All right, great to have you out this evening. And I hope you did get a copy of the study notes for tonight. And I invite you to get those out and join me in Romans chapter one. I know I'm talking tonight to several of you who enjoy literature. I have a literature fan in my family, Alicia, and she not only likes to read different types of literature, especially some of the English literature, but she herself likes to write and compose content as well. So if you're into literature, you probably know the name Arthur Conan Doyle, right? Pastor Ernie? Who's his most famous character? Sherlock Holmes. How many of you have read a Sherlock Holmes book? Raise your hand. How many of you have watched one of the old or new movies, Sherlock Holmes, right? Alright, then you know some of these Sherlock Holmes quotes from Doyle. I'll give you a couple of these. Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, but talent instantly recognizes genius. I like that. That's Sherlock Holmes character. Another Holmes quote. You have a grand gift for silence, Watson. It makes you quite invaluable as a companion. I like that. That's a good marriage quote, right? Or how about this quote by Sherlock Holmes? Education never ends, Watson. It's a series of lessons with the greatest for the last. I like that. Another one. My name is Sherlock Holmes. It is my business to know what other people do not know. And then one more. There is nothing more deceptive than the obvious fact Nothing more deceptive than the obvious fact. Some have even given credit to him for this similar statement, you have an amazing grasp of the what? Of the obvious. You know, as we've been studying this topic of personal evangelism on Sunday nights, we've been studying what are the main obstacles to personal evangelism, and we've kind of come at it two different ways so far. First of all, from the standpoint of the believer, how do believers get in the way of personal evangelism? And then in our second study, we saw how the local church itself actually becomes an obstacle to personal evangelism. And what I want to pose to you tonight, as we finish up the obstacles part of this series, is this. What are the obstacles when it concerns the unbeliever? And I'm going to list out four for you in our study this evening. But before I do, I want to take this quote by Sherlock Holmes and apply it. When we ask the question, what's the main obstacle to unbelievers coming to faith? I hope we have an amazing grasp of the obvious. An amazing grasp of the obvious would answer it this way, because they are what? They're dead. The unbelievers are dead. And I want to just give you, by way of introduction, a string of passages just to write down that remind you, listen, of the obvious. Romans 1, verses 24 through 28, therefore God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. Verse 26, for this reason God gave them over to degrading passions. Verse 28, just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind. Another passage is 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14. You'll know this verse, a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him. And he cannot understand them because they are spiritually appraised. An unsafe person with no life can give attention to truths of life by themselves. They are dead. They are dead. Probably some of the better known passages in this regard would be Ephesians 2, 1 through 3. Paul writes, And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked, according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lust of the flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. Verse 5. even when we were dead in our transgressions. What's the greatest obstacle for an unbeliever to come to faith? It's the fact that they're dead. They're dead. Ephesians 4, verses 17-19, So this I say and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart. And they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity or greediness." And Paul will again say, one more, in Colossians 1.21, although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds. You say, what's the greatest obstacle to an unbeliever? It's this. They cannot believe by themselves because they're dead. A popular illustration of evangelism is there's someone drowning out in the sea of life, heading towards a waterfall, right? And so you are responsible to row your boat close to them, throw the life-saving ring out to them, and hold on to the rope, and they have to make their way to that life-saving ring. And I can see how that might be an effective encouragement to be evangelistic, but the problem is, theologically, it falls way short. because you're throwing a ring to someone who's not grasping for air, mostly alive. They're already at the bottom of the river with no breath. They're dead. And something bigger than just me has to happen there. So the greatest obstacle, to state the obvious, is that they are dead. Now, with that as our backdrop this evening, I want to discuss on a human level how we can, if that isn't complicated enough that they're dead, we as believers can complicate it even more. In other words, we ourselves can actually become further obstacles, as if a dead person needs a further obstacle, getting in the way of them and the gospel. And I want to state four of them this evening. First of all, they can't see us. The unbelievers can't see us. Now let me give you this obstacle stated with these