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With Sarah Yardley
65 Plays5 years ago
When you run one of the biggest evangelistic events in the UK, can you take a holiday from sharing the gospel for the rest of the year?
Sarah Yardley is a Californian based in Cornwall who loves Jesus, family, friendships, coffee, travel, and guacamole. She grew up at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa, served at Reality Carpinteria, and currently lives in the UK, serving full-time with Creation Fest UK and Tubestation in Polzeath. She loves discovering what it means to follow Jesus and inviting others to know and follow Him.
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Transcript
Introduction to PepTalk Podcast at Creation Fest
00:00:08
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the PepTalk Podcast, the persuasive evangelism podcast. I'm Andy Bannister, joined by my co-host, Christy Mayer, and we are in beautiful Cornwall. The sun is shining. It's really warm outside. We are at this amazing festival called Creation Fest at Wadebridge in Cornwall. Thousands, somewhere between 10 and 15,000.
00:00:29
Speaker
people coming and going across
Sarah Yardley's Role and the Festival's Significance
00:00:31
Speaker
the week. And we are joined, Christy, aren't we, by a very special guest today. We are joined by Sarah Yardley, who is Mission Lead for Creation Fest. Sarah, welcome to the show.
00:00:40
Speaker
Andy, I am delighted to be with you. And if you're listening in, he is right. Cornwall is the brightest place on earth at this moment in time. It absolutely is. And Sarah, you know, that's a sort of question to kick the conversation off. I mean, Christian Fest is amazing. And I think what amazes me is two things. Firstly, the sheer number of people, both Christians and non-Christians, who come to this thing, and how little other people in the country
00:01:02
Speaker
know about it and it excites me that you know in rural England you have probably arguably one of the signature Christian events going on here on this amazing sort of site just outside Weighbridge. What is Creation Festival about? Why are you excited about it? And how did you get involved with this thing?
00:01:18
Speaker
Yeah. And it's funny, I was speaking to one of our leaders and he said, we have more volunteers this year than we had attendees our first year. So I thought that was a good contrast. So Creation Fest exists to celebrate the good news of a God who loves us. And we do that through a large scale seven day festival event. As you've just said, we get about 15,000 people over the course of the week. And that includes campers and day visitors and about a third of those who come are Christians. They're hungry to know more about who Jesus is and how to grow in faith.
00:01:45
Speaker
About a third of those who come, I call the un-church Christians. They've had some experience of faith at some point, might not be plugged into a church context. Still want to grow in knowing what that means. And then about a third of our attendees have no faith background or any other faith background imaginable. And they come because we have a free skate park and fitness factory, blacksmith forges. They come because it's Cornwall and it's summertime and might as well pop down for a free to attend festival. And our prayer is always that those who come on site would experience something of the grace and kindness of Jesus.
Sarah's Journey to Creation Fest
00:02:15
Speaker
that they'd have an encounter with the God who loves them. And as you know, we believe that that encounter changes everything. Yeah. That's incredible. And we just love being here this week and seeing precisely that. What is it that brought you into Creation Fest in the first place? Why are you passionate about it? Yeah, I'd love to have a really beautiful story around this. My sister was going to England and said, hey, Sarah, come with me to England. You're triple B free. And so 10 years ago, I hopped on a plane to the land of Jane Austen and charming cottages.
00:02:41
Speaker
instead found myself on a rainy site in Cornwall. Came over for five years consecutively because of the relationships I developed with people. And so five years ago when I came over, summer of 2014, just planning to be here for the summer event, the previous director passed away quite suddenly. And God really called me to stay here in England. It was through Isaiah 49. God's calling us to you from birth to the coastlands. From the body of your mother, he has named you by name. He's made his word in your mouth like a sword.
00:03:11
Speaker
and he's called you to bring one who bears light to the nations. And that word was confirmed by someone literally praying that scripture over me, experienced a real prophetic calling to the UK, and have lived in Wadebridge for, well, three years in Wadebridge, but five years total in Cornwall now, and really feel at home here in the UK.
