Pastor to Pastor

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Ray Comfort: Do not preach the gospel unless you precede it with a moral law. Because no man is going to embrace a cure unless he first is convinced of the disease. And the convincing agent is the Ten Commandments, the moral law.

Dave Stone: Hey everybody, welcome to Pastor to Pastor with Dave Stone. I am Dave Stone. Thanks for being a part of our podcast today. Thanks for joining. Make certain that you subscribe to Pastor to Pastor wherever you listen to podcasts. And you can follow us on Instagram at Pastor to Pastor podcast.

And on YouTube, you can follow us on the Focused Pastor channel. We've got a lot of great resources there for pastors, so make certain that you check that out. And if this conversation blesses you, please pass it along, share it with others. We're having a great year in 2026 and it's because you all are sharing the news with other people so that they can be encouraged.

And if you haven't done so, drop us a review. I don't ask for that hardly ever, but if this has been a blessing to you, then put a review on there for us. We really would appreciate that. Today's conversation is both sobering and encouraging. It is challenging and it's entertaining because we're talking about something each of us experiences personally and that we see up close and in person on a regular basis.

We're talking about human weakness, and we're going to be reminded that when we are weak, that's when God's Spirit can be extremely strong. And our guest today is a man who is an incredible evangelist. His name is Ray Comfort. Ray is the founder of Living Waters and he's a well-known evangelist who has spent decades boldly sharing the gospel around the world from street corners to college campuses.

He has millions of views online on his YouTube channel. His newest book is called *Idiotic Things That People Did in the Bible*. Now, that title might make you chuckle, but the fact is that the Bible is full of stories of people who made some ridiculous and terrible decisions, and yet God still used them.

And I don't know about you, but that makes me feel a whole lot better and lets me know that God can use me as well. Ray is a bundle of energy and I know you're going to enjoy this one a whole lot. You're probably going to want to listen to it time and time again because he will challenge you because he is so intentional. Join me in listening to my friend Ray Comfort. Ray Comfort, there's a lot of places you could be and you're with us. Thank you so much, my friend.

Ray Comfort: Vice versa, thank you for having me on. I appreciate it.

Dave Stone: I have looked forward to this ever since I got a copy of your book, *Idiotic Things People Did in the Bible*. And we're going to talk about that a little bit later, but I know that you came to Christ when you were in New Zealand. I'd love to hear just a little bit about your testimony and let people in on how it is that God really grabbed your heart.

Ray Comfort: I was born twice in New Zealand. I had a Solomon experience. I didn't have the wives of Solomon, the wisdom of Solomon, or the riches of Solomon, but I had his testimony. At the age of about 20 years old, I'd achieved everything I wanted in life. I had my own business. Someone said, "What do you do for a job?" I'd say, "I mind my own business, what do you do?"

I had my own house, my own wife, we'd made a child at that time, everything material. And I was thinking, what's next? It dawned on me that I was part of the ultimate statistic: 10 out of 10 die. And I, as Solomon, began thinking I'm just chasing the wind. Vanity, vanity, all is vanity. I remember one night I looked at my wife who had gone to sleep, newly married six months, and I wept at the thought of her dying. And I just cried out, "Why?" And I wasn't crying out to God, but He heard my prayer.

Six months later, I heard the gospel. I read the words of Jesus: "You've heard it said by them of old, you shall not commit adultery." This Christian guy on a surfing trip left his Bible open and I read it. And I thought, well, if there's a heaven, I'll get there because I've never committed adultery. But then I read those words: "But I say to you, whoever looks upon a woman to lust for her has committed adultery already with her in his heart."

And the only way I can describe it, it was like an arrow hitting my chest. And I thought, I'm undone. If God's seen my thought life, I'm in big trouble on Judgment Day. And that's when the cross made sense. Christ died for our sins. I didn't see myself as a sinner, suddenly the gospel became relevant. I broke the law, the Ten Commandments, He paid the fine. That means God could dismiss my case, He could legally let me walk out of His courtroom on Judgment Day and let me live forever.

And I was like a man on fire. I began preaching the gospel in the local square daily for about 12 years. I got a 34-seater bus and put "The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" and "I am the way, the truth, and the life" on the other side in 14-inch professional signwriting. I put a billboard outside my house with a scripture on it. I got a printing press, put it in my home, I gave tracts to everyone.

