all excited about soul winning
and never done it before.
She's following my sister and they go to the door.
A lot of doors were being slammed and nobody was really listening.
Well, they get to this one door and my sister says,
do you know for sure if you died today you'd go to heaven?
And on and on, she goes through it and she says, well, can I show you this?
And the girl steps outside and shuts the door and says, sure.
And as soon as she said, okay, sure,
then the girl that was with my sister just went like this, yes!
So my sister's embarrassed because my sister has the attitude like I have.
Well, she's expecting people to say yes.
She's acting like it's perfectly, of course they're going to say yes, yes,
they're going to show you this, boldness.
But this girl, she said, can we show you?
Yeah, sure, you can show me.
This girl's like, yes!
She literally did that like, yes!
Because then my sister's embarrassed.
Now this girl thinks that, what, one in a thousand people say yes.
It's like we just won the lottery or something.
Somebody's going to listen.
I thought that was pretty funny.
She's like, yes, score!
Somebody's going to listen.
And so it ought not be that way in your soul winning.
You have to have confidence and boldness that people need to hear it.
You've got the good news.
I mean, why shouldn't they want to listen to you?
It's shocking that they don't care if they're going to heaven or hell.
That ought to surprise you.
And so you ought to just be ready and expecting.
Of course people want to hear it.
Of course people want to get saved.
People need to hear this.
Of course they've got five minutes to listen to this.
So that's one way that you can be bold.
But other ways, sometimes people are timid.
And they don't want to mention hell.
Because they're too timid or afraid.
They don't want to offend anybody.
You know, have the boldness to just lay it out on the line the way it is.
Look, you're a sinner and the punishment is hell for all of our sins.
Now I don't beat that into the ground with people.
I get them to realize it and admit it.
As soon as I get somebody to realize it and admit it, look.
You've committed sin and you deserve to go to hell.
I move on.
I've been with some people so many, and they just run that into the ground.
I mean, they'll go through each of the Ten Commandments
showing the person how they violated each and every one of them.
Have you ever done this?
Have you ever lusted before?
Huh?
You know, the guy's wife is standing like five feet behind him.
Have you ever thought a dirty thought?
Huh?
You're an adulterer.
Have you ever lied to your wife?
She's like standing right behind him, you know?
Have you ever stolen?
Huh?
Are you cussing?
Have you ever wanted something that didn't belong to you?
That's covetousness.
Have you ever done that?
I mean, just going through and just ripping somebody's face.
And I mean literally saying like,
You're so disgusting in the sight of God, you're like a filthy rag.
You know what I mean?
You know, and if you take that verse in context,
it's a person saying it about themselves.
You know, humbling themselves saying,
All of our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
And I've shown that to somebody,
but you know, I say it the way the Bible says it,
like, all of our righteousnesses, okay?
That's in the first person plural.
It's not all your righteousness.
You on your best day is a filthy rag, you piece of trash.
Okay?
That's not a good way to go soul winning,
and that's not the good news.
But at the same time, hey, the good news is,
you're going to hell.
Hey, the good news is, you're wicked as hell.
You dirty, filthy pervert, rotten scumbag.
It's only by the grace of God that you're going to go to heaven,
because you're such a piece of trash.
That's not the way you should go soul winning,
and you can't show me that in the Bible for a soul winning technique.
It's not right.
But that's the movement.
That's the trend now.
You know, you got to go out,
and people should be like shaking
when you're talking about conviction,
and they're going to be like shaking and crying.
Yeah, they probably will be crying
after you tell them how worthless they are.
But that's not the right way to do it.
But at the same time, you don't want to be a wimp,
and, you know, not mention hell, not tell them they're a sinner.
But you know what?
Somebody doesn't have to be a scum dirtbag to go to hell anyway.
They just have to be a sinner.
So all you have to do is prove that they're a sinner.
The sin that I usually use is lying,
because the Bible says that everybody has lied.
Not everybody has committed murder.
Not everybody has committed adultery.
And so the sin that everybody has committed is lying.
And so I just show them in Revelation 21, 8,
and I mentioned that earlier in my list of scriptures,
that all liars shall have their part in the lake
which burneth with fire and bridges.
And I just say, look,
where does it say that liars are going when they die?
To hell.
And so that's all it takes.
I mean, I show them, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
And I say come short, not fall short.
That's the NIV.
It's come short.
For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
There's a difference between falling short and coming short.
See, coming short means you're moving from the bottom to the top,
and you don't get there.
Fall short means you were up there, and then you fell down here.
Okay?
We're not Mormons.
We don't believe that we, you know, fell out of the sky
and we used to be in heaven before we were babies.
Okay?
And so we come short of the glory of God.
Okay?
And come short, this is how I explain the term come short.
I say, look, I point at the phrase come short,
because the first verse I go to, Romans 3.23,
I say for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,
I say, do we measure up to what God expects us?
You know?
No, we come short.
We don't measure up.
We don't reach, we don't attain God's standards.
And then I say, well, there's a punishment for our sin.
I take them to Romans 6.23, I show them the wages of sin is death.
Then I take them to Revelation 20, 14, 15,
and explain to them that after you die physically,
there's a second death.
Okay?
Hell.
And I show them that, you know, even lying will send you to hell.
It lists all these sins.
The fearful and unbelieving.
Being an unbeliever sends you to hell.
Telling a lie sends you to hell.
Fearful, unbelieving, liar.
I mean, these are things that we've all done.
Or are guilty of right now, even.
You know, people are unbelieving as you talk to them.
People have lied, and they continue to lie throughout their life.
And so, you can show them that they're a sinner.
Look, if a person already understands that they're a sinner,
it's time to move on to the next point.
If they already understand that hell is the condemnation, move on.
Because I've watched people convince, somebody's just like,
yep, I believe that, yep, we're sinner, we deserve to go to hell.
And then they'll spend like 10 more minutes on that.
What is the point?
They already understand that they already believe it,
they've already agreed to it.
Let's get to the gospel, you know, let's get to the good news.
Why would you sit there and run something into the ground?
And even the other points, once you've got them to believe it and agree,
hey, let's move on and finish the job here,
and not just spend hours talking to somebody,
just for the sake of spending hours talking to somebody.
There's no point.
And so, boldness.
Expect them to listen.
Don't be timid and shy about it.
Come out of your shell, be bold, expect them to listen.
Have confidence.
When somebody comes to me and talks to me about something,
they're not even confident in themselves and what they're saying.
Why would I be confident in what they're saying is true.
