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.

Have you ever been with a group of people and felt like you just needed to talk to that person over there?

A sense that God was pointing out that particular person?

Phillip (in the story of Phillip and the Ethiopian Eunuch) was prompted to “Go Stand next to THAT chariot.”

Of all the chariots on the road that day, he was prompted to go next to one.

A moment with Friends

Maybe been with a friend, visiting in the coffee shop, and you have this unmistakable sense that they want to talk with you about their faith or yours?

Or maybe a friend has surprised you and started opening up about their faith struggle and search for God?

What are these moments?

These moments have the potential to become kairos moments, moments where we as Christians are aware of the gentle prompting of the Holy Spirit to pay attention and likely talk about faith.

The are moments that are full of possibilities for a persons spiritual journey towards Christ, where the person who are talking with may make more steps closer in their relationship with Jesus.

Some might call these divine appointments.

I call them kairos moments.

Here are some examples:

• God’s presence is with us. – My tutor hears the gospel
• Seminar Testimony – a wrong phone number
• Is he a PC USA Pastor? – Divine moment in Cracker Barrel
• What is an Evangelist? – Student wants a definition
• Reflections from Enfield CT – Wal-Mart Stories
• Evangelism Motives: Why bother? – taxi driver shares Jesus

Each conversation moment has been prepared and thanks to the working of the Holy Spirit another person makes another step forward towards discovering their relationship with Christ.

Some people search for God

Luke 19:1-10, the familiar story of Zacchaeus shows that noticing people and these divine appointments turns out to be more art than science.

Verse one says; “Jesus entered and walked through Jericho.”

Luke transitions from story to story with phrases letting you know that Christ was on the move.

On this particular day he came across a shunned tax collector named Zacchaeus whom we would place in the category of lost.

Nevertheless, verse 3 says that Zacchaeus “wanted desperately to see Jesus” (The Message).

The Greek rendering of the word “desperately” is zateo.

Zateo carries with it a meaning of a frantic pursuit. This is a very dramatic and passionate verb that Luke uses.

If you lost your child in a crowded public space, “zateo” describes the desperate search.

If your passport is missing the night before your international flight, zateo is the word to express the intensity of searching.

Do we believe that some people zateo Jesus?

They have been prepared and are so full of spiritual thirst they will do anything to find the water of life?

Jesus looks for them, rewarding their search.

Here’s what’s remarkable about Jesus. As he’s traveling along, he comes upon an ordinary tree and then does something extraordinary; he stops and notices! Jesus is busy, the religious crowd wants his attention and yet he stops and stares up at a tree. Go figure!

With all the travel language in the book of Luke, when Jesus stops it’s a big deal. What really happened at that tree could not be seen, the beauty is in the unseen.

When Jesus stopped at the tree of Zacchaeus, he ascribed worth to him and said that Zacchaeus mattered.

This was Jesus’ paradigm for letting people know that he cared about them—he stopped and noticed them. It wasn’t what Jesus said that was so compelling but what he did. In the economy of Jesus, Zaccheus had high value.

Others may grumble because you don’t do it right.

Verse 7 says, “Everyone who saw the incident was indignant and grumped, ‘What business does he have getting cozy with this crook?’ ”

Jesus was not playing the part correctly.

He was supposed to let Zacchaeus know how much he didn’t approve of his sin and share “the gospel” with him, which starts with an explanation of his failures.

Instead, Jesus stopped, noticed, called him by name and had a conversation with him on his turf.

The story ends with Jesus making this statement, “For the Son of Man came to find and restore the lost.”

The Greek verb that is translated ‘find and restore’ is none other than zateo.

The art of Noticing People

Apparently, Jesus is passionately pursuing the people formerly known as lost. Pursuing Jesus was his business, his passion, his reason for existence.

Jesus profoundly impacted Zacchaeus not by sharing good news with him, but by being good news to him on that day. He stopped and noticed.

If we want to be on mission with Jesus, we’ll need to relearn the lost art of noticing.

Some of those conversations will go deep.

Some of those conversations that happen will go deep.  Others will remain shallow.

I have experienced lots of moments where after noticing people as in the Zaccheus text, the opportunity to offer a piece of the gospel happens.

Sometimes I get to harvest what others have sown, other times I get to water what was already there.  Sometimes I get to plant a seed for the first time.

It all starts with noticing those promptings of the Holy Spirit.

Evangelism Coaching corner

For a 5 CD audio set that will help you with this, click on the banner below.

If you want more personalized coaching for you or your team over a 3-4 month period, see our

• Personal Evangelism Coaching services page.
• Evangelism Team Coaching Page

Conversations appear.  You don’t have to force a conversation.  Conversations about faith simply show up. 

