¤ ¤ 00:00:01.36\00:00:04.73 ¤ I want to spend my life mending broken people ¤ 00:00:04.77\00:00:15.34 ¤ I want to spend my life removing pain ¤ 00:00:15.38\00:00:26.25 ¤ Lord let my words heal a heart that hurts ¤ 00:00:26.29\00:00:36.70 ¤ I want to spend my life mending broken people ¤ 00:00:36.73\00:00:59.85 ¤ ¤ 00:00:59.89\00:01:07.53 Hello friends, welcome to 3ABN Today. My name is John Lomacang 00:01:07.56\00:01:10.57 and you know I cannot top who I have sitting next to me, my 00:01:10.60\00:01:14.90 Lovely wife Angela. Good to have you here. 00:01:14.94\00:01:16.64 I am always happy to be here and I'm glad that you have tuned in 00:01:16.67\00:01:20.01 today and you're going to be blessed by this program. It's a 00:01:20.04\00:01:23.61 great couple and they have a lot to share with us today. 00:01:23.65\00:01:27.72 It's about evangelism and because I'm director of world 00:01:27.75\00:01:31.55 evangelism for 3ABN it has taken on a more particular special 00:01:31.59\00:01:35.99 meaning to me because evangelism the single word may mean 00:01:36.02\00:01:40.16 something different to a lot of different people but today we're 00:01:40.20\00:01:42.83 going to talk about the expanded view. What is evangelism and 00:01:42.86\00:01:46.87 what kind of evangelism is relevant and necessary for the 00:01:46.90\00:01:50.11 challenges of the days in which we live. But before we introduce 00:01:50.14\00:01:54.81 our guests we'll go to our music We want to just thank you for 00:01:54.84\00:01:57.65 your prayers and financial support of this network as we 00:01:57.68\00:02:00.45 continue going and growing getting ready for the coming of 00:02:00.48\00:02:02.62 the Lord. Honey who do we have for music today? 00:02:02.65\00:02:06.76 Oh we have Pastor Wintley Phipps is going to share a wonderful 00:02:06.79\00:02:11.23 song entitled Coming Again. 00:02:11.26\00:02:14.46 ¤ ¤ 00:02:14.50\00:02:50.50 ¤ Why stand ye gazing there up into the sky ¤ 00:02:50.53\00:03:02.41 ¤ Be not discouraged for we have brought good news ¤ 00:03:02.44\00:03:15.12 ¤ This same Jesus whom we do magnify ¤ 00:03:15.16\00:03:23.47 ¤ Soon He will come again for all to glorify ¤ 00:03:23.50\00:03:39.45 ¤ He is coming again He is coming again ¤ 00:03:39.48\00:03:50.23 ¤ Son of the Father He is coming again ¤ 00:03:50.26\00:04:04.34 ¤ On Calvary He claimed my destiny ¤ 00:04:04.37\00:04:10.01 ¤ Lord I humble myself to Thee ¤ 00:04:10.05\00:04:31.03 ¤ Lord I want to see your face just help me be strong ¤ 00:04:31.07\00:04:42.64 ¤ I know you will return I know it won't be long ¤ 00:04:42.68\00:04:54.26 ¤ He is coming again He is coming again ¤ 00:04:54.29\00:05:08.80 ¤ Son of the Father He is coming again ¤ 00:05:08.84\00:05:19.91 ¤ On Calvary He claimed my destiny ¤ 00:05:19.95\00:05:25.75 ¤ Lord I humble myself to Thee ¤ 00:05:25.79\00:05:41.17 ¤ Lift up the trumpet and Loud let it ring ¤ 00:05:41.20\00:05:44.74 ¤ Jesus is coming again ¤ 00:05:44.77\00:05:50.25 ¤ Cheer up ye pilgrims be joyful and sing ¤ 00:05:50.28\00:05:55.32 ¤ Jesus is coming again ¤ 00:05:55.35\00:05:59.29 ¤ Coming again, coming again Jesus is coming again ¤ 00:05:59.32\00:06:08.96 ¤ Coming again, Coming again Jesus is coming again ¤ 00:06:09.00\00:06:22.31 Thank you so much, Pastor Wintley Phipps. You know every 00:06:22.34\00:06:30.42 time I see Wintley Pastor Phipps singing he's singing for a 00:06:30.45\00:06:34.16 president which he sang for so many of our presidents or 00:06:34.19\00:06:36.93 dignitaries or at a funeral or at inauguration. God has really 00:06:36.96\00:06:41.53 gifted Pastor Wintley Phipps to be able to be in circles that 00:06:41.56\00:06:43.93 many of us will never get into and he's lifting up Jesus with 00:06:43.97\00:06:47.44 that wonderful song Jesus is coming again. What a wonderful 00:06:47.47\00:06:50.74 song. 00:06:50.77\00:06:52.11 Beautiful. 00:06:52.14\00:06:53.48 Let's introduce our guests. 00:06:53.51\00:06:54.84 Oh this is the best part right here. Stephen and Felecia Lee, 00:06:54.88\00:06:58.65 welcome. 00:06:58.68\00:07:00.02 Thank you. Thank you for having us. Excited to be here. 00:07:00.05\00:07:02.75 Now Felecia you've been here before. 00:07:02.78\00:07:04.15 Yeah so it feels like coming home. 00:07:04.19\00:07:05.55 There you go, there you go. 00:07:05.59\00:07:07.26 Always feels comfortable here with you guys. (Yeah) 00:07:07.29\00:07:09.69 Is this your first time here? 00:07:09.72\00:07:11.66 It is my first time. 00:07:11.69\00:07:13.23 Yeah so Felecia has to show you the ropes... 00:07:13.26\00:07:16.46 I feel like I'm bringing him home to my parents 00:07:16.50\00:07:19.37 Yeah, there you go I like that. And you are well been married 00:07:19.40\00:07:23.61 a couple years now. 00:07:23.64\00:07:24.97 Two years. (Two years) 00:07:25.01\00:07:27.84 That's wonderful. How's married life? 00:07:27.88\00:07:30.48 Amazing. Beautiful. There's so much to learn. It's one of the 00:07:30.51\00:07:36.95 best experiences that you could have to learn about that 00:07:36.99\00:07:39.72 relationship that God has with the church. It's not always easy 00:07:39.75\00:07:42.86 and you know but we're doing great but a lot to learn. 00:07:42.89\00:07:46.96 That's right. And the other thing we're excited about is you 00:07:47.00\00:07:50.83 both are on the cutting edge and since our topic is about 00:07:50.87\00:07:55.54 evangelism what I'd like to begin with and by the way just 00:07:55.57\00:08:00.48 briefly for our viewing audience and listening audience give us a 00:08:00.51\00:08:04.11 little bit about your background Let's start with ladies first. 00:08:04.15\00:08:07.75 Give us kind of the concoction of your nationality. 00:08:07.78\00:08:11.55 You have an accent. 00:08:11.59\00:08:12.92 Sure yeah so I am from the islands like Angie so I relate 00:08:12.95\00:08:16.76 to you on that level. But I'm originally from the Bahamas. I 00:08:16.79\00:08:19.73 studied in Jamaica. My parents are originally from Haiti and 00:08:19.76\00:08:24.30 now I live in the U.S. and I'm married to a South Korean. Like 00:08:24.33\00:08:29.20 all of the United Nations all in one. But my background is I 00:08:29.24\00:08:32.97 studied elementary education. Then I got involved in radio and 00:08:33.01\00:08:36.01 television. Then I got into online evangelism through the 00:08:36.04\00:08:39.71 Center for Online Evangelism and through that work that's how I 00:08:39.75\00:08:43.85 got to meet Stephen. That's how we met, me working for Center of 00:08:43.89\00:08:49.59 Online Evangelism and I met him so that's a little bit about my 00:08:49.62\00:08:51.29 background. 00:08:51.33\00:08:52.66 He was your first convert or you were his first convert? I don't 00:08:52.69\00:08:56.77 know which way it went. That's a good way. Stephen what about you 00:08:56.80\00:09:00.07 Tell us about yourself. 00:09:00.10\00:09:02.57 Like she said I am South Korean born and I was raised in south 00:09:02.60\00:09:08.98 California area so that's where I grew up. Coming from a non 00:09:09.01\00:09:14.08 Adventist background so my parents weren't Christians or 00:09:14.12\00:09:19.45 nominal Christians and eventually I learned about the 00:09:19.49\00:09:21.49 Adventist truth in my high school. So I have some stories 00:09:21.52\00:09:25.39 to tell about that later on. (Okay) Yeah. 00:09:25.43\00:09:30.00 Well let's start with the basics since we're talking about 00:09:30.03\00:09:33.03 evangelism. Just give us a snippet what's the difference 00:09:33.07\00:09:36.44 between evangelism and what you are involved in and let's talk 00:09:36.47\00:09:40.61 about that. Either one of you just begin. 