MASS EVANGELISM!         DFO1510          30/4/83

         1. I HAVE VERY LITTLE FAITH IN MASS EVANGELISM!--I watched Billy Graham & all the rest of them. The proportion of salvations to numbers, the rate of efficiency of salvations to crowds is too small!
         2. IS IT WORTH THE PRICE OF SUCH PUBLIC EXPOSURE & tempting the attacks of the Devil to go public & smear ourselves & our names all over publicly, to get ten thousand hand-raising decisions, & maybe get only one or two real solid Family Members, genuine disciples, all-the-way-converts, & at the same time invite disaster & complete banning & suppression & be driven totally underground to where we can't expose ourselves publicly at all? That method is more apt to hurt the whole Family throughout that country & maybe throughout the whole East, than almost anything that's happened!--Because it's tipped the Devil & his people off as to who we are & how much we're accomplishing!
         3. JESUS DIDN'T COME OUT OPENLY & PREACH IN THE TEMPLE MUCH UNTIL THE LAST WEEK IN HIS LIFE--& THAT WAS IT! He'd operated mostly underground for 3-1/2 years before that--teaching, slowly indoctrinating, training His 12 disciples & getting them to train another 70. His public sermons & crowds were the rare exception & nearly always caused Him trouble! He got a lot further underground with a handful of well-trained disciples who were able to carry on the work afterwards, still largely undercover in the long run.
         4. IT DEPENDS ON WHAT WE WANT! Really, it boils down to this: It depends on whether you're sold on personal evangelism, winning hand-picked souls one-by-one & training them quietly, secretly, undercover, protected, with peace & time & place to do it, & developing a few good solid national disciples who can carry on after the explosion--or whether you prefer & believe more in mass evangelism, which gets more stats, more temporary popularity, fleeting fame, & then is gone forever with never a chance to do it again!
         5. THIS IS A FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE I'M DRIVING AT!--DO WE BELIEVE IN WHAT WE STARTED ON? Are we sold on the basic principles on which we actually began? The thing that sold me on Fred Jordan & his ministry was not his public meetings, it was his disciples, solid lasting forsake-all fulltime fruit!--Hand-picked souls won one-by-one, who were better Christians, better witnesses, better soul-winners & better-trained & longer-lasting than all of Billy Graham's disciples put together!
         6. WHERE ARE BILLY GRAHAM'S DISCIPLES TODAY?--Nowhere!--He didn't start anything! So where are they now?--Shepherdless! Billy Graham didn't really teach witnessing & personal soul-winning at all! Where's Billy Graham now? I mean, the World's going to forget about Billy Graham, but they're going to still be remembering us throughout the Tribulation, Brother, because we're still going to be there! I don't have any expectations of this outfit folding at all!
         7. THEY HAD BETTER COUNT THE COST BEFORE THEY GO INTO A BIG PUBLIC MASS EVANGELISM SITUATION, because when you come up above ground & have such tremendous success with such seeming numbers & popularity, watch out! That's the Devil's style, the kind of thing he likes the churches to do, because he knows how ineffective it is! You may have a little flourish of success temporarily, but they're soon going to find out who you are, & that will be the end of it!
         8. YOU WILL THEN HAVE AN EVEN MORE DIFFICULT TIME WORKING UNDERGROUND! You're going to put the squelch on the whole works! You're going to kill all of our chances of any kind of street or public witnessing or literature distribution or anything by that kind of thing, because the public exposure raised such opposition! It's the same temptation that the preachers have to have crowds. What's their real motive? Do they really want to get some real disciples, 100%ers?--Good old-fashioned disciples?--Or do they just like these shows & popularity & the fleeting fame!
         9. THE FAMILY'S GOT TO CHOOSE ITS COURSE & DECIDE ON WHAT IS THE MOST EFFECTIVE METHOD! Jesus & His disciples & many others found out long ago that the most effective, lasting, fruitful, efficient, best method is the one-by-one personal, individual soul-winning & the training of solid disciples, more than any mass evangelism or all of it put together!--And I wouldn't be in this kind of work or doing what I'm doing if I didn't believe this!
         10. MOST OF YOUR KINGS & QUEENS & FISH ARE ALMOST GOING TO HAVE TO BE SECRET DISCIPLES, or they cannot have the influence that they have--that we need--to help us carry on! They are secret disciples & have to have secret meetings. They witness to other people secretly at the risk of their lives, not knowing whether they might be a traitor or a stool pigeon or a spy!
