Here is a sample Christmas Party ice breaker and conversational guide that is similar to the one found on page 38 of Christmas Party Games from Creative Youth Ideas.

You can use this icebreaker as a Christmas party game for adults, for youth, and for kids.

You can probably find this party game for Christmas everywhere on the Internet but what I like is the discussion applications to help break the ice for some great faith oriented conversations over the eggnog or punch.

Christmas Party IceBreaker

Name of Party Game: Christmas Forward and Backward.

When I played variations of this Christmas Party game during other seasons, I called it Move to the Left or Right.

Energy level of Christmas Party Game: Low, using chairs in a line.

How to play: Move forward or backward depending on the criteria that is called.

If someone is already occupying that chair, sit on their lap.

Example criteria:

• Move forward if you are wearing green.
• If you like eggnog, move forward one chair
• If you plan to go to church on Christmas eve, move back one chair.

The actual resource of Christmas Party Games for Youth (read my review of Christmas Collection from Creative Youth Ideas) suggests 30 different criteria for this Christmas party game.  That should be enough to stir your creativity for more.

Discussion starters

As a talking point, you can talk about moving forward or moving backward in life.

As you think about your relationships this past year, have you moved forward or backwards?

As you think about your spiritual life, have you moved forward or backwards?

Did you reach any goals you may have had at the beginning of the year for your spiritual life?

Then you can ask this an application:

Take a few moments to plan where you want to be spiritually at the end of next year.

• In relationships?
• In your education?
• In your career?
• In some personal goals?
• In your relationship to God?

This party game for Christmas can be a great ice breaker to start future conversations later over that bowl of eggnog.

Your guests might volunteer with you 1-1 where they would like to grow spiritually later that year.

Read more about the  resource of Christmas Party Games for Youth.

When we make it a human work, we

• feel pressure to get a decision.
• feel unprepared to handle every possible objection.
• feel insecure in presenting what we personally know about Jesus.

Rather, Evangelism is the work of the Holy Spirit.  But even with that in mind, we are prone to errors.

Top 3 mistakes in personal evangelism

1.  Failure to pray

Prayer prepares your heart, and God uses prayer to draw people to Christ.  Evangelism is ultimately a spiritual work.

Perhaps you can create a prayer list to help you with that?

Action step: Make a prayer list of friends.

When was the last time you prayed through your list of friends?

See Also:

• Ten Prayer Points For your Friends
• Prayer and Evangelism
• Three Verses on Prayer (in a book review article)
• Take the Risk, Offer to Pray.
• Prayer and Evangelism (Acronym to lead your prayer)
• HEART.
• Evangelism PAINS
• Prayer Strategy for Personal Evangelism (PODCAST)

2.  Spend zero time with non-Christians

Most effective evangelism happens between friends.

But many of us have been Christians for so long that we have few if any non-Christian Friends.

Thus, one highly effective habit to be intentional in building deep and authentic relationships.

As you look over your list of friends you are praying for, who do you need to “get to know better” or “spend some time with” this coming week?

Related Article: Spheres of Influence

3.  Control the conversation

This one is huge.

There are evangelistic methods where the evangelist controls the conversation through leading questions.

Others require the evangelist to steer the conversation from the mundane to the spiritual in a few short steps.

I watched one evangelist talk about the credibility of the bible, when it was clear that wasn’t a question in the mind of the listenener.

Instead, listen for spiritual thirst.

Spiritual Thirst opens conversational doors.

Good questions will open the door to great conversation, rather than leading the conversation down a defined path.

Read:

• 5 Great Spiritual Conversation Questions
• Resource: 52 Questions for Bible Teachers
• 44 Spiritual Conversation Starter Questions
• 20 Evangelism Questions To Start a Conversation
• Evangelistic Conversation Starter Questions

Personal Evangelism Coaching:

If you would like personalized help in personal evangelism over the next 60 days, I provide a telecoaching service of four phone calls over a 60 day period.

Read more about it here:  Personal Coaching for Personal Evangelism

Here are 5 as written out in Organic Outreach for Ordinary People: Sharing Good News Naturally

The following is directly quoted from page 190.

Here are some questions that could move your conversations with nonbelievers to deeper levels of spiritual interaction:

1. What are some joys you are experiencing in this season of your life?

Most people would love to share about the good things in their lives, but they are afraid that others won’t care. Just by asking and listening, you open the door for great interaction. Also, if there are clear signs that God is blessing their life, you could open the door for conversation about the source of all good things.

