How to Make an: "Are You Ready" Cross

1/2" FOAM CORE

C- THRU Stencils (Brush Script 3")

HOLLYWOOD FOLLOW-UP 7-23-11

Dean, Sai, Forest, Clint, Steve and I all met at the Noho station for a great time of prayer before heading out to Hollywood.

Hollywood was PACKED! We camped out at one of our favorite spots "The Nook" which is an enclosed entrance way into a building at the corner of Highland and Hollywood. Perfect for handing out tracts and Stoplight preaching!

We set up the heckler mic and at one point the heckling started...

... and kept going.

Here Mondevan (who was clearly intoxicated) came up to ask me several questions.

Then his friend David (who was also clearly intoxicated) asked me why we were here and what we were sharing... which was a perfect opportunity to share the gospel with him. He said he was Jewish so I tried to quote a couple Messianic verses from Pslam 22 and Isaiah 53.

Then Tracy came up to tell me that I needed to make sure people understand that "God loves the sinner but hates the sin." I shared with her that "God is angry with the wicked every day" Psalm 7:11 AND that "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." - Jhn 3:16

That first verse didn't seem to settle well with her. After I thought about this commonly used quote (which I'm sure I've said myself) I realized that there are several issues with this over simplified cliche that conflict with the bible:

1) "God loves the sinner but hates the sin" is not a biblical expression... it is however a quote from Ghandi "Hate the sin and not the sinner" (Mohandas Gandhi's 1929 autobiography)

2) If God ONLY hated the sin... then why does He send unrepentant SINNERS to hell? He doesn't send sins to hell but those who sin against Him.

3) You can't seperate a criminal from the crime. Try that one in court.

4) It seems that scripture has verses for BOTH the love and hatred of God towards sinners.

"The boastful shall not stand in Your sight; You hate all workers of iniquity. You shall destroy those who speak falsehood; The LORD abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man. "- Psalm 5:5 & 6

"But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." - Rom 5:8 NKJV

BOTH of these attributes are exemplified in the CROSS which displayed God's HATRED of the sinner and LOVE for the sinner at the same time. I read this helpful article by John Gerstner on this subject.

We had an AMAZING time! The team was faithful to hand out about 1500 tracts & 40 bibles in both English and Spanish! I love serving with these dear brothers and sisters.

God is AWESOME and gets all the Glory!

New Tract Display!

There is a NEW tract & DVD display in the foyer of CBC to provide a one stop place to get resources to distribute to those who don't know Jesus Christ.

I encourage all our regular evangelists to help "guide and encourage" our church to OBEY Jesus and pick up some tracts to give out to others.

"And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works," - Hbr 10:24 NKJV

Glendale Cruise Nights 7-16-11 Follow-Up

Forest, Steve, Mark, Elder Bob, Dean & Sai and myself all went out to Glendale Cruise Nights!

There were lots of people out that night and to be honest the "mood" of the crowd seemed more somber this year than the usually joyful environment from years past. Maybe the poor economy is taking its toll.

People are mainly walking thorough this event so its amazing to get a conversation with anyone.

We also got to enjoy seeing some cool cars and eating hamburgers!

We were by God's grace able to distribute about 5000 tracts in a little over 2 hours! We ran out before it even got dark.

This event was Steves ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY of joining the CBC Evangelism team!

Please pray for all those who got tracts. God is good!

The Big Question

We just got the "Evangel Pack" of 100 of these DVD's for our outreach. Its a very thorough, clear, gospel presentation and will make for a great resource to give people who you get to talk with on the street. I also plan to offer these out while open air preaching.

Burbank Centennial Follow-up

I went with my family to the Burbank Centennial and to give tracts to those who wanted to hand them out... WHAT a SURPRISE!! There we thousands of people at this event. I was not expecting this kind of turn out.

There were so many people that it was hard to navigate through some places. Steve, Kareem, Dean and Sai handed out tracts while I spent time with the family. They ran out in no time!

"Do you not say, 'There are still four months and [then] comes the harvest'? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest - Jhn 4:35 NKJV

My family joined up with the group, gave out more tracts to everyone and joined in the laboring!

My son boldly handed out tracts. How could you resist that cuteness.

Kareem had several conversations.

My son handing out the Millions.

Dean and Sai being swarmed.