They don't even seem confident.
So, have boldness.
You say, I'm a shy person, I'm a timid person.
Pray for boldness.
The Holy Spirit will give you boldness.
Okay.
And so, you have boldness in your beginning.
You start out, you know, they want to listen,
you've got the good news, and you're ready to give it to them.
Also, boldness.
Don't leave out hell.
Don't leave out the fact that they're a sinner.
Give them the straight talk.
This is the way it is.
This is the bottom line.
Okay.
Now, you get into the plan of salvation.
You've convinced them that they're a sinner.
You've convinced them that they're on their way to hell.
Now it's time to give them the gospel, the good news,
the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
So, from there, this is what I say.
After I've shown them this, I say,
but, I said, God loves you.
So, if God loves you, does God want you to go to hell, do you think?
And they say, well, no.
And I say, well, look, but doesn't the Bible say that you deserve to go to hell?
I mean, and sometimes I'll say this.
You think God just says that, but he doesn't mean it?
You think God just says, well, they're all going to go to hell,
but I guess they can go to heaven because I'm an icicle of God.
No, I mean, God means what he says.
But I said, but God wanted to, because he loved you,
he wanted to find a way to save you so that you wouldn't have to go to hell.
Here's how he did that.
And I take him to Romans 5-8.
But God commended his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners,
Christ died for us.
And I explained to them how Jesus Christ and God in the flesh
came to this world, lived the perfect life that none of us can live.
And then, he was beaten, he was lied about, spat upon, arrested, you know,
nailed to the cross, and I say to them this,
when he was nailed to the cross, the Bible says that
he himself bare our sins in his own body on the tree.
So every sin I've ever done, every sin you've ever done,
every sin that anybody in the whole world has ever done,
when Jesus was on that cross, it was as if he had done it.
And so when Jesus was dying on the cross,
he was not being punished for any of his own sins,
because he had no sin, he was being punished for your sins.
He was dying for you, as in, he was dying in your place.
And I explained that to them.
And I explained to them how he died on the cross,
his body was buried in a tomb,
his soul went down to hell for three days and three nights,
and then I asked them, what happened three days later?
Because usually they didn't really answer.
He rose again from the dead.
And then I asked them this,
do you believe that Jesus died for everybody?
And usually they say, yes, I believe that.
And I'll say, well, you're right, because the Bible says
that he died not for our sins only, but also the sins of the whole world.
But I say, do you think that everybody's going to heaven?
And they usually say, well, no, they're probably not.
And I say, you're right again.
There's only one thing that separates who's going to heaven and who's not.
Who's going to heaven from who's going to hell.
I said, it's very simple, let me show it to you.
And I take them to Acts 16, 31.
And I show them where it says, what must I do to be saved?
And they said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved in thy house.
And I say, does that say that you have to go to church?
No.
Does that say that you have to live a good life? No.
Does that say that you have to repent of your sins
and turn over a new leaf and change your life around
and be willing to quit your sins and quit drinking?
And I'll just list these things off.
And they say, no.
I say, what does it say that you have to do to be saved?
They say, believe.
And I say, let me show you the most famous verse in the Bible.
I take them to John 3, 16.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish,
but have everlasting honor.
I say, does it say whosoever is good enough?
Whosoever goes to church?
Whosoever is sincere? Whosoever lives a good life?
No, it's whosoever believeth.
Whosoever, as I explained,
if they're not, whosoever means whoever believeth.
And then I take them down to John 3, 18.
He that believeth on him is not condemned,
but he that believeth not is condemned already
because he had not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
I said, look, isn't that clear?
Those who believe are not condemned.
I say, can you see from these scriptures I'm showing you
that it's all based on what you believe,
whether you believe on Christ or not.
And usually it's very clear to them at this point.
Then I say to them this, I say,
well, let me show you one last verse that kind of puts it all together.
And I'm going to spend a lot of time on it.
You know, I don't tell them this,
but I'm going to spend some time on this verse.
But I say, hey, this is the last verse.
This is going to tie it all together.
I take them to Romans 6, 23.
That's where I finish off every time.
A lot of people finish off with Romans 10, 9, Romans 10, 13.
I prefer to finish with Romans 6, 23
because the thing that I want to spend my time on
and emphasize is that salvation is by faith
and that it's a gift and that it's eternal, okay?
Because that's what they need to believe in order to be saved.
That's what they need to understand.
That's what they need to see.
So that's where I'm going to spend my time, okay?
And so I spend my time on Romans 6, 23.
Sometimes I'll use...
And I'm not going to belabor this because you know this,
but I'm going to show them illustrations about a gift,
who pays for it, the giver or the receiver,
of course, the person who's giving the gift.
I'll role play with them.
Let's say I'm going to give you my car, keys to my car.
And I say, here, I'm going to give you this car,
but you owe me $5 for that car.
And I say, well, look, the car is worth $20,000.
Five bucks.
But it's still not a gift because you're paying for it.
Even one cent.
I mean, it's only a gift if it's free.
And then I'll say, well, once I give it to you, whose is it?
Or sometimes I'll use my Bible and say,
if I give you this Bible as a gift, this is a gift from me to you,
but I just need $5.
It's not a gift.
And usually people can understand this.
If you're paying for it, then it's not a gift to you.
It's a purchase.
And I explain to them that Jesus paid it all.
Jesus paid for the gift of your eternal life
with His blood on the cross, with His death, burial, and resurrection.
All you have to do is receive it.
I explain to them that once He gets it to you, it's yours.
And I say to them this.
If I were to give you a Bible, and I said,
here, I'm going to give you this gift, this Bible, as a gift from me to you,
and not only that, but I'm promising you that I'm giving it to you forever.
I mean, it's yours forever.
I said, if I came back two weeks later or two years later,
the point is that, and I took that from you,
was I telling the truth when I said it was forever?
They say no.
And I show them.
I say, what does eternal mean?
In Romans 6.23, they say forever.
I say, if God gives you a gift that's eternal,
how many times do you have to get it?
Just once.
And how long does it last?
Forever.
Could He ever take it away from you?
No.
And if they're having trouble understanding it too,
I'll quote some other verses like Hebrews 13.5.
Let the conversation be without covetousness,
and be content with such things as he hath.
For he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
Or 1 John 2.24, where he says,
This is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life.
Titus 1.2, In hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie,
promised before the world began.
Or, you know, on and on, you can go.
I mean, how many times does the words everlasting and eternal occur?