2. What challenges and struggles are you facing?

People will share their pains and hurts with someone who truly cares about them and takes the time to listen. As they share, you may find that it becomes an opportunity to minister the grace of Jesus. Sharing struggles can also create space for you to pray for or with them.

3. What is your personal history when it comes to faith and God?

This question is not so much about what people believe as it is about their personal histories.

A person might say, “I have no history when it comes to religion,” or “I grew up going to Mass every week and my parents are quite devout,” or “I have always been very spiritual and I still read my horoscope daily and do a lot of meditation.”

No matter what answer they give, you end up learning something about their journey that may allow you to move the conversation to a deeper level.

4. What do you believe about God?

With this question, we move into more personal convictions and beliefs.

Again, no matter how they answer, remember that you are learning and already going deeper than a typical conversation.

Some Christians feel pressured to correct “wrong thinking” or “errant theology” in their conversations with nonbelievers. Try not to do this.

Just listen and learn where they are; then you’ll gain a sense of where they still need to go on their journey toward Jesus.

5.  What is your perception of Christians?

Or put a different way, “What is your perception of Christianity or of the Christian church?” It takes courage to ask this question, listen, and not get defensive. But I have found that it can be an open door to deeper conversations.

Taken from Harney, Kevin G. (2009-09-29). Organic Outreach for Ordinary People: Sharing Good News Naturally (pp. 191-192).   Order your copy from Amazon by clicking the affiliate link and Amazon will pitch me a few pennies.

Perhaps you’ve spent time sharing your faith (maybe a few years) by

• Developing authentic relationships with non-believers
• Faith sharing conversations over dinner
• Answering difficult questions

Yet, they never seem to get the faith you share with them.

Years of faith sharing with little results

Some of you probably have encountered this.

I know I have.

There are people in my life that no matter how much I share my faith, they remain apart from Christ.

As an evangelist, that’s hard.

I remember one person with whom I shared my faith with for four years.  Nothing.

Apostle Paul shared his faith with the same person for two years!

At the end of Acts 23, the apostle Paul was sent to Felix, the governor. Felix had Paul guarded in Herod’s palace (Acts 23: 35) until he had the chance to hear Paul himself (Acts 24).

After the hearing, Felix gave Paul some ”freedom and permit his friends to take care of his needs” (24:23)

Felix had some level of spiritual curiosity, and some working knowledge about the followers of Jesus (Acts 24:22), even if it was only on a political level as the movement of Christianity spread.

Several days later Felix came with his wife Drusilla, who was Jewish. He sent for Paul and listened to him as he spoke about faith in Christ Jesus. (v24)

Paul and Felix discussed Jesus and what it means to follow Jesus.

 25 As Paul talked about righteousness, self-control and the judgment to come, Felix was afraid and said, “That’s enough for now! You may leave. When I find it convenient, I will send for you.”

I can imagine that Felix even experienced the convicting work of the Holy Spirit in some of those conversations.  Even if there were some hidden motives for hearing Paul (like bribery – v. 26), Felix still got to hear of Jesus and the implications of being a disciple of Christ.

These faith sharing conversations went on for the next two years (v.27).

Even though Paul was a prisoner, it’s hard not to imagine that a friendship developed, or at least a level of mutual respect between these two men as Paul shared his faith.

We can speculate some of the relationship dynamics that changed over the course of the next two years.

Two years of faith sharing, no immediate fruit

I can imagine (and this is santicified imagination) Paul doing the following

• Praying for Felix on a regular basis.
• Asking God for how to talk with Felix.
• Waiting for God to open the heart of Felix to respond.
• Frustration when Felix cuts the conversation short when it gets personal.
• Rejoicing when questions were answered to the satisfaction of Felix
• Celebrating the apparent progress Felix was making on the journey to faith.

Yet Felix was appointed somewhere else and was no longer in Paul’s life.  The end of the road together had come.

Two years, Felix and Paul talked about Christianity, salvation, following Jesus, etc, yet Felix still walked away without having surrendered his life to Christ.  I would imagine author Luke would have reported on Felix’s conversion if it had happened.

Sharing faith without results?

Perhaps you are in a similar situation of sharing your faith with someone who seems to have spiritual curiosity, but just won’t surrender.

Like Felix, they keep cutting the faith conversation short when it gets personal.

They simply avoid the hard questions of surrender.

What can we do?

1.  Don’t give up.

Keep praying for your friend.