I put John 3:16 or John 3:1-16 in three-inch high professional signwriting on the front window of my business. So if anyone could be considered a religious nut in those days, it was me. Nowadays, I'm much worse. I'm more on fire, and gratitude is the prime high-octane fuel that drives me to do the will of God.

At the age of 76, I'm closer now to death than I have ever been in my life. I guess that's the testimony of everybody, but I'm so utterly grateful that God took death off me. Jesus Christ has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. So I live to share the gospel with others. Every day I go twice a day, except Fridays when the schools close.

I go to a local college and share the gospel with those students with rings through their nose and purple hair and it's such a joy. And we put them on our YouTube channel, Living Waters YouTube. You know, the Apostle Paul would be green with righteous envy if he knew what we had in the internet. If he wanted to communicate with someone, he'd dictate a letter, they'd handwrite it, and they'd hand-deliver it.

Maybe take weeks to get there. We push a button and literally millions of people get to hear the gospel. What a wonderful time in which we live.

Dave Stone: And I've seen some of those videos of you on college campuses. And Ray, first of all, I can't believe that you're in your mid-70s. You have the energy of somebody in their 40s and I do think that it's because you're so passionate for Christ. I love your gift of evangelism, the way you're using that. I love your boldness, I love your sense of humor.

And God is using you. And yes, that is every one of our stories, and that is that we're closer to death than we ever have been. And that's one of those things that motivates us to say, "Okay, what am I doing? What on earth am I doing for heaven's sake?" And thank you for making a difference. When did you come from New Zealand over to SoCal?

Ray Comfort: 1989.

Dave Stone: And what prompted you to do that? What brought you here?

Ray Comfort: A 747. Was there any reason that motivated you to say I'm going to leave New Zealand and I want to come to the West Coast? Yeah, I used to do a teaching, and still do through social media, teaching called *Hell's Best Kept Secret*, which brings out the principle that was used by Jesus, Paul, Spurgeon, Wesley, Whitefield, Luther.

And they all said adamantly, "Do not preach the gospel unless you precede it with a moral law." Because no man is going to embrace a cure unless he first is convinced of the disease. And the convincing agent is the Ten Commandments, the moral law. When someone realizes they've sinned against God, they've lusted after a woman, committed adultery in their heart, they've got lying lips, their eyes are full of adultery, they're thieves and blasphemers, that's when they say, "Whoa, I see I'm in big trouble. What should I do to be saved?"

And that's when you bring in the cross and it makes sense. So the preaching of the cross is foolishness to those that perish, and it's only because they lack the understanding of the nature of their sin. And that was Paul's testimony. He said, "I had not known sin but by the law." He said, "By the law is the knowledge of sin." The law is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. And that was the principle used by Jesus when He opened up what sin was in the Sermon on the Mount.

The Book of Isaiah said He would magnify the law and make it honorable. "You've heard it said by them of old, but I say to you," He was giving the spiritual nature of the law to show the nature of sin and the holiness of God. And that's what's lacking in many pulpits. Many of our preachers are not sons of thunder, they've become motivational speakers because they lack the terror of the Lord.

Paul said, "Wherefore, knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade men." And if anything puts the terror of the Lord in a human being, it's the thunderings and lightnings of Mount Sinai. So that we say with Moses, "I'm exceedingly fearful and quake," with Israel, "Don't let him speak lest we die." That's what's lacking.

And so that teaching was heard by a pastor when he was in Hawaii when I was teaching. Someone has to do it. And he called me in New Zealand week after week and just kept saying, "You must come to America. America must hear this message." So came over here. David Wilkerson heard it after three years, flew me to his church, then another well-known minister had me preach it to a thousand pastors.

And he put it on video and screened that video to 30,000 pastors. And that opened up the ministry. And then the actor Kirk Cameron heard the teaching and joined ministries for about eight years. And that was the birth of our television program. And so I sit back and think, wow, what a wonderful journey I've had. What a privilege I've had to be used of the Lord. Of course, God speaks through donkeys, but I'm still honored.

