My life was forever changed by a pastor who insisted I learn to share the gospel. Bob Latham, former pastor of Northside Baptist Church in Indianapolis, Ind., did not ask if I wanted to be equipped; he insisted on it.
Todd Gray
He signed me up for a witness training course and told me when and where to show up. I did show up and was trained to share the good news of Christ and then went to work as a witness.
That training took place over 30 years ago and its impact was indelible as I am still witnessing today. In the past week, I shared the gospel three separate times. That is not much, but it is better than nothing.
The two requirements for having more Kentucky Baptists who are faithfully sharing the gospel are amazingly simple and doable: be one and teach one. Make up your mind that you will attempt every day to share Jesus with some poor lost sinner and then decide that you will teach a fellow follower of Christ to do the same.
How can we equip others to share the gospel? Here are five simple ways:
1. Lead a witness training course in your church. Your Kentucky Baptist Convention Evangelism Team, led by Rob Patterson, would love to supply your church with a witness training kit that you can use in your church. Simply send an email to evangelism.team@kybaptist.org and ask for a training kit to be sent to you. Then review its contents, gather a group in person or online and train the trainable. You may end up equipping the next Ravi Zacharias for a life of evangelistic leadership.
2. Invite someone to attend an online witness training course with you. As we continue through the COVID-19 experience, there is a plethora of online training courses available. Some of them focus on evangelism. Consider going to the kybaptist.org website and searching for the Bill Fay webinar and viewing its contents with a friend.
3. Share the gospel with a Christian to train them to do the same. One of the fastest ways to learn to witness or sharpen your evangelism skill is to role-play with a fellow believer. Practice sharing the gospel with a fellow believer and then ask them to do the same in return. Give each other helpful feed- back and watch as you both leave the encounter sharpened for gospel outreach.
4. Read an evangelism book together with another Christian and practice what you are learning. I make a practice of reading 12 to 15 books per year on evangelism. Another great way to raise up a soul winner is to get a friend to read the same book along with you and interact over its contents.
5. Take someone with you to intentionally do personal evangelism. I learned evangelism by doing evangelism. I have trained others by taking them along with me when I do evangelism. I remain convinced that the best way to train others is to let them watch you witness and then ask them to step out and do the same.
If you will train one person to share the gospel and the one you train shares the good news, then you have doubled your impact for Christ.
Here are two questions to help you get started.
• Who can you train to share the gospel?
• When will you get started?
I am concluding this article and about to call a friend so we can get started doing evangelism together.
Todd Gray is executive director-treasurer of the Kentucky Baptist Convention.
Todd Gray