The challenge is then how to listen to their spiritual thirst and listen to the work of the Holy Spirit to help the other person discover their next step towards faith.

Here is a recent testimony from a pastor’s wife after a recent Fear Free Evangelism Seminar.  Notice that they took the initiative to pray first and then the conversations unfolded. 

My husband and I attended a Christmas party on our street last evening. All of the people on the street were invited. This is a first since we have lived here.

I connected with an older woman in her 80′s. After probably 30 minutes of conversation, she said, “Is your husband a minister?” I replied, “yes.”

She shared about being raised in a strict Catholic home (very common in our town), but she doesn’t “practice it” anymore. She hasn’t since she was about 18.

I asked why?

She said it was the confession to the priest that turned her off.

I asked if she had ever tried any other church.  She said no. She never wanted to.  But, she hastened to assure me she believes in God and do it their “own way.”  She said religion has never been a real priority.

She began to make a negative comment about “these born-again Christians.”  I felt very peaceful in gently saying to her, “I’m a born-again Christian.” She apologized and I said, “Oh, no. I understand.”

About then her husband and a young woman joined us. The husband said, “I’m reading the Bible.” and the young woman said, “That’s on my list, too.”

The older woman said, “It’s too hard to understand. I tell him he’s just reading it to make him sleepy.” She and her sister had tried to read it when they were young and “there was no one to explain what it meant” to them. They couldn’t understand it.

By this time, my husband joined us. I asked the husband what version of the Bible he’s reading and he said the King James. I said, “Oh, you could read a more modern version.” I don’t think he even knew there were other versions.  I told him we could give him one and I plan to take it to their house.

We parted with hugs and the older lady invited me to come to visit them and bring my grandson.

I was amazed that my husband and I were talking with three of our neighbors about reading the Bible!! But, we did pray before we went to the party.

Now my husband wants to make a list of our neighbors and pray for them. He talked with some people that I didn’t. I’m very excited about how God may what to use us here.

This is an excellent step in growing.  The conversation was natural, and I already know that the Bible has been delivered.  That led to a follow-up conversation that may turn into an investigative Bible study.

See another testimony at: Fear Free Evangelism Case Study.

Let me ask you this?

Have you spent time asking God to whom are you going to speak with today?  Do you notice those who cross your path?

If you would like a Fear Free Evangelism Seminar in your area, give me a call at 335-1445 to discuss how I might be able to come to your area.

• Are there good programs available?
• What program do you recommend?
• How do I as a pastor train my church to do evangelism?
• What resources are good for us?

The best form of personal evangelism training is simply to do it and have debriefing sessions after the event to help one reflect on the spiritual conversations that have occurred.

It might feel clumsy at the beginning, and a little awkward, but with the progress of the training, conversations will get easier to have and become more comfortable.

One Example of Evangelism Training

One idea is to consider a small group that focuses on accountability to have a spiritual conversation each week.

The conversation can be between friends, or with a stranger that God underlines for you.

The group could meet weekly with the sole purpose of

1. Praying for each other to have the eyes to see whom God is underlining.
2. Discuss your evangelistic conversations since the prior meeting.
3. Debrief the conversations to discern what worked and what didn’t.
4. Dismiss again till next time.

The group doesn’t study an evangelism book, think about welcoming visitors, or read academic treaties between incarnational evangelism vs. proclamational evangelism, missional vs. attractional church growth, or emergent postmodernism.

The group simply focuses on the spiritual practice of evangelism — having evangelistic conversations and holding each other accountable to it.

Debriefing the conversations

Some questions I like to ask are:

1. “How did God point out that person to you?”
2. “Where did you notice God was already at work?”
3. “What was their spiritual thirst?”
4. “What would you do differently?”
5. “What did you share about Christ?”

Let me ask you this?

• Do you have a similar evangelism group?
• What does your church do for personal evangelism training?

Let me suggest:

Send me via email what your church does for evangelism training and I will send you a list of 99 questions to launch an evangelistic conversation.

See also: Effective Evangelism Training Lab Time, Evangelism Training.

Evangelism Training Study Course

For a home study course on personal evangelism, consider my course:

Mathew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

She talked about her attempts trying to walk the straight and narrow, but that it was difficult and full of problems.

God has prepared the way

In God’s sovereignty, we talked at a moment where the circumstances of life were overpowering and she’s looking for God’s comfort.

It’s hard to communicate in words the emotional context of her struggle.

A tired, single mother, working 2 if not 3 jobs, having the cost of living go up substantially, and struggling to keep her little family afloat and raise her infant child in these circumstances.

All of us have moments when we think the world is crashing.  Sometimes those are passing moments, and we get back up on our feet and plow ahead.  Sometimes, we take these anxieties before the Lord and ask him for His peace and move forward.

