After a number of you asked, I thought I’d answer by saying thank you for praying for me during the busy period of preaching I’ve just finished yesterday, when I spoke on Noah’s drunkenness! (at Christ Church).
I just wanted to say that I really enjoyed preaching at Westminster Chapel for the previous 3 Sunday mornings. It’s the first time that I have ever done three consecutive Sundays at the same church as a guest speaker. The church has changed so much since I first preached there 7 or 8 years ago. Greg Haslam, the pastor, is currently away on sabbatical in the USA, and he asked me to do some talks aimed at equipping and inspiring believers in evangelism.
I called the series, “Life’s Greatest Adventure”. All three talks were ones that I have never done at Christ Church, London. The first was “Communicating the Gospel in Your World” which is about overcoming disappointment and redefining what success in evangelism really is. It was all about finding ways to make new friends while doing an activity or pursuing some hobby or interest.
The second was about “Six reasons why people become Christians” and gave me the chance to tell some of my favourite conversion stories, and the third talk which was provocatively entitled “Becoming a storyteller like Jesus.” this was breaking some new ground, for me anyway, where I tried to convince people that they already have 3 or 4 great stories that they can tell. This gets us into the whole question of why Jesus chose to teach in parables, and what relevance that has for us today. I am convinced that our friends are up for hearing a good story, a story that we can use to explain an aspect of the gospel, just like Jesus did.
Anyway, they were all very enthusiastic afterwards, and I was not too intimidated by preparing in Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ vestry!