00:03:30
Speaker
I have to say it's probably important as an American you don't move outside Cornwall because that way you can maintain the illusion that the whole of the UK is cottages and country lanes and cream teas. That's the whole of the UK is like that. Don't go into the inner cities. I believe everything you say, Andy Benister. Absolutely. One of the things I love about Christian Invest, we're surrounded by the noise of that here. That's why there's kind of background noise on the podcast is the number of people who become Christians through
Impact of Creation Fest on Modern Evangelism
00:03:54
Speaker
this. And I think what's interesting is there's a sort of
00:03:56
Speaker
It's a myth, really, in the wider church that I think, you know, you can't do evangelism in today's kind of secular age. This festival is full of young people, it's full of people who have got their background to church in some cases, and they give their lives to Jesus. Like last night, a whole bunch of people kind of responded to the gospel. We have well over a hundred tangible cards filled out for first-time faith decisions. And in addition to that, as we all know, in a venue like ours, which holds up to 4,000 people in that cattle shed,
00:04:21
Speaker
You saw people standing up for Jesus publicly in a way that was significant. I'm always aware that only a fraction of those actually get captured on the cards and data that we put together, but the stories are tremendous. I told one this morning on the main stages, a man who came with his wife to Creation Fest because it was free, total atheist, disbelief that God existed in any way.
00:04:42
Speaker
heard a preacher proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ responded to that message and three years later is now leading our Big Shed Cafe as a full-time volunteer having seen the transformative work of God in his life. And there's thousands of stories like that of what God has done not just in those moments of decision but in the lifelong transformative legacy of his work in their lives.
00:05:02
Speaker
So Creation Fest, a lot of noise, huge excitement, just a week. And there's a lot of preparation, but just a week. And so when this thing finishes on Saturday and all the sound crew and everything are schlepped their equipment away, and here you are in Wadebridge, you know, small rural part of the country. Does the evangelism end? Or have you found ways to kind of carry on that?
00:05:25
Speaker
passion you have for seeing people connect to the good news of God when all of this noise and fast shuts down and it's just you and a few other people living here kind of incarnationally and the rain and the tourists have gone. How does that work?
Evangelism in Wadebridge Beyond the Festival
00:05:36
Speaker
So when I first started coming over as a volunteer at a creation fest, I said to one of the pastors, how is it not like a firework show where you create this big explosion but then all that you're left with at the end is a little bit of ash and a nice memory?
00:05:47
Speaker
And because of that, I said this to you right before we began recording, I am actually more passionate about what happens the 358 days of the year around Creation Fest than I am for the seven days of the event itself. So we live and work in the community of Wadebridge. And because of that, we're building relationships all year round with the schools, with the police, with the young people, with the pub owners, with literal neighbors on our streets.
00:06:12
Speaker
And I believe celebrating the good news of a God who loves us throughout the year. And one of the things I've become really passionate about this year, which is such a basic concept of Christian faith, but I feel like I'd missed it for my first 35 years, is that when God says, love the Lord your God and love your neighbor, he means it.
00:06:30
Speaker
And so I've been learning, I would say, in tangible ways, what does it mean for me to love my neighbor in Jesus' name? And I'll give you a couple of the practical ways that he's kind of prompted us to do that. One of the biggest has just been through hospitality. I've found that, as we all know, meals are a huge way of breaking down barriers. And at times it can be a bit overwhelming because I find myself regularly cooking for 15 to 20 people. Good thing I came from a family of nine and had a little bit of preparation around that.
00:07:00
Speaker
But we have had such incredible conversations around tables. And one of the things I've loved is putting around those tables people who might not otherwise ever be in the same space. And people often say that I relentlessly invite. And I think one of the great joys of coming from a background in culture that's outside of this country is, I just think everyone wants to come hang out at my house with me. And so I'll walk down the street and quite literally invite people to come to meals at the house.