My family went home while I stayed with everyone till we ran out of tracts. Steve drove me home to get more then hebrought in the reinforcements to Dean and Sai. They stayed for round two hanging them out till they were totally GONE! Below is a short video of how effective these tracts are especially at events:

Burbank Centennial Celebration

This is great opportunity for evangelists. All of Burbank will probably be out in the Down Town Area to Celebrate Burbank's 100 year-ness. THIS FRIDAY between 5-10 p.m. I plan to go out an hand out tracts and witness.

4th of July in Hollywood!

I can't think of a better day to take advantage of the FREEDOM we have to proclaim the Gospel than the 4th of July! Well except for maybe every day!

Two dear brothers braved the heat with me to go to Hollywood Blvd. I had 1000 "4th of July Millions" that I inherited and wanted to move them out of my garage. :) What better way then to actually USE them.

It was a CROWDED day on the Blvd.

Steve has really been growing in his open-air. You can hear the Lords work in him. The bible display has been such a great way to let people take a bible while a guy is preaching.

Mark (who has MS) faithfully comes out sometimes needing his cane but still goes...

... and reguarly preaches the Good News! This day we had more people encourage us than heckle us. There was even a group of guys from a Baptist Bible College who prayed for us.

Later I did a little trivia to try and draw a crowd.

Had a professing Christian take the "Good Person Test", he went through it for the sake of the crowd, hugged me and thanked me afterwards. We handed out the lat of our Millions and headed home.

Please pray for Paul. He listened to me preach for a while then came up to share his testimony of how the Lord had delivered him from homosexuality & his heavy involved in satanism! He has been walking with the Lord for two years, sounded like he's getting good teaching and shares his faith regularly. May the Lord use Paul in a mighty way!

The Lord saves the VILEST sinners to display His GRACE!! I know because He saved a wretch like me!

Burbank Media Center Follow-up 7-2-11

It was a SUPER BUSY NIGHT at Burbank Media Center!

We had an AMAZING turn out of High Schoolers, Pastors, church family and our regular evangelists! The Lord raised up many laborers to reach many people in Burbank. We were basically a SWARM of locusts that took over the area. My apologies for anyone who did not make it into a picture... there were just too many of you! Not a bad problem to have. :)

Pastor Tim brought out his whole family. Its always an encouragement to see Brea handing out tracts.

There were so many people handing out tracts that we kept the preaching going pretty solid all night. Had a few people stop while Mark explained the Gospel.

Steve preaching the good news. I like this picture because you see by the smile on Steves face it is GOOD news!

Dean preaching while people came up to take bibles from Steve. About 40 Bibles went out last night!

Earlier in the day Sai had a near death accident when she was crossing the street someone barreled through an intersection in their car and at the last minute slammed on the brakes coming within literally an "inch of her life". By God's grace and protection she was unscathed and out witnessing that night!

Many of the high schoolers had never done street witnessing. They all did GREAT!

This young brother even preached in the open-air for the first time and did a GREAT job sharing the Gospel.

At one point this kid Chris came up and fell to his knees in "mock worship" asking for a bible. I invited him to the mic where I took him through the Law and the Gospel.

Nathan passionately preached the Gospel even through tears at one point.

Thank you to all those who were faithful to come out and witness. To God be the GLORY!

Please pray for the guys who came up to the heckler mic: Dan (totally intoxicated), Robert (beleived some new age stuff), Evan (asked some interesting questions) also everyone who took tracts, bibles & heard the gospel this night.

Give Yourself a Lift!

Last night we had an AMAZING turn out of High schoolers and CBC members plus our regulars to reach the lost. While guys were preaching I talked with a Youth Pastor from a local church who had some encouraging words about what we were doing BUT (and that is always the word that lets you know there is something they don't like about what you're doing) he took issue with the fact that we were standing on a BOX to preach the Gospel... (sigh)... people will always find something they don't like about this ministry. Nevermind that when I asked him "if I was your friend who had three minutes to live what would you say to me?" he gave me an abismal presentation of "God has a purpose for your life" and I had to basically BAIT him into sharing anything from the Gospel... but I digress.

He felt we should be on the ground to "connect" with the people. That we may appear that we think we're "better than everyone else". I let him know that people hate us and the Gospel whether we are on the ground or on a box, they will always look for an excuse NOT to believe. Personally, sometimes I like to preach on the ground and enjoy it because you can get more animated, however I still like to keep a box close to me for many of the reasons mentioned in the following piece of advice from Ray Comfort.

