A Revolution in Evangelism 11.1.1969 — George Verwer

This is session number one of an international student rally held at the University of London Students' Union on Saturday and Sunday the 11th and 12th of January 1969. In this recording George Verwer speaks on a revolution in world evangelism.

Several times during the message he moves away from the microphone to indicate items on a map. As he does so the amplification of the recording equipment is increased to maintain the level of speech and this results in a pronounced increase in the background noise at these points.

Experiencing God’s Mercy in Mexico

We trust however that it will not disturb your meditation on this vital subject. Here now is George Verwer. There's a verse in the Old Testament that speaks about how we can experience being mounted up on wings of eagles and over these past weeks as we've had so many meetings and have been in the midst of our crusade in Mexico this is what we have experienced and we know many of you have been praying.

How many of you have been praying for the crusade in Mexico? Raise your hand. Quite a few of you. The Lord probably gave us the biggest campaign yet for this two week period, holiday period. We had 240 universities and college students from all over the United States and Mexico target in on probably one of the most sinful or wicked cities in the world, the city of Juarez.

Some estimate one out of every three women in that city is a prostitute and it's just a complete Sodom and Gomorrah situation, El Paso and Juarez. And yet night after night in the meetings and in the door to door and personal evangelism the Lord brought men and women to himself.

We have experienced his mercy there. There's a great flu epidemic, the Hong Kong flu I guess is probably here as well. This looked like it was going to wipe us out. Some of the schools where students were coming from were completely closed before the campaign and yet among all these 240 or so young people we had hardly a single case of this flu.

And the young people came safely down, some of them making a trip of two and a half thousand miles to get there. It's a bit of a run for Chris' season. And the Lord kept his hand upon each car and each person.

God’s Preparation for Evangelistic Ministry

And during this time we of course, before this time and since this campaign we've been having many other meetings and God in answer to prayer has just opened up all kinds of unique opportunity to challenge face to face many thousands with this message.

On Sunday we were in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and God brought great numbers to the meeting and then Monday in Wheaton where we faced 1 ,500 students in the Wheaton student body and then on Tuesday in the Moody Bible Institute, again 1 ,000 or so students and Wednesday in Grace College in Winona Lake.

And in each one of these places it's so obvious and I don't just say this, it's so easy to say this but the Lord had gone ahead of us and just sensed it. And I've never sensed in my ministry such liberty in speaking, especially in difficult situations.

You get 1 ,500 students, most of them ultra critical to say the least and you're given 22 minutes to speak. Well, if any of you know me, 22 minutes to speak, you might as well put me in a bird cage and ask me to whistle.

And yet in that one situation I'm thinking of, I actually had finished, I could already believe it but before the 22 minutes was up, I didn't have anything more to say. My heart was empty and I was ready to sit down and let the Lord work from there.

And we believe that the same Lord who's been with us in Honolulu and Washington and Los Angeles and Mexico City where many hundreds of Mexicans came. I've hardly spoken Spanish for eight years and yet the Lord just brought all the words back and though we devoured the grammar, we communicated and it was a great blessing.

Graham Scott has been a terrific impact as well in all of these meetings, giving his testimony and challenging people about the ship. And I would say that interest in this ship in the United States has tripled in the last three weeks.

And there are people that are united with us to believe that this ship will be on sea in this year, 1969. And God is pressing us very much in that direction. There's so much I could speak to you about, but you know the thing that has been so thrilling in these past days and this trip is the Lord has been continuing to teach me what I believe is the true secret, whatever way you may come to it, of living for Christ.

Complete Daily Dependence on Christ

And that's total daily dependence upon Him. In my flesh there's only one place I want to be and that's back with my wife and family. Some of you know I can't stand airplanes. I hate them with a passion and they make me nervous in the flesh.

The Lord usually calms it over, but especially when we start to drop a few feet up there, it seems to come right back despite all of my faith. So I have a long way to go yet. But each day, without my family plus so many of these flights, I've just seen that it's just complete dependence on Him.

And that's the Christian life. He won't let us. He doesn't want to let us or allow us to get to any other place than that place of complete, absolute dependence on Him. Not on oil, not on machinery, but on Him.

The Biblical Call to World Evangelism

Praise God. Now, if our boys can eventually get up here with this map, we'll go into our first subject for this morning, entitled, A Revolution in World Evangelism. And I hope that some of you will, maybe all of you, take some notes about some of these things.