Keep spending time with them.

Enjoy life together.

Keep sharing your faith and answering their questions.  They are on a spiritual journey

They are your friend, not your evangelistic project, so keep the relationship authentic.

2.  Trust God’s sovereignty.

I’ve heard testimony from people who have come to faith 15 years after I shared with them.

Remember the friend I shared my faith with for nearly 4 years without success?

Fifteen years later, she tells me she became a Christian.  Those seeds I planted produced a harvest.

God can keep the story going, even if you are no longer in the picture.

An opening in a conversation when a non Christian expresses their spiritual insight, or opens up about some restlessness in their heart.

Then well-meaning Christians become a one-way torrent of gospel information about what a person needs to believe and why other religions are wrong.

Or maybe you’ve seen this:

Your small group has two first time guests who have come to check out a little more about Christianity, but a well meaning Christian tries to get them saved the first night by explaining the need to be washed in the blood of the lamb to satisfy the wrath of a God who hates sin.

These are conversation killers.

These are spiritual thirst killers.  The tender shoot is growing forth and just got squashed.

I’ve seen it in small groups I’ve been a part of, conversations that I’ve learned from, and mistakes that I have made.

How not to kill spiritual thirst.

When a person first opens up to their spiritual need, it’s the time to have a genuine spiritual conversation about their struggles and questions.

Allow God room to work in the life of the person with whom you are talking – we don’t have to rush the process, we are invited to help it along.

1.  Love means you listen

Listening shows love.   Impatiently spewing forth doctrinal truth to correct their mis-beliefs does not.

If someone has become vulnerable enough to freely talk about their spiritual thirst, or even share their current beliefs about life, death, or other spiritual themes, you need to listen.

In small group gatherings, love means listen to the beliefs and opinions of all who express them.  It’s important to listen to their story, not think about your own or how you need to correct them.

In personal conversation, love means listen to your friend and understand them.

Tolerance is not approval, but giving space to people to express their views even if we disagree.  There is a time to engage in critique, but not at the first glimpse.

2.  Love means you ask great questions

Asking great questions invites your conversational partner to express their opinions and beliefs.  Asking questions invites further conversation, further sharing, and further insight into people.

Good questions uncover the truth about what people really think, and they create the opportunity to share life and truth together.

I like to follow my curiosity when people express something I don’t understand:

• How does that comfort you?
• How did you discover that?
• How does that happen?

I also like to follow my curiosity about where beliefs might cause internal conflict:

• Does that answer all your questions?
• Where do you wish you had more answers?
• Can you elaborate on that?
• How is it working for you?
• How does your position X work with your conviction Y?
• How does that satisfy the longing that I hear you express?

Drilling down with “how” questions, without it being an interrogation, allows a conversation to grow deep, and creates the safety and security between you to allow for the formation of new ideas.

Don’t kill spiritual thirst, water it.

Rather than squashing spiritual thirst in my enthusiasm to share the gospel, I listen and  use questions to help the spiritual conversation along.

I call this watering – nurturing a spiritual journey to Jesus.

I trust in the sovereignty of God to be at work.

By giving space for small group visitors or my friends to express their beliefs or even disagreements about Christianity, I eventually earn the right to express my belief and engage them in meaningful and safe discussions.

I get the chance to answer questions, shape ideas, and help a person in their discovery of Jesus.  But only after helping them feel safe talking with me.

• Noticing the prompting of the Holy Spirit
• Listening for Spiritual Thirst
• Using great questions to help a person discover their thirst and need for Christ.

So I’m always on the lookout for great conversational tools and training to help Christians grow more comfortable with sharing their faith.

I’ve personally shifted from seeing evangelism as only a one way proclamation event to a multi-faceted process of a series of events that add up to a person’s decision to surrender to Christ.

Many conversations are a key element in a person’s journey to Christ.

New ideas change us slowly, like water on a rock, imperceptibly reshaping grooves and contours. We rarely change our minds in the heat of discussion and usually need several opportunities to hear new ideas before we adapt a new position. (p. 48)

Have more fruitful spiritual conversations

In Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk, authors  Dale and Jonalyn Fincher intend to help Christians gain the right to be heard through genuine care and concern for those God places in our lives as we go about our daily activities.

How does a Christian have normal conversations about Jesus without accidentally sounding offensive, bigoted or intolerant?

Part 1: Making Spiritual Small Talk

The first section of Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk focuses mostly on principles of spiritual conversation.  Principal #7 was a great restatement: Allow people to remain unconvinced.

