So this is the accountability portion of this class. Alright, so number one, our mission is God's purpose. God's purpose. Number two, our passion is God's glory. Number three, our heart is love and obedience. Number four, our evangelism is God-centered. Number five, our confidence is God's sovereignty. So pretty easy, right?

It was just the headings. So okay, and then number six, this was a little bit open-ended but there is an answer to it. What does it mean when we say that as evangelizers we must be careful to distinguish results from efforts? So the idea or thought behind this one was that we're just simply meant to be faithful preachers of the Word.

So we don't have to worry about the fruit of belief because that's on God. So number seven, in God-centered evangelism what is involved is not only integral but primary. The local church is correct, letter A. And then number eight, nine, and ten, just go ahead and answer those. And the extra credit, list out the four Greek evangelism words.

Remember these? Let's go in order. The first one, the preach. Preach was uangelizo. The second one is teaching which was didasco. Didasco. Don't worry if you didn't get it. The English would be sufficient, right? Letter C, or the third one would be to herald or to proclaim or to invite which is keruso.

And then the fourth one was the idea of witnessing. It sounds like martyreo. Okay, martyreo. So go ahead and uh, so each one of those, if you got the Greek words, if you got the English words you don't get a point. So you can write it, that's fine. But if you wrote it in the Greek and somewhat it sounds similar, you can give yourself an extra point for that.

Hey, you're not turning these in. This is just for you. So point per. So it's possible 14. 14 out of 10. Okay, so we're gonna be doing this every week. It is important to get here on time. Today, I get it, 730 in the morning. So please, next week we're gonna go back to nine o'clock if you can try to get here at nine promptly so that we can grade the quizzes together.

All right. Well, last week we went into the whole motivation and the heart behind evangelism. That is likely one of the more important concepts that you're gonna have to keep in mind. That our desire and our heart, where our motivation lies, if that's not there, everything else that we do for the next five classes, it won't matter.

You'll learn and perhaps you can, well it'll matter in the sense that you might be able to evangelize a little bit clearer or crisper, but you yourself, it might not be done out of a heart that actually honors the Lord. So it actually says that in Isaiah chapter 44 and Isaiah chapter 55, God lists out all these things to the Israelites.

He talks about oxen or cows and he talks about goats and then he talks about the grain offering and he lists all these things out and right next to it he puts, "Don't do this. It actually is as if you were drinking swine's blood." For the Israelites, it was an act of worship.

The way God received it, he said, "It's detestable." So everything that we do, although we live in the new covenant now, there is still the aspect of if we're not doing it for the right reason, if our heart is not in the right place, we have to question, like is God pleased in it?

So that's why last week's class on motivation was so important. Today we're gonna go into the first of the four in the gospel presentation itself, which is God. This is the beginning of all of it, so the introduction. Although we can simplify the gospel so that it's clear and understandable, we must not aim to reduce the message of the gospel down to its minimalist form.

Like any good teachers, we are using various methods to help people understand the Christian worldview. So the temptation is to not present the whole gospel and then I would say, I would kind of pose this, the opposite, there's another temptation in the opposite direction, which is to just be in with the fear of trying to get the whole gospel, you just kind of list them out.

And so tracks aren't bad, I think they're helpful sometimes. You know, many of you might have used like the four spiritual laws and things like that, but what you want to do is be able to be as comfortable with these four points as possible so that you can interact with people where they're at instead of saying, "Here, let's take you through this tract." Tracts are helpful, I'm not saying it's wrong or bad.

Actually, they're probably beneficial, but for you to be as comfortable with the gospel and to be able to take it from different angles, like you could spin it around and it's like a globe, where you spin it around, put your finger somewhere and you know exactly where you are, and you know how to lead people into this kind of conversation.

So there's going to be nothing new that comes out the next four weeks. So I don't know if you're disappointed, this is an evangelism training course, but I think this really is the way to evangelize. So the first one is, "God is the creator." God is the creator. Isaiah 44 24.

