21 Lifestyles of the Evangelist – Continuation
In the life of the evangelist, you need to relay that it is all finished. You must know this well.
You know the gospel, but you don’t enjoy the life of an evangelist, it’s only about yourself. Before you do anything for evangelism, what’s more important is for your life to be on a journey where evangelism has no choice but to take place. All your judgments and decisions are based on material gain, what’s to your benefit or loss. “Is this person going to receive or reject my thoughts?”
Even though Simon Peter made the confession, “You are the Christ, the son of the living God,” and they went out in pairs to evangelize, but he wasn’t centered on God; he was centered on himself, materials, and success. Satan knows this, so you must quickly escape from this, and that’s what we call, “Only Christ.” If you’re able to do this, incredible blessings await.
“Lord, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” from this point on, all blessings follow. “Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for this was not revealed by flesh, but by my Father in heaven, and on this rock, I will build my church.” Without this rock, we cannot have a church nor continue. From this point, the church will be raised on this rock.
We as individuals are the church, and from this point on, missions and evangelism take place. Before this, what happened? Everyone was running away, because they kept shoving material things into people, they ran away. Some people center their revivals on these things, “I use my brain to pull people here,” or they gather people to their church with different methods. That’s not a revival, but once the wind blows, all of this will fall.
Your poverty curse will remain until this is broken, and everyone has this without knowing it, so this is the reason they keep failing. There’s no reason for them to stop it or not, because they will stop it naturally when they receive these blessings. From this point on, they receive the key to the kingdom of heaven. This is the answer, but if you don’t acknowledge this, you don’t acknowledge God. If something is an answer and something isn’t an answer, it gets sporadic and confusing.
Everything is your answer, and the key is Christ. It’s not just a very simple Christ. This “only Christ” is the beginning of the life of the evangelist, and what happens after that is the Kingdom of God. If you don’t have Christ and you hold onto the Word however you want, what’s convenient or beneficial for you? That’s not the Word God wants. Only once you have “only Christ” will God’s Word come into me. God rules over everything with the Word just as the president rules through laws, and the Word of all Words is mission. This comes into me.
Awhile ago, we had an evangelism camp, and a believer was so excited that they shared their testimony, and he wanted to evangelize to one person because he was driving a BMW. This was a long time ago, BMWs were rare in Korea, and as soon as he saw that, he completely lost hold of evangelism. Do you know why? Because this was a cursed guy who drove a BMW, I’m an evangelist who couldn’t even afford a Hyundai, so what kind of evangelism could he do? Many years later, he told me he got over it.
Only Christ. Even if you don’t have this, you can evangelize. But if you don’t have only Christ, then Christ will be blocked by a BMW. If you don’t have only Christ, it’ll get blocked by COVID, then no matter what you do, if you try to talk to a Harvard professor, your mouth will get stuck together. Christ is Christ, but it’s undercooked and won’t work in Harvard? Christ does work but it’s not working for you. This is why we talk about the life of the evangelist. We must begin like this, then later on, it doesn’t matter; you’ll realize they’re stuck in Satan, sin, and hell. Then the moment you’re able to do this, you can evangelize consistently as you see this in your life.
You do research in your college and see them next to you. Of course, you set a time for it, but you can’t go out and research, but you have to research as you talk to your coworkers, then moving in itself is evangelism, and there’s value. Everywhere you go, this is your mission. People get confused because of the gospel, they received grace when they came to church, but they get divided when they go to the field.
I remained in Korea for 10 years because of this. It’s not just about knowing, faith and skill are one, but I couldn’t think about the word or prayer in the field. The pastors said something would happen and I thought they were uneducated, that they didn’t know what they were talking about. When I was a young adult, I thought the pastors would say this because their studies are their faith, but this wasn’t resolved.
Every single college retreat, there would be the same question, “How can my studies and the Word be connected?” If the pastor can’t do that, it’s difficult. Their pastoral ministry can’t be run separately. If it all takes place, it all becomes one, and from that point on, you’ll realize what it means to hold onto the covenant and pray and study and work. From that point on, wherever you go, you hold to the covenant. It must become like this for the devil to not shake you.
People don’t crumble at church, but they crumble in the field due to their studies. They have the covenant in their brain but it’s not with them in their field, so they shake. You study for the covenant and work for the covenant, and this is the life of the evangelist.
Heavenly Mandate, Calling, Mission
What should I do right now at this time schedule? The calling accumulates together to result in the mission, and that’s the heavenly mandate. That’s why the cornerstone of the life of the evangelist is the three todays, because your lifelong mission is aligned with the church and is poured out into your covenant. That’s God’s mission, then God will continue to relay His mission to you.