00:09:40.64\00:09:41.98 Yeah, the best way that I could describe evangelism: Imagine if 00:09:42.01\00:09:47.32 you go to the store and you found out there's a huge sale 00:09:47.35\00:09:49.78 and this is a shadow of an example, but there's a huge sale 00:09:49.82\00:09:53.96 and you know that you can benefit a lot. You cannot help 00:09:53.99\00:09:57.53 but tell people. Hey this is where you can find everything 00:09:57.56\00:10:00.60 that you need, like groceries are 99 percent off and clothes 00:10:00.63\00:10:06.40 and shoes and your tuition paid. Well we have a good news in the 00:10:06.43\00:10:12.34 gospel. Jesus Christ died for us so that we could be reconciled 00:10:12.37\00:10:16.11 with the Father and when you experience that you cannot help 00:10:16.14\00:10:21.28 but tell people everywhere using whatever means possible. So 00:10:21.32\00:10:27.02 that's the edge of evangelism sharing that good news and we 00:10:27.06\00:10:30.13 are commanded by Christ, in a good way, to tell others and to 00:10:30.16\00:10:34.96 make disciples. So that's the basis of evangelism. 00:10:35.00\00:10:38.20 And what about you Stephen? 00:10:38.23\00:10:40.70 I think she did a wonderful job I don't know if I could top that 00:10:40.74\00:10:44.94 For me if it wasn't for evangelism I wouldn't be here. 00:10:44.97\00:10:49.14 For some point. So it really has more of a heart wrenching I 00:10:49.18\00:10:58.09 think the principle and someone actually evangelizing to someone 00:10:58.12\00:11:01.69 else, sharing the good news, has impacted my life personally 00:11:01.72\00:11:05.69 and brought me out of depression and suicidal things. You know I 00:11:05.73\00:11:10.77 am here because of it so it's very personal and I think we 00:11:10.80\00:11:14.37 have to have every way possible to share that. 00:11:14.40\00:11:18.77 Now many people are not doing online evangelism, many churches 00:11:18.81\00:11:24.11 I should say. Why is it a problem if we are not doing 00:11:24.15\00:11:27.78 online evangelism. 00:11:27.82\00:11:29.28 You know I have some numbers here and it might seem a little 00:11:29.32\00:11:33.66 striking but I feel like it's so important to sort of get 00:11:33.69\00:11:37.09 why online evangelism is so important. So every month there 00:11:37.13\00:11:45.23 are 49,500 searches for Sabbath. So somebody's going online every 00:11:45.27\00:11:49.34 single month someone is typing in: What happens when you die? 00:11:49.37\00:11:53.64 Well not someone 74,000 searches for What happens when you die? 00:11:53.68\00:11:58.05 There are 550,000 related to anxiety and 324,000 searches 00:11:58.08\00:12:07.72 related to Bible prophecy. They might not be coming to your 00:12:07.76\00:12:12.39 church door or knocking but asking about Bible prophecy. 00:12:12.43\00:12:15.46 but that does not mean that people are not searching. People 00:12:15.50\00:12:18.80 are searching online. So why would we not want to be where 00:12:18.83\00:12:24.11 people are searching. We would be doing a great disservice to 00:12:24.14\00:12:29.98 the gospel, to the spread of evangelism if we're not making 00:12:30.01\00:12:33.92 that emphasis to have a presence where people are. So that's one 00:12:33.95\00:12:39.12 of the reasons why, like the foundational reasons why 00:12:39.15\00:12:42.29 Center for Online Evangelism and its founders are so passionate 00:12:42.32\00:12:45.99 about equipping churches and equipping individuals and 00:12:46.03\00:12:50.57 ministries to get online and to optimize or make their presence 00:12:50.60\00:12:53.87 be better seen online. 00:12:53.90\00:12:56.64 So many people are online today aren't they? 00:12:56.67\00:12:59.24 That's true, I mean... 00:12:59.27\00:13:00.61 it's the way of the world it seems huh? 00:13:00.64\00:13:02.14 It's called social media, the YouTube universe, Twitter, 00:13:02.18\00:13:05.95 Facebook, Instagram, TikTok. People are online and there are 00:13:05.98\00:13:11.92 hardly any people today that don't own a phone. So that's a 00:13:11.95\00:13:14.42 really amazing statistics. So what I hear you saying is, if 00:13:14.46\00:13:18.06 they're going to search we need to be where they're searching. 00:13:18.09\00:13:21.16 (Yeah exactly) That really makes a difference, Wow. 00:13:21.20\00:13:23.80 There's a story, most of us might be familiar with it in 00:13:23.83\00:13:27.87 John chapter 4. It's the story of the woman at the well. (Oh 00:13:27.90\00:13:31.91 yes) Why didn't Jesus stay in Jerusalem and have the woman 00:13:31.94\00:13:35.64 come find Him in Jerusalem? When we're not online it's like we're 00:13:35.68\00:13:40.58 staying in Jerusalem expecting the Samaritan's to come find us. 00:13:40.62\00:13:43.39 (Good point) Jesus didn't do that. He took His disciples who 00:13:43.42\00:13:47.86 were very uncomfortable. Ah we can't go through Samaria. Like 00:13:47.89\00:13:52.16 they were uncomfortable but Jesus was like that's the only 00:13:52.19\00:13:54.66 way that He's going to get through to her. So He took that 00:13:54.70\00:13:58.53 trip and His disciples and met her at the well where she was. 00:13:58.57\00:14:02.40 That's what online evangelism is We're not staying in Jerusalem 00:14:02.44\00:14:05.91 We're going to the well because that's where people are. 00:14:05.94\00:14:09.58 Wow, preacher! (Multiple voices) That was beautiful. I love what 00:14:09.61\00:14:15.95 you said. Go to the well. That's a sermon title which you be 00:14:15.98\00:14:20.72 working on. 00:14:20.76\00:14:22.09 I can see you brain already. 00:14:22.12\00:14:23.53 It's going to work at the well. All right. That's really really 00:14:23.56\00:14:28.03 good. But now talk about...You hinted to something about 00:14:28.06\00:14:31.33 evangelism was the reason why your life was saved. Now would 00:14:31.37\00:14:35.10 you like to share that after or would you like us to show Tina's 00:14:35.14\00:14:38.51 story first. 00:14:38.54\00:14:39.87 I think we should start with the good news first. Let's start 00:14:39.91\00:14:41.98 with Tina's story because I think it's an amazing testimony. 00:14:42.01\00:14:45.11 Yeah. What you're about to hear is...if you're listening or if 00:14:45.15\00:14:50.09 you're watching what you're about to see is a...one of the 00:14:50.12\00:14:53.19 beautiful stories about online evangelism can turn a life 00:14:53.22\00:14:57.33 around. Right after this you'll hear Stephen's story. 00:14:57.36\00:15:01.53 I drank every night to the point where I didn't really care if I 00:15:01.56\00:15:08.10 lived or not. It was just when's my next drink. I'll go to work 00:15:08.14\00:15:12.57 and be sober but then when's my next drink. It just got to the 00:15:12.61\00:15:16.21 point where I just want to get a divorce or I just want to die. 00:15:16.24\00:15:19.45 I just don't want to be here anymore. 