Can we maybe start from Agnes and we'll go to Sue. "Blessed is the Lord, your Redeemer, and He who formed you from the womb. I am the Lord who makes all things, who stretches out the heavens all above, who spread the broad earth by myself." Okay, so this idea of God being creator is clear in Scripture, that's obvious.

Actually, Ariel, maybe you can read Revelation. "You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power. For you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created." And then Marsha next. "1 Corinthians 10 26. For the earth is the Lord's and all its fullness." It's simple in our Christian worldview to just say God is the creator.

But there is a difference between truthfulness and truth. Truthfulness is when you just learn Christian concepts, you learn truthful things. It's different when you yourself truly believe something to be truth. And for that to happen, you have to be able to defend it. Even something as simple as this.

You can talk to an unbeliever and say, "Hey, God's the creator." You can say, "It's in the Bible." But you have to feel the confidence in, and even Scripture, is it going to be just because you learned it in church? You read it somewhere in the Bible? Remembering, even in Isaiah 44 when it says, "Blessed is the Lord, your Redeemer, and He who formed you from the womb.

I am the Lord who makes all things." It's so simple, but it gives you a lot of confidence in this fact. He makes all things. He stretches out the heavens all alone, spreads abroad the earth by myself. God alone was creator. There was no one else. There was nothing else.

It was God. He created. We hammer each of these things down as concepts in our minds that are not just concepts, but a truth that we individually believe. So there are ramifications to this. This is the beginning of the gospel, that God is the creator. It's not easy to always start with that, that God is creator.

But this is our starting point. And so, letter A, everything belongs to God. Everything has its origin and source in God. Everything belongs to God. Everything has its origin and source in God. That is the ramification of God being creator. You could talk to unbelievers like this. If God creates, then the natural next thing is that everything that is created then belongs to Him.

We have a hard time with this concept, but this isn't a hard concept. If you create something, it belongs to you. That's in our society. That's how we're wired. And so, if God is a creator, if they admit, "Yeah, I believe that God created the world," then you belong to Him.

That's the next natural ramification. Psalm 24. Let's go backwards. Go to Charlotte. Okay, and then Psalm 50. "For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the mountains, and the wild beasts that field are mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell you.

For the world is mine, and all is holy." Okay, remember last week we talked about the fact that it's very easy to get lost in man-centered gospel preaching. These thoughts are going to help you anchor this down. We don't shake on this. We're not ashamed of this concept. That you belong to the Lord.

You belong to Him. He created you. He gave you breath. He sustained you. He gives you heartbeat. He gives you the next day. There is no living. In John 1.1, when it says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God," right after that, it says that this being, who we later in verse 14 know to be Jesus, it says that He is the one that sustains life, and that through Him all things were created, and for Him all things are.

That's what we find in Colossians chapter 1. Everything, just everything, all of creation is found in Him. Again, we got to anchor this down. It's very tempting not to say these things. We're ashamed of this concept, I think. That it sounds not palatable to an unbeliever, but we're unashamed of saying this.

He created you. You belong to Him. Everything in this world belongs to Him. The second ramification is that He has full authority of His creation. So if everything belongs to Him, then He has full authority. I didn't type out Romans 9, 18 through 24, but do you all know this passage?

This is a very difficult passage. The clay, yeah right, right. Will the clay say to His maker, "What are you gonna do? Will the pot say anything to the one who made the pot?" No. He has full authority over you. He's like, "Don't make me this way." You can't say that.

It was in His volition to do that. You could get mad or whatever, but it was totally in His volition to do that. Letter C, He cares about His own creation. This is an actual ramification of God being creator. Someone who creates cares about creation. Letter D, His creation then, and these go together, that's why the verses are down below in D, His creation carries His imprint.

His creation carries His imprint. Psalm 19, 1. Oh, Alyssa? So everything that's made in creation, it will show what the Creator is like, what the Creator thinks is beautiful, what the Creator thinks is good versus not good. He won't create something He doesn't like, right? So in creation itself, there's an imprint of something about Him.

