6 Things Your Church Can Do to Reach the Lost

Hi, this is Roy Jones with ManTalk Radio Podcast. Our mission is to break down the walls of race and denomination. Your chosen Truth Radio broadcast will be starting in just a few seconds. Thank you. This is the Truth Network. Stu Epperson here. Welcome to another segment of Truth Talk. You're in for a treat.

Fasten your seat belt. Best-selling author of Case for Christ, Case for Easter, and now his new book, The Case for Heaven. Lee Strobel is our guest next, and I'm not the host.

How did I miss this one? Well, my good buddy Steve Jumper is filling in. He's an evangelist, a businessman, an entrepreneur. He loves Christ, and he was able to grab Lee after a conference on missions at Calvary Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Get ready to hear a powerful interview with my buddy Steve Jumper right here, right now, with Lee Strobel. And thank you to all of our awesome listeners, our prayer warriors that pray for Truth Talk, and so many affiliates all over the country that carry this program. We love you.

We're grateful for you. And now join us, Steve Jumper, with Lee Strobel on Truth Talk. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com. I'm Steve Jumper, filling in for Stu Epperson with Truth Talk Live. We are here at Calvary Baptist Church in Winston-Salem at the North Carolina Baptist Missions Convention, and we are here with Pastor Lee Strobel, and you probably know him best for A Case for Christ, and now it's A Case for Heaven. But what people might not know about Pastor Strobel is he has a passion for evangelism and missions. They probably know you, Pastor, as more about apologetics and defending the faith, but tell us about where does that passion for missions come from? Yeah, I mean, people think of me as an apologist, but really I only use apologetics as a tool in trying to reach people with the gospel. You know, we live in an increasingly skeptical culture, and often people need to know not just what we believe, but why we believe it. And so my real passion is to see people enter into a personal, life-changing, eternity-altering relationship with Jesus Christ. Somebody asked me, what do you want on your tombstone? And I said, I'd like it to say he dragged as many people to heaven with him as he could.

So that's my passion. I think a lot of it grows out of the fact that I lived a very immoral, narcissistic, self-destructive life as an atheist for many years, and God changed my values, my character, my morality, my marriage, and so forth. And I just want other people to experience that kind of transformation that only comes through Jesus.

Absolutely. So Pastor Strobel, in our churches, we're struggling to do a better job at that. And what can you tell us about how our churches in America could reach out better in regards to evangelizing? I think there's six steps that if churches go through them, they're more effective at reaching their community for Christ. Number one, that the leaders of the church must own and model the value that lost people matter to God. Secondly, they must instill that value in the congregation. Third, I think every church needs an evangelistic point person to lead the evangelistic efforts of the church, whether it's part-time, full-time, or a volunteer. Fifth, or fourth rather, we've got to train 100% of our congregation on how to naturally and effectively share their faith.

Both words are important, to do it in a natural way and an effective way. And then fifth, we need to harness the gifted evangelists in our church. They tend to reach more people than the average Christian can, and we need to encourage them and equip them and give them missions that really make a difference in the community. And then finally, six, to create ministries and events to reach the community for Christ, including, I believe, small groups for non-believers made up of six to eight non-believers and a Christian couple or two Christians that lead the group that go on a journey of discovery together. We call them spiritual discovery groups. We find they have an 80% conversion rate, and that's just one example of a kind of ministry that churches can implement.

You know that word discovery. Last night you really touched me with your message, and you talked about the adventurous Christian life. So we're kind of on an adventure with this talk right now. Maybe speak to that adventurous Christian life and how exciting it is. Yeah, I think when three things are true of you, when you're motivated to engage with people about Jesus, when you make yourself available to do that, when you're prepared to do that, then you don't know what's going to happen. It could be an average and routine day, but God might bring about a conversation with someone that could change their life and change their eternity.

So I call it the unexpected adventure because you don't know what's going to happen. And this is when our prayer life takes on a whole new depth because we're praying desperately for God to use us and give us the words to say. Our worship takes on a new dimension because we're worshiping the God of the second chance who loves our lost friends more than we do. Our Bible study takes on a whole new dimension because we're not just looking for abstract theological truths but for something that might help us reach a friend. So the whole Christian life is elevated when we invite God to take us on these unexpected evangelistic adventures. So we did talk a little bit about that, my adventure here with the Truth Talk radio station as we speak. And then I think I shared a little bit with you about International Commission and my role starting this week with that organization, Totally Evangelism globally around the world. And now International Commission is going to be taking evangelistic projects with working with churches, equipping with churches, walking side churches in the United States, Canada, and all of North America.

So I'm really excited about that and I'm excited to have shared that with you today. We have been talking to Pastor Lee Strobel, The Case for The Case for Christ and now The Case for Heaven. Pastor Strobel, thank you very much for your time today. My pleasure. And we started a new Center for Evangelism and Apologetics at Colorado Christian that's all online.

And if people go to strobelcenter.com, they can get information on that as well. Thank you so much, Pastor. Blessings. My pleasure. This is the Truth Network.