Please turn in your Bibles to that famous passage, Romans chapter 10. Romans chapter 10, that famous passage on evangelism and on the gospel ministry, beginning at verse 11. For the Scripture says, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.

It's a wonderful verse, isn't it? For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek. For the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent?

As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things. They have not all obeyed the gospel, for Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed, I report.

So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. So many times I have read this passage of Scripture, and it has spoken to my heart again and again. When we think of the task of world evangelism, and we look at this map of the world, which represents 3 ,000 million people, we can easily become overwhelmed, very easily, because we realize that it's an impossible task.

Population Growth and the Global Evangelistic Crisis

In some places evangelism continues to go backward at an enormous rate, not because there are no missionaries, not because nothing's being done, but because of the gigantic population explosion that is taking place around the world.

In India, for example, this little country over here, it looks new compared to Africa and South America, there are 13 million more people every year. This means an area or a population equivalent to that of London, more actually, is added to India every year.

Recently I was in Pakistan, in East, I was in East and West, but I was especially thinking of East Pakistan. East Pakistan, that little area under my one finger, much smaller than the British Isles, equivalent to perhaps the land of Scotland, has 60 million people.

I don't know if you're aware of the fact that right now many are starving to death in East Pakistan. I was meeting with a British engineer, he was traveling to East Pakistan, working for a marine company that charters small ships to go out to these huge American wheat ships to bring the wheat into Chittagong, which is a port that's too small for these huge super freighters.

And he was telling me how many, they estimate, are going to perish from famine in East Pakistan. But this exploding population makes it almost impossible to catch up with the problems that face these lands.

Of course, when we think of South America, we also think of exploding populations. Where we were in Mexico recently, there are now 40 million people. Some ways Mexico, in terms of its poverty and suffering, seems the same way it was when I was first there 10 years ago.

During the cold time in Northern Mexico, where we were, people were dying in the night because of the cold. And we could take an enormous amount of time this morning talking about country after country and discussing the impossible situation that has come to pass because of population explosion.

Prince Philip, some time ago, said that half the world was going to bed on a diet that would reduce the average Westerner to skin and bone. Perhaps it isn't as true in 1969 as it has been previously, but there's still a lot of truth to that statement.

The Church Must Awaken to Extraordinary Crisis

And I believe that this world situation that we face demands some intensive thinking. I believe that the Church must wake up to the fact that we are living in a time of crisis. In Tozer's book, Born After Midnight, I copied this quotation.

In times of extraordinary crisis, ordinary measures will not suffice. The world lives in such a time of crisis. Christians alone are in a position to rescue the perishing. We dare not settle down to try to live as if things were normal.

Nothing is normal. Nothing is normal while sin and lust and death roam the world, pouncing upon one another till the whole population has been destroyed. To me it has always been difficult to understand those evangelical Christians who insist upon living in the crisis as if no crisis existed.

They say they serve the Lord, but they divide their days so as to leave plenty of time to play and loaf and enjoy the pleasures of the world as well. They are at ease while the world burns, and they can furnish many convincing reasons for their conduct, even quoting scriptures if you press them just a bit.

How true it is that we live in the midst of this enormous crisis. Many of us as if no crisis existed. And the first stage of revolution in evangelism must always be revolution in our own personal lives, without any doubt.

Personal Transformation as the Beginning of Evangelism

All over the United States and Mexico in the past few weeks, I have been reading a very devastating quotation, two devastating quotations. One of them is from C .S. Lewis and the other is from J .B. Phillips.

J .B. Phillips in his book Ring of Truth said this, and I believe it represents the core of the problem. Here is the first and most deadly casualty in our modern pattern of thought. You might want to write that down.

That we do not seriously believe that God is willing to penetrate the inner springs of human character and begin a solitary revolution there. This disbelief is our incalculable loss. So perhaps hear that quotation again before this weekend is through.

But this is the core of the problem, and this is where we must begin this morning in this first hour of our weekend together, with the conviction that God can bring to pass a revolution in our own lives.

Otherwise, talking about evangelism, talking about India, talking about the Middle East is all a gigantic waste of time. It has to start on a personal level. Tozer said the popular notion that the first obligation of the Church is to spread the gospel to the uttermost parts of the earth is false.