And the pinnacle of that we know from Genesis 1 is that it's us, it's humanity. Humanity is created in the image of God. Romans 1, 18 through 23, we see that, that it's wired, whether you're a believer or not, it's wired in you that there is a Creator God, and that we are simply suppressing that truth that God is actually our Creator.

And in letter E, we have dignity. We have dignity. The biblical illustration, the great biblical illustration of this is that He is the potter and we are the clay. Since He molds the clay with intention, we know that He is a creative God. Since He is the potter, He can make whatever shape He desires.

Since He is the potter, He's the one who has invested the time and the energy. Since He is the potter, the clay bears the imprint of the Maker. You can see how this is very helpful in talking to an unbeliever. If He is Creator, and if they admit to it, which many people do, you're gonna go out and you're gonna ask, "Do you believe that something created?" Many people walking out there say, "Yes." And who does your life belong to?

They'll say, "Me." I try to live a good life though, you know. I say, "No, no, no. The ramifications of there being a Creator God is not for someone to go and live on his own accord." Now you have to kind of vet that out a little bit and see where that flows.

Okay, here's some useful questions. And this is helpful in bridging to Him as Creator. Letter A, "Is this the way the world should be?" Try asking that question. Why? Because how they answer that question is going to show what they think about the Creator or lack thereof. Is this the world, is this the way the world should be?

In two weeks we're gonna be doing some role play. So you guys are gonna be again taking on a different religious person or background and then someone is gonna be a believer and you guys are gonna switch. These are some questions you could ask though. As you're having this fake conversation, you know, I'm gonna actually have you write out like a background of who you think you are.

So for the non-believer you can say like, "I converted at this age," and stuff like that. And you're gonna really try to take on that role. So as you're talking you can ask that, "Is this the way the world should be?" And try to kind of go into that.

"What do you think your purpose is in life?" Think about how people might answer that question when you ask that. "What do you think your purpose is in life?" What they say is going to prove or show or reveal or manifest what they think of the Creator. "What do you think about tree huggers?" There's a random one.

The reason why I'm putting all these random ones is because I'm trying to show you examples of different ways you could go about this. You're gonna come across someone who's like an environmental fiend. You know, they're all about the environment. And so you go, "What do you think about tree huggers?" And they're gonna be like, "Oh great, you know, we got to protect the environment." "Well why do we have to protect the environment?" "Oh because we have..." And you keep going down this line.

It's like, "Is there any real reason other than the fact that you know that God created the world and He created it good?" Letter D, "What kind of God is He?" If someone believes that there is a God, you can ask this question. Here's some sins against this truth.

So this is what you should be looking for. When you come across this idea of Creator and trying to help them see this concept of Creator, there are gonna be people who just straight-up deny His existence. This is their rebellion. This is their sin. Just be aware of that.

If they're not denying His existence, they might also be suppressing His existence. Or it could kind of go hand-in-hand there too. You suppress His existence. What's the difference between those? I've seen A like crazy. I haven't really seen B like crazy. Yeah, I think they really do go hand-in-hand.

You know, if you're denying, you are definitely suppressing. But I have seen people who like just straight-up feel like it's just suppressing. So we go onto the campus every week. There are just lots of different types of people on the college campuses. And they're all willing to talk. And they'll say something and then the next sentence they're saying something that completely contradicts what they said.

And I say, "Hey, you're suppressing something here. This is what you actually believe. You said it. It came out. And then you said this. That's suppression." So they won't, a lot of them will be like, "I'm not denying His existence. I don't know." I say, "Oh, you're definitely suppressing something here.

You know. You know. You said this." So does that... Right, right. So people like to wiggle around and be like, "I don't know." Bible says, "They know. They know. They're suppressing." So, okay. Any other questions on God as Creator? Oh, actually I do have a question. What if someone were to ask why did He create all things?

Because the answer that I gave to this person was that you can't say that, like, why a person creates. It's just something is like their nature and character. We don't attribute something to... We don't say a person is Creator and then therefore He creates. We say He creates, therefore He is a Creator.