Dave Stone: And that has been at the heart of Living Waters from its inception is the sharing of the gospel. And isn't it amazing how an Old Testament passage of the Ten Commandments in Exodus really sheds light on the fact of how we all come up short?

And when James talks about, if you're guilty of breaking one part of the law, then you're guilty of breaking all of the law. And I love the way something as simple and as well known as the Ten Commandments can become the springboard. Is that what you use a lot when you are on college campuses? Do you go back to the Ten Commandments? Is that your MO?

Ray Comfort: Is the Pope a sinner? Yes, absolutely. I do that every time. But I use other principles that are from the scriptures. I speak to the conscience as Jesus did using the moral law, but I also address the will to live. God has placed eternity upon the heart.

Hebrews 2:14 and 15 says, and this is from the Amplified Bible, so it reads it a little louder, it says every human being is haunted by the fear of death all their lifetime. And so when I ride into a local college, and I do it twice a day with my bike, an electric bike with a platform, and my dog sits on the platform. My dog's wearing sunglasses, I'm wearing sunglasses, I've got instant rapport with students.

She's the best bait I've ever had when I go fishing for men. They crowd around, "Love your dog, how cute." And I say, "Oh, it's a YouTube channel. Would you like to go on?" They say, "What's it about?" I'll ask you about the afterlife. And someone says, "Yeah, I'll go on." First question is this: Are you afraid of death? And they say, "Oh, a little bit." I say, "A little bit? Are you kidding? It's horrifying, it's breathtakingly horrifying.

Someone's going to put you in a box and bury you six feet under the ground. It's horrific." And they say, "Yes, yes." And I can see by their eyes their reaction, they're saying, "How does this guy know? I haven't told mom or dad, brother, sister, but I think about death every day." And the reason I know is because Hebrews gives me insight, the Book of Hebrews.

And so I say, "Do you ever read the Bible?" and they say, "No," because they don't teach the Bible in colleges. I said, "Did you know in the Old Testament God promised He would destroy death? And in the New Testament we're told how He did it? Did you know that?" And they go, "No." And even an atheist begins to show interest. I say, "Would you like to hear what God did?" "Yeah." Why? Because they're haunted by the fear of death.

And so I share why we die. We die because God's paying us in wages. The wages of sin is death. Our death will be evidence to us that God is deadly serious about sin. And I ask the question: "Do you think God is justified in giving you the death sentence, or are you a good person?" And that's when they say, "Yeah, I am a good person."

I say, "Well, let's go through the Ten Commandments, they're written on your heart via your conscience to see if you're a good person." You know, we have a Ten Commandment coin with the Ten Commandments on one side and the gospel on the other. And I've got to give glory to ChatGPT for this, and the Lord.

I wrote in, "What are some of the good questions I can ask about the Ten Commandments?" And number three threw me against the wall, slight exaggeration, but it did. It was this: Which of the commandments is the hardest to keep? That was the question. I thought, whoa. So I went out in the beach with our camera crew and the first question I asked a guy, I said, "Here's a coin with the Ten Commandments on it.

Which of the commandments are hardest to keep? Which one?" And he said this: "Adultery." And he put his head down. I said, "Are you committing adultery?" He said, "Yeah." He was so open to the gospel, I went straight to the gospel because he was so penitent. So now I say, "Which is the hardest commandment to keep?"

People say, "Lying." "So you have a problem with lying?" "Yeah." "Stealing," "Blasphemy." It reveals their secret sins immediately so you can cut to the chase and talk about the law written on the heart. They know it's wrong to blaspheme or lie and steal and lust, fornicate, commit adultery, and how God's wrath abides on them, they need a savior and God provided one in Christ.

So I appeal to the conscience using the Ten Commandments because the work of the law is written upon the heart, and the will to live because God has made us unique in creation. We're not like dogs, horses, cats, cows, or kittens. We're human beings made in the image of God with a burning will to live, that eternity written upon our heart. So that opens up sinners' hearts to the gospel.

Dave Stone: I love that. I love that fact that you have that coin. Also love the fact that you use ChatGPT to help in your interactions and learn some things. We just had a podcast episode just a few weeks ago with Josh Burnett talking about the value, the cautions, but the value that comes from using ChatGPT. I'm sure that comes in incredibly helpful for college campuses.

