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With Roger Carswell
412 Plays7 months ago
Steve Osmond and Kristi Mair are delighted to chat with a living legend of the British church, Roger Carswell. Roger reflects on over 40 years of sharing the gospel in different ways, with his trademark warmth and wisdom. HIs insights on the changing world, the consistent gospel, Christian literature and the heart of gospel preaching are so encouraging.
Roger Carswell is a travelling evangelist and author. He leads evangelistic church and university missions as well as speaking at Christian conferences. He has written a number of books including ‘And some evangelists’ and ‘Where is God in a messed-up world?' and publishes numerous gospel tracts and booklets. He is married to Dot, has four children and lives in North Yorkshire
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Transcript
Introduction of Hosts and Guest
00:00:10
Speaker
Hello and welcome to PepTalk, the persuasive evangelism podcast. I'm Christine there. I'm zooming in from London and I'm joined by my wonderful co-host, Steve Osmond. Well, where are about two bass at the moment, Steve? Who are you? I am in Perth, north of Edinburgh. It's sunny Scotland, or not so sunny Scotland today.
00:00:34
Speaker
I bet you are missing the sunshine at the moment. But we're very much so thankful to have Steve with us while Andy's currently away, maybe writing, who knows what he's doing, probably speaking to many people about Jesus. But we're thrilled that we have Roger Carswell with us. Roger, hello. How do you do? Good to see you.
00:00:53
Speaker
Good to see you too.
Roger's Daily Evangelism Routine
00:00:55
Speaker
Now Roger, just in the green room beforehand, you would call yourself an evangelist based in Yorkshire. What kind of things does an evangelist get up to in their day-to-day lives?
00:01:08
Speaker
Well, a day always begins with spending a little bit of time with the Lord, reading the word, praying, committing the day, and also praying, Lord, will you lead me to somebody with whom I can chat with about the gospel? And then the day, yes, it unfolds into all sorts of different ways. I might be meeting individuals. I might be doing something on Zoom. I love Zoom and spend a lot of my time on it, and then going to meetings.
00:01:33
Speaker
They might be small meetings in a church during the daytime, they might be larger meetings in the university or whatever. So it's a mixture of preaching to a crowd and personal evangelism. That's my life and I love it.
00:01:48
Speaker
Ah, lovely. And so you've been doing this for quite a while then. Yes, indeed. I didn't tell you how long, but let's say it's well over four decades.
Cultural Changes and Evangelism
00:02:00
Speaker
Fair enough. That's fantastic. I was just thrilled when I saw that you were coming on to join us at PEP talk, because this is something that I've only recently myself gotten into in terms of a more full-time type of role as an evangelist.
00:02:18
Speaker
And so I think one of the main questions that I thought of at first was, you know, you've been doing this for a while and culture is changing all of the time. And so what do you see as some of the major ways that things have changed for you in your interactions with people as an evangelist over the years that you've been doing this?
00:02:42
Speaker
Yes, I have been changed. I hope my message hasn't changed at all. I hope I've kept to the main thing. I love DL Moody's great quotation, the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. And I think the main thing is expressed in Luke's Gospel, Chapter 24, where Luke tells us when the Lord's giving the Great Commission what
00:03:03
Speaker
we are to be proclaiming. And he says we're to be proclaiming the sufferings of the Lord Jesus, his resurrection, repentance and forgiveness of sin. So that basic content, those ingredients of the gospel, which is so important, that hasn't changed at all. But the people with whom we're talking to have changed in that.
00:03:24
Speaker
I think there's much less understanding of even the basics of the Christian message or the Bible story. There probably is a little more increased antagonism. I don't think, I don't know, I live in the north of England, maybe in London there's perhaps more angst about it. I don't find that particularly when I'm talking to people about the law, they're not usually angry or annoyed, but they're just, it's a sort of hardened indifference
00:03:54
Speaker
almost as if it's water off a duck's back. They're not even saying, as they said a few years ago, I admire your faith. I wish I had your faith. Or even, well, it's all right for you, but I'm not. They're just displaying a sort of indifference. So I think the challenge really is to trigger people's need.
