Dudley Rutherford shares his passion for every Christian is to be equipped and bold in sharing their faith.
Read Transcript
- Well, sharing the gospel is nothing more
than mouth to ear resuscitation
so says Pastor Dudley Rutherford.
He also says that anybeliever can share the gospel
effectively with the propertraining, take a look.
- If someone comes up to youand specifically asked you
how to become a Christian,and your first thought is
I need to call my pastor,something is wrong with that.
- [Reporter] Dudley Rutherfordis the senior pastor
of Shepherd Church, the 15,000 member
congregation in Los Angeles.
Over the years he's observedthat many Christians
feel uncomfortable feeling their faith.
He says the church is in need of people
who will share the lifechanging message of Jesus,
to a world that is spiritually bankrupt.
In his latest book Compelled, Dudley
gives practical methods to help you share
the gospel effectively and with boldness
to those around you.
- All right, DudleyRutherford joins us now.
Great to have you here.
- Thank you boss, it's good to be here.
- Appreciate you being with us.
I love, I want you to start our talk today
the way you start the book.
And that is this really powerfulstory at Dodger Stadium,
tell us about it.
- True story, I'm sittingthere, Dodger Stadium
and off to my left I see aboy, he's about 12 years old.
He's totally blind, hiseyes are like rolled up in
the top of his head, he'ssitting there with a baseball
glove like he's gonna catch a fly ball.
His mother is sittingnext to him and every play
she's telling him whathappened with that play.
And again, I just keptlooking at him there
thinking he's gonna catch a fly ball.
Totally blind, and sureenough about the fourth,
fifth inning there's afly ball, a foul ball
that comes our direction,I think it's coming to me,
I see it curve towardshim, I never once thought
it was gonna land inhis glove, I'm thinking
it's gonna hit him inthe head and kill him.
And it just literally grazesthe back of his head, it goes
right behind him, andI see a bunch of people
fighting for the ball behind him,
and he's in his chair doing this,
he doesn't know what's going on.
The ball rolls down about 12, 15 feet,
and there's a lady sittingover there with her
boyfriend, not evenpaying attention and looks
down and picks up the ball.
- It's always the peoplethat don't pay attention
to get the foul ball.
- Yeah and she's standingup there holding the ball,
and I'm the one who says guyslook the ball's over there.
The lady's got the ball over there.
So I'm sitting with a buddy of mine
and I said I'm gonna go ask that lady
if she'll give me thatball to give to that kid.
The kid's sitting there the entire game.
It was the greatest pictureof faith I've ever seen.
And my buddy said let medo it, he wanted to do it.
- Who wouldn't give theyoung man a ball anyway.
- Well I ended up giving them $20 and said
if she won't give it to you, offer her
some money for the ball.
She starts to hand the ball over,
and her boyfriend says no,we're not giving the ball.
And the boy says this, he says it's a once
in a lifetime opportunityto go to a Dodger game,
and to catch a foul ball,we're not giving it to anybody.
And when he told me that,I know I'm a pastor,
I know I'm a Christian but Idid not have Christian thoughts
when I heard that, cause I wanted to say
a once in a lifetimeopportunity is not going to
a Dodger game, and catching a foul ball.
A once in a lifetimeopportunity is going to a Dodger
game and catching a foulball and looking over and
seeing a 12 year old boywho has never seen a thing,
never will see anything,and going over and putting
that ball in his glove, and saying
there you go kid, there's the ball.
- They refused, and I keptwaiting for a happy ending
to this story, there wasn't one.
So how does that tie into your instruction--
- It's a great question.
I believe that we'relike that lady that God's
grace has just fallen in our lap.
We didn't deserve anythingand God redeemed us, saved us.
We were blessed to havethis precious gift called
salvation and we have it.
And if you look around, allaround us people are blind.
People are empty, people are searching.
There's all kinds of peoplethat would love to have
this piece, this truth that we have
and we keep it to ourself.
- [andrew] Why do we do that?
- There's a lot of reasons but obviously,
I think the Devildoesn't want you to share
but we're afraid of a lot of things.
We're fearful, we thinkwe don't know what to say
if someone asks a question, that we won't
have the right answer.
- Well and that fearis a big one isn't it?
You say in your book howfear is maybe the greatest
tactic the enemy has,what do you mean by that?
- I think there's thishurdle, it's like almost
a wall, we know, I believe this, Andrew,
I think that every Christian deep down
that we want to share our faith,
we know that we should share our faith.
But we just struggle in sharing our faith.