00:15:19.48\00:15:22.55 ¤ ¤ 00:15:22.58\00:15:29.72 Most of my life I didn't realize it I think God really had a plan 00:15:29.76\00:15:33.76 for me all along. Before I was born, my mom was 15 when she got 00:15:33.80\00:15:40.44 pregnant and she had me and had to go into a home for moms and 00:15:40.47\00:15:44.24 she almost gave me up but my grandma decided you know I want 00:15:44.27\00:15:47.78 to keep her and I'll help you raise her and so she raised me 00:15:47.81\00:15:51.88 Throughout my teenage years life was a little rough. My dad was 00:15:51.91\00:15:57.52 an alcoholic. Then I eventually got saved and baptized in the 00:15:57.55\00:16:05.83 Baptist church. But then I met my husband-to-be and we got 00:16:05.86\00:16:12.57 married. He was from a family that liked to party a lot and so 00:16:12.60\00:16:17.31 I just got sucked into that and that's what we did. We would 00:16:17.34\00:16:20.78 party all the time. I became a bad alcoholic and my kids 00:16:20.81\00:16:26.35 suffered as a result of it. But then I just got tired of it. I 00:16:26.38\00:16:32.52 was on the verge of divorce so many times but then something, 00:16:32.55\00:16:36.32 probably my mom's prayers, just kept me going. And I started 00:16:36.36\00:16:41.66 doing some searching online, reading the Bible and googling 00:16:41.70\00:16:48.14 some different questions I had about the Bible. And I found 00:16:48.17\00:16:52.74 that there was people that worship on Saturday and I'd 00:16:52.77\00:16:56.78 never heard of that before. I checked it out and there were 00:16:56.81\00:16:59.71 two churches in the area that worshipped on Sabbath. They were 00:16:59.75\00:17:03.59 called Seventh-day Adventist so I went to the one church and it 00:17:03.62\00:17:08.49 was actually in Edenville, Michigan. So then I started 00:17:08.52\00:17:11.49 doing more research. I did find a lot of negative things about 00:17:11.53\00:17:15.26 Seventh-day Adventists on there saying they worship Ellen White 00:17:15.30\00:17:19.87 they're a cult and just some weird stuff and I thought you 00:17:19.90\00:17:24.44 know I just don't know if I believe all that. So I did some 00:17:24.47\00:17:28.31 more researching and the people that I met they just didn't seem 00:17:28.34\00:17:31.55 like that. They didn't do those things that I saw on the 00:17:31.58\00:17:35.65 internet. And I decided I want to get baptized. I believe this 00:17:35.68\00:17:40.46 is where God's leading me. This is what I want to do. I wouldn't 00:17:40.49\00:17:44.76 be here if I wouldn't have looked up and listened to the 00:17:44.79\00:17:48.03 podcasts and did my research and not believed some of the stuff 00:17:48.06\00:17:52.43 that was out there. I found out for myself whether it was true 00:17:52.47\00:17:56.47 or not. I highly encourage no matter how old you are to get 00:17:56.50\00:18:00.74 involved. My mom, she's almost 70 and she gets on Facebook and 00:18:00.78\00:18:07.35 she posts verses and encouraging words and people see that. It 00:18:07.38\00:18:11.62 helps. It does help. I encourage you as a church member or even a 00:18:14.32\00:18:20.63 leader to get your church online get them the materials they need 00:18:20.66\00:18:24.47 You don't have to know how to get online and how to do these 00:18:24.50\00:18:29.17 things. Center for Online has a ton of stuff that you can look 00:18:29.20\00:18:32.97 at and you can get members of your church that knows how to do 00:18:33.01\00:18:38.38 these things already. Get the young people involved. Get the 00:18:38.41\00:18:41.68 older people involved. They may not want to get online and do 00:18:41.72\00:18:45.99 things but they'll help support either financially or they'll 00:18:46.02\00:18:50.13 pray for your ministry and if the churches don't get involved 00:18:50.16\00:18:53.86 digitally we are missing millions of people and people 00:18:53.90\00:18:57.53 that are going to be lost, my children, your children, your 00:18:57.57\00:19:01.00 grandchildren, they're all online If you don't get involved 00:19:01.04\00:19:05.07 online you're missing all these people. 00:19:05.11\00:19:08.24 ¤ ¤ 00:19:08.28\00:19:25.23 Wow, what a powerful story. (Yes it was) What I love about is 00:19:25.26\00:19:28.33 that it took away the mist and brought into focus the truth 00:19:28.36\00:19:33.54 I like how Tina said there were a lot of negative things about 00:19:33.57\00:19:36.77 Seventh-day Adventist online and I know we've run into that 00:19:36.81\00:19:41.14 ourselves but instead of trying to find out from other people 00:19:41.18\00:19:44.55 what we believe how did you change that? By giving the true 00:19:44.58\00:19:49.42 story. Wow, wow. 00:19:49.45\00:19:51.35 She went to church. She found the church, she ignored that and 00:19:51.39\00:19:54.76 she went to church, found a church. 00:19:54.79\00:19:57.46 And not so much ignoring it but she said I'm not going to be my 00:19:57.49\00:20:03.40 last understanding of what people are saying about 00:20:03.43\00:20:05.93 Adventists. I want to find out for myself. (You're right) And 00:20:05.97\00:20:08.90 found out that was a misrepresentation. 00:20:08.94\00:20:10.41 Praise God for that. 00:20:10.44\00:20:12.47 It is very good and what's remarkable about Tina's story 00:20:12.51\00:20:13.84 is that she actually works with us now. 00:20:15.94\00:20:17.28 She does?! 00:20:17.31\00:20:18.65 Not only was she able to find the truth through online but 00:20:18.68\00:20:23.15 now she is one of the ones in the forefront to work with us. 00:20:23.18\00:20:28.16 Her story is just amazing what God is able to do through her. 00:20:28.19\00:20:33.16 Now on the other side like you were saying some people or 00:20:33.19\00:20:37.37 actually, most people are very discouraged by what is said 00:20:37.40\00:20:40.04 online about Adventists. Sadly that is my story, more so my 00:20:40.07\00:20:45.94 dad. When I came to know about the Adventist truth it was the 00:20:45.97\00:20:49.44 Sabbath that really converted me and there's a whole long story 00:20:49.48\00:20:52.31 about that. 00:20:52.35\00:20:53.68 Were you a Christian before? 00:20:53.72\00:20:55.05 I was kind of a Christian. I went to church because of sadly 00:20:55.08\00:20:59.55 ladies and basketball. That's really what I cared about. 00:20:59.59\00:21:03.02 back in the day. So I just went because my parents went, people 00:21:03.06\00:21:07.76 went but for me I came to a point where I was very depressed 00:21:07.80\00:21:12.60 and I didn't want to live but I then found the Adventist truth 00:21:12.63\00:21:15.14 eventually. But the sad part about this is when I learned 00:21:15.17\00:21:20.81 about the Seventh-day Adventist truth my parents had no idea 00:21:20.84\00:21:25.18 what we were. And so what did they do. They went to Pastor 00:21:25.21\00:21:30.32 Google because everyone is going to Google for answers even 00:21:30.35\00:21:35.59 spiritual answers. So when they searched about Seventh-day 00:21:35.62\00:21:39.79 Adventists in Google the Google said they're a cult. The Google 00:21:39.83\00:21:45.67 said they believe in all these false ideas and they are brain 00:21:45.70\00:21:50.74 washing people. Especially from a Korean background if you're a 00:21:50.77\00:21:55.44 cult you're thinking about baby sacrifices and arranged 00:21:55.48\00:21:59.48 marriages and the whole nine yards. So when they saw that 00:21:59.51\00:22:04.32 online they came to me like Stephen no matter what you do 00:22:04.35\00:22:08.79 you're not going to believe in this. But for me, that was where 00:22:08.82\00:22:14.86 I found hope. And so I had this conflict. Long story short I 00:22:14.90\00:22:23.87 basically went straight fulltime ministry and started working for 00:22:23.91\00:22:28.74 the Lord because I believed that was my calling. And literally 00:22:28.78\00:22:33.18 because of that information that my parents found online, not 00:22:33.21\00:22:36.99 from anyone else, from Pastor Google for 10 years they have 00:22:37.02\00:22:42.82 been distrusting of Adventists. Now my mom is coming around but 00:22:42.86\00:22:48.76 my dad, my stepdad actually, he completely left the church. He 00:22:48.80\00:22:53.54 doesn't believe in Christ anymore and it all started 00:22:53.57\00:22:57.44 because they got the wrong information. He's gotten the 00:22:57.47\00:23:00.08 wrong information from Google search. 