Other times, those moments are not passing and we remain in a state of anxiety, a restless mind that keeps us awake at night and peace is hard to find.  Though we might even have faith in Christ, the body remains restless.

We talked in a divinely appointed moment where the circumstances of life were crowding in.

Asking Questions

Many of the questions I asked felt inspired in the moment.

They weren’t scripted, they weren’t part of my morning devotions.  Rather, they were prompted as a result of the kairos moment we were having on the 2nd floor in the corner McDonalds.

This is God’s working, and being sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit.

“Why is the narrow road better?” I asked.

“It just is what I’ve been taught, I don’t know why.  Because it leads to eternal life?”

“Eternal life is for mañana.  What difference do you think that makes right now?”

“I don’t know.”

God’s presence

She’s right, it does lead to eternal life.

But something I believe God showed me at the moment was that walking along the narrow way with Jesus is just that — he is with us.

The narrow way is better NOW because God is with us.

We can face the challenges of today with God’s presence.  No matter what the world throws at us, nor our circumstances, the narrow way is better because we can know and experience God’s presence.

One of the most amazing promises of the bible is this: “Lo, I will be with you until the end of the age.”

My testimony = My experience with God.

We discussed this promise at length.

She invited me to tell stories of how I know this to be true.

My testimony wasn’t about how I came to know the Lord, but rather I came to know this verse to be true.  How I came to know that the narrow way is better because I can experience God’s presence.

I was the credible witness, a living example of someone who can experience God’s comfort in the midst of struggle.

The more I shared about knowing God’s presence, the deeper the conversation went.

The more evident the spiritual thirst became.  I could see God drawing this person to Himself.

The final question for this conversation

After spending the two hours talking about all sorts of things, this question rose to the surface.  In the relational context we had established, this question was normal, and non-threatening.

“What keeps you from following Jesus today?” I asked.

“Fear.”

“Fear of what? Can you tell me?”

I won’t go into some of the answers as that’s part of the private conversation.  Clearly, my conversation partner wants some more time to think, consider, wrestle, examine, pick your own verb.  She’s counting the cost.

There will be more conversations in the future.  But for now, there is a huge step forward in her journey to Christ.

Let me ask you this?

Would you join me in prayer for this person?

For more information on my thoughts on spiritual thirst, click some of the related links below.

Talk #2 in the Fear Free evangelism Study Course is all about spiritual thirst and the role it plays in drawing people to start following Jesus.

But, I also want to point out how the Holy Spirit prepares the way for evangelism to occur naturally.

Phillip and the Ethiopian

Consider Phillip and the Ethiopian Eunuch.

Clearly the Spirit of God was at work in the life of the Eunuch.

• He had gone to Jerusalem to worship.
• He was reading Scripture.
• He wanted someone to explain Scripture to him.

The eunuch had a spiritual thirst, created by the Holy Spirit, and he was busy searching to slake that thirst. He was like the merchant looking for the fine pearl.

Easy Conversation

This was an easy conversation to for Phillip to participate in.

He didn’t have to

• argue with a loud voice
• apologetically stand up for his faith
• use the 10 commandments as a hammer.
• verbally convince the eunuch of his sinfulness.
• spend 10,000 words arguing God’s existence.
• rationally defend against opposite worldviews.

The Holy Spirit had prepared the way.

The Holy Spirit had gone ahead of Phillip.

Both Sides of the Equation

There are two individuals involved in this story. One seeking faith, and the other obediently positioning himself to share his faith. Two sides of an equation.

The conversation would not have happened that day if both parties were not in the same GPS location at the same time, an encounter brought about in the sovereignty of God.

Both Sides of the Equation

The Holy Spirit was working in Phillip and the Eunuch. To borrow a phrase from my old algebra teacher, God was working “Both sides of the equation.”

As you do personal evangelism, notice how God is already at work in preparing the harvest field for you. He has gone ahead of you!

Let me ask you this?

In your personal evangelism efforts, are you aware of God going ahead of you?

Are you noticing that when you are attentive to the Holy Spirit that you find those people where He is already at work?

Want to learn more?

Get the 5 CD set at the banner below

We are the only North American family in the place (by American — they mean me, the English speaker).

God has used this little church in ways to allow me to experience some healing and growth in my life, even though Spanish is not in my native language.

The service is in Spanish: prayers, announcements, greetings, offering, Scripture reading, and preaching. I get maybe 70% of it at this point.

Last night, one of our first time visitors didn’t speak Spanish at all, but she stayed for the entire service.

During a time of “come forward for prayer for whatever” she came forward and Pastor invited me to come and pray with our guest (as I’m the only attendee that speaks English as my first language).

Among other questions, I asked her, “What brought you here?”

“I want to feel Jesus.”