00:04:13
Speaker
and also to not assume any basic knowledge or understanding of the Christian message. I'm amazed how far back people are in their basic understanding. But the needs are the same that everybody has sinned, they need forgiveness and we all are going to face death. How dare we face death if we're not right with the one who made us and before whom one day we'll meet. So the needs are the same, the message is the same,
Engaging with Christians and Non-Christians
00:04:40
Speaker
but
00:04:40
Speaker
I think we're starting much further back when we're talking to people. Your love for the Lord, Roger, is contagious. You mentioned that sense of apathy that comes up often. How do you go about encouraging
00:05:00
Speaker
Christians in their own kind of lack of, well in their own indifference and then how do you go about encouraging in your own evangelism and those who don't yet know the Lord to see his goodness and relevance and how do you kind of just tap through that armour I think that that's very common in the 21st century.
00:05:21
Speaker
Two big, big questions there, Christy. There is indifference amongst believers, I think that's true, and it's sad. Because actually, amongst many other losses, they're losing the tremendous joy there is in speaking to people about the Lord Jesus.
00:05:37
Speaker
It's a great thing at the end of a day to look back and think, oh, dear, I didn't do this. I didn't do that. I did have a conversation with so and so and and to have somebody to pray for like that. And I would do my best to encourage somebody to perhaps do something with me.
00:05:54
Speaker
So if I can encourage somebody to, I don't know, I often go onto the street in nearby Skipton, for example, and we'll just give out some tracks for a while. Now, if I can encourage somebody to come and join me, they will be incredibly apprehensive, but they're amazingly blessed at the end of it. And yes, there'll be some people who are rude, but there are not many like that. And they're not usually from Yorkshire, they're from the other county on the other side of the Pennines, of course.
00:06:20
Speaker
They're not usually rude. They may, as I said, be indifferent. But it's amazing how many people are willing just to open up a little and begin to chat. So I try to encourage others by doing things with them, by doing something evangelistically with them. As far as reaching the non-Christians, I think to be warm and winsome and not aggressive,
00:06:44
Speaker
The people whom we're meeting are not our enemies. They are as we once were and we want them to be as we are now and to love them, to love them in and not to write them off because we think they've been, I don't know, a million miles away from God. Who knows what God might do? Last night I was in a village in Lancashire preaching and I spoke on Jonah
00:07:07
Speaker
And I think Jonah is very encouraging because the Assyrians were wicked, cruel, brutal people. And yet, Jonah goes there. He doesn't even preach the Gospel, preach the word warmly at all. But God takes that message and these people repent and the Lord spares them.
00:07:27
Speaker
So whoever we're meeting, they may have done the most awful things and have most terrible attitudes. But I do believe the Lord still loves them and wants them to be saved. And who knows? And sometimes the people, I think, are most unlikely to come to Christ, the ones who do and the ones you think, oh,
00:07:44
Speaker
They're very close to it. Somehow they just remain very close and never come right through. So there is a joy as well as a responsibility. I know there's a responsibility, but there is a joy in talking to people about the Lord Jesus. And what a wonderful thing if the Lord uses us to win precious people to the Lord.
00:08:05
Speaker
Absolutely. That's so encouraging to hear just some stories of you being on the ground. It does sort of make me think of people's perception of evangelism and evangelists. So I think you mentioned Luke there and the call for sharing the gospel, taking it out. I think many people
00:08:25
Speaker
in some way might be hearing you speak and tracking with you and thinking, oh, you know, here he is, someone who's specifically called to this work of being an evangelist. And that's for him. It's, you know, great people can do that, but for me, you know, I'm sitting in church, I'm a Christian, I must leave it to the evangelists or expect it, you know, for them to be doing. But is that
00:08:53
Speaker
What we see in the Bible is evangelism for all of us. And off the back of that, how would you encourage someone who is maybe feeling a bit of trepidation about speaking to friends, family, colleagues? You've mentioned some of the challenges that might be out there. So who is evangelism for and how do we begin to do it more persuasively, more comfortably?
Role of Christians in Evangelism
00:09:20
Speaker
Well, you're right, Stephen. There is the gift of the evangelist. We read a bit of say in Ephesians 4, and it's very clearly a designated gift. So there will be somebody, some people who've got the particular gift of explaining the gospel, proclaiming the gospel.
00:09:35
Speaker
But every Christian is called to be a witness. And we do have the most wonderful message on earth, don't we? And it's also the most urgent message. And somebody else is going to meet people I'll never meet, but I'll meet people that they'll never meet. But let the Lord take us and scatter us. And while we meet a lot of people, don't we? The person we sit next on a bus or a train, the person
00:09:57
Speaker
I don't know. We perhaps give money to in a supermarket. There's no queue behind us. Maybe we can just start chatting, et cetera. And I think one of the keys is just to talk. Now, I think it's easier. Sorry, Christie, but I think it's easier for Northerners. In London, they sit on tubes and they just glower at one another.
