How To Tell The Truth: Preston Perry

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How to Tell the Truth

Guest:Preston Perry

From the series:How to Tell the Truth (Day 1 of 2)

Air date:October 17, 2024

Preston: The moment you tell somebody that you’re a Christian, in a lot of ways, you’re an evangelist. The moment they ask you questions, you become an apologist. And the moment they’re willing to follow you is when you become a discipleship maker.

Shelby: Welcome to FamilyLife Today where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Shelby Abbott, and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com.

Dave: This is FamilyLife Today.

Okay, so I watched a video the other day on YouTube, and this guy was on the streets basically sharing Christ with strangers that he met on the street. He had one of the most gentle perspectives and tender heart of love toward these people who don’t believe what he believes. I was very respectful of what I watched him do.

Ann: This says a lot because this is important to you. You’re an evangelist at heart.

Dave: I think that’s one of my gifts.

Ann: And the way people approach that is important to you. So for you to have admiration and respect for this person says a lot.

Dave:Yeah, and he’s sitting across the table from me right now. Preston Perry is with us.

Preston: The whole time I was like, “Who are they talking about?”

Dave:You’re hoping it was you, but you didn’t know.

Preston: “Preston, this is how he did it. You should do it like him.”

Dave:Exactly. No, I was watching your YouTube channel and seriously, I mean, I know it’s in your book. We’re going to talk about your book today, How to Tell the Truth, and you talk about not winning arguments but winning people. But to watch you do it, I was so impressed because we’ve all seen how it’s not done well. But let our listeners know a little bit about you. I mean, a lot of people know who you are, and they know about With The Perrys, your podcast with your wife, Jackie Hill Perry, but give us a little background.

Preston: Yeah, my name’s Preston Perry. I grew up on the south side of Chicago. What’s crazy, I think a lot of people are starting to find, especially people who followed the apologetics and evangelism. I didn’t grow up in church. I didn’t grow up in a church environment. My mom, she raised me, my siblings. I grew up in a lot of poverty-stricken areas. I grew up in the hood and the only person that was a Christian in my family was my grandmother. She loved the Lord, and she would take us to church. On Easter Sunday we’d go to church with her. But other than that, I didn’t grow up in the church at all.

Dave:I heard your grandmother loved the Lord, but she was spicy.

Preston: She was. She’s a firecracker.

Dave:That’s what I heard, yeah.

Preston: Yeah, yeah. She’d love you well, but she’d tell you the truth. How to tell the truth, right. And I heard the gospel for the first time in a house church. The gospel that rocked me. This pastor got up and said, “If you think God being a God of love means He won’t destroy everything He hates, you don’t know what love is.”

Dave:Really. How old were you?

Preston: I was 15. I was 15.

Ann: Why do you think that stuck out to you?

Preston: Because I think I heard that God is a God of love. I heard about God, but I never really connected with my sin. I never really connected it with that I was the enemy of God, that the things that I did deserve death because of my sin and my rebellion against the holy and the righteous God. And so when he said that it was like, “Wow.” I became so keenly aware of my sin. I didn’t give my life to the Lord, but I became aware that I was a sinner and that I needed somebody to save me.

Ann: You mentioned earlier as you were talking through the cover of your book that you were in a gang. Were you in a gang at that point?

Preston: I was gang activity. I was breaking into cars. I was stealing.

Ann: Even at 15?

Preston: I started when I was 12, so I started selling weed when I was 12 years old. I lost my virginity when I was 12 years old. I mean, I did a lot of things, breaking into houses. I got kicked out of school multiple times; went to alternative school three times. I got kicked out of three high schools. And so I was just really just a problem kid.

Ann: Looking back on that kid, how did that kid come about? What happened in your life to create that rebellion? You didn’t know anything about God.

Preston: My mom was raising me, but my grandmother, she used to just let us stay at her house for summer. So I had 15 boy cousins and so we would just stay at my grandmother’s house every summer. And she lived in this community called Roseland far south in Chicago, and we would just stay there. My dad and my mom got divorced when I was five. And so for five to the age of twelve, thirteen, I don’t think I saw my dad. I got reconnected with him back when I was 13. And even then, our relationship wasn’t really strong like that. And so my mom, she just worked. My mom was an RN, well, she was trained to be an RN for years, but she was a nurse.