00:23:00.11\00:23:04.51 So you eventually joined an Adventist church and got 00:23:04.55\00:23:07.68 baptized. 00:23:07.72\00:23:09.05 That's right amen. 00:23:09.08\00:23:10.42 In Southern California? 00:23:10.45\00:23:11.79 No that was actually...I traveled a bit. I was baptized 00:23:11.82\00:23:16.79 in New Hampshire. That's where we're at now. But I learned 00:23:16.83\00:23:20.10 about the truth in California. 00:23:20.13\00:23:24.07 Wow, wow, so we got some, I mean once again I've never heard 00:23:24.10\00:23:29.24 about Pastor Google but... (laughter) 00:23:29.27\00:23:33.21 Now whose church do you go to? Pastor Google's church? 00:23:33.24\00:23:36.61 And believe everything Google says. 00:23:36.64\00:23:38.61 As strange as that my sound people take online postings as 00:23:38.65\00:23:44.12 valid. It seems to be somebody says I saw it online. It must be 00:23:44.15\00:23:47.99 true. Friends of that's the position you have be very, very 00:23:48.02\00:23:51.66 careful. Because it's online doesn't mean it's true. 00:23:51.69\00:23:54.86 Check it out, follow the bread crumbs. So now tell us about 00:23:54.90\00:24:01.27 online evangelism as it connects to what you do. I'll go back to 00:24:01.30\00:24:05.07 you Felecia. 00:24:05.11\00:24:07.28 Yeah, so the Center for Online Evangelism just a little bit of 00:24:07.31\00:24:10.91 a background. Ed Wagner who is the founder of it, he would 00:24:10.95\00:24:14.42 travel and he would find you know whenever he was in a new 00:24:14.45\00:24:18.59 city where do I find an Adventist church. And it's when 00:24:18.62\00:24:21.56 he pulls up his phone and he says Seventh-day Adventist all 00:24:21.59\00:24:23.93 this negative content is coming up and he said well if I am 00:24:23.96\00:24:28.66 seeing this and I know better as a Seventh-day Adventist what 00:24:28.70\00:24:32.33 is happening for people who don't know and they're searching 00:24:32.37\00:24:35.10 and they're pulling up all this negative information. And so 00:24:35.14\00:24:38.41 that was how the Center for Online Evangelism was birthed 00:24:38.44\00:24:41.51 He saw this need. He saw this problem actually and how many 00:24:41.54\00:24:47.42 people were turning away from truth because of what Pastor 00:24:47.45\00:24:51.49 Google was saying. So with the Center for Online Evangelism 00:24:51.52\00:24:54.32 the focus is and it's a word that might go over our heads a 00:24:54.36\00:24:58.29 little bit: Search Engine Optimization but it is 00:24:58.33\00:25:02.36 essentially finding ways to optimize your website, make your 00:25:02.40\00:25:07.54 website more visible so that when people search that it's 00:25:07.57\00:25:10.97 coming up on the first page of Google because people rarely 00:25:11.01\00:25:14.21 when they search a question or a topic, if it's not in those 00:25:14.24\00:25:19.88 first 10 results they're not going to switch the second page. 00:25:19.91\00:25:23.52 So they're going to focus on what's at the top of that list. 00:25:23.55\00:25:27.66 So the Center for Online Evangelism is trying to get the 00:25:27.69\00:25:32.53 website of our churches, of Adventist.org, all of our 00:25:32.56\00:25:36.50 ministries to be on that first page because people are away 00:25:36.53\00:25:41.57 searching. They want to know about God. They want to know why 00:25:41.60\00:25:43.81 there's suffering. They want to know what is the Sabbath. What 00:25:43.84\00:25:46.57 is going to happen and so we are targeting what we call the low 00:25:46.61\00:25:52.18 hanging fruit, people who are already searching. So that is 00:25:52.21\00:25:55.25 the focus of the Center for Online Evangelism. I don't know 00:25:55.28\00:26:00.12 if you want to add something. 00:26:00.16\00:26:01.49 Yeah with that there's a good example that we could say like 00:26:01.52\00:26:05.06 it's hard to reach the Muslim countries right? Because they 00:26:05.09\00:26:08.40 do not allow such religious things to be seen or heard. Well 00:26:08.43\00:26:13.60 we are partnering with our coordinator for Adventist/ 00:26:13.64\00:26:19.54 Muslim relations in NAD and so what we're trying to do is 00:26:19.57\00:26:24.58 something that we're doing already where we have a website 00:26:24.61\00:26:26.82 that when people in those Muslim countries search our content 00:26:26.85\00:26:33.09 will come up so now they can find those answers where they 00:26:33.12\00:26:37.66 couldn't find it physically around them. (I like that) 00:26:37.69\00:26:39.26 They, the Muslims, they favor more the Adventists don't they? 00:26:39.29\00:26:43.97 Right and that helps because there's so much, once again, 00:26:44.00\00:26:47.84 Pastor Google. You know a lot of time people go online you 00:26:47.87\00:26:50.74 know...Matter of fact, I recently saw online, this is a 00:26:50.77\00:26:53.81 very good time to say this, how there are a lot of things online 00:26:53.84\00:26:58.45 are shifting. I think that the pressures of religious 00:26:58.48\00:27:01.95 influences are even taking things that we know are 00:27:01.98\00:27:05.09 historically true and changing it is because other people said 00:27:05.12\00:27:07.36 that's not what we want to come up online. Like I put what is 00:27:07.39\00:27:11.46 the seventh day of the week? Well, we know that's a given. 00:27:11.49\00:27:14.43 The Saturday is. But now you go online and you put that in, they 00:27:14.46\00:27:18.43 say Sunday because this push to bring Sunday to the forefront 00:27:18.47\00:27:22.54 is leaking out of Europe where they changed the calendar to 00:27:22.57\00:27:26.17 make Sunday the last day of the week. And now it's influencing 00:27:26.21\00:27:29.54 America so you put that in there now they say Sunday. But we know 00:27:29.58\00:27:33.31 that historically you know period from creation to the 00:27:33.35\00:27:36.28 present Saturday is the last day of the week. So we could say 00:27:36.32\00:27:39.59 if you just go to Google and ask Google that's what you're going 00:27:39.62\00:27:42.66 get. You're going to get conflicting views. But when you 00:27:42.69\00:27:45.53 go to the Encyclopedia and the Britannica and official 00:27:45.56\00:27:49.66 authoritative sources you get the truth. So we're saying 00:27:49.70\00:27:56.17 that's what online evangelism is doing, taking you to the source 00:27:56.20\00:27:57.67 not just to this gigantic market flea market of ideology. (Right) 00:27:57.71\00:28:02.58 So when you think about that what can we do to enhance search 00:28:02.61\00:28:07.95 engine optimization. By the way before you go to that I want to 00:28:07.98\00:28:11.12 bring up a slate of your website because this is something that I 00:28:11.15\00:28:14.16 think is so significant for people when they see this. 00:28:14.19\00:28:18.79 Millions are Asking (they are) and there on the bottom left 00:28:18.83\00:28:22.60 CenterForOnlineEvangelism.org and take note of that. We're 00:28:22.63\00:28:26.74 going to give that address again but wonderful website. I thank 00:28:26.77\00:28:31.21 the Lord that the person who brought this about, what was his 00:28:31.24\00:28:33.31 name again? (Ed Wagner) I mean when you see this need, it's not 00:28:33.34\00:28:37.95 just helping your ministry but it's putting us in the proper 00:28:37.98\00:28:40.68 light. So what can we do to increase search engine 00:28:40.72\00:28:43.59 optimization? 