One empahsized idea is to ask more questions and not be afraid to learn from the person you are talking to.  Questions open up the possibility of meaningful conversation and honest engagement.

The authors also point out conversation stoppers that have killed their own conversations (chapter 3)

• When feeling cornered by someone’s question, offer a spiritual cliché, for example, “Just take it by faith.”
• Don’t fallback on that’s-the-way-I-was-raised answers.
• When feeling fearful or threatened, lash out hatefully.
• Show your disgust for the other person or his views or situation in life.
• Sniff out their sin, and then club them with shame and blame.

Part 2: Restocking Your Tools

The second section includes chapters on discussing our faith in particular in contrast with spiritual themes in our culture.  This will date Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk as they tackle four popular books from the last few years like The Secret.

But the principles they lift out will remain valid for having conversations.  They provide more examples of ways to engage others in dialogue about faith.

Part 3: Helping Friends Home

This final part of Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk deals with common questions and topics that might arise in spiritual conversations.  For example, the problem of pain and suffering is one that different religions handle with vastly different ideas on the solution.  They raise the question of evolution and other red herrings that distract people from focus on Jesus.

Some of these are attributed to a particular “brand of Christianity” rather than foundational truths about following Jesus.  Some theological streams will take issue over what issues the authors molehills and mountains.

My take on Coffeshop Conversations

Overall, the book was a decent read.  At times I felt like Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk drifted, allowing quick skimming of certain sections.

As a strength, it focuses on conversational principles and points the reader on skills to grow your spiritual conversations.

This is not a book on how to memorize and present a gospel formula – it’s goal is not to teach you a script or presentation.  Rather, their stated goal is to help you have more conversations that can open the doors to that gospel sharing down the road.

For those that believe in proclamation via monologue presentation before relationship – Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk won’t work.

For those that want to grow in their conversation skills, Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk gives several suggested ways to grow more comfortable in your conversations.

Order your copy of Coffee Shop Conversations: Making the Most of Spiritual Small Talk from Amazon (affiliate link).

I’ve had deeply personal conversations with strangers, and have led strangers to Christ.

But those conversations were the results of months of spiritual preparation by their friends who were already speaking into their life – I just happened to be a confirming piece of information they were looking for.

Statistics in various studies have shown that the verbal and life witness seen through personal relationships with genuine Christians are what lead new believers.

For example, in Shawn Anderson’s nationwide study in the US (in (Living Dangerously: Seven Keys to Intentional Discipleship), writes

The results revealed that, indeed, individuals were influenced to commit their lives to Jesus by people who modeled Jesus in their lives.

4 Reasons that Relationship Evangelism Works.

As I thought about this, here are 4 reasons why relationships are important in personal evangelism.

1. You’ve got credibility.

From reading unChristian, the Church as an institution doesn’t have a lot of credibility. Your friend might even have a crazy relative or obnoxious friend who is always forcing a Jesus-conversation upon them.

For your friend to become a Christian, they need a credible witness: someone who is normal.

Your friend trusts you and your ideas, even if they don’t agree with you. You’ve built respect in your relationship and that fosters the positive credibility to be a person of influence.

Growth step: In which relationships with non-Christians do you need to improve credibility? What can you do this week to change that?

2. You’ve got visibility.

Over time, people can see what defines your life. Your interests, hobbies, and choices, plus how you respond to circumstances, are visible to your friend.

For example, with my friends, I can talk about

• my calling,
• how I experience God’s provision for our work
• what I’m learning from my devotional life with God.
• how God is at work in the life of our church as people find faith
• knowing the presence of God’s peace in the midst of our challenges.

They see that I choose

• Giving $$ to mission projects that advance the gospel.
• Going to church over cutting the yard on a beautiful Sunday
• Godly ways I raise my children as I get wisdom from God’s word.
• Giving vacation time to foreign missions with my family instead of a week at the beach.

I am comfortable in expressing the spiritual side of my life: my walk with Christ. People hear that I walk with God. They hear current stories of what God is doing in my life.

Growth Step: Can you talk about your spiritual life with Christ? What story God’s activity in your life can you share with a friend?

3. You’ve got accessibility.

When strangers interrupt our life with some agenda they are pushing, we are naturally defensive.

But in your relationships, you’ve got access to speak to deep places.

You’ve got access to hearing their needs, hopes, desires and struggles. They call on you when life throws them a curve ball.