00:07:27
Speaker
And I found that often that meal breaks down some of these suspicions or boundaries around why someone might not come to a church gathering, but might want to meet a Christian, hear a little bit of their story, understand a little bit of why it is they believe that God even exists at all. And so meals have been a huge part of what God's done. The second thing and something that I believe is significant in sharing faith.
Organic Evangelism Through Personal Connections
00:07:55
Speaker
For so many people, evangelism, they feel that it's something they've got to force. They've got to script and plan, and they've got to, in the first five minutes of conversation, get through all five points of a gospel message. And I found that my best opportunities for speaking about faith have been with the people who I'm already interested in, with the girl who catches my eye because her hair is pink.
00:08:16
Speaker
with the man who's standing behind me in line at a coffee shop. And it's often been in those bridges of ordinary conversation that God's opened the door for me to have really real life chats with people. And because I'm soaked in God's word, because it is my literal daily bread, there is always something of the gospel that I'm able to share. It's not often the five points and the cross on a first conversation, but it is just looking for opportunities to speak to the people who are around me about the God who I love and why I love him.
00:08:47
Speaker
That's incredible. Can you give us an example of what that's looked like for you? So like say you're in that coffee shop here as I've been up at Fortress Coffee and you turn around and chat to someone. What kind of things, how do you actually open a conversation to begin with? Yeah, I'll tell you one from last week. There's a coffee shop I go to every Sunday morning and I go to it on Sunday mornings because it's the only coffee shop in Cornwall open before a church service on a Sunday morning.
00:09:09
Speaker
So I walked in a week ago and he looked at me and said, you look nice this Sunday morning. Where are you going? And I said, oh, I'm on my way to church. And he started laughing almost hysterically. He's like, that's a great joke. Where are you actually going? And I said, no, no, I'm actually on my way to church. And he stopped laughing and he said, oh, oh, you're.
00:09:33
Speaker
You're serious. And I said, yes, absolutely. Do you know, I really love Jesus and I love gathering with his people. And he was so astounded that he was meeting someone of a younger generation who apparently was reasonably interesting and on their way to a church service that he began then to ask me, but why do you go to church and what is it that you find there? And I found that I was just able to respond to the questions that he was asking by being willing to respond honestly
00:10:03
Speaker
about my faith. And I think sometimes we're so scared of saying anything about our faith that we don't even say if we're on our way to a church service. And actually he began to ask me all of the questions. He created the open door for me to begin to speak about who Jesus was.
Living Curiously and Encouraging Faith Questions
00:10:19
Speaker
I know what's interesting about that, right, is that Scripture, 1 Peter 3.15, which often people who love apologetics quote all the time always be willing to give a reason for the hope to those who ask you. And there's implication there that people will be asking. And I think there's something isn't there about how as Christians do we live lives and are just friendly, we're outgoing, we're normal, such that people would ask that kind of question, right?
00:10:41
Speaker
And I think sometimes that scripture, which I absolutely adore, has been used as an apologetic to say, you need to know every answer to every hard question about every area of the Christian faith and be prepared to respond to everything in detail. And actually, and I'm just unpacking this right now, Andy, so feel free to come back to me with it as I know you will.
00:11:00
Speaker
I believe it's more about be passionate in yourself about the reason for the hope that lies within you. And one of the things I love is that resources like this podcast, resources like the books that both of you have written help give true reasons for the hope that lies within us. But actually, if someone's really asking questions about truth,
00:11:19
Speaker
I have a friend who's written a book called More Truth, and I can let them unpack that further through Christie and her writings. I don't need to have memorized every answer in Christie's book, but I might be the only person who could look at my friend in a coffee shop in Cornwall and have that first bridge conversation with them about faith, and then introduce them to the wide variety of really incredible resources that are out there around Christian faith.