words in your notes. We are locked away in our Christian ghettos. And that's in quotes, and I'm taking that quote from an article that Moody Monthly Magazine, years and years ago when it was still in print, did a whole article on this, a whole issue on the topic of the Christian ghettos. And I like the point they were making. We have our own Christian clubs. We have our own Christian programs, we have our own Christian schools, universities, homeschool groups, friendships, publishers, and we even know when we're going to go through a toll road which Christian from our church is in which booth when we go through so we can just pay our tolls to Christians. I mean, if we're not careful, we can spend our whole day interacting with nobody but Christians. And Moody Monthly correctly calls that the Christian ghettos. We can survive 24-7, I say here, without any meaningful interaction with the unsaved. And you know, there was a day in conservative Christianity like ours where that might have even been seen as a virtue, where our only time that we interact with the unsaved is in an effort of evangelism. And as we've been saying previously in this series, and we'll say it again and again and again, you and I need to be more intentional to have friendships. Actively build points of interest and connections and friendships with the unsaved. Think of it as building bridges and allowing enough time and contact to pass so that we can walk across that bridge and that friendship with the full weight of the gospel. We must be intentional, but the thing is, for some reason, through the years and the decades, have considered it a virtue to say, well, there's no ungodly influences getting close to me. And at the same time, I understand that it's one thing to be insulated, You know, Peter says, do not be conformed to your former lusts which were yours in your ignorance. James says in James chapter 1, he talks about keeping yourself unstained from the world. I get the importance of being insulated, but there's a huge difference between being insulated from the unsaved and being isolated from the unsaved. They can't see us. Why? Because we're not around. We're not around. And it's here that I love what we hear from our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount. Look with me at Matthew chapter five, a couple Bible texts to consider. Let's go to the Sermon on the Mount again. Isn't it amazing how often we come to these three chapters? The first discourse in the New Testament. Matthew chapter five, verse 10. Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. Now listen to verse 13. You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? That's a haunting question. We're going to come back to that tonight, too. It's no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. Verse 14, you are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven." I mean, here's a clarion call that we are to be salt and light. Where? In our ghettos? Merely to each other? No. No, it is sweet, the fellowship we have with each other. And the New Testament will even say, be salt among yourselves. I get that. But this call here is to exist and to initiate contacts and to live the God life out there and to be distinct like salt and light. Again, I think Jim Berg is absolutely right in his book, Changing to His Image, where he says, if you want to change something, you don't add more of the same. In order to make a difference, you've got to be different. We have to be out there. It's interesting, in John 20, verse 21, Jesus says, as I've been sent, so now I send you. You go to the world with redemptive agendas. I have a book right here. It's a great book. I require this in one of the classes I teach in seminary. It's called The Gospel and Personal Evangelism. And it's written by a Baptist pastor in Washington, D.C., Mark Dever. And if you take away the appendix, it's only 104 pages of reading. It's a fast read, one or two sittings. And I'm going to share several quotes from this book and then give this book away tonight to you, okay? Along these lines, look in your notes, Mark Dever says in page 22, Isolation from unbelievers may be the most common excuse for a lack of evangelism. This is the excuse of choice for mature Christians. You ever notice that? You ever see someone come to Christ, an adult perhaps, and they don't know any better yet? They're not refined enough, they don't know the big words yet, and what they end up doing is after they get saved, they run right back to their family and tell them about it. And they run right back to the shop or their military unit and start talking about it to people. They don't know any better, do they? I mean, when they're more refined like us, they'll sit up straight, use longer words, and have less zealous contact with the unsaved. Maybe we could learn from the new believers what it looks like to be seen by the lost. In addition to being dead, I mean, it can't be any worse than that, but in addition to that, we complicate it further because they don't see us. We're not around. And if we happen to come through the checkout at Myers, We don't let it on with our words or our conversation or our concern for them that we're a child of God. So they can't see us. Number two, they can't hear us often. They can't hear us. Here's the obstacle stated simply, our lives undo our words. See, what do you mean they can't hear us? What happens if we are actively