00:28:43.62\00:28:44.95 That's a great question because like you said even Google is 00:28:44.99\00:28:49.49 turning their algorithm; what I mean by algorithm is why they 00:28:49.52\00:28:53.06 will put certain websites first, certain answers first when 00:28:53.09\00:28:57.67 people search. That is actually changing. They are trying to 00:28:57.70\00:29:02.10 implement more of the consensus way of giving the results. Kind 00:29:02.14\00:29:06.98 of like you said if you ask Google when is the seventh day, 00:29:07.01\00:29:12.45 they are saying Sunday. You know why that is, is because most 00:29:12.48\00:29:15.92 people online are saying that is true. So it's the consensus 00:29:15.95\00:29:21.12 based result which is not right. Right because we have the truth, 00:29:21.16\00:29:25.99 we know what the Biblical truths are. That should be what's true. 00:29:26.03\00:29:29.96 But now what they're doing is going by what majority of the 00:29:30.00\00:29:33.94 people are saying which could be a devastating thing. That's why 00:29:33.97\00:29:37.81 for us, the Center for Online Evangelism, we really want to 00:29:37.84\00:29:40.34 encourage and help even other ministries to have more of our 00:29:40.38\00:29:44.15 content, more of our truths, out there so that every single page 00:29:44.18\00:29:48.35 that people find, say if they're asking when is the seventh day, 00:29:48.38\00:29:52.55 we're all saying the same thing and when they see that the 00:29:52.59\00:29:57.36 Google...Google is just the machine, you know, picking 00:29:57.39\00:29:58.99 things up. So when they see that it automatically goes toward our 00:29:59.03\00:30:02.43 favor so that when the majority of the people are searching they 00:30:02.46\00:30:06.00 find the right answer. And that's really, I think, one of 00:30:06.03\00:30:08.87 the best ways that we want to encourage our Adventist 00:30:08.90\00:30:13.04 ministries and churches and even members to put the right and the 00:30:13.07\00:30:17.21 truthful answers online. 00:30:17.25\00:30:19.01 You know I'm smiling because I thought about that search engine 00:30:19.05\00:30:21.82 optimization. Now I am actually blessed in this area, not that 00:30:21.85\00:30:24.62 my website is SEO-friendly, working on that, but my name is 00:30:24.65\00:30:28.72 so unique that when you put John Lomacang you're not going to get 00:30:28.76\00:30:31.33 another John Lomacang. Right. So unique and that's what you're 00:30:31.36\00:30:36.50 talking about. Get the right results. If you put Adventists 00:30:36.53\00:30:40.87 you're going to get the right results. If you put seventh day 00:30:40.90\00:30:42.24 Sabbath you're going to get the right results. 00:30:42.27\00:30:43.61 And also when people...say you lost a loved one, you know, 00:30:43.64\00:30:48.31 people are devastated so they put in what happens when you die 00:30:48.34\00:30:51.91 you know, they want to know. How does that reach your website 00:30:51.95\00:30:57.95 or how does it come up or help the website? 00:30:57.99\00:31:02.09 Help answer that question. 00:31:02.12\00:31:03.46 Exactly. We do search engine optimization like you said and 00:31:03.49\00:31:08.23 the thing that you have to do to make that happen is a lot of 00:31:08.26\00:31:12.53 work. We have a team of 30 now all over the world. We all work 00:31:12.57\00:31:16.91 remotely and just to have one page come up it takes sometimes 00:31:16.94\00:31:20.81 two years to get to that first page because, depending on the 00:31:20.84\00:31:24.85 search term and phrase you have to compete with other websites 00:31:24.88\00:31:29.02 to have it up there and it just takes a lot of work. So what we 00:31:29.05\00:31:34.12 do is specifically like those questions that people are asking 00:31:34.16\00:31:37.09 What are people asking. You search and we do research about 00:31:37.13\00:31:40.93 what people are actually wanting to talk about or asking and 00:31:40.96\00:31:44.77 creating the website, writing the website, putting the 00:31:44.80\00:31:49.30 structures in place so that Google when they are searching 00:31:49.34\00:31:52.54 for that answer which website gives the best answer for this 00:31:52.57\00:31:55.24 question. They are able to say hey our website actually makes 00:31:55.28\00:31:59.08 sense, what we're saying and also the structure and the 00:31:59.11\00:32:02.98 technical aspect, how fast does it load. There's so many things 00:32:03.02\00:32:05.32 that they would check off to say okay this website is actually 00:32:05.35\00:32:08.42 giving the best answer, and they will put that up in the first 00:32:08.46\00:32:12.03 page. 00:32:12.06\00:32:13.90 Wow. When you think about the amount of work the millions but 00:32:13.93\00:32:16.36 the billions because you'll never exhaust a search. If you 00:32:16.40\00:32:20.14 just put the letter A in the internet and hit enter you'll 00:32:20.17\00:32:24.64 have millions of responses. So we know that the competition is 00:32:24.67\00:32:29.58 really, reallly great. Before we go any further I just want to 00:32:29.61\00:32:32.08 say Praise God. It's so encouraging to hear that they're 00:32:32.11\00:32:35.68 say hey we will not allow ourselves to be misrepresented. 00:32:35.72\00:32:40.92 Because misrepresentation could be the matter of salvation or 00:32:40.96\00:32:44.49 being lost. 00:32:44.53\00:32:45.86 Yeah. I want to add to that too. It goes with this concept in 00:32:45.89\00:32:48.40 Matthew chapter 5 where Jesus says you are the light of the 00:32:48.43\00:32:52.13 world. You don't put a light under a basket. But most of us 00:32:52.17\00:32:56.40 that's what we're doing. Right. We're putting our light under 00:32:56.44\00:32:59.54 the basket which is somewhere else when everyone else is 00:32:59.57\00:33:03.41 online. So all right guys put that light where everyone can 00:33:03.45\00:33:06.88 see it. And in this morning age where is the place if you put a 00:33:06.92\00:33:11.29 light everyone's going to see it It's going to be online. It's 00:33:11.32\00:33:14.72 not a matter of if you feel comfortable with it or 00:33:14.76\00:33:18.06 if technology and the world is changing us, that's true. But 00:33:18.09\00:33:21.13 again as I mentioned the disciples had to go through 00:33:21.16\00:33:24.13 Samaria even though they were uncomfortable because Jesus knew 00:33:24.17\00:33:26.97 that there was a soul that had to be saved and the whole town 00:33:27.00\00:33:31.11 was converted. So that's how I like to see SEO too is putting 00:33:31.14\00:33:34.74 the light where everyone is going to see it. 00:33:34.78\00:33:38.48 I like that. (Beautiful) You're not only an online evangelist, 00:33:38.51\00:33:40.82 you're an offline evangelist. I mean... 00:33:40.85\00:33:44.49 She does speak for women's ministries and things like that. 00:33:44.52\00:33:46.99 Right? Yeah. 00:33:47.02\00:33:49.26 What a wonderful dynamic team. Let's talk about some of the 00:33:49.29\00:33:51.39 ways we could modify this and help get this message out there. 