You say, Pastor, why is it that you emphasize
eternal security so much in soul winning?
Because the Bible emphasizes it by saying,
again and again, eternal, eternal, eternal, everlasting, everlasting.
How many times are those words used in the Bible?
Again and again and again.
It's vital to understand that.
And I'll tell you what.
Let me just stop right here and say this.
A lot of independent fundamental Baptist soul winning
is not really getting people saved.
I'm telling you, I've been soul winning with people,
and I've been in independent fundamental Baptist churches for years,
and I mean, I think a lot of these independent fundamental Baptist
soul winners are not really even getting people saved.
And they're just spinning their wheels.
Because here's what they do.
They go around, and they get people to admit that they're a sinner.
They show them that Jesus is the only way to heaven.
And they take them to Romans 10-9, and they show them,
you know, if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus,
and believe in thy heart that God has raised him dead,
thou shalt be saved. Romans 10-9.
Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
And they'll pray with that person and pray with them
and have them pray that they, you know,
that they're receiving Christ as Savior.
But the problem is that that person,
you could ask that person when they're done.
And I would challenge anyone,
anyone maybe who's listened to this from a CD or something in the future,
anybody who is, you know,
you go soul winning with somebody who's not from our church or something,
I would challenge these people to,
when they're done winning somebody to Christ,
to ask them whether they believe that you could lose it.
And a lot of them would say,
well, yeah, I mean, you've still got to live right.
Because it's not being emphasized in soul winning
among independent Baptists, I'm telling you.
They'll go soul winning, and they emphasize praying the prayer
instead of emphasizing believe on Jesus, okay?
And so, sometimes they'll ask me,
well, why are you going to heaven?
Because I prayed.
You know, that's what they'll answer.
But if you ask that same person, could you ever lose it?
Like if you killed somebody, or what if you never go to church,
or what if you don't get baptized?
A lot of times they'll say, well, you do have to live right.
You do have to follow the commandments.
Did they get salvation?
They're no better off than when you got there.
You didn't win people to the Lord.
If you go out and run through the Roman's road with somebody,
and pray a prayer with them,
and they still believe that if they don't live right,
they're going to go to hell,
and if they do live right, they'll go to heaven,
how is that person saved?
Explain that to me.
And I mean, it's been scary for me,
and it's been very, very disturbing to me
to see how many independent Baptists go soul winning,
and it's kind of a one, two, three, repeat after me.
It's disturbing.
They'll talk to a Roman Catholic.
They'll show the Roman Catholic they're a sinner.
The Roman Catholic believes they're a sinner.
They'll say, believe Jesus died and rose again.
The Roman Catholic says, I believe that.
Pray with me and receive Christ.
They pray.
Did they get saved?
No, because they still believe in works,
and that's not salvation.
You understand what I'm saying?
I mean, it's crucial that you understand
that an unsaved person, in order to get saved,
it's not that they didn't pray the prayer, right?
There's all these people around that just believe the right thing,
but they just never prayed that prayer.
Do you think that's their problem?
Do you think people are going to go to hell
because they didn't pray the prayer?
They believed it all right, but they didn't pray the prayer.
But that's what these independent Baptists,
it seems like what they're doing,
because they go around and ask,
they ask them if they believe things that they already believe.
Well, pray this with me.
Okay, now you're saved.
That doesn't make any sense.
What does the Bible say?
Pray a prayer and thou shalt be saved.
Whosoever prayeth and has Jesus saved, thou shalt be saved.
It's whosoever believeth in him.
Not believing in their church to save them.
Not believing in baptism or their own works.
You've got to believe on Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
And I'm telling you, soul winners in America
need to quit doing this one, two, three, repeat after me
and understand that a person is going to get saved.
They have to change what they believe.
They believe one thing when you get there.
You walk up, you talk to them,
what they believe has got to change if they're going to go to heaven.
If what they believe didn't change,
either they were already saved or they're still not saved,
because salvation is based on what you believe.
I mean, pastors all over America,
let's bring it into another arena.
They preach behind a pulpit,
every head bowed, every eyes closed,
you know, the ritual that they go through,
and they say,
there's people here that have been coming to this church for years
and you've never been saved.
You need to come down the aisle and get saved right now,
you know, and you've never prayed to receive Christ as Savior.
Now look, the reason people aren't saved is because they believe wrong.
What they ought to be saying,
if they want to get their unsaved church members saved,
maybe they should get up and preach and say,
hey, you don't believe right.
You think it's by works.
You think you can lose it.
You think it's because you gave up your sins.
Hey, trust Christ alone as Savior
and get on your knees and pray and confess to Jesus Christ as your only way to heaven.
Hey, that ought to be salvation.
Pray and ask Jesus to save you,
but change what you believe, okay.
If you don't change what you believe,
if you believe the same thing you believe,
then you're still not saved if you still believe.
And, you know, people say,
well, they have a head knowledge but not a heart knowledge.
I've had all kinds of examples of people touted to me
who turned out later not to be saved,
and they said, well, they had a head knowledge but not a heart knowledge.
You talk to those people,
you find out they never believed that it was by grace through faith plus amount.
They were either trying to say you have to give up your sins
or they thought you could lose it.
They never believed that it was all through Jesus,
because guess what?
People who believe that it's all Jesus are saved.
And we need to get back to emphasizing faith,
what the Bible emphasizes.
Believe, believe.
Who's gonna believe it?
He that believeth not.
He that believeth.
Who's gonna believeth on me?
That's what the Bible emphasizes, not praying a prayer.
Now, do I believe in praying a prayer?
Of course.
As soon as I'm done preaching the Gospel to somebody,
getting them to change what they believe,
then I say, pray with me.
I'm gonna help you tell God that that's what you believe,
and ask for salvation.
And if you ask, you'll receive,
but you gotta believe in your heart,
or you're not gonna receive it.
I'm telling you what.
I'd say a lot.
I mean, I dread to think,
and I'm not even gonna speculate right now,
but I'm telling you a huge percentage of soul winning is just
people going out and praying with people,
but they didn't get them to change what they believe,
because they didn't even tell them about eternal security half the time.
They didn't even tell them,
they didn't even emphasize to them that it's not works.
They just said,
well, you just gotta believe this, pray this, both.
Did you tell them that it's not of works?
That's how you manage to boast?
Did you tell them that they can't lose it?
That it's not based on them?
That it's not based on church?
That it's only based on what Jesus has already done on the cross?
That's how you're gonna make sure that somebody's gonna say it.