They might share with you how they face financial ruin.

They might share with you how they are headed towards divorce.

In the safety of credible relationships, you’ve got access to their deepest needs when they come to the surface. You’ve got access when they start to talk about their spiritual thirst.

Very rarely will a stranger get that level of access.

Growth Step: What steps can you take this week to deepen your relationships with non-Christians?

4. You’ve got “speakability”.

Within the safety of a trusted relationship you have earned the right to speak freely about faith.   You’ll have earned the right to speak about your friend’s faith.

You’ll have earned the right to speak to their spiritual thirst when you hear it.

And this conversation may not be just at one time, but over the course of several conversations spread out over time.

The people that I have most influenced for the kingdom of God are people who allowed me to speak into their life over a season of time.

I’ve been able to ask about their beliefs, talk intelligently about them, and even disagree without being obnoxious about it.

Growth step: Have you heard your friend speak about their spiritual restlessness?  Pray that the Lord gives you a chance to speak into that.

Imagine sitting in a coffee shop talking about life with a friend.

The conversation begins to go deep about some personal issue: your friend is confessing a deep sense of remorse over some sin in their life and how they seek forgiveness.

Your friend looks at you and says:

How do I find forgiveness to bring peace to my soul?

The Best Gospel Conversations Are Never Planned

Now this doesn’t happen to me all the time.

But perfect opportunities like this  to share the gospel and point people to Jesus  happen.

It’s never planned ahead.

It’s never organized on my calender.

It is never at a scripted moment (unless one manipulates the conversation).

Rather, opportunities to point people to Jesus are surprise impromptu events in life that catch us off guard.

Are you ready to seize the moment?

Several years ago, this happened to me.   A new acquaintance asked me ”What is the gospel?”

I fumbled the opportunity and made a verbal mess in my answer.

I was not prepared to answer the question, even though I had been to seminary and was a pastor.

Many factors got in the way of a clear and simple answer to the question.

How do we prepare ourselves?

I came across an interesting article, quoting Captain Sullenberger, the pilot who landed the plane in the Hudson River after hitting a flock of geese.

At a Hero’s Homecoming in Danville, CA, where he lives with his wife and daughters, Captain Sullenberger finally spoke:

“Circumstance determined that it was this experienced crew that was scheduled to fly that particular flight on that particular day,” he told the crowd.

“But I know I can speak for the entire crew when I tell you we were simply doing the job we were trained to do.”

Source: http://blogs.jobdig.com/wwds/2009/01/16/i-knew-chesley-sully-sullenberger-us-air-hero/

Here is the phrase that struck me:  ”We were simply doing the job we were trained to do.”

Training gives us a chance to learn what we need to do when we are put on the spot.

Training gives us an internal calm when surprises catch us.

You might think you know the gospel already since you’ve likely heard it hundreds of times.

But when you have to put words to what you think you know at a moment you are not expecting– you suddenly discover you don’t know.

• You don’t know where to start.
• You don’t know what content to include.
• You don’t know what order to present the claims of the gospel.

You might know all the theology of the gospel, but when given a chance like what happened to me, the reaction is one of disorientation, not one of content.

Personal Evangelism training gives you the place to learn

• A functional outline to conversationally walk through
• A big picture framework

There are plenty of gospel summaries out there.  Each one of these can provide a script that we can use as a “default setting.”  We need to master one so that we can answer questions in a calm, clear, and concise manner.

Even though the disciples didn’t have any formal personal evangelism training, we can increase our confidence for those unexpected moments by taking regular ongoing personal evangelism training.

Personal evangelism training removes alot of the “I don’t know what to say” fear.

Next Steps in your  Personal Evangelism Training:

If you haven’t mastered a gospel outline, choose one from the List of Gospel Presentations and master it.

If you want more personal evangelism training, consider my personal evangelism audio course, a 5 CD set that can be shipped to your house.  It covers topic such as motivation, cooperating with the Holy Spirit in conversations, and testimony development, along with a basic gospel sharing plan.

You might be a stranger who has one conversation (like with a fellow passenger on the airplane), or a close friend that is able to have multiple spiritual conversations that shape a person’s journey to Christ.

As an evangelist and church planter, I have learned some ways to having more spiritual conversation opportunities than simply waiting for them to happen.  I echo these same four out of Gary Rorhmayer’s book: Spiritual Conversations.