00:10:15
Speaker
But up north, we do talk to people in a bus queue. And it is easy. So I just say, just talk and see if you can guide the conversation a little bit towards the things of God. But Stephen, I think you're right. I think fear of opposition, of rejection, of losing our reputation. These are very, very real things. And yet,
00:10:36
Speaker
All around us are men and women, boys and girls, who in a hundred years from now will be in eternity. And we want them not to be lost. We want them to be saved. We want them to know the Lord Jesus. As well as just talking to people, I'm a believer in using significant moments in our life evangelistically. It might be, I don't know, an 18th birthday, a 21st birthday,
00:11:00
Speaker
It might be a, I don't know, 50th birthday. It might be a wedding anniversary. It might be moving house. There are things where it's very easy to invite a group of people round to your house or to a hired hall in a church or something. Put some food on.
00:11:16
Speaker
And if it's a birthday, you know, you have your food, whatever you have. And eventually you stand up and you simply say, look, I want to thank you all for coming. You're all very special guests to me. And I feel particularly indebted to ABC, et cetera. But as many of you know, I am a Christian. I feel particularly indebted to God because so many years ago, and you can tell your
00:11:39
Speaker
You can say something like, particularly indebted to God. I'm not very good at explaining these things, but I've got a friend here and maybe an evangelist or a minister. I had a big birthday recently, as did my wife, and we invited Paul Jones, who was Manfred Mann, the pop singer of our sort of era, long, long ago. He and his wife came and they sang, they shared the gospel. We gave everybody a New Testament and a Christian book that my wife had written.
00:12:06
Speaker
I'm a great believer as well in using evangelistic books. Now, I've got a bias here, of course, I love ten of them, but they produce evangelistic books, some testimonies, some direct explanations of the Gospel, incredibly cheaply. So you can buy 10, 20 and give them away and your pocket won't even notice it. So at Easter, at Christmas, I would always
00:12:31
Speaker
You know, the people who come to the house, the postman, etc. I have a box of chocolates and a book, maybe some money as well, and give them to all of these people. And it's just a way of seeking to get out the gospel. So use literature, use anniversaries and use the passion in your heart to love others and seek to win them to Christ.
Using Literature for Evangelism
00:12:54
Speaker
Roger, one of the things I love about your approach is that it is just so human. It's just so easy to do those things, isn't it? It's not about talking about Jesus from, you know, elite towers in the sky. It is every day talking about Jesus and using opportunities in our lives to be able to use that as a bouncing board or a springboard.
00:13:14
Speaker
to introduce Jesus to our friends. You mentioned literature and one of the things that you do so well is you write these kind of gospel tracts and leaflets and this kind of gets you onto the streets as well, just engaging with other people. What does that look like for you at the moment? What have you been doing recently in sharing Jesus through those tracts?
00:13:38
Speaker
Well, I do go onto the street with others and I always, I, this isn't visual so I can't show it, but I carry a wallet in which a very, a good number of different tracks. So when I'm talking to people, I'll pull out the wallet and have a look through and see which track is appropriate.
00:13:56
Speaker
When there's a special occasion it makes it a lot easier. So at the moment I'm using one, how did St Patrick become a saint? Because of course March 17 is St Patrick's Day and then Easter follows on from that. There's a tract ready called the cross that counts for the election. As soon as the election's announced there's a tract for that occasion. Then there's a harvest one I've written recently
00:14:19
Speaker
I live in a very rural area. Churches still have big harvest festivals and they're useful opportunities. And Christmas, of course, Christmas is always a wonderful time to give out Christian literature. It's well received then, but special occasions last year, of course, we had the king's coronation and I've forgotten how many tracts went out, but they went out in huge numbers.
00:14:43
Speaker
And one church came and said, look, we've been given money by our diocese to use the opportunity of the coronation. Could you make the tract into a book? And so 10 of those made it into a very attractive book called God Save the King. Somebody
00:14:59
Speaker
I don't know who it was. I know his name, but I don't know anymore. Got to the entrance to Westminster Abbey and managed to give to two thirds of the people going in a copy of this book. Remarkable. Literature has a way of finding its entrance into all sorts of different doors and homes and pockets, and we hope hearts as well. So using literature, I don't call them tracks. I do when I'm talking to Christians, but I call them a Christian leaflet. They'd be a gospel leaflet.