Now, listen.
Pastor Anderson.
Here's the question.
Pastor Anderson.
Do you believe that you could win somebody to Christ
without explaining eternal security to them before you pray with them?
Yeah, of course it's possible for somebody to get saved
without me specifically explaining to them eternal security.
You know, if I just explain to them that it's all through what Jesus did on the cross,
you gotta believe on Jesus alone is your only way to heaven.
You know what?
But I'm gonna tell you something.
I think that the vast majority of people,
if you don't explain to them eternal life,
probably will not understand the Gospel.
And you say, well, I think you're off on that.
Well, you know what?
I've been soul winning for thousands and thousands of hours,
and I've seen thousands of people saved,
and I'm telling you that if you don't explain eternal security to people,
when you're done praying with them,
they still think that they have to live right.
Okay?
I'm just telling you that.
Now, there are exceptions to that,
but I'm just telling you the way that works.
I'm telling you that when you don't emphasize that it's eternal and everlasting,
then people walk away thinking that they still have to do their part.
And the best way, and yes, there are other ways to teach people this,
but the best way to show somebody who's not saved that they're not saved,
the best way to show them that the Gospel is free and that salvation is all through Jesus,
the best way is by talking about eternal security.
That's the best way.
It's the best way to show Catholics that they're not saved,
to show Mormons, Jovis, Witnesses, anybody that they're not saved,
is by emphasizing eternal security.
It's the greatest soul winning method that I've ever learned from anyone,
and it is the most effective thing that I've ever taught to anybody,
everybody I've ever taught that to,
it has revolutionized their soul winning.
And so we could sit here and debate it all night.
The 1 John 5, 10 says,
He that believeth on the Son of God hath to witness in himself.
He that believeth not God hath made him a liar,
because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son,
and this is the record that God hath given unto us eternal life,
and this life is in his Son.
The record that people have to believe in order to be saved is that God has given to us eternal life.
If they don't believe that, they're not saved.
You could debate me all day long on that, but that's what the Bible says.
If you don't believe that God has given to us eternal life and this life is in his Son,
you are making God a liar and you are not saved.
Period.
And arguing with me, and you know, that's a rare doctrine.
You know, most people think that all these Pentecostals are saved,
they just think they can lose it.
You know what, you can argue that with me all day long.
I don't care.
It's not going to take one Pentecostal out of hell
for you to pretend that people who believe you can lose your salvation are saved.
You can pretend that all you want, that Nazarenes and Assemblies of God
and all these people who believe you can lose your salvation are saved.
Go ahead and pretend that all you want.
But it's not going to take one Assemblies of God or Nazarene out of the pit of hell
because you tell yourself that they're saved.
Why don't you just face up to the reality that people have to believe the record
that God has given of his Son in order to be saved.
And then when the first step is recognizing the problem,
and then you can get them saved and win them to Christ.
Just face it.
Just face up to it, you know.
Your relative that's Assemblies of God is going to hell
because they think you can lose your salvation.
Because they don't believe it.
They don't believe what Jesus did is enough.
They think it's what they do and what Jesus did working in tandem
and that is not salvation.
Period.
And so emphasize eternal security.
Now, let me give you some other tips.
I'm trying to hurry.
Whenever I preach these kind of sermons I run out of time
because there's so much I want to say.
And I apologize to people who have heard some of these things again and again.
But it's good to emphasize them again and some people might not have heard them
or got it the first time.
So we've got to go through this thoroughly
because I want you to be a thorough soul winner.
Get people saved.
I'm not just trying to put a bunch of numbers on the bulletin.
Who cares?
You think I care about these numbers?
Look, Brother Dave has been my soul winning partner a lot
for the last year and a half.
And Brother Dave knows that if we talk to somebody and pray with somebody
but we walk away and we're not really sure that they got it,
Brother Dave will tell you that I never count that person.
Isn't that true, Brother Dave?
I mean, if we pray with somebody and they pray and get saved,
but we're like, hmm, you know, we did the best we could,
we preached it to them, they wanted to pray and get saved,
but I'm not really sure that they even got it, you know,
because there were some red flags or whatever.
We don't count those people.
I mean, we're not just looking for ching, ching, ching, ching, ching, ching.
It's dumb.
You know, numbers are...
The whole point of putting the numbers on the bulletin is just to motivate us.
It's just to give us goals to reach so that we can aim higher and win more souls.
It's just something to encourage us.
Not everybody goes solving.
It's for people to be blessed, to see the people being saved through our efforts.
And that's why we put those on the bulletin, and we're going to keep them in the bulletin.
I like having them in the bulletin.
But it's not a numbers game, right?
It's about getting people saved.
All that really matters is how many people are in heaven,
not how many people are written on the page.
And so that's that.
Anyway, let me say this.
And I'm going to skip over some of my points,
but let me just give them to you without elaborating on them.
Emphasize eternal security.
I can't emphasize that to you enough right now.
And emphasize believe, not the prayer.
The prayer is important, but believe is 10,000 times more important.
So believe, believe, believe, faith, faith, faith.
I'm going to skip that point, okay?
You can just think about that.
But here's something that will really help you with your soul winning.
Use basically the same methods for everyone that you talk to.
Don't try and get all elaborate and creative with people.
And don't think that winning a Mormon is different than winning a Jehovah's Witness,
is different than winning a Catholic, is different than...
And a lot of people go down this road where they study all these false religions.
Well, I'm going to read the Book of Mormon so that I can know how to win Mormons.
Why would you want to fill your mind with lies?
Oh, I'm going to study all the Mormon literature.
I'm going to study the Jehovah's Witness magazine.
You don't need to know what they believe.
Know the truth.
You know, I've heard that people who are trained in banks to study counterfeit,
you know, to recognize counterfeit bills, they study the true bill.
They don't spend just days and weeks studying every kind of counterfeit bill.
There's too many different kinds and they're always coming up with new counterfeits.
They're always coming up with new counterfeits for Christianity.
Study the real bill.
Study the watermark.
Shine the little blue light to find the little seal.
Okay, hold it up and see the stripe.
You know, do all this stuff.
Okay, that's what you do to see whether that bill is real.
And you only need to know the true gospel and be able to present that.
I remember I was talking to my grandma the other day
and she was telling me how, because my grandpa's family, a lot of them were Mormons.
They were kind of Jack Mormons, if you know what that means.
I wasn't really that into it, didn't really believe in it much,
but a lot of my relatives were Jack Mormons.