00:11:43
Speaker
I think there's an interesting analogy I came across the other day, I think particularly as you say around Christians being afraid of stuff, is that, you know...
00:11:51
Speaker
I have friends who are Christians who are quite nervous about evangelism but are very happy to talk about their latest Apple product, for example. And to go, many of you listening to this probably have devices or gadgets or things that you like. I've got my iPhone here, it's great, it's fantastic. And I can evangelize quite happily about this without feeling nervous. I don't know everything about this freaking gadget. If somebody says to me, how'd you do X? And they go, I don't know. That doesn't mean I'm not willing to talk about it. Or some great experience you've had. Why is it when it comes to evangelism
00:12:20
Speaker
We feel we need to know absolutely everything that we, in order to talk about Jesus, why not just talk about the experience you've had, what Jesus means to you, answer the questions that you can. And as you say, when you do get stuck, go on a great book or on a great podcast, and maybe then go away and learn the answer for next time. So as someone asks the question again, you're not dumbfounded, but don't feel afraid.
00:12:41
Speaker
Rebecca McLaughlin, the author of Confident Christianity, she said one of her friends asked her a really difficult faith question. And in that moment, she had the humility to say, I don't know how to respond to this properly. But she also said, if three years later I was asked that question again and I gave the exact same response, I wouldn't have been faithful to the calling that God's put on my life. And what I found is I believe people are hungrier to speak about faith. We underestimate the hunger for the gospel.
00:13:07
Speaker
But equally, our calling as Christians is to continue to grow and learn in how we share our faith.
Curiosity Sparked by Christian Literature
00:13:12
Speaker
And a really practical example of that, kind of in a similar note, I've got a young woman that I'm walking with towards Jesus and she's this beautiful teenager. And her biggest obstacle in walking towards Jesus is that her sister died of cancer when her sister was two years old. And so she's really been battling this question of if there is a God, how could he be good?
00:13:32
Speaker
And I still am not convinced that there even is one at all. And what we found with this particular friend is that the best part of walking with her towards Jesus has just been listening to her story and gently asking the spirit, where are the places that we can help her take that next step? Because actually the wounds in her soul that need to be healed are deeper than one conversation will ever bring.
00:13:56
Speaker
But I recently tweeted this so you might have both seen it. She came over to my house the other day and said, I think I'm finally ready to read my first Christian book. And so I pulled out four different books and laid them out on the bed and she gasped in awe and said, you have friends who love Jesus enough that they've written a whole book about it? And I think sometimes within Christianity, we've gotten so included in this bubble that we're like, well, of course people know
00:14:22
Speaker
that there's lots of reasons to love Jesus and there's lots of ways to explore faith and there's lots of examples of what that looks like. And here's my little 17 year old friend, gasping in awe that there are people who love Jesus enough that they've written a whole book about it. She's just read her first and is on her way to her second book about the Christian faith.
00:14:39
Speaker
That is fantastic. And actually, you know, the risk of her giving a plug for something, Sarah. I mean, what was the book that she picked? So she picked When Faith Fails by Dominic Doan. And I read her the back cover of all four. She felt all four of them were fascinating. But she said, I'm going to start with this one.
00:14:57
Speaker
And the second one she read is called, And Still She Laughs by my friend Kate Merrick, whose daughter also died of cancer at age nine years old and speaks about the God who enters into our suffering but gives us a defiant joy.