So what would be, like, an alternative response to that? Why did God create all things? Maybe we could... Anyone want to respond to that? I'm not saying you have the right answer or... I'm just saying from a social point of view, we are created to glorify God. That is why He created us.

As for why He created everything, I don't know. Why He saved us, I really don't know. It's nice to have the choir here, you know. So, yeah. He created us ultimately for His glory. And there's a lot that goes along with that, though. You know, we have the right answers, but to be able to engage with someone, you know, it's a lot more complex than that, right?

We know God is holy and wrathful and just, but we know that there's a lot more to that than someone who's a judge with a gavel. So we can't have this one-dimensional view of God and just say, like, God is for God's glory. That is absolutely true. And then we work with that fact, right?

Which you would do, like, as you keep talking. Another facet of it is He wanted to. You know, like, you don't ask an artist, like, why'd you do that? It was His joy to. It was His desire to. Why are you asking this question, you know? So there's a lot that we as creation accuse God of without realizing because we're made in His imprint, we actually know the answers to it.

Like, if we were to ask, like, they're not fair questions, you know? So even the age-old question of, like, how could a loving God, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? Even that question, it's wired into us. But because we're, like, so, like, self-centered, the accusations that we throw against God, like, it's, like, we could quickly make people see that it doesn't make any sense, you know?

Like, for example, like, if you just use a simple image of, I talked about this with some of the college students, but I saw a video this past Tuesday of, like, cockroach eggs, and they were hatching. It was really nasty. There's, like, thousands of little cockroach eggs in a little pack.

But if you imagine, like, a cockroach egg nest, like, embedded into your wall, everybody in this room is going to say, "Destroy the house," you know? Like, "Just get rid of everything. It is so nasty, so vile, so ugly." You can hear it kind of skittering around. It was so gross.

There is no one that's going to approach the other direction and say, "Oh, well, you're going to kill them? You know, like, give them a chance," you know? There's no one that's going to do that. And so there's this, like, view that we come from where, because of our sin and because of, like, our desire to preserve ourselves, we throw accusations up at God.

That's what happened as soon as sin entered into the world. Blame shift, blame shift, blame shift. And so we're trying to help people see that, you know, when you come from a God-centered worldview, the man-centered worldview just crumbles. In Psalm 2, it says, "God looks down at man, and he laughs, he scoffs in derision," like, these people who try to just do their own thing, you know?

It's not the truth. Huh? Oh, the cockroaches? I'm not looking that up again. Oh, so gross. Okay. God is holy. God is holy. 1 Samuel 2.2. I forgot who was next. Okay. Okay. Okay. Habakkuk. Okay. And the 1 Peter? Okay. Another concept we understand, man, how difficult is it to communicate a holy God to an unbeliever?

That is so hard to do. And yet, you can't convince someone of their sin unless they see that. So you can get a lot of people to see that they're flawed, and you can see a lot of people to even see that they're broken. You can't get many people to see that they're sinful before a holy God.

But this is our anchoring thought. We can't get to next week's lesson until we go through this one, that God is holy. We can get someone to say, like, "Hey, are you a liar?" We've seen that done before, right? That presentation. Do you lie? Oh, then you're a liar.

Do you covet? Then you... What's covet? Covetor? You get the picture. Like, so if you do these things, then you are. And someone might say, like, "Oh, yeah, I am." But until the holiness of God is seen, what are you trying to convince them of? How can you convince them of their need for Jesus?

There's no need to even get to those points until they are able to see this. This is the truth. But here are some of the ramifications, and then we'll kind of circle back to it. Letter A, God determines the standard of right and wrong. If God is indeed holy, then what someone thinks right or wrong is does not end up mattering.

He dictates it. He says it, and that's how it is. Like someone who creates a board game, they make the rules. No one can come by and start questioning you and be like, "Why? Why would you do that?" He made the board game. That's how it is. Letter B, the holy God requires perfect obedience to his law.

The holy God requires perfect obedience to his law. Let's read some of these. Matthew 5. Okay, and James. All right, and then Psalm 34. All right. So if God is indeed holy, then there are these ramifications that come out that we must adhere to the holy law. Now, God being holy, it can be displayed.

