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It recently occurred to me that in the short time that I have been an active soul-winner for Jesus Christ, that I have had some pretty interesting experiences. I have no doubt that if we got a room full of soul-winners together and talked about our most memorable soul-winning experiences that we could be telling stories for days on end. I have decided to write down some memorable soul-winning experiences I have had. I don't know if anyone will be interested in reading this or not, but I would like to be able to remember these stories for a long time, and if anyone else can be entertained or motivated by them that just makes it that much better. If you have any interesting stories you would like to share, please send me an email and tell me and I'll add it to this site if you like.
--One of the first (if not actually the first) houses I door-knocked was a lady probably in her late 40s or early 50s. I was with my soul-winning trainer, Tim, and he was doing the talking. He chatted with her for a few minutes and then asked her if she had a church she went to. I believe she said she went to the Congregational Church. Tim asked her if she were to die tonight, was she 100% sure she would go to Heaven. She quickly said that she knew she wouldn't. Tim then asked her if he could take just a few minutes to show her from the Bible how she could know for sure she was going to Heaven. She said no. Tim then asked her if he could leave a short Sunday school lesson with her (a tract). She said no again. We then closed our conversation and moved on. It just amazes me how a person can flat out say, "I know I am going to Hell when I die" and then tell you they don't want to know how to go to Heaven. Especially people who "go to church". It also amazes me that people can go to church their whole lives, and never know if they are going to Heaven or not.
--I was with Tim again on a different evening knocking doors when we came across a lady who was probably in her 60s. She was very pleasant to talk to and seemed pretty open to talking with us. That is until Tim asked her the question. She said no and then she told us she had to go. She needed to go pick asparagus (or something like that). If that lady doesn't get saved before she dies (and I pray she does) she will be thinking about the time she had a chance to accept Christ, but chose to go pick asparagus instead. And now she is burning forever.
--Tim and I talked to a couple (about in their 40s) and their teenage son in their backyard one night. The couple were sitting in their lawn chairs drinking wine while we chatted with them for a bit. Tim then asked the question and they told us that they were pretty sure they would go to Heaven when they died. The man did most of the talking (kind of a surprise these days) and told us that they live good lives and they help people out a lot. Their son responded to the question too. He said, "I don't think anyone can know for sure they're going to Heaven when they die. You just have to have faith." That was the smartest thing anyone in that family said the whole evening (the faith part, that is). Tim explained to them that the Bible talks about our inability to work our way to Heaven and explained the actual way to Heaven. He gave them a Gospel tract and explained to the son that he is exactly right about having faith. He explained that faith is the way we get to Heaven. We have to have faith in Jesus Christ and what He did on the cross for us. None of them accepted Christ and we moved on.
--Tim and I visited a coworker of his. She and her husband had recently become parents and he wanted to visit them and use that as an opportunity to witness to them. They were an extremely nice young couple and had a beautiful baby. As I recall, she was a Catholic, but not a very active one. The husband I believe was Catholic also and claimed to know for sure that he was going to Heaven. She on the other hand was not so sure. Tim proceeded to show her from the Bible how she could know for sure. She didn't get saved because she was about to start taking some Catholic "doctrine" classes at the base chapel. She wanted to get a better understand of the Catholic "faith" and a better understanding of the Bible as well. We visited her several other times but were never successful in winning her to Christ. I have never in my life been closer to going straight to the chapel and beating some sense into that Chaplain. I pray that she does eventually get saved, but if she doesn't, her blood is going to be on that chaplain's hands that's for sure.
--My wife and I were out soul-winning one night when I decided to go visit a couple of my coworkers. I had felt the Holy Spirit laying this couple on my heart for quite some time, and had in fact gone to their house a few times before, but they were never home. But this night they were both home. We went inside an chatted with them for a while and then I launched into the plan. Neither one of them were sure about Heaven and I began taking them down the Romans Road. I got finished sharing the verses with them and then asked them if we could pray. They agreed and I began to pray for God to convict them and for them to receive Christ at this time. Now, as you can understand this would be the worst point for an interruption and that is exactly what the devil did. He picked the worst possible time to interrupt us and had a meat salesman knock on the door while I was praying. I stopped praying and looked up and told them to go ahead and get the door. The wife answered the door and the whole time she was gone (which was probably only a minute or so, but felt like forever to me) I was praying for the Holy Spirit to remain here and convict their hearts. When she came back I back-tracked a little bit and then asked them if they would like to receive Christ right now. They both said yes!! I nearly fell off the couch. This was the first time I had ever had someone say yes to that question. I was so excited I almost forgot what to do next. But I was able to lead that couple to the Lord, despite the devil's attempts to stop it. The devil is no match for God Almighty!!