Some of them, later on down the line, became just these dyed-in-the-wool Mormons,
you know, just hardcore.
But he had a burden to try to win all these Mormons,
his relatives and his family, the Lord.
He wanted to see them saved.
So he went out and he bought the Book of Mormon.
And he said, you know, I'm going to read this
because I want to be able to have an intelligent conversation with them,
you know, and get them saved.
And so he got the Book of Mormon.
He read like two pages of it.
He got mad, started yelling at it.
He started yelling at the Book of Mormon.
He's like, this stupid piece of trash!
You know, threw it in the trash.
So then, like a couple of years later, she said,
he went out and bought it again.
He's like, I'm going to read this and I want to be able to, you know,
talk to them and show them what's wrong with it.
He got it and read a page or two and he said,
this stupid piece of junk, he just threw it in the trash, got mad.
He's like, this is why this stupid thing belongs next to this.
Look, he had it right.
Reading the Book of Mormon is not going to help him be a better soul winner.
People ask me all the time, have you ever read the Book of Mormon?
No.
To this day, I've never read it.
I've never even read a whole page of it.
Oh, you're ignorant, blah, blah, blah.
Look, the part that I read was stupid enough for me to see that it was bogus.
Okay?
Look, let me just bury, put the final shovel of dirt on Mormonism
for how wicked and bizarre it is.
Mormons, this is all I have to say and whenever I talk,
when I give the Gospel to a Mormon and they don't get saved,
this is the thought that I leave them with.
Once I give them the Gospel, I just tell them, you know what?
I say, you believe in more than one God and I believe in one God,
one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, the Lord Jesus Christ.
You believe in hundreds and thousands of God.
I say, that's not Christianity.
I mean, that's all you have to know about Mormons.
Well, could there be saved Mormons?
They don't even believe in God.
They believe in multiple gods.
Did you know that?
It's polytheism and so that's all we need to know about it,
that it's wicked and the wrong religion.
But listen, what I want to emphasize to you right now is
you don't need to study Mormonism, Catholicism,
Jehovah's Witness, all these different doctrines.
Have fun trying to learn what they all are.
It's too much and you know what?
You're going to pervert your mind in the process.
The Bible says in Jeremiah 10 to learn not the way of the heathen.
The Bible said in Romans 16, 19,
but yet I would have you wise unto that which is good and simple concerning evil.
Be simple concerning the Book of Mormon.
Who cares what it's about?
If it contradicts the Bible, we don't need to read it.
If the Apocrypha contradicts the Bible,
I read about two or three pages of the Apocrypha.
I said, this is stupid.
It's junk. It's contradicting the Bible.
I didn't feel the need to finish reading it.
I don't want to fill my mind with junk.
You can tell that the spirits are not of God.
There's nuts to them.
And so that's all.
But here's what I want to emphasize about that.
When I'm given the Gospel to a Catholic, a Jehovah's Witness, or a Mormon,
I start out the same.
I give the Gospel the same.
I finish the same the only time that it changes.
Because there are some specific concerns that you may need to address with Mormons, Catholics,
Jehovah's Witnesses, or some of these of God.
But it doesn't affect the way I start.
I start out by giving them the same plan of salvation.
Here's why.
All false religions have one thing in common.
They don't believe in eternal security,
and they don't believe that it's through faith alone without works.
The Catholics don't believe that?
Do the Mormons believe that it's by faith alone?
No works? No repent of your sins?
It's all Jesus?
Jesus paid it all?
They don't believe that.
Do the Jehovah's Witnesses believe that?
Do the Seventh-day Adventists believe that?
Do the Assemblies of God?
Do you see how it doesn't matter who you're dealing with?
It's just the same thing that you go through with them?
But then, let me give you a perfect illustration of this.
There was a Jehovah's Witness guy that I won to the Lord in Chicago,
and this man, I won him to the Lord, he got baptized in church after he got saved.
So this was a great victory to give the Gospel to a Jehovah's Witness,
have them receive it and be saved,
and then to come to a Baptist church the next day and get baptized.
Praise the Lord for that, right?
That's the power of God.
And so, let me tell you how I did it, okay?
I talked to this guy, I sat down with him,
I went through the plan of salvation exactly like I do with everybody else,
the way that I explained.
You're a sinner, blah, blah, blah.
I'm not going to go on, no, no.
When I got to the very end, I proved to him that it was eternal.
It's all Jesus.
I said, now, wait a minute.
I said, before you get saved, I said, there's one more thing that you need to believe,
because I knew that you believed wrong on this because he, you know, born raised Jehovah's Witness.
I said, there's one thing that you need to change about what you believe.
I said, you know, you don't believe that Jesus is God.
You believe he's the Son of God, but you don't believe he's the only one God.
You know, they also believe in a multiplicity of gods, if you will.
And I said to him, I said this, I said, listen,
if I could just show you in the Bible where the Bible just flat out says that Jesus is God,
I said, would you believe it if you saw it in the Bible?
And he said, if you can show me in the Bible, I'll believe it.
And I said, okay, you know, because he's already softened,
because I've already gone through the powerful part.
Because I'm telling you, when you talk to these Jehovah's Witnesses about eternal security,
you know, it's news to them.
And it's a powerful message that Jesus paid it all.
And that it's all through Jesus, by grace, through faith, not of works.
That's powerful.
And so, once you get through that, you're going to have an easier time
tearing apart some of their false doctrine.
But if you start right in, just in an argument about whether Jesus is God,
before you've even given him the Gospel, you're not going to get anywhere.
You start in ripping on Catholicism before you give the Gospel, bad move.
Now, you've got to tear it apart, but wait until you're done giving him the Gospel,
then tear it apart, then pray with him and help him receive Christ as Savior,
and turn away from that wickedness.
You've got to do it in that order, I'm telling you.
If you just walk in, just, let me show you everything that's wrong with Catholicism.
They don't want to hear it. It's not a powerful message.
They're not going to, you know, they're just going to argue with you and push you away.
I'm just telling you the truth about it.
And so, what did I do?
I took him to a couple of real clear verses.
I showed him Hebrews 1.8, as a good verse to Jesus as God.
I took him to the part where Jesus says,
Why callest thou me good?
There is none good but one, that is God.
And the reason I like that one is because Jehovah's Witnesses will often use that
to try to prove to you that Jesus is not God.
See? He's rebuking someone for calling God, and I say to them,
Wait a minute. Do you believe Jesus is good?
Well, of course. I say, You're saying that Jesus is not good.
