Evangelism Interview with Brady Brewer: Closing thoughts and Encouragement

Me: The last question that I have for you today is meant to provide a little help for others. With either pastors, churches, or individuals who may have that desire in their heart to evangelize. What would you say to help encourage them, to help them get started, or to put evangelism at the center of their church?

Brady: I think, like Ray Comfort says, “Just do it.”

Let’s say you have a pastor or a few in your church, find some good gospel tracts. Just start handing out gospel tracts.  When I started I had good intentions but I almost forced them to have a conversation with me. One thing I don’t like is using the ‘bait and switch,’ approach. Just tell them, “I have a message about Jesus.” A lot of times you are handing tracts to people as they walk by. You can gauge whether a person may be curious, and it can lead to a conversation. Consider going out as a church. You don’t have to go out preaching, just get some tracts and offer them to people. You can get in a lot of good conversations without hardly trying.

As for preaching, if somebody has a desire to do that and they don’t know how to get started, I think what you said is the way to do it. If you know the word of God, you don’t need to have a lot of scripture memorized. Just do what you were just suggesting, open up a passage of scripture and explain it. That’s what I do at the bus station almost all the time. I might open up to Galatians 1 today, I’ll preach my way through Galatians 1. Usually I get through about five verses and then it becomes a springboard. You may be expositing those texts, then somebody may say something that sparks another thought or passage. Just get the word of God, stand up, and open up the Bible in the open air. Start reading through it and comment on it. Let the Lord do what he’s going to do, and before you know it you’ve been preaching the word of God for 20 or 30 minutes. The word of God is the sword of the Spirit. Just reading the word of God, if you’re a Christian you’re going to know the gospel. We need to study it, learn it better and how to communicate it better, but just start by reading the scriptures.

God may use it to convert a sinner, God may use it to harden a sinner, God may use it to encourage a believer. He may use it to bring in somebody and you end up having a new friend.

Me: There is your true friendship evangelism.

Brady: I was just talking about that, today, because we were talking about the gay pride parade coming up in June, we need to be praying about that. I told the people in our church the story about Hunter and Savannah and how we met them there and now they are members of our church. We’ve met a lot of Christians over the years on the streets that have been encouraged and become friends with them.

It’s okay to share your testimony, we are witnesses. We have witnessed Christ and his resurrected power, and we have a story to tell. Not in some cheesy way but a story to tell how Christ changed your life through the gospel.

If you feel a desire to preach, get out there and talk about how Jesus Christ saved you, in doing that you’re going to communicate the gospel. I was a sinner and headed for hell. When people hear me talk about myself, I may be preaching 1 Corinthians 6, “do not be deceived, neither fornicators nor adulterers”. They here me saying, “that was me, I was that adulterer, that sinner,” and God had mercy upon me, he made me into a new creation. When people hear that I used to be a slave to sin and I’m not any longer, you can see people going, “Wow!” They understand that it had an effect on my life. It’s not complicated, just a matter of going over our problem. I’m speaking to me, that’s how I get over my pride. I heard Ray Comfort say years ago that it’s just that simple. He’s teaching that we have to get over the fear of man and it’s just pride. We have the fear of man, what are they going to think of me? It’s not like you overcome it one day and you’re done.

Me: Great. Ray says he’s been doing this for decades and every time he goes out, that first sentence is the hardest, he’s still nervous.

Thank you, Brady. There’s a lot of information here that will be helpful and encouraging to others.

Part 1: Profile
Part 2: Bus Station Ministry
Part 3: Evangelism Centered Church
Part 4: Closing Thoughts and Encouragement