--My wife and I were out again one night and came across the house of a little old British lady in her nightgown and house coat. She invited us in (and we were happy to go because it was freezing outside) and we chatted with her for a while. She explained to us that she goes to the Lutheran church (there are two of them here, one with a female "pastor" and the other a man). I attempted several times to get her to tell me if she was going to Heaven or not and her response was always to tell me of all the great things she does for the church. I asked her if I could show her some verses from the Bible about knowing for sure you're going to Heaven and she began to explain to me that she had taught Sunday School for longer than I have been alive (I was 24 at the time) and that there is nothing I can tell her that she doesn't already know. So I said, well then you must know that the Bible says in Eph 2:8-9 and Titus 3:5 that you can't work your way to Heaven. Oh yes, I know that. So have you accepted Christ? Well you know I do this and I do that and blah blah blah... OK fine. She talked our legs off about how good a person she is and then told us to come back and see her again sometime. I tell you what, if we could work our way to Heaven, this lady would be first in line. She probably is first in line, only problem is that she's in the wrong line.
--I was knocking doors with my very good friend Lance one night when we came to a house where the wife answered the door. The husband came to the door about the time we were just introducing ourselves. Lance was talking and after a little bit of chatting he asked them where they go to church. They said they were Catholic and Lance asked them if they knew for sure they were going to Heaven when they die. The wife quickly turned her expression to a frown and said "I don't think that's any of your business." Lance said OK and thanked them for their time. The husband was clearly embarrassed by his wife's rude response but was too much of a woman to tell his wife to shut her yapper and listen to what we had to say. Instead of standing up and being a man, he's going to let his wife send him to Hell.
--I used to run a bus route to pick up kids and take them to church on Sunday mornings. One day I was out knocking doors trying to meet new kids to take to church. One of my helpers, Pablo, was with me when we came upon a house where there were three boys (all about 6-10 yrs old) sitting around. We began to talk to them about the bus route and one of the little boys got really excited about riding the bus to church and took us to his house to let us talk to his mom about riding that next Sunday. His mom was very nice and sounding very enthusiastic about her son riding the bus. She said that her and her husband were looking for a church to go to and that she would come to church that Sunday. Her husband was going to be out of town and she decided to bring her son to church with her before the let him ride the bus. I clearly felt the Holy Spirit leading me to witness to her right then and there, but I ignored it in fear that she wouldn't come to church and wouldn't let her son come either. Stupid. Never ignore the Holy Spirit's leading. Many times when you do this, you will never get another chance. Fortunately that was not the case here. She did come to church that morning and heard an outstanding salvation message. At the invitation she came forward and accepted Christ as her Saviour with tears. After church I shook her hand and she thanked me for inviting her to church and she told me she believed there was a reason that I came to her house (obviously referring to the leading of the Holy Spirit). I agreed with her and then next couple of weeks her and her husband attended the church a few times. I visited them at home several times, but they ended up going to the Nazarene church in town. Although that is discouraging, I am very thankful that she did get saved despite my disobeying the Holy Spirit.
