How can you break into a conversation about if they are unsure if there is a God or not? How do you find out that they are an Atheist?
One effective method to ascertain someone's beliefs is to pose a question such as "Do you believe in God?"
If their immediate response is not "No!" ask this: "If you believe that there is no God, we will call this a zero (0), or if you are absolutely certain that there is a God, we will rate this a ten (10). How would you rate your belief on a scale of 0 to 10?"
This is a little exercise that my friend Dave K. added to our Blind Spot Test ice breaker. (Like the Blind Spot test it can be used for ice breaking evangelism or discipleship.)
Someone put a black dot in the middle of a white A4 piece of paper and held it up. Dave was then asked to tell them what he saw. He replied “a dot?”.
Ever wondered why your networks grow so easily within displaced ethnic groups compared to the people in your own country? Ever wondered why these displaced groups are on softer ground than they are in their home country? Ever wanted to reach out to the harder and sometimes more dangerous fishing grounds, but they seemed out of your league? Well, they are softer, and yes, you can reach out back to their home countries.
Walking along the beach I see stones, lots of stones. As I continue to walk I see from a distance one particular stone. It is not necessarily the best looking stone, but it has caught my eye. I pick it up, appreciate the beauty in it, and put it in my pocket close to me.
The beauty of stones becomes greater when you put them together, one enhances the other. Dark, light, big and small, together they make a statement, a beauty to behold, simple but profound beach stones.
I Have a friend, Christine, and she has an amazing tool that she uses. (I am trying to persuade her to write an article on it. In the meantime I will try and tell you a little bit about it.)
The Bible has many wonderful promises to equip us to do our assigned tasks for the Kingdom (e.g., “Perform signs and wonders," “that you will do even greater things,” Mark 16:17–18, and John 14:12–14, etc.). We do not seek out glory and power for ourselves, but miracles can accompany disciples as they go out into the world and interact. These can be very powerful tools in evangelism. You can easily crash and burn as well! Don’t let yourself be the free goat (I'll expain later on).
In this series, I have been trying to share with you some of my low points in disciple-making in the hope of saving you some grief and perhaps helping the Kingdom along the way. This one is related to the first story in that not everyone sees the world as you do, but they are also not offended in the same way you might be. This tale of woe is probably the worst one, and I don’t want to really admit it, but here goes.
Putting aside for the moment that we can boldly go ahead of God without any prayer, lacking gentleness or respect, there are less obvious reasons why we might crash and burn trying to share the Good News with someone. In the West, we can get too myopic (tunnel vision). The simple fact is that not everyone thinks the same as we do. We all see the world from a different perspective.
We offered a free beverage or drink if they would stop and share their story with us. We then offered a snack to go with the drink if they took a short survey.
The survey was just six questions about sharing Jesus without fear or argument. Actually, sometimes we add other preamble questions that are topical at the time.
The three main reasons individuals struggle to change are:
1. They don’t really see the need to change. They feel as though others (externally) are "imposing" the change upon them.
2. A lack of clear, specific, and measurable goals.
3. There is little or no support (training, backup, and accountability) in reaching those goals.
SMART can help fix that.
We specifically designed this icebreaking exercise to facilitate "cold witnessing" with strangers. We discovered that cold witnessing is a last resort because witnessing to someone with whom you already have a relationship is much more effective. We call this primary type of witnessing "oikos mining." This activity is especially beneficial when interacting with a group rather than working one-on-one. A real challenge sometimes. It seems especially good with pre-teenage and teenage boys or young men.
This is a well-liked discussion starter. This will turn any conversation on the temporal (earthly) domain into a discussion about the eternal realm. If you think it is acceptable for that particular conversation, give it a try.
“If God could do a miracle today for you or your family, what would it look like?” or
"What would it look like if God performed a miracle for you or your family today?"
(You can search for "icebreaker" to see additional examples.)
Over the years I have heard the proliferation of good reasons why people should use tracts as part of their witnessing toolbox. A lot of people that I respect use them as their first preemptive strike. nonetheless, I have always hated them. I found them cheap and cheesy. (Not just gospel tracts, any tracts or adverts.) For the most part, deep down, I guess I sort of thought people who threw out tracts were just trying to make themselves feel better, whilst avoiding embarrassing themselves by engaging in the harder conversations.
A long time ago Dave M shared this concept of how to explain the gospel simply. Since then it has been tweaked and reformed often to suit the target audience.
Here is the classic “3x Circles Gospel Presentation” but with a more complete explanation than usual.
You can get what you need and ditch the rest.
For example instead of a full explanation of what baptism is you could just say that “you need to get washed clean” or similar.
Well, we are not talking about what a builder does with a chalking gun around your bathroom sink. It is a way of seeding the mind of someone to start thinking about their eternal future without confrontation. You can put thought-provoking phrases or questions around public spaces in chalk. We use chalk so that it will not damage public property and if someone takes great offence to it they can wash it off. You can also mix it up in the same area so that people are not exposed to the same sign every day.
Ever had someone state emphatically that they do not have any spiritual beliefs at all?
You could try just talking them around but many people today respond better to visual communication as well as talking.
Youth today have an attention span of about 1 minute. Just look at their browsing habits.
Someone who has just tried to shut you down and end the conversation probably can only stand about another minute or so before they walk off. What can you do in a minute?
Dave M. has a wonderful (free) question that he sometimes uses to break the ice when witnessing. If someone says to him “Look I don’t know about this God stuff. I think that I’ll just live my life and have some fun. I’ll get right with God at the end before I die and go to heaven.”
Dave can ask them two questions to get them thinking about God right now. (You can use these questions with or without the Living Waters “Million Dollar/Pound Note” tract)
Find your Blind Spot. There are many ways to find your blind spot. The first is using a Card or sheet of paper with a dot and a cross on it. All you do is hold the paper out in front of you (say holding the Cross closest to your hand, it doesn’t matter) Then cover your eye with the other hand.
"I would like to ask you 6 Quick Questions:" (Stopping whenever they feel uncomfortable. Don’t comment on any answer they give, just listen to them patiently and move down the list.)