00:15:28
Speaker
something heartwarming for you to read here it is and etc and I'd always seek to distribute them and talk about using them to open the door of conversation but losing them and it's amazing where you can lose tracks and you hope somebody will find them
00:15:44
Speaker
So good, using them and losing them. You know, I actually think I still have a few in my bag from the Queen's funeral. So they're there, they're ready. And it's amazing that even though the Queen died, what, 18 months ago now, that tract about the Queen's death still is very well received. Well, thank you so much for creating that for us. And of course, for those who received that as well, what a gift, Roger. Thank you.
00:16:12
Speaker
Just zooming out a little bit now in terms of we've only got a couple of minutes left. One of the things that you mentioned that you'd noticed was about gospel messaging. And so kind of going from the everyday practicalities of what it looks like to share Jesus, just zooming out into some of the big headlines of what you've noticed in gospel preaching, either in personal conversations or maybe in public proclamation as well.
00:16:37
Speaker
What have you noticed there, Roger, in terms of what's been happening or if there's a shift or things that have or haven't worked well? Chrissie, I think this is very important points. Thank you for asking. I've been a Christian quite a few years now and there's been a move away from gospel preaching and that troubles me.
Essential Elements of Gospel Preaching
00:16:55
Speaker
I thank God that there's been a good emphasis on expository preaching, but expository preaching is not the same as gospel preaching. And I believe we need to go back to expository evangelistic preaching. So it's taking the word, it's preaching the word, but it's preaching it for non-Christians to understand and hear. So there's a very clear explanation of the gospel.
00:17:19
Speaker
and just listening to the word being preached to believers is not the same as gospel preaching. So when I was much younger, sorry to appear to be reminiscing, we would normally have on Sunday evening a gospel service and we all knew that if we brought along non-Christians on a Sunday evening they would hear an evangelistic message and we saw people converted. Now sadly there's been, for various reasons and some of them good, there's been a move away from that, but gospel preaching
00:17:46
Speaker
enables the Christian to bring their friends, contacts, etc. We used to go on the streets and invite people just to come in, enables the opportunity to hear the gospel, but it also is regularly equipping the Christian to have a clear sort of systematic understanding of the basics of the gospel. I think it's very important and I long for us to go back to that.
00:18:09
Speaker
I mean, just on that, Roger, what are some of the distinctives of gospel preaching that you think need to be kind of exposed a little bit more? I mean, how would our listeners kind of tune their ears and thinking, okay, this is great gospel preaching from actually, this might be, this is good, but it's not as good as it could be. What sort of things do you have in your
00:18:30
Speaker
Well I would go back to that passage in Luke 24 verses I think 46 and 47 where Jesus said go to to his disciples go to Jerusalem so your neighbors if you want and all nations and you're to preach my suffering so an explanation of the death of the Lord Jesus that when he was on the cross he bore our sin in his own body on the tree the hidden work of Christ as he paid the penalty then his resurrection and then the need to repent
00:18:56
Speaker
We don't like to use that word but it's very important that there's got to be a turning from our own sinful way and we'll explain what that means to God's way and then the joy of forgiveness of sins. And we will speak about eternity of heaven and hell but I think those four basic things are absolutely crucial. And it's interesting as you go through the book of Acts written of course by Luke as well and look at the evangelistic messages, some of which are very much prayseed, others are a little longer.
00:19:25
Speaker
They all go through those four things. So Luke is really driving home that they took seriously the Great Commission. These are the things they preach. And of course there were the wonderful signs following of people being converted.
00:19:38
Speaker
Yeah, I love that, just keeping the gospel front and center and everything we do, our evangelistic message, the preaching, all of it. It's about the gospel, it's about Jesus and getting our friends and family and those we meet to know Him and know about the good news. I think we could probably keep going for another two hours. Can I just say one last sentence?
Greatest Act of Kindness: Sharing the Gospel
00:19:59
Speaker
Please do, yes.
00:20:01
Speaker
So if I was going to summarize my heart, I think the greatest act of kindness I can show anybody is to introduce them to the Lord Jesus. And the greatest act of tyranny is for me to know the gospel and not pass it on.
00:20:15
Speaker
Absolutely. If we have this amazing message, this treasure, we have to be sharing it with people. I believe that wholeheartedly. And so thank you so much for sharing that with us. For our listeners, that's it for today. Thank you so much for joining us for pep talk. And yeah, thank you, Roger, so much for joining us as well, for joining Kristi and I. And we hope to chat to you again very, very soon. God bless you.