There is this idea, when we think of just even the justice system, we have an inherent understanding of adhering to a good law. And so when you try to display God's holiness, you can talk about it with someone with images that they will be able to understand. But I want to kind of come back to this.

Don't stray too far from the authority of scripture. Even just the ability to say, "Hey, this is God's word, and it tells us who God is, that he is holy, and that one day when you die, you will come across a holy God who is going to judge right and wrong." That thing, more often than not, if you guys have gone evangelizing pretty frequently, more often than not, actually a lot of people believe it.

They don't buck against that too much. And I was very surprised by that the more I saw that. Why don't people buck against this idea of the fact that they're going to be judged one day? It's very strange. It's embedded in many, many religions that we're going to be judged on some kind of standard.

And so to get people to believe that God is holy just by saying, "Hey, it says here in God's word that God is holy," people don't fight against that as much as I thought they would. They fight against lots of other things, but I don't think there's a reason to try to go too far with this.

That's how it is. God is holy. So you can go into the morality, into the ethics, like why is there right and wrong? You should, and you should talk about those things. We'll talk about some of those things in the methodologies portion in section six, and talk about why do you think it's wrong for someone to, "Is it okay for me to come up to you and slap you in the face?" Would that be right or wrong?

Wrong. Well, you have morality. It's good to talk about all this, but sometimes you can get lost in that. It's like, man, God is a holy God. Okay. Then letter C, and this is why the law of God is revealed in conscience. Romans 2, 14 through 15. So when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also being a witness, and between themselves, their thoughts, if using or else if using them.

Okay. Or excusing them. Thank you. Yeah. So it's all in there. He describes even the Gentiles. They don't have the law, but by nature do the things in the law. Remember the law being given to the Israelites was given as God's grace to give a very clear path, but the law was actually written on the hearts of people.

It's there. And so again, it's not difficult to get people to believe in the fact that God is holy. Here's some useful questions to address this. How do you deal with guilt? Oh man, I've gotten some fascinating answers to this one. How do you deal with guilt? There is no human being that can actually live with guilt.

You can't. You have to do something with it, whether you bury it or try to justify it or whatever. When you talk about guilt, they'll just start talking about the fact that they actually do believe that they are under some kind of judgment and scrutiny. It's immediate. And when you start talking, you should talk about things as if people have an understanding of created order.

That they have these things that God is holy and that we are going to be judged by him. We can talk to them as if they have an understanding of it. And when you do, when you try to go around and convince them of something that you think they might not be convinced of, sometimes you do a disservice to it.

Don't be afraid. Don't be so scared that you're going to jump too far ahead of them. They know a lot more inherently than we give them credit for just by being humanity. Did that make sense? I don't know if that was clear. Okay. Let it be. Who determines the right and wrong for you?

Or even in our society? I'm sure all of you have used this one before. Who determines right or wrong? What do you think God requires from us? Just imagine the answers that come to this one. What do you think God wants from us? We get a lot of like, "Oh, he wants us to be good people." Well, if God is holy, there's a lot more to it than that.

Let it be. On what basis does God determine who goes to heaven and who goes to hell? And why? Why do you believe that? Yeah, we're going to talk about open-ended questions at the end of this. All right. Sins against this truth. People will try to deny an objective standard.

So don't let people get away with this one. If your standard is not my standard, then at what point does our standards align? I can slap you in the face then, right? Because it's not against my standard. Suppression of guilt, that's similar to the other one. So if you corner people and saying, you corner people into a place where it's like, "Oh, it's got to be some kind of objectivity here." Like your standard can't, like the fact that I'm so staunch on mine, you're going to get cornered at a certain point and then they're going to start trying to suppress the guilt portion of it.

Involvement in false religions. False religions have come up because of this. And then sin upon sin. People will, on top of their sin, begin to sin more and more and more because in the face of God's holiness, there needs to be zero sin. So when you're encountering one sin, you either confess and repent of that sin or you have to sin more to be able to suppress that sin.