00:15:10
Speaker
I think one of the phrases that you used there, Sarah, I'd just love to unpack a little bit, actually, you talked about people who are on a journey towards Jesus. I wonder is that helpful too, because I think one of the things I struggled with as a younger Christian was the sort of sense that I got the idea from somewhere that the way it was supposed to go, here's my non-Christian friend, I was supposed to go in
00:15:30
Speaker
you know, deliver some magic sound bites that I'd learned from the pastor or some book I'd read, and then they'd go, wow, I've got to become a Christian. And you very quickly discover it doesn't work like that. It's for many people, it is a journey. And there's something I wonder about helping, you know, taking the pressure off ourselves and going, by listening to the spirit, being faithful to the gospel, our job is to help people, you know, maybe two steps, three steps, four, you know, half a step. And if in our conversations with our friends, we can get them just slightly further along that journey towards God than our workers, ambassadors of Christ is,
00:15:59
Speaker
Yeah. I'm always really keen to give credit where credit
Engel's Stages of Faith and Relational Guidance
00:16:02
Speaker
is due. So I've been really heavily influenced by Engel, and he has seven stages of walking towards a full-time faith commitment. There's also some other recent speakers and authors who've put this into a more modern vocabulary. But the reality is, whichever of those we reference and read, there are so many places where we might help people for the first time realize not all Christians are as weird as I thought they were.
00:16:26
Speaker
Or we might help someone turn from skeptic to seeker, to use a more commonly known phrase in our vocabulary and circle. And what I've found both in my own life and something that I believe is part of Creation Fest ministry as well, is that I do want to appeal to people, make a decision for Jesus Christ. I'm passionate about seeing that proclaimed and proclaimed clearly.
00:16:47
Speaker
But also, I've known for many of my friends who I work with and walk with throughout the year. If I walked into my Buddhist friend and said to her, decide for Jesus Christ today or else, we would probably end our friendship completely. And I would have no more space for a voice in her life. If equally I said to her, can I put this question on the table? Can we look together at the question of suffering and can I hear what you would have to say on this and can I share with you
00:17:14
Speaker
what I believe the Christian God of the Bible says into this. She's walking with me towards the next step of considering a complete mindset and lifestyle shift. And that would be another kind of practical friendship that I'm walking with and walking towards where she knows quite clearly what I believe, why I believe it, and that I believe that the message of the gospel changes everything. But equally, she knows that I love her.
00:17:40
Speaker
regardless of whether or not she makes the full decision for Jesus Christ tomorrow. And so I believe that there's often a calling to be winsome in how we share the gospel so that we might win some for the sake of the kingdom. Amen. Sarah, listening to all this, it's just so encouraging. I just think, gosh, I could go away and actually do this with my friends, just be human, talk to them. But also what comes through in your life, in your manner, in your personality is this
00:18:06
Speaker
deep love of God that there's a transparency in you that you share with others. How do you feed yourself? How do you keep going? You were saying that you're soaking yourself in God's Word, but how do you cultivate this evangelistic lifestyle that just loves others?
Sarah's Daily Spiritual Practices
00:18:29
Speaker
I think like any area of faith, it's the most simple and most involved in its simplicity. I love Jesus Christ because I love Jesus Christ. He has widened my heart for the sake of the kingdom on a really practical level, because there's people listening who might want to know what are some of those practical tools. What that means is one, I spend solitary time alone with Jesus every single day.
00:18:56
Speaker
And that looks for me like spending time in prayer and not just talking to God, but listening for Him.
00:19:03
Speaker
It looks like spending time in his word, I'm always consistently going through a passage of scripture. And every morning that scripture is for me daily bread. I know that if I don't do that in the morning, when I am jarred, what comes out will not be the grace and kindness of Jesus Christ, but it will probably be whatever's top of my own head. I believe that it's important that I'm quick to repent, but quick to receive God's grace in my life.
00:19:30
Speaker
And fourth and finally, although we could unpack lots of this for a long time, having close friends who I know will hold me accountable, who love me enough to say, oh, Sarah, let me pull you aside and remind you that that was probably not in character with who Jesus Christ is. Having friends who love me enough to both hold my back, but also guard my tongue. Those four things have been invaluable in my life.
00:19:56
Speaker
Sarah, this has been an absolutely fascinating conversation. So grateful to you taking the time and all the work that you and the huge team are doing at a creation fest. Thanks for being a guest on the show. It's been great to have you with us.