Born in the Heart of God

TYPES OF MEETINGS

Some evangelists are known as revivalists; one of these is Sam Cathey of Del City, Oklahoma. Others use a deeper life emphasis and some preach only for the salvation of souls. Jerry Drace specializes in Family Festivals. However, most evangelists emphasize both revival and harvest. In addition, some men have special abilities for chalk talks, ventriloquism, music, and so forth. These are only bonuses in helping to draw a crowd or get into local schools to speak.

The music evangelist must book one-service concerts as well as revival meetings in order for them to make it financially. That is unless they are coupled with an evangelist who is able to financially support them. If not, they will have to make a living some other way. Musicians are many, and those who are called to music evangelism are many, but only a few are chosen by God's confirming hand through the churches' use of them. Those who are chosen for music evangelists often have more financial difficulty until they become very well known. It seems to be feast for groups like "New Song" from Marietta, Georgia and famine for others.

I personally believe there are some men and women who are in evangelism who should not be. They are there only to escape a problem in a church or a personal problem. Generally these people will not last or they will never really be in demand by the churches. God opens doors and God closes doors; we must follow God's obvious leading.

No doubt, some pastors are more like evangelists than pastors. You must realize that every pastor must do the work of an evangelist, but also use evangelists in his church.

Most evangelists have at least seven or eight "sugar stick" sermons. By "sugar stick" I mean that they are sermons that, like a sugar stick, can be used again and again and always remain "sweet" or effective spiritually. (As the years go by most men have between 40 and 60 sermons they could preach at the drop of a hat.)

Because evangelists go to the same churches they cannot use the same sermons. I have gone back to some churches as many as 15 times for revivals. At the Centercrest Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, I preached the second series of meetings with six years intervening. Rev. Bob Curlee asked me to preach the same sermons that I had preached from six years before. I did, and heaven came down. The people did not remember the sermons, and responded equally as well the second time. The interval for the next series of meetings was briefer and as usual, I preached new sermons. Evangelists need to be sure that God's Holy Spirit warms the evangelist and empowers the message each time he preaches it. The evangelist is given a special ability by God to preach the same sermon many times, and never lose its newness. In fact, I have to preach a sermon at least six times, before I get comfortable with it.

Some outstanding sermons have been preached hundreds of times and still remain effective. Two of these are J. Harold Smith's "God's Three Deadlines,” and Bailey Smith's "The Wheat and Tares." Sam Cathey told me in 1984 that he had preached the same sermon on the opening Sunday morning of revival for five years. Jim Bob Griffin, Sam's music evangelist, said, "That sermon gets better every time I hear it!" Some sermons that I have preached hundreds of times are "Atheists," "God's Will," "Claiming God's Victory," "The Blessings out of the Curses," "Ye Must be Born Again," and a number of others. Every evangelist will develop these effective "sledge hammers" from the Word of God, used by the Holy Spirit to break up the concrete of cold hearts.

In Siberia, milk is often delivered in blocks rather than in bottles, the weather being so cold that the milk freezes before it reaches the customer. Sometimes "the sincere milk of the Word" is delivered in the same state, and calloused frigid hearts are unmoved and unchanged. There must be the breath of the living God to melt the ice and move men's hearts. The evangelist must be so warmed and the church must provide that warm atmosphere.

The evangelist will always stir Christians and call men to salvation even if he is teaching a Bible Study, because God has his hand on him. It has nothing to do with the man or his abilities, but it has everything to do with the hand of God in his life for harvest.

Recognizing the evangelistic gift in men, behooves the evangelist to help men with the same gift every way that he can. In so doing, the local churches will also see the need to properly use God’s evangelist.

Each evangelist will develop his own best strategy for revival. In 1975 at the Home Mission Board retreat for evangelists, we were told that during the first five years of evangelism the evangelist would send out either a revival plan book or suggestions for revival preparation to the churches. Then, by the end of the fifth year, the evangelist would be so frustrated by a lack of preparation, that he would not send out any preparation, but would try to do things to make revival happen while he was at a church, (such as utilizing a dummy in the first five minutes of the service to increase attendance, or occasionally doing door to door visitation on his own and doing public school programs). By the tenth year of evangelism, the evangelist would once again opt for a plan book. This has been a true prediction in my ministry. The revival plan book, which I am currently sending out to churches for revival preparation and planning, can be downloaded off the Internet at www.harpscrossing\keithfordham.com. Ninety-eight point six per cent of the time you use an evangelist someone will be saved. This percentage improves to 100% when thorough preparation before the revival.