Give Yourself a Lift

"If you are going to preach in the open-air, elevate yourself. For eighteen months, I preached without any elevation and hardly attracted any listeners. As soon as I did it “soapbox” style, people stopped to listen. Their attitude was “What has this guy got to say?” They had an excuse to stop. Also, elevation will give you protection. I was once almost eaten by an angry 6'6" gentleman who kept fuming, “God is love!” We were eye to eye...while I was elevated. On another occasion, a very heavy gentleman who had a mean countenance placed it about 6" from mine and whispered, “Jesus said to love your enemies.” I nodded in agreement. Then he asked in a deep voice, “Who is your enemy?” I shrugged. His voice deepened and spilled forth in a chilling tone, “Lucifer!” I was standing beside my stepladder at the time so he pushed me backwards with his stomach. He kept doing so until I was moved back about 20 feet. I prayed, “Wisdom, Lord,” then said, “You are either going to hit me or hug me.” He hugged me and walked off. That wouldn’t have happened if I had been elevated. Elevation will also give you added authority. Often hecklers will walk right up to you and ask questions quietly. This is an attempt to stifle the preaching, and it will work if you are not higher than your heckler. If they come too close to me, I talk over their heads and tell them to go back to the heckler’s gallery. They actually obey me because they get the impression I am bigger than they are. When Ezra preached the Law, he was elevated (Nehemiah 8:4,5). John Wesley used elevation to preach. Jesus preached the greatest sermon ever on a mount (Matthew 5–7), and Paul went up Mars’ Hill to preach (Acts 17:22). So if you can’t find a hilltop to preach from, use a soapbox or a stepladder."

GET TO THE POINT!

All Open-Air preachers should learn to give various lengths of presentations from 2-20 minutes. Hecklers can understandably change this time from 2 minutes to an hour in a good open air setting. In the video below Ray Comfort does a great job of sharing a quick Gospel presentation without sounding like a human Gospel tract.

I beleive its better to do a shorter presentation that is CLEAR, CONCISE and HITS THE MARK then to ramble for 30 minutes to an hour (which I'm guiltry of doing) where the listeners have no idea what you're talking about. Once you get a solid "structure" you can add meat to the bones over time.

Here are some great guidelines from R.A Torrey on this topic:

"Don't be dull. Dullness will kill an open-air meeting at once. Prosiness will drive the whole audience away. In order to avoid being dull, do not preach long sermons. Use a great many striking illustrations. Keep wide awake yourself, and you will keep the audience awake. Be energetic in your manner. Talk so people can bear you. Don't preach, but simply talk to people."

"Dont read a sermon. Whatever may be said in defence of reading essays in the pulpit, it will never do in the open air. It is possible to have no notes whatever. If you cannot talk long without notes, so much the better; you can talk as long as you ought to. If you read, you will talk longer than you ought to."

"Don't talk too long. You may have a number of talks in an open-air meeting, but do not have any of them over ten or fifteen minutes long. As a rule do not have them as long as that. Of course there are exceptions to this, when a great crowd is gathered to bear some person in the open air. Under such circumstances I have beard a sermon an hour long that held the interest of the people, but this is not true in the ordinary open-air meeting."

"Don't be soft. One of these nice, namby-pamby, sentimental sort of fellows in an open-air meeting the crowd cannot and will not stand. The temptation to throw a brick or a rotten apple at him is perfectly irresistible, and one can hardly blame the crowd."

Remember guys:

Eye of the Tiger!

Spurgeon quote for the day! 7-1-11

“The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” John 1:29.

"Then, lastly, the proof which these people, who had seen Christ and followed Him, gave that they had really found Him was that they went and tried to bring others to Him. They said to their kinsfolk and acquaintances, “We have found the Messiah!” “We have found Jesus!” Ah, you have never truly found Jesus if you do not tell others about Him! You know how children act—we ought to be children in all things before God. If a little child, in its rambles, were to find honey and its brothers and sisters were all around, I feel certain that it would give such a cry after it had first sucked its own fingers, that all of them would soon be plunging their hands into the honey, too! You have never tasted its sweetness if it has not made you cry, “Come here! Was there ever such joy as this? Was there ever such delight, such rapture as this?” It is the instinct of true children of God to desire to fetch others in to taste and see that the Lord is good—to share the unspeakable bliss which is already their own!"

C.H. Spurgeon - "The Baptists Message"