Volunteers Of Christ Institute of Leadership RESOURCE Illustrations

EVANGELISM - Stories and Illustrations

This longer story has been placed first due to the quality of the illustration:
The following article is based on a sermon by missionary Del Tarr who served fourteen years in West Africa
with another mission agency. His story points out the price some people pay to sow the seed of the gospel
in hard soil.
I was always perplexed by Psalm 126 until I went to the Sahel, that vast stretch of savanna more than four
thousand miles wide just under the Sahara Desert. In the Sahel, all the moisture comes in a four month
period: May, June, July, and August. After that, not a drop of rain falls for eight months. The ground cracks
from dryness, and so do your hands and feet. The winds of the Sahara pick up the dust and throw it
thousands of feet into the air. It then comes slowly drifting across West Africa as a fine grit. It gets inside
your mouth. It gets inside your watch and stops it. The year's food, of course, must all be grown in those
four months. People grow sorghum or milo in small fields.
October and November...these are beautiful months. The granaries are full -- the harvest has come. People
sing and dance. They eat two meals a day. The sorghum is ground between two stones to make flour and
then a mush with the consistency of yesterday's Cream of Wheat. The sticky mush is eaten hot; they roll it
into little balls between their fingers, drop it into a bit of sauce and then pop it into their mouths. The meal
lies heavy on their stomachs so they can sleep.
December comes, and the granaries start to recede. Many families omit the morning meal.
Certainly by January not one family in fifty is still eating two meals a day.
By February, the evening meal diminishes.
The meal shrinks even more during March and children succumb to sickness. You don't stay well on half a
meal a day.
April is the month that haunts my memory. In it you hear the babies crying in the twilight. Most of the days
are passed with only an evening cup of gruel.
Then, inevitably, it happens. A six-or seven-year-old boy comes running to his father one day with sudden
excitement. "Daddy! Daddy! We've got grain!" he shouts. "Son, you know we haven't had grain for weeks."
"Yes, we have!" the boy insists. "Out in the hut where we keep the goats -- there's a leather sack hanging
up on the wall -- I reached up and put my hand down in there -- Daddy, there's grain in there! Give it to
Mommy so she can make flour, and tonight our tummies can sleep!"
The father stands motionless. "Son, we can't do that," he softly explains. "That's next year's seed grain. It's
the only thing between us and starvation. We're waiting for the rains, and then we must use it." The rains
finally arrive in May, and when they do the young boy watches as his father takes the sack from the wall
and does the most unreasonable thing imaginable. Instead of feeding his desperately weakened family, he
goes to the field and with tears streaming down his face, he takes the precious seed and throws it away. He
scatters it in the dirt! Why? Because he believes in the harvest (Italics added).
The seed is his; he owns it. He can do anything with it he wants. The act of sowing it hurts so much that he
cries. But as the African pastors say when they preach on Psalm 126, "Brother and sisters, this is God's law
of the harvest. Don't expect to rejoice later on unless you have been willing to sow in tears." And I want to
ask you: How much would it cost you to sow in tears? I don't mean just giving God something from your
abundance, but finding a way to say, "I believe in the harvest, and therefore I will give what makes no
sense. The world would call me unreasonable to do this -- but I must sow regardless, in order that I may
someday celebrate with songs of joy."

Fritz Kreisler (1875-1962), the world-famous violinist, earned a fortune with his concerts and compositions,
but he generously gave most of it away. So, when he discovered an exquisite violin on one of his trips, he
wasn't able to buy it. Later, having raised enough money to meet the asking price, he returned to the seller,
hoping to purchase that beautiful instrument. But to his great dismay it had been sold to a collector. Kreisler
made his way to the new owner's home and offered to buy the violin. The collector said it had become his
prized possession and he would not sell it. Keenly disappointed, Kreisler was about to leave when he had
an idea. "Could I play the instrument once more before it is consigned to silence?" he asked. Permission
was granted, and the great virtuoso filled the room with such heart-moving music that the collector's
emotions were deeply stirred. "I have no right to keep that to myself," he exclaimed. "It's yours, Mr. Kreisler.
Take it into the world, and let people hear it."