Ann: Hard worker it sounds like.

Preston: Oh, my mom was a hard worker trying to provide for us, and her and my dad divorced. I mean, she didn’t have a job at that time, so she had to learn everything by herself. And so my mom, she was a nurse at night; during the day she worked at a retirement home. And then during the weekend she worked in our apartment complex in the office, the leasing office. And so she just was trying to provide for us.

To answer your question, I think what later on the Lord showed me what caused a lot of the stuff is just rebellion. I was a wicked dude; you know what I mean? My heart needed to be transformed, but I also was just a hurt individual, hurt and angry. I was really angry because my dad wasn’t there and a man who was raising me was my mom’s youngest brother, my uncle Stan, and he was shot and killed when I was 13.

And I think my only father figure being taken away, I think. And then later on my friend got shot. It’s in the book and my mom trying to revive him. He ended up dying in front of me.

Ann: So you saw that?

Preston: Yeah. Yeah, I saw that. And it’s just a lot of anger, a lot of unprocessed grief and hurt and pain that I didn’t know how to even voice. So, but luckily when I was 15 years old, I felt like the Lord started to pursue me. I didn’t know God. I didn’t want God. I thought Christianity was for people who got really old, and their life is over. So now you just trying to serve Jesus. I literally thought that’s what Christianity was, and God was just very kind to reveal my sin to me. And I think that was the beginning of him trying to reveal himself to me as well.

And so the Lord started to pursue me. And I remember when I was 15 and I heard that gospel message for the first time in a house church. I just couldn’t shake it. I still did bad things after that, but it was just like I was aware that God was watching. I just remember that moment like “Man.” I used to joke with my friends. We were breaking cars, and I would literally say, “We deserve death for this, right? God can kill us for this.” I used to say that like, “Bro, stop. Man, you’re blowing our high. Stop saying that.” But I remember that and that’s the reason why I put this story in the book.

And I talked about, I linked it to evangelism because I think evangelism is about seed planting, planting seeds, seed that he planted in my life. God, later on in watered when after my friend got shot, I was able to go live with my aunt who was a minister 20 minutes outside of the city, and she connected me with this guy named Gary, Gary Brown.

And he was an ex-gang member who God radically changed and redeemed, and he was going to Moody College downtown Chicago. And he took me under his wing and literally discipled me, taught me how to read the scriptures. And I remember one day a woman flirted with him. It was really simple. A woman flirted with him at the bank, and he flirted back for the first time. I was so shocked. I was like, he was like a holy guy. And he flirted back.

And then afterwards we left. He apologized to me for flirting with this lady in front of me. And he said, because the whole time his heart wasn’t right. And that was the first time I ever heard the word convicted. I feel so convicted. And I said, why are you convicted? He said, bro, my heart wasn’t right. Can you pray with me? And he began to pray. And the Lord spoke to me at that moment and said, “Preston, this is what it means to love me, and you don’t love me like Gary loves me.” And I went home that night, and I repented, and I gave my life to the Lord in my room.

Dave: How old were you then?

Preston: I was 19.

Dave:Oh, so the seed was planted at 13.

Preston: At 15.

Ann: —15.

Dave: Fifteen, okay, so four years.

Preston: Yeah. And then I give my life to the Lord. after I heard the gospel, I’m searching. And then when Gary came in my life and modeled what Christianity was for me, is when I was like, “Okay, this is what it means to love God.” And so I remember in my room praying, “God, I want to love you like Gary loves you. Forgive me for my sin.” I remember a weight being lifted off of me, and the Lord saved me that day in my room.

Ann: Talk about discipleship.

Preston: Yeah.

Dave: Talk about the passion of what you wrote about. This is your life, right? Apologetics, evangelism; explain that.

Preston: Like I said, Gary, he came into my life when I was 18 years old, discipled me, and he was just an evangelist. The first time I met Gary, he said, “You want to go play basketball with me?” And I go, “Okay, where are we going?” He said to Washington Park. If you know anything about Washington Park, that’s a rough neighborhood. I said, “Are you from there?” He said, “No, I’m not from there, but I know a lot of guys over there.” And afterwards, he just thought the sheriff’s testimony and he just started praying for the guys on the court

Ann: Out loud?