--Any opportunity I get, I volunteer with the Rock of Ages Prison Ministry to go into prisons and share the Gospel with the inmates. In November 2002, I went to the Washington State Penitentiary for a four day revival and was able to lead nine men to the Lord. What a blessing that was. A couple of those men were men who came forward during the invitations at the end of services we held. But most of them were the result of cell-to-cell visitation. One of these men clearly sticks out in my mind. We held a service in the maximum unit of WSP that was a pretty long service. I believe this was on Sunday and the service was about 1 1/2 - 2 hours long. We had two men preaching and gave invitations after both services. There was a fellow sitting in front of me the whole time that was pretty stone-faced. I observed him during the singing just standing there looking toward the pulpit. He did not sing and during the services he did not say amen or anything like many of the men do. He did not leave his seat when the first invitation was given, but during the second invitation he came forward to me. I took him aside and asked him if he had come to accept Jesus Christ as his Saviour. With tears in his eyes he asked me if I would pray with him. He explained a little bit about the situation in his life. He had only been in prison for a few days and on his second day there his roommate was shot to death buy one of the officers for fighting in the yard. He told me that his crime had gone unsolved for (I believe he said 7 years). And they didn't catch him, he turned himself in because he felt God was convicting him to do so. He explained to me that he was not bragging about this, but he wanted to share this with me so I could pray with him. After he explained this and a few other things to me, I assured him that no matter what the circumstances were in his life, that Jesus loved him and would accept him. I told him that Jesus was the only way for him to be able to deal with the problems in his life and asked him if he wanted to accept Jesus as his Saviour. With tears still rolling down his face he said yes. I led him in prayer and then prayed with him about his problems. When we were done he thanked me for listening to him and helping him through this. He didn't come to anymore of the services (as far as I know, I was on the medium unit for some of the services). But I know that the Lord will take care of him and get him through this tough time in his life.
David Bower emailed me this soul-winning story on 21 Mar 03.
--My wife and I had visited Mrs. W on several occasions seeking to share the gospel with her and lead her to Christ. She was always too busy, too ill or too most anything to listen. We continued to pray for her and visit periodically for a couple of years. During a series of meetings with an Evangelist, I said to him one morning, come along with me, I want to see Mrs. W again, fully expecting a reception similar to those we had before. When we arrived at her home, her response to our knock at the door was almost immediate. She said, "Why, hello Dave, please come in, I have been thinking of you and hoped you would stop by." She had her Bible open and had been reading it. She said, "I want to trust Jesus as my Savior, will you show me how?" Obviously the Holy Spirit had been at work and we gladly showed her what she needed to do. Mrs. W. lived only a few months following her salvation, but during that time she never missed a single meeting. Whether is was Sunday morning, evening or Wednesday she could be counted on to come and worship that One she had come to love and now lives with for all eternity.
A brother named Ryan emailed me this soul-winning story on 9 Jun 03.
When me and my wife were young in the Lord which we still are. It seemed that every Sunday when it was time to go to church we would start fighting. Well one Sunday we ended up fighting and not going to church that morning About 3 hours later my sister came over with her boyfriend and they agreed to go to Church with us later that night. When we got there the place was empty. My Pastor came and said hi and it turns out we had an afternoon service that day so the evening was cancelled, My Pastor asked if we wanted to come in and have a pop and a Bible study and we said yes. The next thing I know my Pastor is basically talking to my now brother-in-law, Dave. He shared the Romans road etc. Much to my surprise when Pastor asked if he would like to get saved he said YES When Pastor said the prayer and told him he could say it to himself or aloud I was shocked when he prayed out loud. He still needs to grow and so do we all but he got baptized about 3 months later and has helped me several times passing out tracts. Praise the Lord.
Here is another story I received from Ryan on 23 Dec 06.
I thought of one that might be interesting to share. My wife
and I went to the clinic one day for a Dr appt. While in the parking lot I
starting putting tracts on people windows the tract was Evolution Evidence for
and Against available here http://www.livingwaters.com
First I thought maybe she thought it was a tract for evolution so I explained to
her that it was a tract showing some of the errors with evolution. She
then went it to a speech how she attended the Lutheran church every Sunday and
that she could show me where it is. I could tell by this time she was
getting upset. I asked her if she died did she know for sure she was going
to heaven. She snarled back "Do you" I said yes. She went
on again about her church and I told her that it sounded like she was trusting
more in what her church that in what Jesus did on the cross. Then the
spark flew. I abruptly ended the conversation. As I was walking to
my car she came walking after me saying "Dude judge not lest ye be
judged". I told her the Bible also said Except a man be born again he
cannot see the kingdom of God. She then yelled at me SHUT UP. I
think I started to argue with her and then my wife calmed me down. I do
not know this lady's name but if you read this please pray for her.
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