in friendships with the unsaved? Well, a lot of believers do that, a lot of professing believers do that. But the problem is, the unsaved look up at you and your friendship with them, or at me and my friendship with them, and they don't see anything different. I'm talking the same way they still talk. I'm laughing at what they're still laughing at. I'm pursuing the same interests, the same desires and lusts that they're pursuing. And while I might be doing it in the name of, for example, Christian liberty or freedom, they don't see it that way. They're saying, well, you're just like me. We think we're cool, but in reality, we have become them. And nouns and verbs of the gospel don't even follow. They can't hear us. And sometimes when we do break the silence and we do say, hey, you want to come to church? Or has anyone ever talked to you before how you can know for certain that you have eternal life? They look at you sideways and say, well, if that happened and if I accepted that and became like you, I still wouldn't be any different than I am right now. I don't understand it. I don't hear what you're saying. And so the stated obstacle is this, our lives undo our words. Can I give you two passages to consider for this obstacle? James 2, 14 through 26. I'm not going to read that whole text to you because I've preached on it. It's online. But it's that passage that talks about the importance of making sure that our works line up with our stated faith. A faith without works, James says, can that faith save him? He says, what use is that? He says, it's useless. It's not perfected faith. I'm just pulling these right out of his words here. As the body without the spirit is dead, so is faith without works. And another one is Luke 14, 34-35, which basically reiterates what our Lord said in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter 5, but he says it a little more graphically here in Luke 14. Verse 34 and 35, Therefore salt is good, but if even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned? It is useless either for the soil or for the manure pile. It's thrown out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. It's possible for you and I to go to church every week and to have relationships and friendships with other believers. We might have a good education in the Bible, but when we rub up against other people that are unsaved, They can't hear us because our lives undo our words. That's an obstacle. You say, well, they're dead anyways. They're dead anyways, but what are we going to line up with them and try to make it even more complicated than it already is? So they can't hear us. Number three, they can't understand us. They can't understand us. This is one I struggle with a lot, personally. they can't understand us. What is this obstacle stated? Here it is. We use quote-unquote Christianized conversation that is foreign to the unsaved. You know what I'm saying here? We use long Christian words that we might understand, or if it's a Bible word in the Bible, every Christian here should be leaning forward to learn those words. It's part of our discipleship. Propitiation, covering, justification, regeneration, sanctification, glorification. If you're going to get ordained, Phil and Ernie, hypostatic union. I mean, that's not a Bible word, but it's a biblical concept. We should be leaning into that and constantly being stretched in our understanding of scripture and systematic theology. But the guy at Kmart doesn't know that. The guy at Exxon doesn't understand that. And if I start out saying to him, hey, you know what, I go to Calvary Baptist Church, you want to come visit with us and come sit with our family when you show up? And this coming week we're doing a series on eschatology. You might really get into that, huh? Oh yeah, and as we study eschatology, we are gonna be totally blown away with the effectiveness of eschatology when it comes to talking to an unregenerate soul about regeneration. You wanna come? And they're like, yeah, I don't know that my mom lets me use all those words, right? That's what they're thinking to you. What are you saying? I don't understand a word you are saying. You know what, I give Mark Meredith a hard time. Why? Well, it's a fun sport, okay? He gives me a hard time about using Greek words at deacon meetings. I'm afraid to now, because he's bigger than I am and faster. And he doesn't like me to use big words in sermons. And I remember when I was interviewing here, he says, you don't come from a seminary in Virginia Beach and use $20 words with a $5 guy like me, and stuff like that. And with a smirk on his face, but can I say this? He's being serious. And he's making a good point. I want to stretch you, as a believer, with your vocabulary. So I don't apologize for that. I want to pull you into a greater understanding of scripture and systematic theology, just as Pastor Graham, Don Rowe, and other pastors. So I'm going to stretch you on that. But when I'm scanning the crowd on a Sunday morning, and I see a visitor that called the church this week for counsel, or emailed me for counsel, or I see someone here for the first time. I always try to put, and so does Ernie, we always try to put a gospel presentation in every sermon we preach. I did it this morning, if you caught me. Twice, actually. That's very intentional. When I get to that point, I'm not going to be doing a lot of stretching in the sermon. I want to