Preston: He literally said, “Hey guys, can I talk to you guys for a minute?” And these are like hardened dudes. And I’m sitting there thinking, “This dude is crazy. And he told his testimony, and it was so sincere, and it was so genuine. He had no pretense, no phoniness about him. That’s what I loved. And he just started sharing his testimony and he was like, “It’s a lot of stuff going out there.” And then they just started asking him questions about, “Are you a Christian?” Yada, yada, yada.

Ann: So they were listening.

Preston: They were listening. They were locked in.

Ann: Was he a good ball player?

Preston: He was.

Ann: That probably helped.

Preston: Yeah. And also too, he came from the cultural context that they came from. And so I think there was a lot of—and I think that God wants to strategically use us in the way he’s brought us up from.

Ann: —made us, yeah, where we’ve been.

Preston: They were intrigued. He looks like us, but he doesn’t sound like us. He doesn’t act like us. He’s different. And so he just started sharing his faith. And so I was discipled under that. And so it became very obvious that the Lord wanted me to be an evangelist. And then later on as I started to do life as a Christian, it became very obvious that the Lord wanted me to teach others how to get the gospel to the outside world around them.

With the book, I think for me is I just wanted to normalize evangelism and apologetics. I think a lot of people are afraid of it, and I think that’s an attack of the enemy to make us want to be afraid of sharing our faith. I think when we think about evangelism and apologetics, I think people think that they have to know a whole bunch of knowledge.

Ann: I think we’re afraid of both of those. One, do I know the answers to apologetics? Two, do I know how to share my faith? And what if I’m rejected? And what if someone’s argument, if it’s apologetics, is more knowledgeable than mine? So I think we all pause for a second before we step out. Did you feel that at the beginning?

Preston: I think it was very obvious that to the court, an evangelist is who I was. Because when I first became a Christian, I just shared my faith with everybody. It was just like, if you was around me for ten seconds when I first became a Christian, you were going to know that Jesus saved me.

Ann: What did it sound like?

Preston: “Oh man, let me tell you my testimony.” Only thing I knew was John 3:16. That’s the only thing I knew. But what was crazy is God still used it. God is not looking for the most knowledgeable. He’s looking for the most faithful, right? 1 Peter 3:15 tells us to always be prepared to make a defense for anyone who asks us for the reason for the hope that is in us, but yet do it with gentleness and respect. And when we think about apologetics, which theos, in the Greek word apologia, which means to make a defense or argument for something, the first thing we think about is knowledge and not love. And I think that’s the problem. Are you ready to give a defense?

And so one, I want every Christian to know that if you are a Christian, you know more than the average non-believer, as it pertains to God, and so a lot of times an apologetic is your testimony. Are you ready? Are you ready to give a defense of why you believe what you believe? And so don’t think about knowledge more so than it is having a heart that’s ready to share your faith.

And I tell people all the time, the moment you tell somebody that you’re a Christian, in a lot of ways, you’re an evangelist. The moment they ask you questions, you become an apologist. And the moment they’re willing to follow you is when you become a discipleship maker. And I think the three aren’t the same thing, but they definitely hold hands. And so I just want to encourage Christians to know that no, if Jesus saves you, that’s enough. That’s enough. Sometimes conversations go deeper, and it’s okay with saying, “I don’t know.” Just say, “I don’t know.” I think we put too much pressure on ourselves.

Dave:I mean, when you started, based on what your stories all throughout the book, you weren’t as tender as what I saw on YouTube, right? You were winning arguments not winning people.

Preston: I definitely was. So what happened was when I first became a Christian, my aunt enrolled me in this two-year college. I was just telling everybody about Jesus. I became the campus evangelist. Everybody knew that I was a Christian or whatever, and in walks this guy with a Bible in his hand. And so I’m just excited to see another Christian on campus. I’m a very talkative person. Like, “Yo, bro, you’re a Christian.” He looked at me with this weird look like, “Yeah,” and I thought that was odd. So I’m like, ”Okay, maybe he’s just a nervous guy.”