00:33:51.43\00:33:55.70 You talked about some cards. Let's kind of go down that road. 00:33:55.73\00:34:01.50 Yeah perfect. So like I said it gets a little complicated 00:34:01.54\00:34:06.47 when it comes to SEO. Not everyone is able to do that. 00:34:06.51\00:34:10.35 It takes so much resources. But what we did at Center for Online 00:34:10.38\00:34:16.69 Evangelism, we wanted to make it so much more easier for all of 00:34:16.72\00:34:20.49 our church members to be involved in helping in this 00:34:20.52\00:34:23.63 mission. And what we decided to do was we created something 00:34:23.66\00:34:27.26 called the Ask a Friend card. And these cards are just such an 00:34:27.30\00:34:32.13 easy way, you can see it on the screen. It has a very simple 00:34:32.17\00:34:37.57 design. People love the quality of the cards in the touch (like 00:34:37.61\00:34:43.11 a credit card) yes exactly. It's like a business card where you 00:34:43.14\00:34:45.01 can carry it around in your wallet. And the front has a 00:34:45.05\00:34:49.85 simple question that people are asking online or even offline. 00:34:49.88\00:34:52.55 And the back has a QR code where people can scan with any of 00:34:52.59\00:34:57.66 their smartphones and find the answer online. Now it's coming 00:34:57.69\00:35:01.43 from an offline place. Everyone can spread this out just like 00:35:01.46\00:35:06.60 any literature. You spread them out when you go to the grocery 00:35:06.63\00:35:10.11 store you're talking to someone or you go to an auto mechanics 00:35:10.14\00:35:12.77 shop right. Maybe you don't have all the time to answer the 00:35:12.81\00:35:16.38 questions they ask or you don't feel comfortable. And you just 00:35:16.41\00:35:19.21 share that card and they could check it out. Once they go 00:35:19.25\00:35:23.82 online now it opens up a whole other world, right? They can now 00:35:23.85\00:35:26.62 look at other answers and even come to a Bible study through 00:35:26.65\00:35:31.23 their website. 00:35:31.26\00:35:32.59 Great! We need this. 00:35:32.63\00:35:33.96 I am just excited. Just hold me back somebody. Now this is 00:35:34.00\00:35:38.30 evangelism. I want to go back to something that I was talking 00:35:38.33\00:35:40.84 about at the beginning here and I alluded to it. You know in the 00:35:40.87\00:35:44.34 old way of evangelism, it still has its benefits to having a 00:35:44.37\00:35:48.81 center rather than a center of the online evangelism. Sometimes 00:35:48.84\00:35:52.51 an evangelistic series will be held at a particular location 00:35:52.55\00:35:56.58 which could be one of three things: The seed could be 00:35:56.62\00:35:58.95 planted, it could be watered, or it could be the time of increase 00:35:58.99\00:36:02.06 because you never know. So what you're doing in fact um I see 00:36:02.09\00:36:06.59 it in ways: You may be planting the seed, you may be watering 00:36:06.63\00:36:10.50 the seed or God may be using your ministry to bring about 00:36:10.53\00:36:13.74 the increase. So we talked about that. There's only three ways: 00:36:13.77\00:36:18.14 One plant. Paul planted, Apollos watered, God gave the increase. 00:36:18.17\00:36:20.81 And so what you're doing now is...Church members...You don't 00:36:20.84\00:36:26.78 have to be a church member. If you're watching and you want 00:36:26.82\00:36:28.52 to be an evangelist say I need a couple of those boxes. Or 00:36:28.55\00:36:33.76 maybe...How many cards do you have in total. So there are a 00:36:33.79\00:36:38.19 total of nine topics. We want to increase a lot more. We have so 00:36:38.23\00:36:41.56 many more questions but a total of nine different topics and 00:36:41.60\00:36:44.47 what you saw on the screen at the last screen we call that a 00:36:44.50\00:36:50.04 Starter Kit. So every church or even a business if you have one 00:36:50.07\00:36:52.91 could order the starter kit that comes with about 900 cards, 100 00:36:52.94\00:37:01.52 cards for each on the topic and it also comes with a display 00:37:01.55\00:37:03.69 like a rack that could hold the cards in place so you could put 00:37:03.72\00:37:09.42 it in your foyer, you could put it in an office desk or 00:37:09.46\00:37:13.23 something like that and now everyone can see all the 00:37:13.26\00:37:16.63 questions. 00:37:16.67\00:37:18.57 I can't wait till this program is over so I can order that. 00:37:18.60\00:37:20.84 I mean really. That's...So a hundred in a box. (900) Oh 900! 00:37:20.87\00:37:26.78 in a box?! Really. 00:37:26.81\00:37:29.34 One hundred for each topic. (Woo-ooo) 00:37:29.38\00:37:32.71 Okay so in the box, all 900 are there. All nine topics are 00:37:32.75\00:37:35.88 represented. (Yes exactly) Wow! You know you guys are... 00:37:35.92\00:37:43.29 Imagine going to a restaurant and you want to leave a tip. 00:37:43.32\00:37:45.06 Put the card with the tip. Priceless. 00:37:45.09\00:37:47.53 And I actually went to the website. I scanned it with my 00:37:47.56\00:37:51.63 phone and it took me to the page which led me to other questions. 00:37:51.67\00:37:55.40 (Exactly) That's the beautiful thing about it. An evangelistic 00:37:55.44\00:38:00.01 series on your phone. This is phenomenal! This is Phenomenal! 00:38:00.04\00:38:03.31 We've got to order it for our church. 00:38:03.35\00:38:05.01 Order for our church. 00:38:05.05\00:38:07.38 There is something else that I want to address while we're 00:38:07.42\00:38:10.15 talking about online evangelism. It's a question that I'm faced 00:38:10.19\00:38:13.36 with. With persons who are a little bit hesitant when it 00:38:13.39\00:38:16.36 comes to online evangelism. Well are you replacing community? Are 00:38:16.39\00:38:20.53 you replacing in-person contact in the church. It's not about 00:38:20.56\00:38:24.00 It's not about that. It's not that at all. It's about one, 00:38:24.03\00:38:27.47 reaching people where they are and then bringing them into a 00:38:27.50\00:38:30.61 deeper connection. Most of us especially in this day and age 00:38:30.64\00:38:34.54 my parents for example live in the Bahamas. When we had our 00:38:34.58\00:38:38.61 wedding we got married in the middle of COVID, our parents 00:38:38.65\00:38:40.52 could not be there, well my parents could not be there. 00:38:40.55\00:38:42.78 Right. But they did not miss that opportunity to be present 00:38:42.82\00:38:46.72 because we had Zoom and we had all of these online ways. And so 00:38:46.76\00:38:51.73 with online evangelism you're connecting with people and then 00:38:51.76\00:38:55.96 drawing them. We have to go where they are. So it's not 00:38:56.00\00:38:59.47 about replacing church and replacing connection or 00:38:59.50\00:39:02.87 replacing relationships. We can't just sit back and be like 00:39:02.90\00:39:07.84 well I don't know about it and I'm not comfortable and people 00:39:07.88\00:39:10.61 are online too much anyway. Well they're online whether we're 00:39:10.65\00:39:14.32 doing online evangelism or not. So we might as well use the 00:39:14.35\00:39:18.65 opportunity to share the gospel. (Well said) 00:39:18.69\00:39:20.96 Is it also accessible to Facebook or Instagram. Do you 00:39:20.99\00:39:25.23 have links in those communities. (We do) Okay. 00:39:25.26\00:39:29.20 We have all those. We try to utilize every platform that we 00:39:29.23\00:39:32.80 can. It all depends on how much can we do as a team. But what's 00:39:32.83\00:39:39.57 also really nice is we actually did a research on why do our 00:39:39.61\00:39:45.61 members have a difficulty in evangelizing? And I think that's 00:39:45.65\00:39:49.28 something that you'd be interested in as well. And we 00:39:49.32\00:39:52.89 talked with pastors, we talked with conference leaders and did 00:39:52.92\00:39:56.93 a lot of interviews asking them you know what do you think is 00:39:56.96\00:40:00.46 hindering our church members? There were top four reasons why 00:40:00.50\00:40:01.83 