make it simple, and I'm fishing. I remember when I, and perhaps I've told some of you about a guy named Toby when I was pastoring in North Carolina. And Toby came in, he was a rough cut character, he was invited to church by a guy in our church, another co-worker, and Toby came in one Sunday, I was told he was coming, he came all the way in late and he went to the front row right in front of the pulpit with his wife and two kids. And he was a rough looking guy, just tough looking. He surely could back it up. Think MMA. That's Toby. And I preached, I was preaching through Matthew at that point, and preached my sermon, and tried to give the gospel, and was at the back door shaking people's hands as they left, and he politely waited in line with his wife and kids in tow, and they came up to me, shook my hand, said, hi, my name's Toby, you know the guy I work with, his name's Norm, he's right over there, and he invited me, and I'm glad I came, but I gotta tell you something, he's gripping my hand the whole time, my eyes are watering. He says, I didn't understand a word you said this morning. I'm like, oh, OK, thanks for the honesty. And I said, you going to come back next week? He says, I'll come back next week. I said, OK. So I get my commentaries out. I get all my language stuff out that week for my normal study times. And I'm going through my process of preparing a sermon. But I had someone else in the office with me every day that week when I was studying. You know who it was? He wasn't really there. But it was a picture in my mind of Toby sitting in my office. And as I'm getting excited about a theological concept that Matthew's going to introduce in his gospel that next week, in the next text I'm going to preach on, I have Toby raising his hand saying, I don't understand a word you're saying. And having him in my office, in my mind that week, forced me to craft those words that he would understand, because he promised he's coming back. And he came back. And I used smaller words intentionally. I might have even smiled at him during the sermon. And he came back to the door at the end after the service, he says, I understood every word you said. And he kept coming back. And it wasn't too many weeks later where he pounded on the door one day after church and my door flew open, that's how he knocked, the door would fly open. I'm in there talking to my youth pastor and he comes in and he comes up to us and I didn't know if I had to fight now, what was going to happen here, okay? And he says, yeah, I need to know, I'm glad we're, how do I get saved? And we looked at each other and I said, Toby, here's what we're going to do, because we had to run out for another obligation. I said, we have an obligation right now, a meeting. You go home, get your whole family there, and we're going to come over to your house right after lunch. Okay? Okay. and went over there after lunch, and as I've shared with you before, I gave him the evangelism explosion presentation of the gospel, which is what I do, this is what I've been trained in, and he repented and called on Christ with tears. His wife, afterwards, after he got up off his knees, because he was on his knees praying, his wife couldn't believe what she just saw, and she was on her knees right after him accepting Jesus. Why? Because they could understand it now. Now, I say all that to say this, when we come to church, our church gathering is primarily for the saved children of God. And Pastor Ernie's laid that out in this series, and I agree with him. We gather, according to Ephesians 4, according to 1 Corinthians 12, according to Romans 12, we can go on and on, we gather to grow and to mature each other and to serve. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14, there's going to be unsaved people visit, and that's great, but they're coming and they're going to see us worship our God and interact in love with each other and then fall on their face and declare that God's here. Okay, when we gather, we're going to stretch and grow spiritually in our understanding. But when we interact with the unsaved, we better be intentionally simple. Intentionally simple. Can I give you a few Bible texts to consider for this? 1 Corinthians 1 verse 18. 1 Corinthians 1 verse 18. Paul writes, the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. But to us who are being saved, it is the what of God? It's the power of God. And look over at 1 Corinthians 2, verses 1-5. And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom. Could he have? Oh yeah, he could have buried them. I was proclaiming to you the testimony of God, for I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. See, that's all he knew. That's all he wanted to communicate to them. Paul could have communicated to them what he wrote in Romans. He says, you know what, when I came to you with the gospel, first footprint of the gospel down, I had one thing, and it was Jesus and Him crucified. Verse 3, I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest in the wisdom of men, but on the power of God. My brother-in-law, Mike Knight, is preaching in Haiti on a missions trip right now. He got there yesterday, I guess, and helped with some church services. And last minute, he was asked last night to preach this morning at a church. Is that how that worked out? Through an interpreter. And he texted today. I guess they have Wi-Fi right where he is. He texted today. He says, even through an interpreter, And during an unseen opportunity, three people came to faith in Christ. I just told them the gospel in the sermon. That's the simplicity, yet the profundity of the gospel message. It's powerful. We don't need to dress it up. We don't need to make it ornate. Give the gospel message, Paul says. You say, what is that gospel message? Well, he tells us in 1 Corinthians 15. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Verse 1, Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, and which you also stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believe in vain. For I delivered to you, as of first importance, what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. And we could go on and on and on. You know, Paul, he's saying this in chapter 15. What has he done prior to chapter 15? Oh, he's taken on false teaching. He's corrected errant worship. He's discussed, he's beginning to discuss in this chapter one of the greatest discussions of the resurrection theologically He's done a lot, but he says, when it comes to interacting with the unsaved, here's my message, it's real simple. Jesus died for your sins according to scriptures, and he was buried, and he rose again. Do you believe? Do you believe? Keep it simple. Proverbs 16, verse 21 talks about adding persuasiveness to our lives. So I have a lengthier quote here, but it's in your notes, and it's from this book again by Mark Dever. Follow along as he kinda unpacks the same point for us. He says on pages 63 and 64, none of us has a complete understanding of the gospel, but we must have a clear idea of the basics of our message. And we must be clear in our expression of them. If there is a likely misunderstanding, then we should address it. We should speak in such a way as to be understood. Contextualization is the big theological word for this. Now, just when you think being simple means sanding down the corners of the gospel, that's not what we're saying. Say, what are the corners of the gospel that you have to repent of your sin? I'm not going to sand that down. What is another corner that you are a sinner? What's another corner? Things are going to be different if you're a child of God. I mean, we don't sand that down so we can trick someone into a conversion. We need to give them the whole gospel of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and the fact that we need to repent from our sin and accept him as Savior and Lord, and things are going to be different. Luke 14 says, count the cost, man. If you're going to be a disciple of mine, count the cost, or you're not worthy to be a disciple of mine. So with that thought in mind, go to his second paragraph. One part of providing clarity when we share the gospel is the willingness to offend. Stop. Sometimes we think, if I offend an unbeliever with my witness, I haven't been simple enough. I'm going to argue with Dever that if you offend with the gospel, you're being extremely simple. They're understanding something that might not be pleasant. That's okay. You let the Spirit do its work. He says, quote, clarity with the claims of Christ certainly will include the translation of the gospel into words that our hearer understands, but it doesn't necessarily mean translating it into words that our hearer will like. Too often, advocates of relevant evangelism verge over into being advocates of irrelevant non-evangelism. And then look at this last sentence. A gospel that in no way offends the sinner has not been understood. Now, you have to just chew on those words. I can't make them any more clear. I remember, with all the zeal of a college student, going out and having guys my freshman, sophomore, and junior year teaching me how to do evangelism on the street. I mean, door-to-door was too slow, man, because you had that space between doors, you know? I wanted to convert the world. And so we went downtown, and anyone that we could catch up with on the sidewalk, we tried to pin them down with a conversation about the gospel. And with all the zeal of a college student in a Bible college, the Lord allowed me to see a lot of conversions, but zero fruit. I mean, I almost wondered if they converted just to let me let them go, you know? And then I made a mistake of reading a book my junior year of college, between my junior and senior year, by John MacArthur called The Gospel According to Jesus. Man, that book messed me up. It told me that I had to start my presentation not with, you don't want to get burned for a long time, do you? Because that would be unfun. But we start a lot of our gospel presentations with, you don't want to go to hell, right? Let's look at a better option. It says start your presentation with the holiness of God. And then talk about this holy God who's been offended as the same God who is seeking to reconcile. And he does so through his son, Jesus. Talk about the clarity and simplicity, yet weight of repentance and faith. And that book just really impacted me. So I went back my senior year, and I still went out on the street evangelism extension. But I did a little differently this time. I actually even wrote a little tract to keep me on track. starting with God's holiness and wrath and man's fall. And you know what? We saw fewer conversions, personally. But we saw fruit, finally. because people are understanding, oh, I see now. And they would come to faith and stick around for discipleship and end