         11. SO THE QUESTION IS: ARE WE GOING TO BE SATISFIED WITH A LITTLE BUT LASTING FRUIT, WHICH IN THE LONG RUN WILL WIN FAR MORE SOULS & DISCIPLES THAN ALL THE MASS EVANGELISM PUT TOGETHER?--Or do we want to be just an immediate, temporary flash-in-the-pan with a thousand hands raised? Do we want to continue to have that freedom to have open Homes where we can take disciples without fear of the authorities & train'm & teach'm & make good soul-winners & missionaries out of them too on a small scale, semi-undercover? Do we want to be able to continue that kind of a ministry for years of partial freedom & partial open witnessing on a small scale, individually?--Or do we want to have huge meetings & blow our cover & blow the whole works to bits so that we can't do anything?
         12. "CHOOSE YE THIS DAY WHICH WAY YE WILL SERVE!" (Josh.24:15) Do you want to serve God His way, the way He knows best, the way we started, the way I have taught, the way I have continually stressed throughout from the very beginning?--Or do we want to blow the whole thing by blowing our cover & going so public that we offend the System & the Scribes & the Pharisees & the Chief Priests & they go to the System & to the Romans & insist that they get rid of us!
         13. WHEN I TALKED ABOUT THEM GOING TO THE UNIVERSITY, NOT ONCE WHEN I WAS GIVING THAT WHOLE TALK DID I PICTURE THEM GOING IN THERE HOLDING A BIG AUDITORIUM MEETING WITH THOUSANDS OF STUDENTS! That's the quickest way to finish yourself off for good, because the Devil will find out right away! Preaching to so many at once, just by the law of averages somebody's bound to be a rotten apple in the barrel & squeal! Whereas you should go around one-by-one & choose your people with discernment!
         14. PERSONAL INDIVIDUAL ONE-ON-ONE WITNESSING & SOUL-WINNING THEY WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO STOP & GOD HAS SAID SO! "THEY CANNOT STOP OUR RAIN!" (See No.128) And it has proven itself historically from one end of the Bible & from one end of history to the other, right into Caesar's household! WHAT'S HAPPENING TO ALL THESE SHEEP IN THESE MASS MEETINGS THAT HOLD UP THEIR HANDS? How many names & addresses are we getting? Who's going to carry on the work? Who's going to become solid, permanent, well-trained disciples who know how to win souls & train others & perpetuate the work & give it a solid foundation that will grow? You're not going to get it with mass meetings!
         15. THE MINSTREL MINISTRY SHOULD BE ABSOLUTELY QUIET, INDIVIDUAL, PERSONAL & PRIVATE, going from home-to-home meeting them, finding out just where they stand, how far they can trust them & how far they can go. You can be choosy when you go to individuals! You can pick them out & be led of the Holy Spirit to choose the ones that are really going to respond & whom you're going to win & make disciples of & be long-lasting fruit & fruitful! That way they could weed out the goats & those who weren't sheep & they wouldn't invite'm. My God, the last thing you want to do is publicise the meeting & invite everybody!
         16. I DO NOT BELIEVE IN MASS EVANGELISM EXCEPT AS THE RARE EXCEPTION & when you're almost forced to--& the Lord will let you know when that is--because it always stirs up trouble! I am opposed to mass evangelism! I don't like mass evangelism! I'm against mass evangelism! I was in it most of my life & I'm against it! I am completely convinced of its ineffectiveness, inefficiency, unfruitfulness & danger! To Hell with it as far as I'm concerned!
         17. I AS THE LEADER OF THIS FAMILY AM OPPOSED TO MASS EVANGELISM! I got out of mass evangelism in order to go into this ministry because I saw the ineffective unfruitfulness of mass evangelism, as well as its dangers! And I saw the advantages & safety & effectiveness of personal evangelism, as well as its long-lasting fruitfulness & its development of good solid disciples & missionaries, & that's why we're here today!
         18. I'M AGAINST MASS EVANGELISM! I'LL FIGHT IT! I DON'T LIKE IT! I DON'T WANT IT & I WANT TO TELL THEM TO STOP IT! It's dangerous! It's going to hurt the whole work! It could kill our ministry in many a country & make it impossible for any of us to work there at all!--Drive us totally underground & undercover to where we'll have to go personal! And maybe that's what God wants, knowing that's the only way He can get you to do it, because you won't do it voluntarily! I've told you to, & He's told you to, & we've trained you to & told you that's the best way to work to get the best disciples & the longest-lasting fruit!
         19. (MARIA: SOON PERSONAL EVANGELISM IS GOING TO BE THE ONLY METHOD WE CAN USE! We've got to get prepared for it! We have to learn it!) Of course! God knows it's the best way & the most effective way & the most fruitful with the longest lasting & most effective fruit. The more media exposure we get, the more dangerous it is! I'm not too proud of our media exposure--I'd lots rather see the personal soul-winning stats go up!--How about you? Choose ye this day which way you'll serve!:--Go public & blow it!--Or stay personal & sow it!--And really reap real Disciples who'll carry on till Jesus comes!--Which?