And that's what you'll find people doing in light of a holy God. So all of this, it feels very theoretical right now, but we're going to be reviewing these things as we go out. And once we, when we're going out, as you're talking, if you start, if you keep these things in mind somewhere in your brain, it's going to, you're going to, it's going to start making sense.

You're going to be like, "Oh, I see what you're doing here." You know, like this stuff is just, it's out of, largely out of a book called The Metzger Book. Did I tell the truth? Is that what it was? I thought it was like a TV show and I got confused for a second.

Yeah. So, so a lot of it comes out of these people who have gone evangelizing a lot and they've used all their study to kind of confirm many things. And the things that I pulled out of the book are the things that I've gone out and done a lot of.

And I'm like, man, these are the things, these are the main things I kind of see a ton. Okay. Any questions up to this point? All right. The, The Chantry Book, the Today's Gospel is a great resource by the way. Very small, thin book, pretty cheap on Amazon, I think.

But he says here, "Preaching on the attributes of God is essential to the conversion of a man. Without a knowledge of God, a sinner does not know whom he has offended, who threatens him with destruction, or who is able to save him. Apart from some clear apprehensions of God, there can be no personal approach to God, and personal savior becomes a hollow phrase." So again, if you don't anchor on this idea of God being creator, God being holy, then everything else we're going to talk about will fall apart.

So given all this, what is the starting point and what is the common ground? I do believe the general revelation is a very good place to begin. Probably the place to begin. Sometimes when I'm looking at someone, this is the thought I have, and just running through my brain, you know that God is, you know that God is God the creator.

Like, and talk to them like they, like they know. If you're constantly trying to convince them that God exists, you know, it just goes down a rabbit trail. And when you just, when you anchor this down, you'll hear them say something, some certain things, and you'll hear it in those comments that they're using.

Like what you just said just proves that you believe in a God. It comes out so much. But if you don't have that anchoring thought in, you're going to spend a lot of time trying to convince it, and you're going to miss the idea and the thought that like, man, what he just said proved it, but he got away with that statement.

And you're still trying to make him believe that there's a God. Yes? Is it still like an appropriate starting point when you're talking about like a staunch atheist? Yeah, I mean, with an atheist, it's, it's pretty easy. I mean, we've all used this, I'm guessing the same strategy. Where does anything come from, right?

That's like the first line. And they're going to go and go and go. But at a certain point, they're going to say, I don't know. They have to. That's the end for the atheist. I don't know. But it's a, it's a higher philosophy, or like, it's a, it's a more sophisticated philosophy for them, right?

Like I'm more sophisticated because I'm able to say, I don't know. Right. Which is faith. And so I still think it's a starting point. I say like, I believe something too. Like I have faith too. And I believe that God created everything. I would say that to an atheist.

I believe that God created everything. And pull him into the biblical worldview rather than play in his playground. Because he knows. So don't play their game. Don't go into their world and, and be like, well, I'm going to try to convince you of the fact like what you just said, like you don't know, proves that, like, first of all, at the very least that there is place or space that perhaps God exists, right?

And they're going to say, well, I guess, you know, like, and so you go from there and you get to the point where you say, well, God created all things. So I would say that next, even if they're not fully here, them taking that step into the biblical worldview, maybe he does as an atheist for him to say that, I would say, well, God is the creator.

He exists. Everything we see around us has been created by God, you know, and we do that unapologetically. We say it with a smile on our face and we say it very nicely. But we say, basically, what we're saying is you're wrong. Not because we have all the truth, like, like perfectly like wrapped up and stuff like that.

But by the confidence that we have in our word. So, okay, I keep moving here. So you know that God is, God the creator, but you also have the moral law that God is the Holy One. That's your conscience. You know that there is right and wrong. What is guilt?

You have these things that points to some kind of creator that is actually, at the very least, good or better or the word we use is holy. Launching the conversation, start with a common conversation. So don't like go and like, like say, hey, so what kind of background do you come from?