Because it says right here, there's only one good, and that's God.
And then they just look at me like, Oh man, I never thought of that.
But I just showed them about three scriptures. I don't remember exactly which three.
I know it was Hebrews 1.8, and you know, two or three others.
I showed them just one place after another where Jesus is God.
There's John 1.1, 1 John 5.7. Of course, those are changed in the Jehovah's Witnesses Bible.
But then you've got Isaiah 9.6 is the same in their Bible.
Hebrews 1.8 are two really good ones for Jehovah's Witnesses.
Hebrews 1.8, Isaiah 9.6.
I show them those, and he said, I believe that.
So then, at that point, I prayed with him, and he trusted Christ.
Now, if I would have just went through everything else,
and just said, Let's pray.
If he's still not believing that Jesus Christ is God,
Jesus said, If you believe not that I am He, you'll die in your sins.
You know, you can't believe in multiple gods and go to heaven. Period.
That make sense?
I mean, you can't believe in the multiplicity of gods and go to heaven,
according to the book of John and other places.
He repeated, You must believe that I am He, Jesus said.
Not, I'm one of them. Okay?
And so, you have to understand that.
And so, he got saved. Praying got saved.
Picked him up for church the next day.
You know, that's part of why he came, because we picked him up.
When you pick people up, they're a lot more likely to come to church.
We picked him up. He got baptized. Praise the Lord.
We tried to win his brother to the Lord.
Give his brother the gospel. Many times, his brother did not get saved.
Hopefully, he'll get saved one day.
We planted the seed and watered it.
And so, at the end, you'll get to a point where you've given a Catholic the gospel.
Then, that's where you step in and say, Now, wait a minute.
Does this say that you have to confess your sins to the priest to be saved?
Does it say that you have to get baptized?
You know, and I usually, sometimes I'll just tell them.
And I'm not just going to rip their face, but I'm going to tell them,
Look, the Catholic Church is teaching that you have to do these things,
but is that what the Bible says?
That's a tactful way of putting it.
I just say, you know, the Catholic Church teaches a lot of things that you have to do in addition to this,
but does the Bible say no? The Bible says it's just belief.
Then, I pray with them and get saved.
And then, when I'm done.
And again, let's emphasize this quickly.
The wrap-up is important. Just like the beginning is difficult, the end is difficult.
You've given them everything. You've taught them everything. They believe right.
I ask them questions, right?
This is how I wrap it up. I say, OK.
This is my review. I say, Do you believe you've sinned? Yes.
Do you believe Jesus died for your sins? Yes.
Do you believe he rose again? Yes.
And then, I ask them this.
Do you believe that if you were to ask Jesus to save you right now, would he do it?
OK, a hypothetical.
Would he do it if you asked him? Yes.
And how long would you be saved for? Forever.
No matter what? No matter what.
I'm just making sure that they really believe.
And I say, OK. Then, let's pray.
And I'm going to help you tell God that that's what you believe.
That's what I say to every person. Verbatim.
I say, OK. Let's pray.
I'm going to help you tell God that that's what you believe.
You can just repeat after me.
You say, Oh, I just repeat. They're just repeating a prayer.
Look, I just asked them what they believe, like five different ways.
And they said they believe it all right.
Well, I used to just ask them, Do you want to pray?
Look, what person who believes all that doesn't want to get saved?
Let's just do it. OK?
The main thing is, do they believe right?
If they say, Yes, I believe. I believe. I believe. Yes, yes, yes, yes.
I say, Let's pray right now. I'm going to help you tell God that's what you believe.
You can just repeat this after me. Let's bow our heads right now.
I'm going to help you pray this and tell God that's what you believe.
We bow our head and pray.
And I say, Dear Jesus. They say, Dear Jesus.
Now, if I say, Dear Jesus. And it's just silent.
Is that what happened to you? You're just like, All right, let's pray.
Dear Jesus.
And I just say, I just look up at them and say, Hey, repeat this after me.
Dear Jesus. OK, that's what I do.
Brother Dave, Gabriel, you guys have seen me.
I just say, Dear Jesus.
Repeat this after me.
You know, slap them a little bit.
Hey, repeat this after me.
Look, I just gave them the gospel for 20 minutes and they said they believe it all.
They need to pray. OK.
So we bow our heads. Dear Jesus. Dear Jesus.
I know I'm a sinner. I know I'm a sinner.
I know I deserve to go to hell.
Please save me right now and give me eternal life.
I'm only trusting you, Jesus. Amen.
Now, see, I kind of did a little bit of a brief recap.
Just to make sure that they know what they're doing while they're praying.
And Jesus said that they're telling them, I'm a sinner.
I deserve to go to hell, but I believe that you died on the cross for me.
Please save me. Give me eternal life. Amen.
Just a short prayer. You don't want to get too fancy with it.
OK, there's no point.
If a person has a speech impediment or is very nervous
or is poor with the English language,
I don't lead them in some allowed prayer. I'll just pray like this.
I mean, if I went through it real thoroughly and answered all the questions
and they're real clear on it, I just say, Dear Jesus, please save me right now. Amen.
Oh, they must not be really saying anything.
It doesn't matter what they say, right?
I mean, it's just that they believe and that they said it.
And then, as soon as we say, Dear Jesus, you know, Jesus' name, Amen,
I look up at them and I say, Now, you meant that, right?
I don't say, Did you mean that?
Because then you're automatically trying to put that out in your mind.
Like, Did you mean that?
I'm like, Well, I thought I did.
You pointed your finger at me and asked me.
And so I say, You meant that, didn't you?
And they say, Yeah, of course.
I say, Well, if you believe that, if you meant that, then you're saved.
You're going to heaven.
Now, then I explain to them, Maternal Security.
Because I already did that before they got saved, right?
See, like 99% of the soul-winning program would tell you,
you pray with them and then you explain to them, Maternal Security.
Oh, really? Wow, you mean I can't lose it?
I mean, even if I don't live right?
It's like, maybe they didn't get saved.
If you're just not telling them that, they just now understand that.
That it's not their life.
So, no, I don't start telling them about Maternal Security
because they already told them that before they got saved, OK?
So, here's what you can do after that.
You say, OK, they got saved.
You meant that.
You're going to heaven.
Great.
See you later.
OK.
Now, you know, it's good to leave them with something.
Now, let me give you three options that you could leave with them.
Or maybe you could leave them with all three.
You know, read the situation.
If somebody's in a hurry or busy
or how much you want to talk to this person more,
you know, you be the judge.