So I said, “Yo, what are you reading? I’m reading—” I forgot what I said. I said, “I’m reading this; I’m reading that.” And he says, “I’m studying with my church right now.” And so we started to talk and then he hit me with this question, how do you know what the church is teaching you is right? And I go, “What do you mean?” And he just started to challenge me with everything when it come to Jesus being God in the flesh, to the Trinity, to all of these things. And I’m like, these are things I’ve never talked about before. I don’t even know what the word apologetics is. A crowd formed around us because the evangelist on campus is being challenged by, I don’t know what religion yet, right? Because I’m very ignorant to all this stuff. And he just embarrassed me in front of the whole class.

Ann: And that’s why people don’t do it.

Preston: Yes, but listen, but listen though, because he embarrassed me and because my temperament, I’m like, “I’m going to study what he believed” because later on he revealed that he was a Jehovah’s Witness. I’m going to study what he believed and I’m going to destroy him every opportunity I—listen, I was so fixated. I went home and I studied. I studied Charles Taze Russell, the man who created the Jehovah Witness doctrine, yada, yada, yada.

And we would just battle every Thursday after class in the cafeteria. It would just be so entertaining for people. And I was just so, and I got so good at studying their religion, his religion. The first time I stomped him in an argument like he had nothing to say, I felt so good about myself. I said, “Yes, I finally got him.” Gary, the guy who led me to the Lord, he picked me up from school that day and I said, “Yo, you should have seen this Jehovah’s Witness. You should have seen him.” I said this, “I took him to Philippians 2:5. I took him to 1 John 1:1, and I explained the Greek and I was just going in on him.”

And then he said, “Preston, are you still trying to win this guy’s heart?” And I said, “I was never trying to win his heart. I was always trying to win an argument bucko. I was always trying to win an argument.” And then he goes, “No, that’s not what we do it for, Preston.” He said, “What’s his last name?” I said, “Oh, I don’t know his last name.” Then he said, “You’ve been talking to this guy for all this time. You don’t know his last name.” And that just showed me that apologetics is more about winning someone’s heart than winning an argument. And it’s shaped the way I’ve done apologetics and evangelism ever since then.

So always asking myself and reminding myself, “Preston, what are you doing this for? Are you doing this to look knowledgeable? Are you doing this to look smart? Or are you doing this because you’re trying to win a soul?”

And one thing that the Lord has shown me through the years is it’s not about destroying other people’s faith. It’s about building up yours and knowing yours and defending yours for the sake of drawing them to the Lord and exposing lies that the enemy has planted. And so for me, it just reshaped the way I did apologetics and evangelism, and so that’s what I’m trying to teach others. I think we see a lot of evangelism done wrong and just a lot of talking to people done wrong a lot. And so I just want to help this.

Dave:What would you say, and again, it’s throughout your book, and especially if I’m someone that wants to be better and do this well, and we’re all called to make disciples, which starts with sharing Jesus. It’s got to start there. So I’m thinking if you’re listening to this, you’re like, I want to be better at doing this. You need to pick this up. There’s coaching all the way through it. So my question would be, if you think about do’s and don’ts, what would you say? You can pick either one, three dos, one do, four don’ts, whatever.

Preston: I would say the first thing is when you think about reaching the outside world, whether it comes to different religions or just people who just cool on God, they don’t want God or whatever, first knowing your faith. Because I think a lot of times when we think about reaching other people, we want to learn worldviews before we know our faith. And I think that we start to find identity and knowledge and information, and I think that’s the biggest mistake that we can make. When you find your identity and the information you know and not the God that you know, you’ll start to treat people like projects and not image bearers.

Ann: That’s big.

Preston: So finding your identity in God first and knowing him, knowing your Bible. And so now you have a framework to engage with the outside world.

Dave:I remember we did a series decades ago called, “So What’s the Difference?” And it was a series. We were going to take three or four or five—I don’t remember—weeks, and say, “What’s the difference between world religions and Christianity?” And so as we were preparing the series, we thought, “What’s week one going to be? Should we compare Christianity to Mormonism?” And we said, “No. Week one should be: what do we believe?” And we spent the whole sermon: this is what we believe about God, salvation, the whole thing. I’ll never forget.