And the biggest struggle is our fear,
it's the fear factor thatwe don't know what to say,
we have the fear ofrejection, they're gonna
reject us, we're afraidthat the words are gonna
come out wrong or that we're gonna
be considered a crazy person.
- Or that we don't knowenough about theology.
All I maybe have is my testimony,
but your book says that may be enough.
- I think the greatesttool is your testimony.
That story that you have, that I have,
of what our life was likebefore we were saved.
How we got saved, and whatour life has been like
since we've been saved.
And I encourage people to write it down.
It starts with that,write your testimony down.
You can take your time,take a week, take a month.
But write it down, howdid you find Christ?
Who invited you?
Did someone give you a bible,did they invite you to church?
Were you watching the 700 Club?
Were you watching, howdid you find Christ?
Write it down, and thenread it, start to read
your own testimony, you justread it, read it, read it.
And then it will become familiar with you.
Then maybe share it withsomeone who's already
saved, say okay Alex, I wantto practice my testimony.
And eventually, you'llbe able to share that
with someone that God opensthe door with you to share.
- We need to be carefulof our walk too don't we?
You talk about traits people have who
were effective in sharing the gospel.
Just one little sentenceyou have in there,
that I love, you say look,if you're mean to people,
you do not win many souls.
We need to live of authenticity.
- Well, I think when you look at Jesus
in the new testament, healways befriended people
somehow he had this repore where people
wanted to be around him.
He was often found eating with "sinners".
I think he was someone that sinners wanted
to be around, that therewas something about him
that was engaging, and Ithink that we as Christian's
need to have a littlebit more of that quality.
- What if we're flat out rejected?
We share the gospel, and we're met
with a harsh, cold response?
What would you guide usto do in that situation?
Once we have the courage to share?
- I always share firstCorinthians 3:6 that
we're to either plantseeds or water a seed,
and then God will give the increase.
And the bible never sayshow many seeds we're
supposed to plant, you're justsupposed to keep planting.
Doesn't say how long we'resupposed to keep water,
just keep watering, you water, you plant,
God will give the increase.
And when you share with someone,
they might reject you at that time,
but that memory is a powerful tool.
They remember that invitation,
they remember that moment.
And then someone elsewill come along and God
will build on top of that.
And they start to add all this up,
and they start to see the changed lives,
and I believe that they will one day come
to put their faith in Christ.
- Tell me briefly about this interchange
that you have in your bookthat happened on Instagram
I believe, I think it'sa really cool story.
That you were following numerous people.
- Yes, my son was runningmy social media accounts.
And he follows and unfollows people hoping
that they'll follow me backand this guy gets on there
and he starts to talk about that he's a
homosexual atheist or something,satanist is what he said.
And I asked my church what would you say
if you got a question,a guy said that to you?
How would you respond?
- What was his question?
Why were you following me?
I'm a homosexual satanist?
- Yes, I'm a homosexual satanist,
and I just skipped rightover the homosexual part,
I said how did you become a satanist?
I kind of wanted to engagein a simple conversation
with him, I could've just unfriended him.
But I wanted to engage, he spoke to me,
I wanted to engage.
And he told me later he wasnot a homosexual satanist,
that he was an atheist.
And so I said, I responded,you're a comedic atheist.
You're a comedian?
And it just began to open up the door
and he, I encouraged him to read the bible
and he said I would never read the bible,
it's a book full of fairy tales.
And then I said why don't you just Google
James Chapter one.
- Why James one?
Out of all you could've led him to?
- Because James is the mostpractical book in the bible.
And it also talks about trials,
and overcoming trials andeverybody in the world has trials.
But he's never read the bible, thinks
it's a book of fairy tales,I'd say why don't you read
James chapter one, and I saidif it means nothing to you
then I won't bring it up anymore.
But just give it a chance,I don't hear a thing from
this guy for several days.
And then I get this response that
says best read of my life.
And since then we've engagedin further conversations
and I'm still working on that guy.
- Civil conversations.
- Civil conversation, whichis what's missing in our
country today, we are a divisive country.
We're polarized, we'refighting with each other.
It seems like now membersof congress are encouraging
us to fight, we're so messed up right now,
we need Jesus now more thanwe've ever needed him before.
- Love your approach, it's a great book.
It's called Compelled, the irresistible
call to share your faith.
It's available wherever books are sold.
Thanks so much for being here.
- Thank you so much.
- Really appreciate it, great book.
We'll be back with more700 Club Interactive
right after this, stay with us.