Ray Comfort: You know, we can be very reticent when it comes to something like ChatGPT and AI and be fearful of it, but I'm sure the same thing happened when the microwave was invented. Whoa, this is going to put restaurants out of business. Chefs, waitresses, everyone's going out. Just the opposite. Restaurants use microwaves.

And it's just we don't need to be fearful of something like this. Of course, you could use a microwave for evil and you can use ChatGPT and AI for evil, which man will do, but we can use it for the furtherance of the kingdom. So I'm breathtakingly excited about the time in which we live, as I said before, with YouTube and ChatGPT to coagulate thoughts and be creative and feed stuff into it. "How would I do this?" and have an answer come back instantly that you think, boy, that's biblical, that is so biblical. And so it's very helpful.

Dave Stone: Let me point out to our listeners and viewers that this is a gentleman who's been in ministry for over five decades that is saying this and is right in the heart of it on the college campuses using this to be salt and light and to share the gospel. So wow, I love that. I want to dig into something because you can't listen to you, Ray, for more than two minutes without your quoting some scripture.

When did you start memorizing scripture, and how would you challenge our listeners to say this is something that could be very, very advantageous for you in sharing the gospel?

Ray Comfort: Okay, I'm going to say something that sounds like a boast, but it's not. I've been reading the Bible every day for 54 years without fail. And I've been a Christian, began itinerating probably two or three years after I got saved, spoke at a church, and I just casually said, "How many of you read the Bible every day without fail?" and only about 5% of hands went up.

I thought every hand would go up. I said, "Boy, you know, God gave us life, His love letter, we should put it first in our life." And so when I meet Christians when I'm on colleges and they say, "I'm a Christian, I love the Lord," I say, "You read the Bible every day without fail?" and this is what comes back: "I try to." And then I say, "Well, do you try and eat your food every day?" No, you don't try to eat your food.

You prioritize it and you make sure you feed your stomach. Well, put your Bible before your belly and you'll never go wrong. Job said, "I've esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food." So I've been reading the scriptures every day without fail because God's the lover of my soul and he proved his love and he gave me life and there's nothing I have that didn't come from him and we love him with heart, mind, soul, and strength.

So it's an easy thing to do, I delight to do God's will. But here's been a key for me: I have an iPod. Do you remember what an iPod is? And I've got it on scroll, and it's the King James Bible, and it scrolls. And I put it on an arm on the bedpost. Boy, I've got a wife that's so tolerant. On our bedpost, it's wood, I've got this wooden arm that I pull down each night and I'm lying on my pillow and I've got velcro and I've got this iPod with the King James Version Psalms or whatever scrolled.

And I just lie my head on the pillow and soak my soul in the Word of God. And it's what puts me to sleep. If I can't sleep, I just start reading Psalms. Last thing I remember is Psalm 25, then I'm gone. And it's just because you want to tire out your mind if you can't sleep. Your body's tired, but you want to tire your mind.

And so I soak my soul in the Word of God. And you know, I've got short-term memory loss because of my age, I don't know if I've mentioned that before, but it's a battle. Sue and I have been trying to memorize two Bible verses for about three weeks, it's been crazy. But when I was a young Christian, I memorized scripture, literally hundreds of evangelistic scriptures, and they're all still there.

I can recall them just like that. So if you're young, memorize scripture. Don't wait until you're older because you won't be able to do it, you know, you tend to forget things so easily. So take advantage of those brain cells while they're still there.

Dave Stone: That's such a good encouragement to every one of us. And God's been putting on my heart to go back to memorizing scripture like I did when I was a kid. And it does come slowly the older I get, but I'm telling you what, then in conversations how He brings those verses to mind and the Spirit reminds us of those things.

And I think just making that effort is an awesome way to show, "Okay Lord, I'm still trying to grow in my faith." I want to talk about your book, *Idiotic Things People Did in the Bible*. I love the cover. For those who are listening, describe this cover for people so that they know the humor that's going to be in this.