And then week two is like, “Hey, let’s review. Remember what we said, here’s Christianity. Okay, now let’s show you the differences. People came up for every week and said, “Thank you so much. I didn’t know what we believed.” They literally were so appreciative of the first week because they reminded us, I wasn’t even sure what I believe what scripture teaches. So you got to start there, right?

Preston: Absolutely. That’s exactly what I’m saying because I think that if you ask the average Christian in the church, it’s like, can you explain the key foundational essentials? You don’t have to know the Bible front and back. You don’t have to be a seminary graduate, but you should know that Jesus is God. You should be able to point to John 1. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. Through him, all things were made, and without him, nothing was made that was made.”

And so Jesus is not just a man, but he’s God in the flesh, right? He’s Emmanuel. He’s God with us because every religion acknowledged that Jesus existed, but they deny his deity. So the Jehovah Witnesses believe that he’s Michael the archangel. The Muslims believe that he’s just a prophet. The Mormons believe that he’s Lucifer’s brother, believe it or not. But the scriptures tell us no, that he’s the eternal God. He’s the second member of the triune Godhead. He’s God in the flesh. He’s God. So how can you explain that to a different religion? That’s just a fundamental teaching of the Christian faith.

Every religion in the world has found something to work for, to please God. Christianity is the only one that says the God who finished the work found me. And so how can we explain to another religion that we’re saved by grace through faith? And it’s not about works. The Jehovah’s Witnesses are knocking on so many doors to be accepted. The Mormons, they’re trying to go on their three-year missionary journey to be accepted. The Muslims praying five times a day to be accepted, but we know that we’re accepted if we just accept a free gift through Jesus.

And so just imagine how freeing that is to someone in another religion who’s working like they were in the Old Testament, to be clean, to be accepted. So how can you explain that we’re saved by grace through faith? These are just fundamental teachings that I think that if Christians learn these fundamental teachings, they will have a framework to engage with other religions. You don’t have to know the Bible front and back to explain that we’re saved by grace to faith. I think a lot of times we major over minors, and we argue about secondary and tertiary things that don’t really matter, but it’s like how can we explain the fundamentals of our faith?

And then more so than theology, I didn’t want this book to be a step one, step two force in theology. I wrote it in story form and creative story form because I wanted to teach emotional intelligence.

One time I was on YouTube, and I saw these guys outside of a Planned Parenthood saying how abortion is wrong and how God cares about the life inside the womb, which I agree with.

Dave: Yeah, we do too.

Preston: I agree with that. I think that life starts with conception. And I think to be frank, abortion is evil, right? It’s sin. But I remember watching this lady, she walked up to this evangelist, and she said, “I was raped.” She said, “Should I still have my baby when I was raped?” And he said, “Was it your baby fault you were raped? In evangelism what I’ve learned is every heart has a cry. We just have to ask the right questions to hear it. And she cried out to him. He didn’t recognize it as a cry because he was so fixated on the argument. So his response could have been, “I’m sorry that that happened to you.”

And I think sometimes when we learn a whole bunch of knowledge and information, it makes us theological robots and we stop being human. And so we don’t have emotional intelligence. And so what would’ve happened if he just would’ve paused and empathized with her, even though his view on abortion was, I agree with, as a Christian, I think every Christian should dislike abortion, but it’s like, no, this woman just cried out to you. And so how can we learn emotional intelligence in our evangelism? How can we have not just led with our minds and our theology, but also with our hearts—

Ann: That’s good.

Preston: —in our humanity? And so I think that’s one of the things that I’m trying to teach more than anything.

Dave:It’s interesting. I don’t know if you remember this, but you had a conversation with a woman and you struck up this conversation, I don’t know where you were, some street, and she decided to talk to you because her daughter said, “Mommy, I think you should talk to this man.” Do you remember that?

Preston: Yes.

Dave:And so I thought it was so interesting because then as you start the conversation, she says, “My spirit guide is telling me not to talk to you.”

Preston: Yes.

Dave:I thought, “Okay, right now is a pivotal moment how you respond to this woman saying, ‘My spirit guide, my daughter just said to talk to you, but my spirit guide is saying don’t talk to you.’” And I thought, “If you respond poorly wrong, she’s done. And if you respond rightly, she may continue this conversation.”