Reflections:
Some people experience spiritual thirst as a desire to experience the presence of God. Some are drawn to the sacred experience that is found in worship. They seek Jesus by coming to church. Drawn by the mystery of the sacred. . . . .

Our music isn’t perfect, we sing in various pitches (read — occasionally off key), typos in the overheads. But when we are lost in worship, that doesn’t matter.

As God inhabits the praises of his people, even when the words are unknown, God may make his presence tangible enough for those seeking Him to know his presence.

Let me ask you this:
Would you pray that people would be drawn to Jesus?

• An Intercessor’s Burden — Getting worked up
• Cultural Connections — From Athens to Machu Picchu

This started as part of a conversation over at Evangelism Action, but will take much more than just a comment to tease out.

Spiritual Thirst propels a search

Spiritual thirst is a way of describing a person’s own search for God.

What motivates a person to seek after God?

In the parable of the merchant searching for the fine pearl — he is propelled to find it because he knows it’s out there. He looks, and looks, and looks.

There is a “thirst” to propel him to find it. When he doesn’t find it, he keeps looking. When he finds it, he has that “Eurkea” moment.

If you are noticing people, spiritual thirst can lead to moments of conversation in divine appointments.

Spiritual Thirst in Athens

While wandering around Athens (Acts 17), Paul gets a sense of the spiritual thirst of the Athenians. He even appreciates their thirst, in complementing them on the quest for God. He says “I see that you are very religious . . . I found an altar to an unknown God.”

He has picked up on their spiritual thirst – the desire to know God.

When Paul was in Athens, he must have said something that brought them to the point of asking “May we hear you more about this matter?” (v.19)

They were thirsty for more information, self-propelled to learn more. Paul saw they were thirsty (manifested in the all the statues, including an altar to an unknown God).

He started where they were.

The Spiritual Thirst of the Eunuch

The Ethiopian Eunch was spiritually thirsty.

He had gone to Jersualem for a worship event to connect with God, yet it wasn’t satisfying enough.

On the way home was reading Isaiah.

He’s spiritually thirsty, knowing that he hadn’t found it yet. By God’s sovereign grace (working both sides of the equation), Phillip was there to explain. The Ethiopian found it — wanted to be baptized. Phillips explanation slaked that spiritual thirst.

(Listen to an audio sermon download on Phillip and the Ethiopian)

Spiritual Thirst yearns for the Water of Life.

Spiritual thirst is the underlying motive that people have to seek after God, to start and continue their search for God.

It could be guilt over sin, it could be a longing for honest community, it could be guidance and direction, among some ideas.

It could be a stark realization that the person has made a giant mess of their life.

The gospel can speak to each one of these.

Let me ask you this?
What “spiritual thirst” have you encountered in the people that you talk with?

Along the way, we got to learn alot about the Inca culture that built the city, and some of its beautiful architecture, likely from the 15th century AD (1450s or so).

Like the apostle Paul in Athens, we got to spend the day wandering around the remains of the city.

Spiritual Thirst in the Culture

We learned about their spirituality as we wondered among their temple ruins.

History books and archelogists fill in the story that these stones tell.

We were filled with awe at how their stones were laid together without mortar, and with gaps so small that a sliver of paper wouldn’t slide between.

We awed over how these buildings had withstood earthquakes because of the way they were engineered together.

We were amazed at how their spirituality and architecture intertwined with building placement and design.

Among the ruins, one paricular stone caught my eye. It has been named the Southern Cross stone. It is a stone (pictured here) in the shape of the constellation in the southern hemisphere called the Southern Cross.

Etched into this stone is the cross itself (not visibile in the picture).

The slope of the stone, and the direction of its apex points right to the red giant star that is in the Constellation.

Here in an ancient culture, a hundred years before the Spaniards came, is a foreshawdowing of God’s witness in the cross.

Make of this what you will. To me, it reflects some spiritual thirst they may have had and felt drawn to the cross.

Maybe they didn’t know what it meant, but it was a part of their spirituality. This stone sits near one corner of the principal temple at the site of Machu Picchu.

When Paul saw an “Altar to an Unknown God” in Athens, he used it as a bridge to explain the gospel.

He knew they were spiritualy thirsty and weren’t quite satisfied. Perhaps these Incas were not quite satisfied with their spirituality either and wondered what the cross might have meant. It’s something already in the culture that we could use to help explain the gospel of God’s grace.

In our evangelism, we can use bridges to the culture that are already there. There is a sense of spiritual thirst that every person has, but some realize it more than others. Our culture bears some witness to this thirst and to where satisfaction can be found.

Let me ask you this?

What kinds of spiritual thirst have you seen or heard in people?

So what?

Next time you are in a conversation, listen for a spiritual thirst.