And they're like talking about the fact that they're Buddhist. And then you just go like, well, God is creator and he's holy, you know, don't do that. But like, start with common conversation. What you're trying to do again, like this isn't, this isn't like a step by step thing that we're going through.

We're saying, tack these things down in your heart, in your in your mind, so that you can at any point when you're spinning it around in a conversation, these things are you're so intimately aware with the gospel. We understand that, right? The four points are the gospel. We're so intimately aware with it that when he says something like something pops up, and that becomes the grabbing point, like, oh, he like this is where I can say that God is creator.

This is where I can bring up the point that God is holy. But start with a common conversation. Listen very carefully, please, please, please do not, we're going to go out hopefully together. But as we go and do this, do not be formulating just your own answer. Actually hear what they're saying.

Try to almost like try to step into their shoes. And why are they saying what they're saying? Why are they thinking the way they're thinking? Why did he get defensive when I said this? Yeah, you're, you're trying to understand the person. So listen carefully and wait patiently for the answers.

Our goal is not to, you know, be like in your face kind of thing. You know, our goal is not to beat them in some kind of debate. Our goal is to care, to love, and ultimately to restore God's glory in this person's life because God's glory is that important to us.

So we patiently a lot of times I think we are after our own glory, because this is what we believe. And so our egos are involved in it. And so as we're talking with people, we're not talking on behalf of God anymore. We're talking on behalf of our Christianity.

And that's very, very bad. You know, it's you lose the love and you lost it. So ask good questions. So we don't have to be preaching at them. We're trying to circulate something here. So ask lots of good questions. I gave you just some in this packet or in this section.

The useful questions in both the God is Creator and God is Holy sections. So those are some starting points, but you can tell that those are just one out of thousands of questions that you can ask based on these things. Ask permission to ask direct questions. This has been super helpful for me.

This was another one of those surprising things. Where are we here? Oh, actually, let's backtrack. So sometimes you have to ask yes or no questions. Have you ever wondered why we're here? Is this the way the world should be? Do you think that God is involved in our world today?

So what the yes or no questions do is it makes them, you and them, you affirm them that we are on some kind of common ground here. Okay, so for example, do you think that God is involved in our world today? If they say yes, there are going to be statements that they make after that will disprove what they said.

So you say, but you said yes, we agree to the fact that God is indeed involved or something like that. So yes or no questions do have its place. However, open-ended questions are better. The how, what, why, you can ask, oh, can you explain that a little bit further?

Those are good. Make them talk and make sure that they're not talking you know, like nonsensically. So if you don't get it, don't just assume that, assume it, you know, because they're a Hindu guy or whatever. So here's some of those questions that can help. How did you make that decision?

What motivated you to choose this job? Why is that so important to you? Who determines if something is right or wrong? What do you think God requires of us to go to heaven? How does someone in your religion get to heaven? Have them explain. You're trying to get them to explain their worldview so that you can understand them better.

All right, now we get to ask permission to ask direct questions. We have here, can I ask you a personal question, Mike? How do you deal with guilt or shame? How do I know if God approves of me or not? So when they're difficult questions, when you feel like, oh, they're getting defensive and they look uncomfortable, you could ask them for permission and it really helps because it makes it feel like they're kind of in control again.

They're not like backing up, but they're like, I gave this guy permission. So now I'm the one kind of moving back forward and there you can kind of re-engage. So ask permission to ask direct questions. Can I ask you kind of a difficult question? I'm not trying to be offensive, but do you mind if I ask it?

Do you think you're a sinner? So if you just said, if you said like, hey, do you think you're a sinner? They might be like, what? But the responses you'll get will be very defensive in nature. But if you ask them, they're going to be like, oh yeah, you know, I think, yeah, it gets a little more cordial.

Though that's not our, that's not our goal. It's helpful. Letter E, listen again and then apply the Christian worldview. Okay. So you're, you're starting with a common conversation. You're listening and waiting for answers. You're clarifying things. You're asking good questions. You're asking permission to ask, ask questions. You're listening again.

