Matthew Stuckey here and I wanted to make a quick video on soul winning in the
Philippines versus soul winning in the United States and so I personally got
saved when I was 18 years old started so winning when I was 19 years old and I
lived the vast majority of my life in the US and so I was so winning in the US
for a good you know 15 years and living in different locations experience
different areas you know receptive unreceptive parks colleges a lot of
different atmospheres right and you know now I've been here in the
Philippines the last couple years and I just want to make a video comparing soul
winning in the US versus soul winning in the Philippines I think sometimes we try
to simplify it down a little bit too much but we need to think through some
things because I often see people writing things online that is just not
quite accurate from my experience and something I would personally disagree
with and you know I'm tempted to make a comment sometimes but I figured it's
best just to make kind of a video to give my overall thoughts from
experiencing both locations and also having done so winning in Guyana and you
know at airports as I'm going in between countries and at layovers so I've talked
to a wide variety of different people and so there's no question that soul
winning in the Philippines can give you more salvation than soul winning in the
US no question about that you know I've never denied that I definitely believe
that's true but I want you to think through some things because it seems
like some people have this idea that in the Philippines you can spend less time
on a conversation than you would in other parts of the world you know I see
people talking about how they got you know all these people saving this amount
of time and they had this many conversations and I'm just thinking you
can't preach the gospel you know ten different times in an hour ten times
through giving the entire gospel you can't shorten the gospel presentation
because you must realize that salvation is the same no matter where you live and
in the United States people need to realize that they're a sinner that
deserves hell in the Philippines they need to realize that they're a sinner
that deserves hell in the United States they need to realize that Jesus Christ
is the way to heaven and he's God in the flesh and you know he is the Savior of
the world in the Philippines they need to believe the same thing in the United
States they need to put their full trust on Jesus not trusting their works or
baptism or anything else same in the Philippines in the US they need to
believe in eternal security to get saved because the gift of God is eternal life
not conditional life in the the Philippines is the same way as in the US
you know you need to believe the same things and so a gospel presentation
should not be under 10 minutes in the Philippines because you wouldn't spend
under 10 minutes in the United States and it seems like some people say that
that it would take like less time or they can give the gospel like so many
times in a short amount of time well that's not actually true because you
need to explain a certain amount of material and that doesn't come in just a
really short amount of time to be all to be completely honest I would actually
say it might take a little bit longer on average here in the Philippines because
you know we don't claim to have a perfect Bible in Tagalog at least I
don't that I'm familiar with and so oftentimes you know we quote the verses
in English and then explain in Tagalog or even quote in Tagalog as well it
takes a little bit extra time for me personally to preach the gospel maybe
that's not the the same way with everybody but honestly I probably spend
a little bit more time here in the Philippines than in the US so you can't
cut out material you still have to spend the same amount of time so hey the
Philippines is very receptive but you can't just shorten the gospel
presentation you must explain everything and so that's one aspect of soul winning
in the Philippines versus the US you still need to spend the same amount of
time and cover the same material but you say well why can you get more
salvation's then a higher percentage of people are willing to listen to you in
the US it's not uncommon to go soul winning door-to-door for a long period
of time and nobody wants to listen and you don't really have opportunities in
most parts of the US to regularly go to parks or to send groups in the
Philippines on the other hand when you go door-to-door you'll often find people
that are willing to listen now I will say this it's not as receptive
door-to-door as I think people think you know when you go door-to-door most of the
time you get rejected it's not like most people want to listen to you it is more
receptive but I've also gone soul winning for five hours door-to-door with nobody
getting saved so you can definitely go door-to-door in the higher areas of
wealth without much success and so it is more receptive door-to-door but it's not
like everything that you touch turns to gold however you're able to go to parks
and we're able to send groups and in parks when people are out in the open
they're far more likely to listen and you're often talking to younger people
and one opportunity you have here in the Philippines is that you can talk to
groups people that were here for our missions trips trips that went to
result park or intramurals they found that they would often be preaching the
gospel to three or four people at the same time and there's a natural respect
that's taught in this culture where they're oftentimes willing to listen to
you so you have the opportunity to preach to more people more interested
you're able to talk to groups and people are also more likely to listen and not
be you know rude or bastos to you when you're trying to preach the gospel so
that is one advantage however I do want to kind of caution you if you ever go
soul-winning here on a couple of different things that you need to be
careful of people as they're often very respectful they might kind of just go
along with a conversation and they might pray that prayer at the end even if they
don't believe because they're trying to be respectful respect is a very
important thing here in the Philippines and you know in the u.s. they'd probably
be more likely just to tell you you know no I don't believe that no I don't
want to pray whereas here they might be willing to go go through with it just
because they're trying to be respectful so you want to be very careful that when
you're explaining the gospel here in the Philippines that they're believing and
agreeing with the things that you're saying the other thing is this is a
heavily Catholic country I personally before I was saved I had a big hang up
on suicide so suis explaining suicide has always been part of my gospel
presentation because I've always been concerned that people would have been
similar to me and thought well salvation is forever unless you do this one sin
now I have heard people preach the gospel that don't explain suicide and
they go in depth and they go thorough and they can definitely get people saved
that way and explain eternal security very thoroughly I personally like to
explain suicide though but here in the Philippines it is a must because of the
fact it is a Catholic country and people think that they can they will lose their
salvation if they commit suicide you'll get to the end of gospel presentation
sometimes and then you've asked everything it's a gift it's eternal you
get saved one time you know eternal life it's just one time you'll never go to
the second death you'll never perish they seem like they get it even if you
committed murder but then you ask well what if you committed suicide oh I'd go
straight to hell right because they've heard that so many times and they've
never really stopped to think about it and so it's good to just spend a little
bit of extra time at the end to make sure they get it and find out what's in
their heart because here in a Catholic country that is a big issue so here's
the thing it is more receptive here in the Philippines more people are willing
to listen to you but you need to make sure you spend the accurate time and you
also need to make sure that they're not just trying to be respectful or
agreeable to you but they're actually believing it so you want to make sure at
the end that they actually are getting it and that they've actually heard and
understood eternal security fully here's the thing we don't know what's
inside people's hearts we do our best to give accurate results here in the
Philippines and the vast majority people at our church I mean the people that
I've gone with they go thoroughly they explain the gospel obviously we don't
know what's inside their heart but we're just trying to do the best we can and
those are some of the similarities and differences of soul winning here in the
Philippines versus soul winning in the United States thank you and God bless