Her first obligation is to be spiritually worthy to spread it. To spread an effete degenerate brand of Christianity to pagan lands is not to fulfill the Great Commission. Revolution in evangelism firstly involves a revolution in our own lives, a revolution in our living, a revolution in our thinking, a revolution in the way we approach such things as the race problem.

Social Upheaval and the Need for Christian Action

As some of you perhaps know, there will be a huge demonstration today in London. Though we tend to move out in the streets with literature, I'm afraid there'll be something 20 times as large as us, as there's going to be a race demonstration, black power demonstration, and some other combination of demonstrators.

I only heard about it on the plane in the center of London today. I'm sure it's not a coincidence that we have gathered at this time. May God give us that wisdom and strength as we go out even this afternoon.

Wherever we go, we see these demonstrations. I can hardly believe when I'm back in the States that I'm in the same country I left 10 years ago. It is incredible. The riots that are spreading now into high schools, the dope addiction that's spreading into high schools, and the immorality that is just accepted as the common day.

The universities in California, the boys and men and women are living together and no one is saying anything about it. It's just as much a part of school life as drinking. And people are just shocked.

In many of our cities now, it's absolutely impossible to walk through the streets. Cook County reported last week, this is the county around Chicago, that last year more were killed with weapons than with automobiles.

Some 20 or 40 higher in the 600 bracket were killed with lethal weapons by accidents and by shootings last year. We see that it is an hour in which we realize revolution is absolutely necessary. Billy Graham said we are dangerously near to saying to the prodigal son it's not necessary to return to your father and home.

We can make you comfortable in the pig pen. We are so totally concerned with material comforts rather than the proclamation of the good news which he so desperately needs. And I'm convinced that this revolution in our personal lives must touch every area of our living.

It's not just going to be some pseudo-religious glow coat. It's going to be something that penetrates the very inner springs of our heart. As J .B. Phillips said, something that goes to the very depths of our personality and brings to pass a vital transformation.

It was Eric Fyfe, an Englishman who is one of the leaders of inter-varsity in America, who said today we have perhaps a higher standard of academic preparation for the mission field than ever before.

But it is unfortunately true that there are very few candidates. Get that. There are very few candidates whose prayer and conversation are such as have a heartwarming quality. Revolution and missions, absolutely essential.

Where does it begin? It begins in our personal lives. We'll be talking about this revolution in our personal lives in quite a few of our meetings this weekend. But with this as a foundation and the background of our thinking, let us turn our eyes to this little map of the world.

Reaching Unreached Cities: Thailand and Bangkok

Let us try to picture some of the situations that we're facing over here in these various areas of the world. As some of you know, I'm living at present in Bangkok. When I went to Bangkok, Thailand, I thought, well, this is a country I certainly don't want to work in.

Missionaries have been here for years. And I was there only as a faith for India. That's because I had to go to Singapore to take part in the Asian Congress on evangelism. There are many missionaries in Thailand.

Just before I left Thailand, I was sitting down at lunch with the director of WECC in Thailand. And we were discussing evangelism. We were discussing the need to reach the masses. He told me how very few people were working in evangelism in the city of Bangkok, where there are several million people.

Missionaries are mainly in the tribes in the north and in other parts of the nation. The great urban area, the massive city of Bangkok, is relatively unreached. There's been hardly any massive evangelistic effort.

In fact, he told me that he didn't know anyone hardly in the entire nation of Thailand that was engaged in door-to-door evangelism or any kind of cold-portage work. And the flow of literature out across that nation is unbelievably low.

Yet the nation is so wide open to the preaching of the gospel. We Americans don't even need visas. And there are tens of thousands of Americans in Thailand, which, as some of you know, is the main American ally in Asia, where all the bomber bases are.

And though OM is not planning any official work in Thailand, I would appreciate your prayers, as I've been asked to address a large number of all the Christian leaders in Thailand on the 5th of February when I return.

Evangelistic Partnerships in Pakistan

But again, I've received what I have received in nation after nation, the unbelievable shock that though there are missionaries there, dedicated missionaries, the job is far from complete. And I'm just overwhelmed when I get in the midst of such situations.

As I mentioned, I was in Pakistan for some time. What a thrill it was to meet with Phil Farshel in East Pakistan. Phil was a young man who received his vision for the Muslim world through attending our prayer meetings at Moody back eight years ago.

