Bezeugen BLOG

“For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven. ” Matthew 5:20

In our two-hour Basic Evangelism Training Seminar we talk about religions. In particular we talk about how many religions there are in the world. If you search on the Internet for “how many religions are there in the world” or other similar searches you’ll find webpages claiming upwards of 4,200 different religions. We talk about how difficult it would to share the Gospel if you first needed to  dispute every point of any one of these religions.

In a sermon I was listening to recently, the preacher suggested all the world’s religion boils down to two: Human Achievement, and Devine Accomplishment. In Matthew 5:20 Jesus teaches his disciples that unless their righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees they will not enter the kingdom of heaven. These are people who were doing everything by the book. Following every letter of the Law. If they could not get in based on their works (Human Achievement), how could anyone possibly get to Heaven. That’s where Devine Accomplishment comes in.

Jesus completely fulfilled the Law by His life, death, and resurrection. He calls us to “repent and believe the Gospel” (Mark 1:15) and when we do his righteousness is credited to us. Isn’t it amazing, God’s Devine Accomplishment is credited to us! God then gives us the command to go and share this message with others.

The artwork on the John 14:6 tract was produced by our good friend Keith Neds. Keith, his family, and many from his church have been helping pack tract club envelopes for the Bezeugen Tract Club for years. Perhaps you’d like some calligraphy for your home, or as a gift for someone special this Christmas. You can order from him at www.calligraphyforchrist.com.

Hard to believe 2021 is almost over. Soon Christmas cards will be going into the mail. A simple way to witness to your family and friends is to include a Gospel tract with your Christmas Card. We have plenty of extra Christmas tracts on hand. For a $5 donation to Bezeugen Ministries we will send you 100 tracts. Use the enclosed donation envelope to make your request or you can donate and make your request online. Larger quantities are available as well. Please consult the website for details. In the article linked at the bottom of this letter on the BLOG we will include details of which Christmas tracts we have on hand.

Christmas is also an easy time to share the Gospel because most people celebrate Christmas regardless of whether they are Christian or not. Therefore it is a great opportunity to explain to them the true meaning of Christmas. You might check the events calendar in your town to see if there are any special events coming up. Perhaps there is a parade where you could hand out tracts and candy canes. Perhaps a group from your church will go door to door to sing Christmas Carols and you could hand a tract to someone at each house. Or maybe you’ll just be going to the mall to shop and need some extra tracts to hand out. The December mailing of the Bezeugen Tract Club will provide 30 Christmas tracts. If you need more, please submit a request.

Thursday, October 7th, is the First Thursday of October. We will meet for prayer for our nation, leaders and revival. We have four locations:

Suggested A.C.T.S. verses for prayer are:

Please also pray for our team from Bezeugen Ministries who will be sharing the Gospel at the State Fair of Texas 10AM to 10PM on Saturday, October 16th.

In October 2008 we mailed our first Bezeugen Tract Club mailing. Craig and Carl had been sharing the Gospel weekly at a local shopping mall and in the process had asked various friends to pray for us each time we went out. That list of people had grown to about 100 souls. We eventually decided to go share the Gospel at some events locally. One such event was a Dallas Cowboys game (back at the old stadium in Irving). I can remember it like it was yesterday.

At this particular game we arrived when the game was ending and were handing out tracts to people as they left the stadium. Most took a tract and continued walking. But some stopped to talk for a one on one conversation. As we have done thousands of times now, if someone would identify as a believer in Jesus we would ask a couple probing questions to see why they would go to heaven. If their answers were not around being “born again” or “trusting Christ alone” for salvation then we would go to the Gospel. Otherwise, we could talk about discipleship.

Often those discipleship questions would turn to asking the person if they had ever shared their faith. Many of those who said no, would follow up with “I don’t know how”. One woman that day said “I wouldn’t know where to get tracts like these”.  I told her that if she gave me her email address I’d send her some links to websites of where she could order. She agreed and I followed up when I got home.

The next day I was driving in my car thinking about this. I realized that a pack of tracts would run $5-7. Someone might want a few varieties. So that’s $20-30. And then there is shipping. So someone might spend over $25 to get some tracts and then when 500 or so tracts arrived might be so overwhelmed that instead of getting started, they might feel defeated and do nothing.

Then I was struck with an idea as if the Lord was speaking to me. No, I didn’t hear an audible voice or anything. But it was as if He was saying “why don’t you send her the tracts”. What if we sent out 30 gospel tracts per month and encouraged people to share one every day. By receiving 30 at a time it would not be so overwhelming to someone. An accompanying letter suggesting ways to share the tracts could help too!