up in a church. I remember leading one guy to Christ. He got off a bus as I'm walking down the street in downtown, and he had a duffel bag, set it right down, right in front of me, and then the bus left. And his name was Clay. I remember his name, Clay, all these years. And Clay's story was he just got off the bus that brought him from the jail. He just got out of jail and had made his way here, and he didn't know where to go from here. And he's in downtown Greenville. And we started a conversation, and I was coming at it now with what I thought was a simpler, more clear presentation, starting with God's holiness. And he was wrapped up in this conversation with me. And he ended up placing his faith, professing Jesus that night, repenting of his sin, placing his faith in Christ. And he's like, well, now what? I said, well, I want to disciple you. We'll set up a time to come back and disciple you. He says, well, what are we going to do tonight? I said, well, I know the guy that's running. He's in class with me. He's running the rescue mission over here on the evening shift. Let's go over there. So we took him over there and he checked in. And we had a few contacts for discipleship. And then he got busy. He was so trustworthy, they started using him as an employee there part-time in the office area. And I bumped into my friend a few weeks, maybe two months later, and says, hey, let me tell you about Clay. And I'm like, yeah. I discipled him, and I haven't been in contact. What about Clay? And he says, what happened with him? I mean, what did you say to him when you led him to Christ? I said, man, it's just a simple presentation about the wrath of God and the mercy of God and faith and repentance. He said, because he has really elevated himself, he's very serious, he's reading his Bible, and we are leaning on him more and more at the mission. And I was just like, well, praise the Lord. That's fruit. Fruit that remains. Keep it simple. Well, let me give you one more this evening, and we'll be done. If it wasn't bad enough that they were dead, on a horizontal level, number four, they can't believe us. They can't believe us. Now I'm going to read you this obstacle stated, then I want you to watch a video. It's probably the only time in church you're gonna see this particular character in a video during a sermon. His name's Penn Jillette. He's an atheist and a comedian, very well known and current today. But I want you to hear of an encounter he had. But let me give you the obstacles stated so you know how to listen to this video. Our lack of urgency in witnessing only communicates a lack of love, right? Our lack of urgency communicates a lack of love and further nourishes what I'll call the soil of depravity. Meaning, they're dead, they can't understand the things of God, and here I am, supposed to be a Jesus person, not even moving towards them. Of course they'll fold their arms and look at me or look at you and say, it's just not real, is it? Listen to someone who to this day is an atheist, rejecting the gospel of Jesus, but moved by a believer who moved towards them. I want to talk to you about this. I've been holding the show, and at the end of the show, as I've mentioned before, we go out and we talk to folks and sign an occasional autograph and shake hands and so on. there was one guy waiting over to the side in the what I call the hover position after I was old on big guy probably about my age big guy and he had been the the guy who has the pics the joke during our psychic comedian section of the show so he had the props from that in his hand because we'd give those away he had the of the joke book and the envelope and the paper and stuff. If you haven't seen the live show, it's not worth explaining, but he had props from the show that we'd given him from the night before. He wasn't the guy that night. And he walked over to me and he said, I was here last night at the show, and I saw the show and I liked it. He was very complimentary about my use of language. complimentary about, you know, honesty and stuff. He said nice stuff, no reason to go into it. He said nice stuff. And then he said, I brought this for you. And he handed me a Gideon pocket edition. I thought it was from the New Testament, but I also thought it was Psalms from the New Testament, right? Psalms, just part of the New Testament. A little book about this big, this thick, you know. He said, I wrote on the front of it that I wanted you to have this. I'm kind of proselytizing. And then he said, I'm a businessman. I'm sane, I'm not crazy. And he looked me right in the eye and did all of this. And it was really wonderful. I believe he knew that I was an atheist. But he was not defensive and he looked me right in the eyes. And he was truly complimentary. It wasn't in any way, it didn't seem like empty flattery. He was really kind and nice and sane and looked me in the eyes and talked to me and then gave me this Bible. And I've always said, you know, that I don't respect people who don't proselytize. I don't respect that at all. If you believe that there's a heaven and hell and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think that, well, it's not really worth telling him this because it would make it socially awkward. And atheists who think that people shouldn't proselytize, just leave me alone, keep your religion to yourself. How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that? I