For me, today, my calling is to hold onto the three todays, Monday through Saturday. We evangelize but don’t have this life, and that’s why you keep falling. We have our heart and everything, but in order for this to continue, it must become our life, not ethics or morality; it is talking about evangelism. If you want to win a Nobel Prize, there’s a suitable lifestyle. It’s the same for the evangelist.
You keep talking about Christ and it’s rightful, but if you hold onto something else, like money or idolatry, you will necessarily have problems. Everyone talks about Christ but holds something else within them. If you plant a bean, you will get a bean. You won’t get something else. Things will sprout according to the spiritual state, it will not be another fruit. It’s rightful.
Why do you face this problem? It’s rightful because you’re holding onto something else. It’s necessary. Why do you have cancer? There’s something rightful and necessary, you’re holding onto something that resulted in cancer. Why did it come right now? There was no choice, your spiritual state is always bad and you’re always worried or diseased.
Rightful, necessary, absolute, you must find God’s plan. This is the life of the evangelist. This has to become very solid for you to raise disciples. You will raise disciples who evangelize with their entire life. Disciples raise disciples; thieves raise thieves, and even teachers raise disciples. Are we an evangelist or disciple who will evangelize for the rest of our lives, or just occasionally?
Pastor Ryu has never forgot about evangelism once after 40 years. Is it that we don’t have the method for evangelizing? Do you know why, in the past, many pastors would occasionally do evangelism camps and not do anything else? They didn’t have this lifestyle. A group of pastors left this organization. They would caravan to the colleges, but when they came home, they’d do something else. They kept creating programs without this evangelist’s life. A life that has no choice but evangelism to take place no matter what time It is.
One heart. Why would your heart be split? It’s finished with Christ; there’s nothing other than Christ. Who is the scariest prisoner? One with a death sentence. If someone charges forward and says, “This is my life,” everyone has to flee. Only a person who doesn’t stake their life will be weak. Look at prisoners as they’re released. Those who are bound to be released will try to maintain themselves but those who are on death row will stay still, and no one touches those people. “If you touch me, I’m going to kill you because I’m going to die anyway,” so people run away from them.
Whole heart, you stake your entire life, that’s the method. What else would be the method? That’s it, you stake your life doing this, that’s the one who has continuation. Why don’t we have continuation? It’s not about the speed. As time passes, God’s prepared fruits are bound to arise. When I was in college, there was a famous person I heard while I was about 20 years old. He gave an analogy of a marathon. The marathon of life is 40km, and you haven’t even come to the halfway point. If you’re racing quickly right now, you’re not very far ahead, and I didn’t have anything famous about me, I thought, “oh, that’s great,” I thought people ahead of me would constantly be ahead of me, but we only know at the end of our lives, and we haven’t even reached that point.
These are worldly words, but this is how I heard it, and it’s the same for the evangelist. The Darakbang movement is similar; those who want to go will go, those who stay will stay, and God has led us. From my perspective, those who had works at the beginning are no longer here. Honestly speaking, it’s not that they had many works, but the laypeople are deceived so they flock to that church, and they all left. That will happen again in the future, why? Simply put, they have not seen the bottom of life, they’ve heard this very vaguely, because they’ve heard this vaguely, but this isn’t about whether I should evangelize or not. These people have nowhere else to go because they know no one else has the answer; they can’t conquer the world, because even if they go into the world, they have this problem.
I don’t know about other churches, but if they’re not able to understand this, even if they’re pastors, they will leave the evangelism movement, but the people who remain within this, even if their speed is slower, the more time passes, the more fruits they have. This is the evangelism God does. Look at the age of Rome, did any evangelism take place? They were hidden in their houses, and the impatient people cannot endure that. Even still, God is carrying out His work and the remnants arose. It was all God’s work.
I was studying in seminary, and do you know what the Baptists say? During the Middle Ages, it was dark because it was seized by Catholicism, and that’s what we learned as Presbyterians, but the Baptist Church pastor said, “Don’t be foolish, for 1000 years during that time, the Baptists maintained the gospel. Presbyterians were persecuting and killing Baptists about the issue of full immersion baptism.” Even though we’ve learned the same history, it’s different, but God was carrying this out even in the Middle Ages. Do you think God was standing still during the Middle Ages? He was carrying this out through those who had it.
You must have this skill, to see your entire life and the next generation. This is the life of the evangelist. If my life just ends with my life, how is this an eternal life, isn’t that right? Only when the work I’m doing right now is connected to eternal things will my eyes be opened.
Acts 2:46-47
One individual cannot continue, so our evangelism movement is done through the church. An individual can go back and forth and crumble, but the church is a system. As long as the church exists, the Word will continue to be proclaimed, so we can do the word and evangelism movement, so it has no choice but to continue. That’s what we must receive.
How can you become like this? They gathered together every day, and in Acts 2:42 it says they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, meaning the pulpit message, they broke bread and had fellowship. This is the key for continuation. If you don’t have this you can evangelize but you can’t have continuation, and it will end with training.