Our first mailing went out in October 2008 to those 100 or so people on our prayer list. We explained it was a one time mailing, unless we heard from them wanting to receive them monthly. Some responded affirmatively. Some didn’t respond till a few months later. Others didn’t reply. As we enter our 14th year of sending out tracts we hope you are encouraged to share the Gospel every day.

This is the 157th mailing of the Bezeugen Tract Club. Each month tracts are sent to every US State and most Canadian Provinces. Over the last 13 years more that 4.6 million tracts have been sent to Bezeugen Tract Club members to distribute. We hope and pray you are encouraged to share the Gospel everyday, “As You Go”.

Thursday, September 2nd, is the First Thursday of the month. We have four groups. If you have questions about a specific location please contact that leader directly. If you’d like to be included as a site for monthly prayer please contact Carl.

Our focus is to pray for our nation, leaders and revival. There are many needs on local and national levels. Below is a list of suggested A.C.T.S. (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication) verses for prayer. If you are interested in getting a daily email with A.C.T.S. verses each day contact Carl and he can add you to the distribution list. The daily email has a number of features including sermons to take you through the Bible in a year, monthly and annual Bible reading plans, and more!

Chad Prather a Christian “comedian, musician, and armchair philosopher” who is also running for Texas Governor put out a t-shirt that reads “I miss precedented times” on the front. Having been through a global pandemic it is great to know we can that put it another way “God is on His throne”. He is Sovereign. He in in control! Yet when the world thinks of “precedented times”  it is thinking of football stadiums at full capacity, not dealing with social distancing, and throwing out those masks!

With that in mind, we return to our staple September tract—Football Trivia! This year we made a new version, with new questions, that highlight both college and professional sports. Now here is a little secret about our trivia tracts. Whether it is this months football trivia, or others that we send for baseball, basketball, NASCAR, soccer, rock n roll, etc., the little secret is “the answers are all the same”. That’s right, for each of these tracts the answers are “A, B, C, B”. Maybe you are wondering why that is? Well, we want you to look like an expert so you can quiz people and see if they are as smart as they think they are. So when you ask question one of any of the trivia tracts, the answer to all of them is A. So as they guess you can be saying “yes or no” without having to look at the answer yourself on the back.

What we have found is people like to show how smart they are and will readily answer trivia questions. Not only have we used these for conversation starters at football games, but we have used them at many other places as well. One day while standing in line at the post office I asked a guy if he liked football. He said yes. So I proceeded to ask him the questions on the card. He got three out of four! Another time at the train station a guy questioned the answers on the back. I had to use my phone to look it up to show him one answer was correct and his recollection of the answer was not!

The last question is the segway to the Gospel. Ten out of ten people die. Regardless if they get none of the other questions. Even Jessie (see August 2021 letter, or check the BLOG) who claimed he would not die, eventually will. So really, even more important than knowing the answer to any of the four trivia questions, is knowing what happens when you die and more specifically how to get to Heaven through faith alone in Jesus.

Over the years I’ve had hundreds if not thousands of conversations with people about the Gospel. It amazes me still that I can run into people who have never heard the Gospel nor had their own Bible nor read the Bible. I usually take these conversations in a couple directions. First is to use the enclosed bookmark to walk them through “what the Bible says” with the ten questions and having them lookup the ten Bible verses. Second, is to encourage them to read the Gospel of John a chapter a day for 21 days. We even have a website where they can put in their email address and get daily reminders with a link to read, listen to, or watch each day. Finally, if they have a lot of wild ideas or questions I point them to our booklet “The Truth May Impact Your Opinion”.

Thursday, August 5th, is the first Thursday of the month. We will meet to pray for our nation, leaders and revival. We currently have four groups. If you have questions about a specific group please contact the group leader directly.

Suggested A.C.T.S. (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication) verses for prayer are:

National Day of Prayer has this prayer guide for 30 ways to pray for authority. Perhaps you can incorporate it into your prayer meeting.

This is the 155th mailing of the Bezeugen Tract Club.

“Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.”   Matthew 7:6

Recently Craig and I had the opportunity to meet at the West End Transit Station in Dallas to do some witnessing. For at least ten years now this has been our favorite “fishing hole”. Since I moved to Denison, it’s a little harder on my schedule to get there for weekday lunchtime witnessing. But this day it worked out. I like to hand out tracts and say “did you get one of these?” Most people will take one. I’m basically waiting for some fish to bite and say “what is it?”