All of them kind of had a similar answer. And one of the 00:40:04.50\00:40:08.84 biggest reasons is because they fear sharing. A lot of members 00:40:08.87\00:40:15.28 fear sharing. They feel like they don't know enough. They are 00:40:15.31\00:40:19.65 not competent in what they want to share what they believe or 00:40:19.68\00:40:24.89 what they think they know. And so that hinders a lot of our 00:40:24.92\00:40:29.49 members from going out. Another thing is they're tired of doing 00:40:29.52\00:40:33.19 the same thing over and over, which we know that traditional 00:40:33.23\00:40:38.57 evangelistic series has it's place but a lot of the members 00:40:38.60\00:40:42.10 are saying, We've been doing that so long. Is there something 00:40:42.14\00:40:45.41 that is more relevant. And so when we did this research we 00:40:45.44\00:40:49.14 said this is perfect. We have these cards and this is 00:40:49.18\00:40:53.11 completely new. It's different than before where they actually, 00:40:53.15\00:40:56.58 the people that are not just reading it from the literature 00:40:56.62\00:40:59.72 but they're reading it online and now they...It's a way of 00:40:59.75\00:41:06.16 sharing in different ways where churches could get involved. 00:41:06.19\00:41:07.53 And so it kind of answered all those questions and now you 00:41:07.56\00:41:10.73 don't need to know everything you need to know about the Bible 00:41:10.77\00:41:13.40 None of us do. Right. But now you are equipped to share these 00:41:13.44\00:41:19.97 cards anywhere you go because you have it in your pocket and 00:41:20.01\00:41:22.41 it has the answer that they need to know. 00:41:22.44\00:41:25.55 Wow, that's really good. Go ahead. 00:41:25.58\00:41:28.05 No, I'm just saying this is so necessary. We're in the last 00:41:28.08\00:41:30.75 days we need to get the gospel out to the world. This is a 00:41:30.79\00:41:34.69 a great avenue to get the gospel out. 00:41:34.72\00:41:36.52 I'm interested in hearing. Did you cover all the four reasons? 00:41:36.56\00:41:40.83 All for reasons, Ah. You were listening. Yeah, so the four 00:41:40.86\00:41:45.93 reasons...So I covered two right The other two are...well I 00:41:45.97\00:41:52.27 covered three actually: Being incompetent to share, a fear 00:41:52.31\00:41:55.84 of sharing and then the third one was tired of doing the same 00:41:55.88\00:41:59.18 thing. The last one is they don't own their faith. That was 00:41:59.21\00:42:03.85 one of the answers that a lot of the pastors and the leaders 00:42:03.89\00:42:06.62 were saying that we are kind of afraid of being known as 00:42:06.65\00:42:11.09 Adventists. We're afraid because people have this negative view 00:42:11.13\00:42:15.63 about Adventism and that's why we actually did our cards and 00:42:15.66\00:42:20.54 the website is called Ask an Adventist Friend. 00:42:20.57\00:42:23.07 Right, to make it clear. 00:42:23.10\00:42:24.77 Make it clear were coming from an Adventist stance. The reason 00:42:24.81\00:42:29.24 why that is, and personally you know that was a problem for my 00:42:29.28\00:42:31.51 family. It's because in the past maybe a lot of people felt that 00:42:31.55\00:42:40.16 there was enough knowledge about Adventism where oh they're a 00:42:40.19\00:42:43.43 cult or they have these negative views. But now we're in a 00:42:43.46\00:42:48.03 different generation where many people don't even know who 00:42:48.06\00:42:50.10 Adventists are. We're not in the forefront anymore. Nobody knows 00:42:50.13\00:42:54.14 who we are anymore. That is a tragedy but it could work for us 00:42:54.17\00:43:00.28 and leverage that where if people don't know who Adventists 00:43:00.31\00:43:03.45 are let's start from a blank canvas. Start painting a picture 00:43:03.48\00:43:07.42 that we know who we are and letting people know truly who we 00:43:07.45\00:43:12.49 are instead of hearing from someone else. 00:43:12.52\00:43:15.56 That's right. We don't want to be the best-kept secret. That's 00:43:15.59\00:43:18.43 a horrible title. You know it's like coming in second place. 00:43:18.46\00:43:21.23 You know you're the first place loser. You don't hey I came in 00:43:21.26\00:43:27.54 second. In the Olympics that may be a glorified thing, first, 00:43:27.57\00:43:31.67 second and third. However why as one of my good friend Dr. Sudho 00:43:31.71\00:43:36.48 Pandit he asked me a question once that really got me thinking 00:43:36.51\00:43:38.88 He said when is a good decision a bad decision and a bad 00:43:38.91\00:43:45.95 decision a good decision? And I thought Why you want to mess 00:43:45.99\00:43:49.02 with me like that? And so here's what his answer was. He says 00:43:49.06\00:43:53.26 a good decision is a bad decision when it could have been 00:43:53.29\00:43:57.93 a better decision or the best decision. So we're making a lot 00:43:57.97\00:44:02.14 of good decisions about evangelism but it could be 00:44:02.17\00:44:04.94 better and why not be the best decision? So this is what I see 00:44:04.97\00:44:10.31 Center for Online Evangelism is all about let's not be known as 00:44:10.35\00:44:15.58 they're good Bible students. Why not be They're the best Bible 00:44:15.62\00:44:21.46 students I've ever met. And I like that what you just said: 00:44:21.49\00:44:24.69 Own it. I'm a Seventh-day Adventist. I'm not ashamed of it 00:44:24.73\00:44:28.36 because the world is not hiding behind any _ right now. 00:44:28.40\00:44:31.93 And when is a good decision, when is a bad decision a good 00:44:31.97\00:44:34.97 decision? That's the other part. When a bad decision could be a 00:44:35.00\00:44:40.94 worse decision or the worst decision. See so we have to make 00:44:40.98\00:44:46.68 sure that we're in the proper context. And thank you for what 00:44:46.72\00:44:48.05 you do here. Now how do we get involved. Let's just kind of... 00:44:48.08\00:44:52.32 you're talking to the viewers here. How could we get involved 00:44:52.35\00:44:56.46 in two ways? Getting you equipped to continue going and 00:44:56.49\00:45:01.43 growing and getting us equipped to continue going and growing 00:45:01.46\00:45:04.57 and getting out there? 00:45:04.60\00:45:05.93 Yeah, so just two ways. Start off with a really short story. I 00:45:05.97\00:45:10.51 love stories. A few maybe months ago I was in my kitchen and 00:45:10.54\00:45:15.34 cutting up peppers. And I saw all the pepper seeds and I was 00:45:15.38\00:45:18.01 about to throw them in the trash. I'm like man this is a 00:45:18.05\00:45:20.45 waste. I had a little planter with soil and I took a handful 00:45:20.48\00:45:27.09 of those seeds...I'm not a gardener, I'm not good at all 00:45:27.12\00:45:32.39 but I thought I wonder what would happen if I just threw 00:45:32.43\00:45:34.90 these seeds in that soil. I threw them in, covered them, 00:45:34.93\00:45:37.83 watered them and all of these sprouts came up. These cards are 00:45:37.87\00:45:43.57 seeds and pastors can purchase the kit, so that's one thing. 