Ann: Okay, let’s hear it. What’d you say?

Dave:Do you remember? Yeah, Ann didn’t watch it.

Preston: Yeah. So that was a very interesting conversation. When she said that I got chills all over my body.

Ann: Because a spirit guide is what?—for our listeners who may not have ever heard that word.

Preston: An evil spirit. Yeah, an evil spirit.

Dave:But you asked her, “Who’s your spirit guide?” And she said, “The universe.”

Preston: The universe. Yeah.

Dave:So it was a totally different perspective on her spot. But what I love is two things. You were tender. There was a day in my past where I would’ve been like, spirit guide, are you kidding me? There’s no spirit. I would’ve attacked her. You were tender. You then said, “Let me understand who’s your spirit guide?” And then you go, “Oh, this is a whole different perspective.” And she felt, you could see it. She felt seen, heard, loved. You said at one point, “I love you.” You meant it. You could tell. And this was ten minutes in.

Ann: So you were respectful.

Preston: Yeah, definitely. Because when she pulled up with her daughter, I felt like the Lord wanted me to talk to her. We were getting done with shooting and I walked up to the car, and I said, “We are having a conversation with people about faith.” And she was like, “Mom, you should talk to him because you’re a woman of faith.” And I’m like, “Yeah.” And then she said, “Okay.” She opened the car, and she said, “My spirit guide is telling me not to talk to you. I don’t know why.”

As soon as she said that I knew I needed to talk to her. I am like, “Oh.” I said, “I think that’s one of the reasons why we should talk because we probably have some fundamental differences. I won’t attack you. I want to listen and hear your perspective.” And she was like, ‘Ah ah” and then maybe in a little bit weird way the Holy Spirit was working through her daughter because her daughter pushed her to do it, “Mom, mom, do it.”

And you can just tell she just felt this nervousness and I just knew that in some way, somehow, I had to give the gospel to her. And I knew that spirit guide didn’t want her to get the gospel. And so I’m just trying to figure out how can I respectfully give her the gospel. One of the reasons why I ask good questions is because a lot of times you can’t have a conversation with someone long enough to give them the gospel if they don’t feel seen. I think Jesus condescending and becoming a man and dwelling amongst his own creation was a way for us to be seen by him in a way that we couldn’t have if he didn’t come down and dwell with us in humanity.

And so I try to take that in my evangelism. It’s like why did Jesus ask questions that he already knew the answer to? And so I knew her spirit guide was not the Spirit, but I asked, right? So she can feel heard and also so she can teach me how to minister to her. A lot of times we don’t ask questions, and we try to just stick with theology. But if you ask questions, people will teach you how to serve them.

Ann: And who asked a lot of questions? Jesus.

Preston: Jesus, the woman at the well, “Where is your husband?” He knew she had five, but he was trying to reveal something to her, namely himself. And so when I asked questions, it’s not always because I don’t know, it’s because I’m trying to reveal Jesus to them. And so I just asked her questions, and you could tell she was uncomfortable, but you can tell she felt loved. And one thing I learned, if people feel love, they’ll continue to talk to you even if they’re uncomfortable.

Dave:And she did. And it was like as your story, you planted a seed.

Preston: Yeah, just planted a seed

Dave:And who knows where that’s going to bear fruit, but you planted it. That’s what we’re called to do.

Ann: So I’m loving this because I’ve got two evangelists at the table. My husband Dave is an evangelist, and Preston, you are too. Give us an application as a listener that maybe we’re like, “I’m a believer, but I haven’t really, like, should I be doing this?” Give us an application from today and what we’ve talked about,

Preston: Well, I think I want to free the listener to know this, that God is going to use you how he has uniquely made you. I think when we think about evangelism, we think about if you don’t walk up to a stranger and share the gospel with them, you’re not useful. And I don’t think that’s necessarily, I think when we think about evangelism, we think about boldness. Boldness is not doing what men are afraid to do. Boldness is about obedience. It’s about doing what God told you to do.