It didn’t take long and I was in a conversation with two young men. It’s an interesting contrast between Jessie, sitting to my left, who bragged about his name was like Jessie James—a bad guy, and Eli who when I said, that’s a good Biblical name responded, yes, it’s actually Elijah! Okay, so Jessie claimed he would never die. He actually believed through science and medicine, body parts could be transplanted into him to keep his body alive forever. I’m not going to try and guess if he was on drugs, but he didn’t seem to be. Eli on the other hand said he thought about death, had been raised in the church, was open to the things of God, but wasn’t really sure about his eternal destination. I reminded them both that God has set eternity in our hearts.

Eli listened intently and asked a number of relevant and sincere questions seeking legitimate answers that I was able to answer to his satisfaction. Jessie on the other hand would share more radical ideas of things he believed with no basis at all. I finally asked him “what is more important the truth or your opinion?” He claimed his opinion is truth. At this point I wished I had had a copy of the booklet we wrote (read or listen online), but since he really didn’t even want to keep the tract, I doubt he would have taken a copy of the booklet. At this point, I turned the conversation to the Ten Commandments and took them through three of them. I was able to quickly show them where they would spend eternity unless they repent and believe the Gospel.

So, why do we use the Ten Commandments in sharing the Gospel. As I mentioned last month, I am in a sermon series on the book of Exodus. There are two sermons in the series on the Ten Commandments where Skip Heitzig gives four uses of the Ten Commandments

1. A compass. Basically a way to plot your path through life.

2. A Thermometer—check your temperature to see how you are doing relative to Jesus command to obey Him.

3. Mirror—reveals sin in our lives.

4. Road sign—to point to Jesus

You can listen to the sermon or read the transcript online.

We have expanded our social media presence. In addition to the sites listed on the right side of this letter, we are now beginning to post regularly to Rumble, Parler, and MeWe. On MeWe we have a page for Bezeugen Ministries and the Everyday Club.

Thursday, July 1st, is the first Thursday of the month. We will be meeting to pray for our nation, leaders, and revival. We currently have four groups located across North Texas. If you’d like to have your group listed please contact us.

Suggested verses for A.C.T.S. (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication) model for prayer are below.

This month we are providing the winter themed “Got Peace” tract. Hand it out and wish someone Merry Christmas! In July? Yes, according to Wikipedia “Christmas in July” is a “second Christmas celebration held mainly during July. It is centered around Christmas-themed activities and entertainment, including small gatherings, seasonal music and specials, and shopping, with the goal of getting the public in the “Christmas spirit” during the summer season.” The meaning of Christmas is valid all year round. So whether you find a Christmas in July event or not, you can still hand out the tracts and wish someone Merry Christmas. Then like Linus in Charlie Brown Christmas you can tell people what Christmas is all about!

At the time of writing this letter I am in the midst of listening to a sermon series on the Book of Exodus. I never thought of Exodus as a place to preach on evangelism. But, I was wrong. When Moses was called by God he gave five excuses why he could not go. He said he is Incapable, Unknowledgeable, Fearful, Unsuitable, and finally Inflexible (in other words, he just didn’t want to do it). The sermon is on Exodus 3-4 and you can find it online. Or listen below.

Skip Heitzig goes on to quote Billy Sunday saying:

We always have excuses; always use the problems as excuses not to do God’s will. Maybe not always, but often. We’re really good at rationalizing. It was Billy Sunday, the evangelist who said, “An excuse is the skin of a reason stuffed with a lie.” Isn’t that good definition? The skin of reason stuffed with a lie. I keep that in mind as we go through some of Moses’ excuses.

Billy Sunday

In the midst of this teaching, Skip shares about a time he was out sharing the Gospel. A guy asked him a question he didn’t know the answer to (See Moses second excuse, being Unknowledgeable). He told the guy he would go home and get the answer and come back next week. When he got back he looked for the guy to tell him what he had learned to answer his question. You see having the humility to admit we don’t know all the answers is a good step. If we wait until we know everything about the Bible to go share the Gospel we will never go. As I have been praying about writing this months letter I received an email from a friend asking a question she had been asked while out witnessing. She was already practing the approach we call “study the last question asked”. Leverage your resources. Talk to your friends, small group leader, pastor, etc. The more you share the Gospel, the more you will be driven into God’s word to study. Then next time the question is asked, you’ll have the answer on the top of your tongue.