Here is our next “hidden gem.” One of earliest posts and starting our “Stories From the Field” category was from Sterling, VA and Pastor Phil Proctor. The simplicity and authenticity that comes through on this post got some peoples’ attention, but maybe not enough people, so here it is in the hidden gems redo. Stories […]
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Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #13 – Serving By Being Served
Our final post in our series on the book, “Get Real,” by John Leonard. Leonard has certainly thrown cold water in our faces many times and challenged all kinds of stereotypes about evangelism. This final excerpt in a calmer way, challenges our standard thinking about serving and being served. “Christians are always taught to serve […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #12 – Praying With The Lost
Continuing with our series on snippets from John Leonard’s book, “Get Real”, we get another surprising jab to start which then leads to another helpful lesson in evangelism. Christians always lie. We don’t mean to, but we do. You’ve done it too. A friend shares a problem with us, and we say, “I’ll pray for […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #11 – Lean Into Other Religions
Returning to our final few posts in this series, this week John Leonard encourages us to lean into talking about other people’s religious beliefs rather than shying away. He wants to persuade us that it will greatly help, not hinder, our evangelism and that there’s nothing to be afraid of. You be the judge if […]
Hidden Gems – Part 3
We introduced this series that we are calling “Hidden Gems.” After 5 years and 250 posts, we have detected several that had a distinct influence on people but maybe didn’t get the attention or circulation warranted. So we are sharing those on occasion over the next few months. Around 3 years ago, we did a […]
5 Years & A Hidden Gem
This week marks 5 years of Outward OPC. How do we measure those 5 years? Well, there are numbers–20,000 visitors to the site, 60,000 post views, and 16,000 podcast listens. Those numbers are great and we are thankful for each one of you who added to them. But the numbers don’t tell the real story. […]
Wisdom & Encouragement From the Past
Came across two quotes that seemed like a fitting post for this week to give everyone some encouragement in our efforts to reach the lost, both in our daily lives and in our churches. First, Andrew Bonar directed toward our everyday lives: “Our power in drawing men to Christ springs chiefly from the fullness of […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #10 – The Gospel Isn’t a Sweatsuit
This week, John Leonard takes on the topic of contextualization—but not the controversial way it’s often used with worship. Rather, he’s talking about two different approaches to sharing the gospel…and yes, he wants to shatter a common picture of evangelism again! I love my sweat suit. No matter how much weight I gain or lose, […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #9 – When Does Your “Testimony” End?
This week, John Leonard is shaking the tree on how we view “our testimony” in regard to evangelism. In the Reformed world, it’s pretty common to make the point that “our testimony isn’t the gospel.” That’s not new. But that’s not where Leonard is going with this one… “Testimonies are powerful. They are so powerful […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #8 – The Inconvenience of Sowing Widely
Last week, John Leonard painted two pictures of evangelism, one an interesting and perhaps more natural way of “sowing widely.” Here he continues to expand and gives an example: “We sow widely by intentional interaction with the people around us. That is hard in a world where personal interaction is being eliminated. I’m a person […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #7 – Sow Widely
Jumping back into our “Get Real” series, John Leonard likes to give us new images of things—squashing stereotypes. This week it’s a common view of evangelism and whether you have “the gift:” “Many of us don’t even want to evangelize because of the stereotypes surrounding the traditional evangelist. We don’t see ourselves standing on a […]
Top 3 of 2022
We do this summary every year because we think what the readers determine is valuable is, well, valuable. So when our committed audience says these are the top posts, we want to highlight that for you. So here are the most viewed, shared, and forwarded posts of 2022: 1. Podcast with Dale Van Dyke & […]
Stories From the Field: Evangelism Where You Are Planted – Part 3
The last snippet from Allison Hill’s article about a youth evangelism conference in Dayton, Ohio. Pastor Tyler Detrick’s reflections on the event are worth a few minutes of consideration: According to Detrick, the kids were surprisingly eager to speak with people, even asking to move to new locations when they weren’t seeing much foot traffic. […]
Stories From the Field: Evangelism Where You Are Planted – Part 2
We are breaking down Allison Hill’s great article about Outreach in Dayton, Ohio. Pastor Tyler Detrick was interviewed about a Youth Evangelism Conference they held. You can read the first post here (Part 1) for context and the “why” of the conference. This week, we look at the “what” of the conference and take a […]
Stories From the Field: Evangelism Where You Are Planted – Part 1
Light of the Nations OPC in Dayton, Ohio is consistently doing evangelism. Recently, Allison Hill (Home Missions Staff) wrote a great article interviewing Pastor Tyler Detrick about one of their efforts with a youth evangelism conference. We are going to break the article up into a couple of short segments with some questions for thought […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #6 – Listen More Than You Speak
We continue taking lessons from John Leonard’s book, “Get Real.” In the past couple posts, he has intentionally startled us with his opening thesis. Today, it seems like maybe he’s been with us on several occasions in our lives, maybe even hanging out with us at work or a group lunch! “It has happened to […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #5 – Who Gets Evangelized & Who Gets Discipled?
If you’ve been following along with our series on lessons from former Westminster seminary prof and current PCA pastor John Leonard’s book, “Get Real,” then you know he likes to throw some cold water in our faces to start an idea. This week is no different in his chapter, “Evangelize Christians and Disciple Non-Christians”: “Conventional […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #4 – An End to Friendship Evangelism???
We return to our series looking at lessons from John Leonard’s book, “Get Real.” This week Leonard opens with a jarring and pointed statement: “Friendship evangelism is not biblical! OK, that’s an overstatement. And yet, the conventional wisdom today is that friendship evangelism is the only form of evangelism.” Now, stick with him as he […]
Hidden Gems – Part 2
We introduced this series last time that we are calling “Hidden Gems.” After almost 5 years and 250 posts, we have detected several that had a distinct influence on people but maybe didn’t get the attention or circulation warranted. So we are sharing those on occasion over the next few months. This one had a […]
Evangelism Reader’s Digest: Get Real #3 – Party Evangelism
In “Get Real,” author John Leonard has an interesting chapter called “Party Evangelism.” There are two sections to the chapter. The first is establishing that the western mindset has distorted the focus of Christianity to overly individualistic at the expense of the community aspect. This distortion has a significant impact on the role of the […]