God touched his heart concerning Muslims, and he heard me once give a challenge concerning East Pakistan, a country that has been on my heart for about 10 years. He went to Mexico with OM and received his training down in a very hot city with a similar climate as East Pakistan on the same latitude.

And he's over there now. After a number of years in which they felt no mass evangelism could be done, they're literally begging us to come in with an OM team. In fact, they've somehow persuaded a Southern Baptist church to supply all the finance and pay the whole thing.

We're still not going, but anyway, he's there and is now the field director of his mission. I mention this because the strategy of OM in this revolution for evangelism is not to become a man-made organization with all the answers that's going to do the job.

That isn't the goal, nor will it ever take place. Our burden is that somehow young people in training with us for a year or a summer, though it's hard to do it in the summer, may experience this revolution, may experience new life and reality in Christ, and that eventually may end up working with all the various evangelical societies and missions throughout the world.

And I'm convinced that this is a great or a very important part of the strategy the Lord has given us. Here's a young man trained with us. Here's a young man who received his vision with us. And it was certainly a young man with a heart after God who was already, after five years on the field, appointed as the field director for his very well-known mission in East Pakistan.

Young people trained with OM are now in more than 30 nations, working with 20 or more various mission societies and evangelistic groups. And I believe this is one of the ways that we can see revolution in missions and in evangelism.

Preparing Workers for Nepal and Afghanistan

Now, as some of you know, I have been basing myself part of the time, and may move there, semi-permanently, in the land of Nepal. You've always heard talk about Nepal being closed and you can't evangelize there.

Nepal has 10 million people. Among those 10 million, there are probably less than 150 who know Jesus Christ. Their illiteracy is approximately, not literacy, illiteracy, 95%. 95%. There are almost no roads in the entire nation.

Young men who are going to reach the Nepali for Christ is going to have to know something about exercises. I doubt if the OM 10-minute sprint at 6 .30 in the morning is going to be quite enough to put men in shape for climbing the Himalayas to reach these hundreds of thousands and millions of Nepalis for Jesus Christ.

Pray as we're opening, Lord willing, a bookshop, an educational bookshop, as a sort of a front for evangelistic work in Nepal. As some of you know, I'm not able to get into India at present, but being able to get into Nepal actually is putting me in a better position for our work in North India than when I was in Bombay.

It's hard to believe, but from Patna, the center of Bihar, to Kathmandu, it's about 3 pound 10 by air, an incredibly strategic place. And we would appreciate your prayers as unbelievable open doors have come in that town or in that city and in that nation.

West Pakistan is another unbelievable situation with a small number of missionaries per person. Afghanistan has 14 million people. Actually, no one really knows the population. They only figure it out by the tea consumption.

I don't know whether they learned that from the British or what. But they know how much tea is imported. All tea has to be imported. And they know how much the average Afghan drinks. And so they divide and what else?

And they try to come up with a population statistic. It's either 14 million or they're drinking more tea than they should. Just recently in Mexico, I was with Gordon Magnet, whose sights for eight years have been on Afghanistan.

You know, I believe this is what's needed in this revolution in evangelism. Men who not only point a finger to a particular difficult country, maybe a communist land or a closed Muslim land, but then who are ready to go through the training, the discipline, the breaking, the teaching that's necessary to prepare a man for that kind of work.

And so there's been seven years of breaking, teaching, more than that, of course, preparing Gordon and his wife, who, Lord willing, will launch out to work completely with the other Christian workers who are already there this March.

Afghanistan is a land of unbelievable need. I was with Christy Wilson, a man considered the leader of Christian work there, over in the Asian Congress on evangelism. We came to a little night of prayer that we arranged in the midst of the Congress.

And I asked him to share something about Afghanistan. And very confidentially, in terms of public news, not in terms of sharing in a meeting like this, he mentioned that there were perhaps less than five baptized believers among the Afghans.

Secret believers, he said there may be another five. How in the world can we possibly even begin to think that the task of world evangelism is over when we think of situations like this? And yet in this so-called closed country, men like Gordon Magney have received a scholarship to study at the University of Kabul.

And I believe that God is going to move in Afghanistan in these days to come. It's going to take, however, a revolution in our thinking, a revolution in evangelism.