Let me give you three options.
You could do one of these or two of them
or all three of them or whatever.
I'm just giving you three things that are good to talk about
after you want to obey the Lord.
Number one, do you have a Bible?
Right? Great question.
Do you have a Bible?
Now, on that bookshelf over there,
we have just tons of King James Bibles
and when they run out, we'll buy more and they're free.
We don't sell anything here.
It's against the Bible to sell things in the house of God.
And so we don't sell anything.
And we provide a Bible free of charge to everyone that we win the Lord.
Because that's, you know,
oh man, you know, that's expensive.
It's four bucks. Those Bibles cost four bucks.
King James Bible is nice. You can read it.
Four bucks.
So let's say we win 300 people to the Lord.
OK. It's 1,200 bucks to get 300 people saved
and to put a Bible in their hand.
Hey, that's a small price to pay.
You know, for the one person a week that you win to the Lord,
you know, you can spring the four bucks
and you don't even have to spring the four bucks
because we already spring the four bucks
and they're on the bookshelf.
Just take a bunch of them. OK?
And so it's that simple.
But here's what we do.
We have the silent partner, you know,
and silent partner is so important
because you're doubling your productivity.
If you have two people that are good soul winners going together,
you know, you got somebody who's not doing the talking
that could be doing the talking.
It's better to split that group in half
and have them each be training somebody new,
taking somebody out solely.
So the silent partner carries a gift and award Bible
because they're not going to use it anyway
because they're not doing the talking. OK?
Or sometimes, you know, the silent partner,
if they talk some of the time,
could carry both a gift and award and their own Bible. OK?
And then we ask the people, do you have a Bible?
They say, no.
I put it in their hand and say, now you have a Bible.
And I usually show them where to start reading,
start reading the book of John or wherever I feel like showing them.
And then sometimes I even give them a Bible reading chart if I have one,
read through the Bible in a year.
Another thing is if they say, yes, I have a Bible,
I say, can you show it to me?
You say, why do you want me to show it to you?
To see if it's the King James Bible and not the wrong Bible.
So I say, do you have a Bible? Yes.
Bring it to me, please.
Can I look at it? Can I see it?
They go get it. They go bring it. It's the wrong Bible.
I say, here, let me trade you.
Oh, no, no. I'm sorry. First, here's what I do.
They bring out the wrong Bible. It's the new King James.
It's the NIV. It's the New American Standard.
They bring the wrong Bible and say, yep, here's my Bible.
I say, can I show you something real quick?
And I show them one of the blatant contradictions,
maybe that Acts 8.37 is missing,
or just some blatant mess up in their Bible.
And I say, look, this is the old original Bible.
These new Bibles are changing things.
They have an agenda, blah, blah, blah.
And I don't spend hours on it. I just spend a couple minutes.
Just show them one contradiction, maybe two.
Hey, if they don't see it after one or two,
they're not going to see it after 200.
So I just show one or two things, and then I'll try to trade them.
I'll say, hey, look, can I just trade you?
I'll give you this brand new King James Bible
for that old New American Standard.
Let's just swap them out.
Or if I feel like they're not the type of person
that's going to swap me out,
then I'll just say, well, here, let me give you this one.
Read this one. This is the right one.
But even better is if you can say, hey, let me trade you.
Here's a brand new one. Let me trade you.
And then if I trade them, you know what I do with that stinking thing?
I go...
No, I mean, I take it down and just throw it in the next trash can.
I just go next door and just use their trash
and just throw it in the trash where it belongs.
The NIV, the HIV, whatever it is, I just throw it in the trash.
And then...
So if they say yes, I look at it.
If it's the King James, I say, great, you got the right Bible.
Praise the Lord. Read it.
And if they say, well, it's not with me.
It's at my auntie's.
Or I don't have it with me.
Then I say to them,
I say, is it the one with the these and the those?
Because that's an easy way right away.
Because the King James only has these.
I say, is the one with the these and the those?
Or is Jesus saying, hey, what's up, dude?
And they're like, yeah, it's the these and the those.
Okay, good, then you have the right one.
If they say, no, it doesn't say the end now,
I say, well, you need the King James.
I put the King James in their hand.
Or if they're not sure, we just give them one.
It's four bucks. We can afford it, okay?
That's option number one. I'm trying to hurry you.
Option number one, you get the Bible in their hand.
Tell them to read it every day. Explain that to them.
Option number two, remember, you can do one, two, or all of these.
Number two, talk to them about winning people to Christ.
Tell them, hey, look, don't you think other people need to hear this?
Your family that's not saved? Your friends?
And then I show them on the back of our invitations
how it has the plan of salvation on the back.
And I say, look, see these verses?
Read this, learn these verses, look them up in your King James Bible,
and you can learn how to show this to somebody.
You can just take this and sit down with someone that you love
and show them this step by step and lead them in this prayer
and do it just the way that I just showed you.
You can show them how to be saved.
So that's another thing that you can encourage them.
Option number three, you can talk to them about baptism.
Very good idea. Do it every time.
Do it sometimes, whatever. That's up to you how you want to do that.
Explain to them baptism.
And you don't have to go too deep with it,
but just explain to them that it's by immersion, you know,
and that it must be after salvation.
You can show them Acts 8, 37.
You can show them Matthew chapter 3 where Jesus is baptized
and how he goes under the water and then he comes up out of the water
at the end of Matthew chapter 3.
You can show them that they that gladly received his word were baptized
in Acts chapter 2.
You can show them Acts chapter 10 is one that I really like to show them.
Look at Acts chapter 10, and this is where we'll close tonight.
Look at Acts chapter 10.
The Bible says in Acts chapter 10, verse number 48,
Acts 10, 48,
And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord,
then prayed they him to Terry certain days.
Now this would say,
and he recommended that they should be baptized.
And he said, if you want to, get baptized.
No, it says he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord.
Now, you're not going to force somebody to be baptized, of course.
But it is a command of God, just as much as thou shalt not steal.
Now, we still have the choice whether we're going to steal or not,
but you should say to people, God is commanding you to be baptized.
And so this is a first step of obedience
where you can obey God's command to be baptized.
And then I sometimes explain to them that baptism is just a picture.
It's not salvation, it's just picture salvation.
You know, it pictures the death when you're standing up
and you go underwater, the burial, come up out of the water, the resurrection.
Sometimes I explain to people that, there's so many,
baptism is a very deep subject.
So you can explain any one aspect of it.
You can explain to them it's a first step of obedience.