Many years ago in St. Louis, a lawyer visited a Christian to transact some business. Before the two parted,
his client said to him, "I've often wanted to ask you a question, but I've been afraid to do so." "What do you
want to know?" asked the lawyer. The man replied, "I've wondered why you're not a Christian." The man
hung his head, "I know enough about the Bible to realize that it says no drunkard can enter the kingdom of

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Volunteers Of Christ Institute of Leadership RESOURCE Illustrations

God; and you know my weakness!" "You're avoiding my questions," continued the believer. "Well, truthfully,
I can't recall anyone ever explaining how to become a Christian." Picking up a Bible, the client read some
passages showing that all are under condemnation, but that Christ came to save the lost by dying on the
cross for their sins. "By receiving Him as your Substitute and Redeemer," he said, "you can be forgiven. If
you're willing to receive Jesus, let's pray together." The lawyer agreed, and when it was his turn he
exclaimed, "O Jesus, I am a slave to drink. One of your servants has shown me how to be saved. O God,
forgive my sins and help me overcome the power of this terrible habit in my life." Right there he was
converted. That lawyer was C.I. Scofield, who later edited the reference Bible that bears his name.

The late Sam Shoemaker, an Episcopalian bishop, summed up the situation this way: "In the Great
Commission the Lord has called us to be--like Peter--fishers of men. We've turned the commission around
so that we have become merely keepers of the aquarium. Occasionally I take some fish out of your fishbowl
and put them into mine, and you do the same with my bowl. But we're all tending the same fish."

The Order of the Mustard Seed founded by Count Zinzendorf had three guiding principles, namely:
1. Be kind to all people. 2. Seek their welfare. 3. Win them to Christ.

The young salesman was disappointed about losing a big sale, and as he talked with his sales manager he
lamented, "I guess it just proves you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink." The manager
replied, "Son, take my advice: your job is not to make him drink. Your job is to make him thirsty." So it is
with evangelism. Our lives should be so filled with Christ that they create a thirst for the Gospel.

Dr Paul Brand was speaking to a medical college in India on "Let your light so shine before men that they
may behold your good works and glorify your Father." In front of the lectern was a oil lamp, with its cotton
wick burning from the shallow dish of oil. As he preached, the lamp ran out of oil, the wick burned dry, and
the smoke made him cough. He immediately used the opportunity. "Some of us here are like this wick," he
said. "We're trying to shine for the glory of God, but we stink. That's what happens when we use ourselves
as the fuel of our witness rather than the Holy Spirit. "Wicks can last indefinitely, burning brightly and
without irritating smoke, if the fuel, the Holy "Spirit, is in constant supply."

Even if people reject the gospel, we still must love them. A good example of this was reported by Ralph
Neighbour, pastor of Houston's West Memorial Baptist Church in Death and the Caring Community by
Larry Richards and Paul Johnson:
Jack had been president of a large corporation, and when he got cancer, they ruthlessly dumped him. He
went through his insurance, used his life savings, and had practically nothing left. I visited him with one of
my deacons, who said, "Jack, you speak so openly about the brief life you have left. I wonder if you've
prepared for your life after death?"
Jack stood up, livid with rage. "You *** *** *** Christians. All you ever think about is what's going to happen
to me after I die. If your God is so great, why doesn't He do something about the real problems of life?" He
went on to tell us he was leaving his wife penniless and his daughter without money for college. Then he
ordered us out. Later my deacon insisted we go back. We did. "Jack, I know I offended you," he said. "I
humbly apologize. But I want you to know I've been working since then. Your first problem is where your
family will live after you die. A realtor in our church has agreed to sell your house and give your wife his
commission. "I guarantee you that, if you'll permit us, some other men and I will make the house payments
until it's sold. "Then, I've contacted the owner of an apartment house down the street. He's offered your wife
a three-bedroom apartment plus free utilities and an $850-a-month salary in return for her collecting rents
and supervising plumbing and electrical repairs. The income from your house should pay for your
daughter's college. I just want you to know your family will be cared for."
Jack cried like a baby. He died shortly thereafter, so wrapped in pain he never accepted Christ. But he
experienced God's love even while rejecting Him. And his widow, touched by the caring Christians,
responded to the gospel message.

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