But they devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching, and through the fellowship, breaking of bread, and the prayers, they will continue. If you do this kind of evangelism, it will continue and make the pastor happy. Otherwise, it won’t work, and we don’t like it because there’s no continuation, so we must have the biblical evangelization movement. It’s not just any message, but it’s the message God gave, because it’s the message God gave to save the region, but it doesn’t fit with you.
Many things are contained within this, if your individual evangelism skill is so renowned, I don’t think that’s great. I was someone who evangelized as soon as I believed, but I couldn’t continue. That’s not biblical. Constantly, every day, then you must know the church. The church is not the pastor, there is a mission God is giving through this church. God gives His Word every single week to fulfill that mission in God’s time schedule.
That word gets relayed to the field because it’s the Word that will save the region, but a church that will not save the region is not from God. If you have your own ambition for church revival, God will not give you His Word. Then they will fall but if you want to save America and this region, then rightfully, the Word is bound to come from the pulpit, aligned with that field and time schedule. Then, rightfully, the immediate answers for the church members are to take this Word and to relay it in the field. That’s the mystery of continuation. You must know this well to save the church and the field together.
Matthew 24:13-14
If it is not deeply rooted, we will shake, because our lives are based on our spiritual state. Do you know why you shake in your life? It’s because the Word of God has not yet been rooted in you, so continuation is so important. What’s important is the imprint, root, and nature that allows you to have continuation.
Mark 13:13
Everyone will hate you because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. The one who holds onto the covenant will be saved, and the one who holds onto and relays this covenant to others will always have the answer of missions and evangelism. It doesn’t matter what circumstance you’re in, but fruits will come.
John 13:1
Jesus Christ, His own personality is to go until the end; He is not someone who wavers back and forth, but He is the One who keeps the covenant, and because God keeps His covenant, if I hold onto this, works arise. It’s not about me doing something, but God says He will do it. When I know this not with my brain, but when it is rooted and becomes my nature in my spirit, I will go to the end.
A pastor said, “You cannot marry the one you love; they get divorced. What’s important is the covenant.” Pastor Kim said, there’s a contractual marriage. You have to have both. You have a marital oath, “I’m just going to go to the very end, in sickness and in health, ‘til death do us part,” but lately it’s different. You make this oath before God, but God says He will do it, then how could you get a divorce? His ministry is different, he doesn’t take it lightly.
If you make an oath before God, you stand before Him with the Word, but regardless of what the pastor said, people will get divorced. But the issue is with me. I have faith in the covenant, but it is not rooted down to continue, so I’m bound to shake, but even if it’s not through this person, God keeps evangelizing. God will even speak through a donkey’s mouth because God is still doing the ministry of salvation from the Throne of Heaven.
We know this Japanese pastor who was trained for a long time, and now he’s doing ministry in Shinjuku, and he came from a wealthy background. One day when he was young, he asked for his father’s inheritance, and he’s the firstborn and didn’t want to take over the father’s business. What did he do? This Japanese pastor came to America and bought a motorcycle and made a cross-country trip, and he went into a bookstore in America and bought a Bible.
He read the Bible and accepted Jesus Christ. Did anyone proclaim the gospel to him? In God’s time schedule and in that region, God prepared that bookstore to save this person. The fact that a Japanese person received the gospel even though no one could share it with him, it means God is working. He’s Japanese but he has Korean characteristics. This Japanese pastor brought all the kids and moved to Korea and went to a trade school with strange classmates but lived there with many years.
His firstborn child married a Korean man, and the second son graduated from Remnant Theological Seminary and is now a pastor, and the third son went back to Japan to study. I know them because my wife helped them as they moved to this country to assimilate. Korean culture is so difficult, but he sat the same way we did and received training and left. For him as well, he was caught by the message, so he packed his bag and moved to Korea. “He’s Japanese but he doesn’t seem like one,” because I know some other Japanese people and they look down on Koreans, but Pastor Matsuda is completely Korean, he’s kind of gangster, he’s different from Japanese people. It’s difficult to change, but this is how God will raise people up to use them for Japanese evangelization.
I’m not saying it’s just this one pastor and wife, but his child who graduated from seminary is an even greater pastor. He doesn’t even shake because there’s something about Japanese people, they are very tenacious, continuation.
Hebrews 3:6
Hold firmly to the end because God moves according to the promise. The works of that faith will come upon me. Disbelief will bear the fruits of disbelief but works in the covenant will bear works of faith. You’re not staying still, because you’re holding onto the covenant. God is going to work through the one holding onto the covenant.
Hebrews 3:14
God’s method to do the Remnant Movement in the wilderness was to write the Word of God on their foreheads and wrists, so the method is to make the word into their imprint, root, and nature. How will we evangelize America and the world? Through A, B, or C? God never says it like that. God says, “I’m going to do it, so firmly hold to the covenant.” This is the Biblical method, the method of the Early Church in Mark’s Upper Room.