Sometimes, depending on who I'm talking to,
I like to go a little bit further and explain to them
how baptism pictures them burying their old man.
And they're going to walk in the new man.
You know, just as Jesus Christ was raised in it,
even so, we also should walk in the newness of life.
And sometimes I'll approach it from that aspect.
Sometimes I'll approach it from the aspect of it pictures Jesus
dying and being buried and risen again.
It represents both, okay?
And it's a first step of obedience.
However you want to explain it to them briefly,
you don't have to teach them everything in the world
that the Bible says about baptism.
But just explain to them the need to be baptized
and I usually just tell them this.
I say, if you come to our church, you can be baptized.
And I say, we're ready to baptize you, you know,
whenever you want to be baptized.
We're always ready to baptize people.
And I'll explain to them, you don't have to take a class,
you don't have to jump through a bunch of hoops,
you don't have to prove anything to us.
We baptize anybody who believes on Jesus Christ
because the Bible says,
If thou believeth, withal thine heart thou mayest.
And believe it or not, there are Baptists
in all of America where you have to take a class
to be baptized the last six weeks long.
Boy, I wonder how they did that class
in the middle of the night with that Philippian jailer
that was baptized in the same hour that he got saved.
What did they do with that verse?
It says, the same hour he was baptized.
You know what that hour was?
Midnight to what in the morning?
Same hour.
What about what we just read in Acts chapter 10?
He commanded him to be baptized.
They just got saved five minutes ago, 15 minutes ago.
He said, Baptize them.
Let's get baptized.
This stuff where you wait,
well, we've got to watch them for a while,
see if they're really saved.
What's that Philippian jailer?
Well, he knew he was saved.
What's the difference, man?
I thought if you believe on Jesus,
you're saved no matter who you are,
whether you're a Philippian jailer, an Ethiopian eunuch,
or somebody in Phoenix, Arizona.
Hey, if you're saved, you're saved.
The sooner you get baptized, the better.
So get baptized tomorrow, get baptized today,
get baptized this hour, whatever.
Hey, we're ready to baptize them.
We're not going to make people wait.
If they wait, that's up to them.
It's not going to be because of us.
Well, we baptize people once a year on baptism Sunday.
It's a big event.
Invite your mom and dad and brother.
No, we baptize people.
As soon as they're willing to get baptized, we baptize them.
We don't hold people up.
I got saved when I was six.
I got baptized when I was nine.
Guess when I wanted to get baptized?
When I was six.
Guess when I got baptized?
When I was nine.
Why?
Because they've got to watch me
to make sure I'm really saved.
You know what I mean?
I don't believe in that.
I don't agree with that.
Now, if somebody turns out they were not,
even a child gets baptized,
they weren't really saved,
baptize them again after they get saved.
And, of course, when we do our numbers,
again, back to the numbers,
when we do our numbers,
we don't count somebody that we rebaptize.
If we baptize somebody twice,
we only count it once.
Because one of the times wasn't for real.
So, one of the times we just got wet.
And so, that's what we believe about baptism.
I mean, sometimes these people are like,
well, I've already been baptized.
I'm like, well, you know what?
I've taken a bath.
I dove into the...
Is it dove?
I have dove?
Dive dove?
Is that what it is?
Dive dove do?
Have dived?
Dive, dive, dived?
Dove?
I don't know.
But anyway, this isn't an English class.
But anyway, I've dove in.
Okay, let's just stick with dived.
I have dived into a pool before.
I've gone completely underwater.
I've dunked myself all the way
under the soap suds in the bathtub.
But that doesn't mean I was baptized.
I said, there's no difference
between meeting in the bathtub
and going underwater,
or jumping in a pool,
than when you got baptized
before you were saved.
It means nothing.
That's what I explained to them.
And when you got sprinkled on the forehead,
you know, by some guy in a skirt,
you know, that's not baptism.
You didn't come up out of the water.
You know?
You get this, you know...
That's how they baptize people, right?
You know, they shake something
off their hand or something.
That's not baptism.
And so you can talk...
Just a quick review.
You can talk about baptism,
get the Bible on your head,
get them reading the Bible,
or the greatest thing that you could do
for your new congress
if you can get them soul-winning.
Part of getting them soul-winning
is getting them, you know,
if you can get them saved
and in church and baptized,
that's what we're going to teach them
how to win souls
like we're doing tonight.
Because that's what this church will do.
I mean, if you come to this church
for any length of time,
you will end up
going soul-winning with me
or somebody in this church,
no matter who you are.
I mean, there's nobody in this church
who's gone to this church
for any length of time
that didn't end up
having somebody take them out
soul-winning at least once
or twice or three times.
And...
Or at least...
Well, not even...
Or anything.
I mean, that's just a fact.
That's just true about every person
who comes to this earth
for a length of time.
And you know what?
Other than that,
people also who come to this church
begin to talk to people that they know
and win souls in their personal life
because that's what this church is about.
Don't tell me about some church
that's weak on soul-winning.
If they're weak on soul-winning,
they're weak on Jesus.
Period.
We're not weak on soul-winning.
We major in soul-winning.
Is it...
Are we just all about soul-winning?
No.
We're about a lot of things.
But the thing that we major in
is soul-winning.
Let's bow our heads
and have a word of prayer.
Father, thank you so much
for these people that love you
and that's why they're here.
And they love lost souls.
They love their fellow man and woman,
even people that they don't even know.
They love them enough
to go give them the gospel.
Maybe they don't feel like it,
tired, embarrassed, shy, timid.
It doesn't matter.
Their love has compelled them to say,
I'm going to overcome whatever it is
that's stopping me
and love is going to compel me
to give the gospel
to the lost souls of Tempe, Arizona
and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
Father, give us the tools
and the skill that we need.
Help us to learn.
It's not a math problem.
It's going to take the power of the Holy Spirit,
but God, that's no excuse for us
being unprepared and unskillful
and not knowing what we're doing.
And so please help us
to learn these techniques
and to learn what works
from somebody who's been winning souls
for years and years
and go soul-winning with other people
in this church who successfully win souls
and learn everything we can from them
and learn the Bible,
memorize the verses, dear God.
Help us to take it more seriously
than the people tonight
that are trying to earn a corruptible crown
for the Super Bowl,
trying to earn a ring
that they can put on their finger
that's going to be someday
on their dead body in a coffin.
They're going to have that ring on their finger
and it's going to rot with them.
God, help us to understand
that we're running for a crown
that does not perish.