mean, if I believed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that a truck was coming at you and you didn't believe it, that truck was bearing down on you, there's a certain point where I tackle you. And this is more important than that. And I've always thought that, and I've written about that, and I've thought of it conceptually. This guy was a really good guy. He was polite and honest and sane, and he cared enough about me to proselytize and give me a Bible, which had written in it a little note to me, not very personal, but just, you know, like to show and so on, and then like five phone numbers for him and an email address if I wanted to get in touch. I know there's no God, and one polite person living his life right doesn't change that. But I'll tell you, he was a very, very, very good man. That's really important. And with that kind of goodness, it's okay to have that deep of a disagreement. I still think that religion does a lot of bad stuff, but man, that was a good man who gave you that book. That's all I wanted to say. How much do you have to hate someone to not tell them? from the lips of an unsaved man to this day. Romans 9, let me direct your attention to one more passage, just to consider in this regard, Romans 9, 1 through 5. You think Paul was shy about it? Paul was the most bold, listen, to those who would persecute him, the fiercest, the Jews. Romans 9, 1-5, I am telling the truth in Christ. I am not lying. My conscience testifies with me in the Holy Spirit that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen, according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belong the adoption as sons, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the temple service, and the promises, whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ, according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen. Verse 3, I wish, I wish that if it were possible for me to be severed from the love of Christ, which he just said at the end of Romans 8, it's impossible if you're in Christ. Just finish that at the end of chapter 8. He says as unbreakable as that is, I would be willing to see that broken if it meant my fellow Jews would come to Christ. Now is that believable or what? That is urgency. I give you one more quote from this book by Mark Dever. When we don't sufficiently consider what God has done for us in Christ, the high cost of it, and what it means, and what Christ's significance is, we lose the heart to evangelize. Our hearts grow cold, our minds grow smaller, more taken up with passing concerns, and our lips fall silent. And look at this last sentence. We engage in the conspiracy of silence. They can't believe us. We say we have a message, but we don't share it with them. I want to give this book to someone. I've already tried to sell this book to you. It's a great book. You can read it in one or two sittings. Mark it up. I just ordered two more tonight. And I think you'll enjoy this. I think it'll sharpen you and get you thinking along the right lines for personal evangelism. Now, I wonder who wants this book. This is how Pastor Ernie does this, right? I'm trying to learn from him. Jim Braunlich. You know what? As I was sitting up here wondering who I was going to give the book to, I thought of you. Why? Because you're one of our many Gideons here. And I know you're going to back it up. And so here, enjoy that gift. See what I did with Jim? I told him something I was pretty excited about. I told it to all of you. And then I singled him out in a friendship conversation. and offered it to him, but he had to reach out and what? Accept it. A very, very elementary example of evangelism. So what do we do? The last three studies have been all about the obstacles to personal evangelism. Obstacles when it comes to believers, obstacles when it comes to the local church, and now obstacles when it comes to unbelievers, and even with the unbelievers, we're the ones that are at fault. What do we do now? Change always is preceded by repentance. Remember? We always have said that. Proverbs 28.13 says, He that covers his transgression will not prosper, but he that confesses and forsakes him will find mercy. So what do we do now? What we do, first of all, individually, privately, is to confess our shortcomings in personal evangelism. And by God's grace, next Sunday night in our new auditorium, we're going to transition into the second part of this series, and we're going to look at the keys to personal evangelism. You say, I don't know how to do it. I'm going to do my best to equip you for that. We're going to take a week and talk about how do you get ready before you even have a conversation with someone. The second study will be, what do you need to remember to include in that conversation when it happens? And the third part will be, what do you do after the conversation's over? You're still not finished evangelizing that person. We're going to look at all of those over the next few studies together. And then Pastor Ernie and I may even put on a couple demonstrations of personal evangelistic conversations, all right? We have some work to do. But before we run into that, let's repent of this. As you have your time with the Lord, And even corporately, I will pray here in just a moment, but you and I need to privately as well, in our own time with Christ, ask us forgiveness, ask for grace, ask for urgency, and ask for love for the unsafe.