Whether I go out into the field, whether I go out the door or not, it is a matter of circumstance. If I go on vacation, it will happen when I’m on vacation. Why? Because God raises works according to our faith, and this is the biblical method, and God will move through the one who holds onto this. Rev. Ryu said for 40 years, there wasn’t a single day where he didn’t think about evangelism. If you misunderstand, you’ll think he’s just persevering, but that’s not it. It’s not that he’s extra tenacious, but when you hold onto the covenant, you go and confirm God has done the work.
Isn’t this our evangelism as well? But God blocks us because we do a different evangelism, we talk about red coats and yellow coats, we say, “Rahab used a scarlet cord, so we have to look for someone with a red scarf,” so it’s very physical, but this isn’t the reason. You are blocking the biblical evangelism movement from being relayed to the next generation. That was our own motive.
In the beginning, I came to America and the pastor said many things, and 80% reached my heart but 20% did not come in. His facial expression changed a bit and the person speaking with the pastor left, and this pastor is still doing missions now. It’s not that he’s stopped evangelizing, he’s still evangelizing, don’t misunderstand, this is not what we’re talking about. I’m talking about teaching the biblical evangelism movement to the next generation so they can continue until Jesus’ second coming.
This isn’t a method, if there’s just one person who holds onto the covenant, just one person in Yongdo who held onto the covenant, he influenced the entire world. He didn’t boast about it, but he received the grace, so he was holding onto the covenant even as he saw spicy rice cakes. He changed everything for evangelism, and this is the kind of disciple who must arise.
But if this deteriorates, God will block it because this isn’t right. It’s okay even if you’re late, either way, we must be biblical, and that’s everything. Everything in my life is here, it’s finished; is there anything more? As you keep going, God continues to move you.
Romans 16:25-27
This is the last thing Paul wrote as an evangelist. Proclaim the gospel that was hidden from long ages past, but people are under a misconception. This was the work God already planned out, but if you don’t know this, then your standard will be based on whether you do it or not, it’s based on people. But God already has a list of people to whom God will testify this gospel from long ages past.
What’s Romans 16:26? It’s now been revealed, and this is evangelism. There is someone who is destined to receive salvation today, and God reveals it today, God reveals it right now. That’s not something I do, but what God has hidden until now, according to His time schedule. The Three Todays is confirming this, the one prepared in the field today. How could you evangelize without this? Yes, crowding onto a campus to evangelize is evangelism but that’s not enough. You don’t know when God’s time schedule for evangelism will open up. A person might not be ready yesterday, but it’s their time today, and it comes from here. God has already prepared this, and my life must be there until all of eternity, right? Because my spirit is eternal, and the person to whom I evangelize is eternal, and my business and studies must be used for eternal things. This is no ordinary word; only such people can continue, but if you think your evangelism and studies are different things, you cannot have continuation. It’s all continuous, the one who is able to have continuation, receive the Word of God, you have no choice, and it doesn’t matter whether people acknowledge you or not. “I’m only going to do this if people acknowledge me”? I only do things for eternal things. What is our crown? It is those who received the gospel through us, and Paul races towards this reward in heaven. If you think you’ll find earthly rewards, you cannot have continuation on this earth. He was racing towards the crown in heaven, so it didn’t matter whether people acknowledged him or not, because his goal was in heaven. It is not like the things of earth do not come, and though he was persecuted, he received 100-fold blessings more. These blessings don’t have to come, but we use it for world evangelization because God knows our goal is world evangelization.
A young adult named Charles joins us every week and that’s not enough. He evangelizes a lot, but he must become an evangelist. It’s not about teaching a strategy or skill. If there’s an expert, you don’t teach someone who has the perfect skill, but one with the perfect body, then you can train them with the skills.
Evangelism isn’t looking for smart people, but it’s those who will have continuation. We must have people who continue. Our goal is not for material gain, but it’s continuation. When the remnants arise like this, even if you don’t do anything with them, they will generate answers like passive income. The church must raise up and commission such people. This is how someone will save this nation and land, this region.
Rev. 2:26
Here as well, God says it’s the one who does God’s will until the end will have God’s authority, so the one who goes until the end will win. Aesop’s fable talks about the tortoise and the hare. The hare is smart but doesn’t go until the end, so we don’t need smart people; the one God desires is the one who goes until the end, and that’s the blessing of missions and evangelism.
Prayer
May you and I have this answer of life. What I told you today, I’m not saying you don’t have to do this or that, but you must have continuation because the devil won’t go away easily. May you have this blessing.
Father God, we thank You. May the evangelist’s life be our life, and may You raise us up to be the evangelists to save our family line, our businesses, and our field. In the name of Jesus Christ we pray, amen.