To celebrate the launch Terry Virgo’s new evangelistic resource, Life Tastes Better, we’re sharing a series of surprising evangelistic encounters in everyday situations.
It was a cold winter’s evening in early February when I met with my old school friend. We have known each other since we were infants, and every year we make a point of meeting two or three times, without our wives, for a catch-up on life. I am godfather to his son and he to mine, he has been there for me at difficult times and there is little that we would not tell each other. Years ago I talked with him and prayed for him, as he worked through the questions that troubled him and made the journey from the childhood faith in which he had been brought up to the embracing of it for himself as an adult. I had walked that same route myself just a few years before.
This evening as we stepped out of the cold into the pub we saw the welcome sight of a wood-burning stove fired up, casting a warm glow into the room. Sadly, casting a warm glow was all that it seemed to do. The bar was freezing; the radiators lukewarm; and the table nearest the stove was a occupied by a single, middle-aged man nursing his lonely pint. We ordered our drinks, kept our coats on and retired to another table, trying to warm up, but it was no good. After several minutes of huddling over the radiator, telling ourselves we would warm up soon and coveting the warmth enjoyed by the solitary middle aged man, we gave in and committed a most un-English act—we asked if we could join him.
And so it was that we met Paul, a musician, who years ago had moved down from the North to earn his living in the Indie rock scene and ended up living in a flat in a comfortable Surrey suburb of London. He hadn’t, however, forgotten his northern roots and as well as having a slight but discernible accent maintained the ability to talk to strangers. We chit-chatted, exchanged names and jobs and similar items of small talk and so it came to pass that he learnt we were both Christians. This could be a conversation killer, I thought, but I was wrong. He was open, encouraging us to give our opinions, even chiding us for our reluctance to speak. He disclosed his own unhappy relationship with the strict Catholicism in which he’d been brought up and how refreshing he found the faith of an inclusive, liberal Anglican church where a close friend of his ministered. He wanted a church close by which he could connect with, where he would be welcomed and not feel condemned.
There he was, it seemed, an open goal, cued up by heaven’s midfield, waiting for the earthly striker to tap the ball over the goal line and score another victory for the good guys. Unfortunately, the goal wasn’t as open as it seemed, it was in fact very well defended. It soon became clear that Paul was much exercised over gay rights, he had many gay friends in the music industry, born that way, so how could that be wrong? His liberal Anglican minister friend accepted them without question, why couldn’t others. What was our opinion?
I tried to answer him. I gave my testimony of a life reborn and unexpectedly changed through a committal to Christ, of the Holy Spirit guiding and changing all who trust in Christ, loving us but not leaving us in a sinful state. He listened but it did not seem to sink in, not this time anyway. He could not connect that God, though all loving, is also all Holy. The Bible’s teaching on homosexuality, or more accurately how the church has presented that teaching with legalism and hell-fire, had created a high wall between him and the good news.
Some sow and others reap, but it is God who waters and gives the increase. So I pray that the words I spoke will be watered by the Holy Spirit and not snatched away by hungry devil birds. And what lessons did I learn? To be prepared to answer the awkward questions today’s society has, to carry a tract or a church invitation on me always, but most importantly that people are often far more open, far more interested and far more willing to talk than I might expect. One day soon I hope to go back to that pub, Paul’s regular where he feels comfortable, relaxed and accepted, and maybe bump into him again, just accidentally of course.
Life Tastes Better is a great book to give away to questioning friends in the pub! It reveals the surprising truth that life with Jesus really does taste better than anything the world can offer us. Read it as a Christian to prepare yourself for evangelistic conversations and have a copy of it ready to give away. Available to buy now.