And as you're doing all this, you're, what you're gathering is their worldview. And then what you're doing is you pull them into the Christian worldview. So just the last thought, we sometimes think like if it's me and Marsha, we sometimes think that they're there, I'm here and here's the truth.

Okay. And so we're trying to get to the truth, but what, how it really is, the actual picture is she's there. I'm standing on truth. So you're pulling her here. So that, keep that, keep that there. Like the anchoring is on God and who he is. Pull, pull them into that.

All the other stuff, like it'll start to fall in place the next few weeks as we go into man, as we go into Jesus, as we go into what is conversion, how, how do, how are they called to respond and apprehend the first three points for it to become a saving gospel to them?

Okay. Any final questions? Okay. Um, the homework, all the homework is going to be written at the end of these. So if it's not written there, it's not homework. Uh, homework should be, is it handling objections? Is it that one? Okay. So handling objections. So this is a resource, read through it.

There are a lot of questions that you're going to want to ask here that, uh, we're not going to get to because we're trying to get to the fundamentals of the gospel. And so the handling objections portion might be helpful. Um, as a person who takes this class, if you want to write up a little snippet to add to this packet, you can send me something.

There's like this objection that someone came up with and you're like, wow, that was a good objection. Answer that objection, send it to me. I'll include it in the packet if it's, if it's good. If it's bad, I won't. Um, if it's good, I'll add it so that the future classes will have more.

Okay. So you can help, uh, Burian like that. And then, uh, we are going to be also reading, which, which two religions are going into? Mormonism and Jehovah's Witnesses, the people who come to your door, right? So we'll hit those. And then, um, and then the memory versus for God.

Hmm. Oh, it's in, it's in your resources section. So I think it's your, your last resource right here. There's four of them. So it's fair game for quiz. Just saying. Okay. Does everyone, did everyone see it? The memory versus are back here. So you're not going into the packet or the lesson itself to get it.

It's right, right here. Okay. Actually, we have time for no more questions. I got to run. So, um, Oh, I have it right here. Okay. Everyone knows what to do, right? Okay. Just to be aware, um, in the calendar, uh, again, uh, we'll talk about it some more next week, but why is nothing in my folder?

In your calendar shows you the two things I'm asking you to try to participate in, which is the, um, gospel, no, the evangelism time that we're going to be doing in March. And then in April, there's a gospel night. Okay. So I'm going to be asking you to, uh, like listen, listen for the announcements today during Sunday service and, uh, be engaged with that because as a class, unless you have prior engagements, totally fine.

You didn't know before we had the class, so that's okay. Um, but if you have that slot free, um, try to think of it as mandatory. Um, yeah, that way, uh, we'll go and we'll share the gospel together. And, uh, it's two, I think very good ways to do it.

It's the cold evangelism. And then it's the, bring a friend to church type of evangelism. And then the middle two weeks, we're going to be, um, I'm actually going to be asking you guys to write down the name of somebody that you know, that you regularly are maybe interacting with, um, and to actually share the gospel with them.

Okay. So that one is a little scarier, I think, than cold evangelism because there's some skin in the game there. So, okay. Are we good? Any questions? No questions? Okay. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we pray for your help to evangelize a gospel that truly is centered around you, uh, that we might not waver as people who believe in a high view of God and a high view of your word, uh, that we might not waver in, uh, deadening and diluting and, and making, uh, boiling things down to, to, uh, something so simplistic that it is no longer the gospel.

Father, we know that the enemy loves it when we preach an incomplete gospel. Um, God, it is not a gospel that is effective to save. And so God, I pray that this would be truly our anchoring thought. You are a holy God. You have created us. Father, everything else falls under that.

And so Lord, teach us, teach us to fear you then that these are not things we're not just preaching. God is holy. God is creator to others, but we believe it deeply. And so we tremble and fear you. We tremble before you and we fear you. And so God, when there's, when we're sitting across from someone sharing the gospel, we no longer fear them.

And so Lord help us to be people who are able in that place, not to love ourselves, but to love the person we're looking at. And most of all, to love you that we would draw them to the one we love in Jesus name we pray. Amen.