I remember one time, me and Jackie, we were in the airport leaving Virginia and I see two Jehovah’s witnesses in the airport. And so you know me, I’m like, “I’m about to go talk to these guys,” but my wife, who’s an introvert, she was like, “Okay, I’m about to go get something to eat, peace.” And she’s like, “I’m not fixing to go over there and talk to no Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

And after I got done talking to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, had a really good conversation with them, I leave, and I go to the restaurant where Jackie was at and she has her head bowed praying with the waitress. And I said, “Wow, what happened here when my introverted wife gets into a prayer?”

And she just said simply the waitress said, “Who are you ordering food for?” She was like, “I’m ordering food for my husband.”

“Where’s your husband?”

Well, he’s right there talking to two Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

And the lady ended up saying, “I used to be a Jehovah’s Witness, and they excommunicated me, and I’ve been done with religion ever since.”

My wife shared the gospel with her, and they ended up praying with one another. So notice how she didn’t pursue a conversation, but she didn’t avoid one when God laid one on her lap. And I think that’s what making disciples is. I think that to think that we’re all going to be used in the exact same way, it’s not realistic. If God wants to use us all in the exact same way, he would’ve created us all the same.

So Jackie is not somebody who’s going to go out there and fish, but she knows how to prepare it. You know what I’m saying? I’m often the fisher; I’m reeling them in. And Jackie, she’s not built like that, but when they come to her, she’s ready. And I think evangelism and making disciples, it’s not about doing it how you see somebody else doing. It’s about being ready. If you’re a Christian, God is going to present those opportunities, whether that’s with family members, coworkers, friends, or even strangers. I think it’s about being obedient, and I think it’s about being ready.

Ann: That’s good.

Dave:And also, being you.

Preston: And being you.

Dave:Because you were being you, and Jackie was being her. That’s all in your book, How to Tell the Truth by Preston Perry. And you can go to FamilyLifeToday.com. This book is full of stories like that, which really brings freedom to the reader to say, “Okay, I can be who I am, and God will use me.” But it does require some boldness too, and we’ll talk about that tomorrow.

Shelby: God will provide opportunities to communicate the gospel. You just got to be ready to, number one, be you the way God has made you, and secondly, be prepared to give an answer for the hope you have in Jesus. I loved this conversation with Preston today because I honestly needed a kick to get in gear where the Lord has placed me in my natural circle of influence, and I hope it has given you a kick as well, an exciting kick.

I’m Shelby Abbott. You’ve been listening to Dave and Ann Wilson with Preston Perry on FamilyLife Today. You can get a copy of Preston’s book, How to Tell the Truth by heading over to FamilyLifeToday.com. The subtitle of Preston’s book is The Story of How God Saved Me to Win Hearts, Not Just Arguments, and I think all of us need to hear that kind of insight.

Again, you could head over to FamilyLifeToday.com or look for our link in the show notes. Or you can feel free to give us a call at 800-358-6329 to request your copy of Preston’s book, How to Tell the Truth. Again, that number is 800-F as in family, L as in life, and then the word, TODAY.

The gospel is something that not only needs to be shared with others who don’t know Him, it needs to be shared with us. We need the gospel. I need to preach the gospel to myself all the time, every single day. And if you have kids, they need to hear the gospel as well. And we wanted to provide you with a unique opportunity to be able to communicate the gospel with your kids at the end of this month. We’re approaching Halloween, and that means that no matter where you fall and how you think about this holiday, people are going to be carving pumpkins.

And so we at FamilyLife® wanted to hop in on that and help you out in the process as you carve your pumpkins with your kids. You can get a free download. That’s right; free download with activities, pumpkin face stencil sheets, and a guided script to help your kids learn about what matters most while you carve your pumpkins. And that is, of course, the gospel. We call it Gospel in a Pumpkin, and you can find it for free at FamilyLife.com/pumpkin. Again, it’s a resource that’s free to you at FamilyLife.com/pumpkin, or you can look for it in the show notes.

Now tomorrow, Preston Perry is back with practical tips for sharing the gospel. I think we could all use a few of those practical strategies and tips. So Preston will be here tomorrow to fill us in on that. We hope you’ll join us.

On behalf of Dave and Ann Wilson, I’m Shelby Abbott. We’ll see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.

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