00:45:43.61\00:45:48.28 Pastors, business leaders, if you have some sort of influence 00:45:48.31\00:45:53.35 over people, when you purchase the kit and you hand your 00:45:53.38\00:45:56.42 members these cards you're giving them seed. So I say go 00:45:56.45\00:46:00.39 throughout the week they can spread these seeds in the super 00:46:00.42\00:46:03.29 market and so forth so that's the very first thing that you 00:46:03.32\00:46:05.69 can do. Just purchase the kit. It is one of the simplest ways 00:46:05.73\00:46:08.70 to get people started with evangelism. You're not going 00:46:08.73\00:46:12.03 to take a church member and have them preach an evangelistic 00:46:12.07\00:46:15.17 series. They can't do that. Or have them going door to door. 00:46:15.20\00:46:16.54 That's great but not every person is ready to do that 00:46:20.11\00:46:24.05 but each person can take a handful of seeds and put them in 00:46:24.08\00:46:27.72 some soil and then the Lord does the rest of the work. So that's 00:46:27.75\00:46:31.79 the first thing and then second the work that the Center for 00:46:31.82\00:46:34.62 Online Evangelism is doing we won't be able to see the 00:46:34.66\00:46:38.43 effect of it until we get to heaven (multiple voices) 00:46:38.46\00:46:41.13 the bounty. But we need more support, the finances go such a 00:46:41.16\00:46:46.70 long way of helping us to hire more people to write, getting 00:46:46.74\00:46:52.21 more questions on these cards, creating more cards to give them 00:46:52.24\00:46:55.71 out to more people. So those are two main ways, purchase the 00:46:55.74\00:46:59.05 cards and then donating to the ministry. 00:46:59.08\00:47:02.48 And more specifically for the second part we definitely want 00:47:02.52\00:47:06.55 more of these cards. We have some about mental health like 00:47:06.59\00:47:10.03 what do you do with grief? We have things about prophecy. We 00:47:10.06\00:47:14.46 have questions about our own doctrines. Even a prayer, can we 00:47:14.50\00:47:18.40 pray for you. We partner with AWR, Adventist World Radio, to 00:47:18.43\00:47:21.70 have answers when people submit prayers they pray for them. And 00:47:21.74\00:47:28.04 so we want all sorts of cards. Think about it when you go into 00:47:28.08\00:47:32.55 Uber and there's a card about as an Uber driver, how do I 00:47:32.58\00:47:39.15 stress less. Right. If you have a card like that and then after 00:47:39.19\00:47:42.19 you get off Uber you just hand them...hey I hope you have a 00:47:42.22\00:47:45.23 better day today or you just give them the card and it's just 00:47:45.26\00:47:50.57 a phenomenal way of just sharing it right. So we want more of 00:47:50.60\00:47:53.00 these cards which means we need more these pages. It takes a lot 00:47:53.03\00:47:57.14 of work and financial support and workers to get that done. 00:47:57.17\00:48:01.41 And we also not only have more pages but we want other 00:48:01.44\00:48:06.85 languages. One of the biggest requests has been different 00:48:06.88\00:48:10.89 languages. When we go to different events people come to 00:48:10.92\00:48:14.02 us in our booth and say you know can we have this in Spanish? 00:48:14.06\00:48:16.42 We would love to have more of these but right now we need we 00:48:16.46\00:48:24.10 need more resources to make that happen. So that's really where 00:48:24.13\00:48:27.27 we want to... 00:48:27.30\00:48:28.64 You know that's really when you think about the number of 00:48:28.67\00:48:30.27 languages and not only languages but dialects when you come to 00:48:30.31\00:48:33.21 come of these countries. Because I'll say do you speak Philippine 00:48:33.24\00:48:36.04 and somebody says what's that mean. Is it Tagalog or Versai, 00:48:36.08\00:48:40.78 which one is it? What part of... You go to New Guinea...We were 00:48:40.82\00:48:46.69 in Africa and we were speaking English to one person in Kenya 00:48:46.72\00:48:50.69 who was interpreting for another person in Kenya who was 00:48:50.73\00:48:54.96 interpreting... I said what's _. We don't, these 00:48:55.00\00:48:58.27 dialects. We need a person between us. So what a challenge. 00:48:58.30\00:49:03.34 What a challenge. 00:49:03.37\00:49:05.64 Everybody has a phone. They could go... 00:49:05.67\00:49:07.01 That's right. Right on my phone. There it is. That's why I got it 00:49:07.04\00:49:11.25 on my phone. So I scanned it and it took me to the website and 00:49:11.28\00:49:14.85 the topical information is just phenomenal. I want to thank you 00:49:14.88\00:49:17.65 for that. I want to reach out briefly, before we go to our 00:49:17.69\00:49:20.26 news break to some of our audience here. Because you've 00:49:20.29\00:49:24.33 heard about this Center for Online Evangelism. 00:49:24.36\00:49:32.47 CenterForOnlineEvangelism.org and if you just put that in 00:49:32.50\00:49:34.27 in the Pastor, Google search it will at least guide you right to 00:49:34.30\00:49:38.87 it. (multiple voices) Let me make this correct. What is the 00:49:38.91\00:49:46.28 cost of the kit for the cards, the 900 cards. What's it average 00:49:46.31\00:49:51.35 So depending on how many cards you do want exactly on the kit 00:49:51.39\00:49:55.72 it goes anywhere from 59.99 all the way to 89.99 but it comes 00:49:55.76\00:50:02.23 with...the highest one comes with the 900 cards and display. 00:50:02.26\00:50:06.53 Okay that's the 89.99 the cards and the display. (Yes) Which is 00:50:06.57\00:50:11.84 great. I mean that's 900 evangelistic series for $89 00:50:11.87\00:50:19.18 That's just...You can't pay for that. (You can't) And when you 00:50:19.21\00:50:22.35 give one person or 100 people that kind of empowerment you 00:50:22.38\00:50:27.36 cannot tell. Like she just said When would we know the impact? 00:50:27.39\00:50:30.03 Mm-hmm. When we get to heaven. 00:50:30.06\00:50:33.93 Well the great thing is we already have so many churches 00:50:33.96\00:50:36.97 signing up. I think we have now about I think 70,000 cards out 00:50:37.00\00:50:43.77 there in peoples' hands, I mean our church members' pockets. 00:50:43.81\00:50:47.54 Or the churches. So that's slowly growing little by little. 00:50:47.58\00:50:52.51 Yeah. So we want every single member to have these cards in 00:50:52.55\00:50:57.55 their pockets. So no matter where you go you're able to hand 00:50:57.59\00:51:01.79 them out. 00:51:01.82\00:51:03.32 Wow. So what are you going to do Honey? 00:51:03.36\00:51:04.69 I'm going to plant my seed. 00:51:04.73\00:51:06.53 You're going to become an evangelist? 00:51:06.56\00:51:07.90 I'm going to become an evangelist. I love that 00:51:07.93\00:51:10.23 illustration you said about the pot. That's great. 00:51:10.27\00:51:12.50 I learned that early in marriage when I was about to throw away 00:51:12.53\00:51:16.17 a little twig my wife planted that and eventually gave away an 00:51:16.20\00:51:19.44 aloe vera plant. To me, it looked like nothing but a twig. 00:51:19.47\00:51:22.64 You know the gospel may look like nothing but a twig or just 00:51:22.68\00:51:25.91 a seed, a byproduct of some fruit or vegetable. That's the 00:51:25.95\00:51:29.65 way you might see evangelism but when you sow the seed of the 00:51:29.68\00:51:33.19 truth as Center for Online Evangelism is doing you'll be 00:51:33.22\00:51:38.63 able to proliferate the gospel and get the world ready. We're 00:51:38.66\00:51:41.33 going to take a short break but on the other side we have a few 00:51:41.36\00:51:44.10 closing thoughts so don't go away. 00:51:44.13\00:51:45.47 If you would like to contact or know more about the Center for 00:51:45.50\00:51:50.97 Online Evangelism you can do so on the following ways. You can 00:51:51.01\00:51:54.38 write to them at 1867 Williams Hwy Suite 255 00:51:54.41\00:51:59.51 Grants Pass, OR 97527. You can call them at (541) 236-4960. You 00:51:59.55\00:52:14.50 can visit their website at CenterForOnlineEvangelism.org 00:52:14.53\00:52:22.20 You can also send them an email at 00:52:22.24\00:52:25.17 Info@ CenterForOnlineEvangelism.org 00:52:25.21\00:52:30.15