1.  Make spiritual conversation a priority.

I regularly look at my day and wonder about the conversations I might have with people.  I look at my list of friends that I’m praying for and see if I’m being led to go have the next conversation with them.  If I’m at a stage of life where I don’t have enough contacts, I’ll work at making some.

I’ll also try to leave some margin in my day for a spiritual conversation if it pops up randomly in a divine appointment.

2.  Pray for Spiritual Conversation opportunities

I maintain a list of friends that I’m praying for.

After all, who am I praying to know the Lord.

Praying makes me more sensitive to the opportunities around me, and more sensitive to the spiritual thirst I might hear in a conversation.  Praying also makes me trust and learn the prompting of the Holy Spirit, to recognize that nudge that preceds a spiritual conversation.

3.  Get out into the community

In our current stage of our church plant, we are doing community exegesis, learning about the needs of the community around us.  We are making new contacts as we seek to involve ourselves in the community.

Likewise, consider joining a sports league, sailing club, or some kind of civic organization in your community.

Rohrmayer asks: What if you tithed 10% of your work hours to something in the community where you can build relationships.  If you are working 60 hours a week in your church plant, what can you do with 6 hours to make yourself available to the community?

4.  Establish routines and presence

One church I’m familiar with is regularly prayer walking the neighborhood.  They regularly pop-in the stores and visit with the owner or manager.  In such a way, they are building a ministry of presence and relationship with their community.  This routine will yield a great number of spiritual conversations.

I used to visit the same Starbucks and got the know the entire staff.  It didn’t take long before they’d come out from behind the counter and visit when business was slow.  I had lots of spiritual conversation simply by being present at the right time with people who had grown comfortable with me.

Next Steps:

Take a 30 day prayer challenge.

For the next 30 days, ask God each day to give you more spiritual conversations.

Spiritual thirst is what allows me to have normal conversations about my faith and the spiritual journey of the other person.  It’s their thirst that propels them to find solutions in Christ.

The concept of spiritual thirst has become a foundational element in my personal evangelism seminar and in my writings on personal evangelism.

For example

• What does Spiritual Thirst Look Like?
• Spiritual Thirst in the Gospels
• How does Spiritual Thirst open Conversational Doors.

Training others to hear that thirst.

One challenge for me has been to help others see spiritual thirst in their conversations or assess the level of spiritual thirst in another person.

Fortunately for me, I found a resource last year that fills in that gap.

Gary Rohrmayer’s book Spiritual Conversations: Creating and Sustaining Them Without Being a Jerk fills in the gap.

Since I read this book, I’ve done 4 webinars with Gary and sell his book at my seminar book table.  (Get your own copy via Amazon).  This little book is a short read, but if you take the time to think through the study questions and actually put some of those things into practice, I believe it will transform your life.

He writes:

There are basically two groups of people.  There are spiritual searchers and active followers of Jesus.

Within each group there are many different types of searchers and followers. There are those who casually approach spiritual things and there are those who are really intense in their search for true spirituality.

On the other side there are those who have discovered the liberating joy of Christianity, who are either brand new in their walk with Jesus or growing deeper in their faith; maturing in their faith.

But the thing that separates a spiritual searcher from a Christ follower is a faith commitment. A faith commitment is that defining moment when a person admits their spiritual need and discovers all that Jesus did for them and has said yes in their spirit to following Jesus as their risen Lord and only Savior.

With that concept of the journey around a faith commitment to Jesus, Gary has developed a useful tool that can help you have more spiritual conversations with people and assess their level of thirst.

A Tool to Assess Spiritual Thirst

Gary introduces a tool to diagnose or assess a person’s spiritual thirst.  It is a description of the spiritual journey to Christ in descriptive phrases

1. Hostile
2. Curious
3. Actively Seeking
4. Surrender

With each one, he provides a description of them.

As you go through the descriptions with people, they will naturally find the one closest to where they would describe themselves.

Then he gives you 4 questions you can ask of the person

1. Where are you now on your spiritual journey?
2. Where would you like to be on your spiritual journey in six months to a year?
3. What is standing between you and that point?
4. What will it take for you to remove those barriers? Or, how can I help you take the next step?

With this simple tool, you can determine a person’s level of spiritual thirst, and it is a natural conversation tool to go deeper about the goals a person has for their spiritual life.

I’ve been using this tool and it’s wonderful.  I even taught a church how to use this in their door to door campaign.

To order your printed versions of the Your Journey Guide, visit http://www.YourJourney.org

Order your copy of Spiritual Conversations from Amazon.