Ray Comfort: Yeah, when we first, when I first thought of, I was toying to a friend on the phone, I said, "Boy, people did idiotic things in the Bible." I thought, what a great title for a book. And I thought, I can think of like two dozen people in the Bible that did idiotic things. And so a publisher wanted to pick it up. So I got onto Chat and I said, "Show me the Mona Lisa being shocked."

Within 30 minutes, I had that picture of the Mona Lisa with a mouth like a rotunda and her eyes open, she's looking horrified. And I sent it to them and they absolutely loved it, the Mona Lisa being shocked. So they picked that up. I dedicated the book to my friend Ken Ham, you know who Ken Ham is, he's with the Ark in Kentucky.

Ken and I have been texting each other every day for six years without fail. The number of texts we did one day was 215 in one day. He's Australian, I'm New Zealander, a New Zealander. The only way an Australian can show affection is through insults. If you know an Australian and he says to you, "Ah, how you going? I quite like you even if you are an idiot," that's about the best he can do because they can't say "I love you" because they're very proud, hard criminal background.

And so Ken Ham and I, every text I get from him is an insult. I lack intelligence, I lack height, I lack looks, I'm old and all this. And it's him showing his love for me. And so I dedicated the book to Ken Ham and on the inside it says, "I'd like to dedicate this book to my friend Ken Ham whose life inspired the title of this book."

Dave Stone: I saw the dedication. I love it. It's right there, I'm looking right at it. Yeah, if you don't know who Ken Ham is, he is the founder and the CEO of Answers in Genesis. And go check it out because he's got a life-size Noah's Ark there. He goes deep into scripture as far as helping us be bold in our faith and feeling good that we can be compatible with science and with what the Bible has to say.

And he's brilliant. When you talk about the insults, just makes me think: 215 texts. That's a lot of insults in one day. So may your tribe increase. It just reminds me of old college basketball trips where our form of showing love to one another was ripping on each other and insults were at the top of the list. And many of my Christian friends have that spiritual gift.

Ray Comfort: Well, it's great, because if I said to Ken, "I like you and I hope you're having a good day," that's the end of it. There's nowhere to go with that. But if I say, "What's the idiot doing today, twitface?" and he'll come back, "You dumber, what do you think I'm doing? I'm preaching the gospel, you lie in bed," stuff like that.

Dave Stone: I can just imagine. But this book goes through a lot of different biblical characters. You go through Adam and Eve, you go through Cain, Lot's wife, the Israelites and the golden calf. You just start working your way through and I had so much fun dog-earing this book and circling different things.

You talked about the Prodigal Son at one point and you talked about G.K. Chesterton. I love this quote: "Don't remove a fence until you know why it was put up in the first place." And you deal with idiotic mistakes. Samson, what a perfect example of an idiot, right? Continually being taken advantage of by Delilah, and yet he continues to give her things until he finally gives her the answer to his strength.

How can we learn things from some of the idiocy that we see in scripture?

Ray Comfort: Well, firstly I'd like to say something about Adam. Some people say, often Christians will say, "When I get to heaven, first thing I want to do is just fall at the feet of Jesus." Well, the first thing I want to do is smack Adam in the mouth. Every bit of suffering we have, including death itself, comes by his hand. So he gets number one, he gets a mention.

Dave Stone: So you're going to punch him before you fall at Jesus' feet?

Ray Comfort: Well, it's just a little slap in the face. It won't be too hard. I'll just, yeah, because I'll be perfect and have no anger or anything. It'll be a gentle slap. Yeah, a gentle soul. And then you've got you've got Samson beguiled by women, you've got David doing the same thing.

Instead of being in the heat of battle, he's lusting after his neighbor's wife and violating all ten of the Ten Commandments. And it just shows us how scary lust is. You know, I'm, as I said, getting on in life, but I'm still having as much battle with lust as I had when I was 16, which is just crazy. I go to Huntington Beach every Saturday.

I used to go around noon, but I found it advantageous to go about 9:30 to do interviews. It's because it's cooler in the morning and the girls have got their clothes on. And when you go later in the afternoon, the heat's off, they come, the clothes come off and they've got these little mini-itsy-bitsy-teeny-weenies.

And so I have to say, "Lord, please help me to guard my eyes." And it's advantageous to just think about the greatness of God and lightning and thunder and the commandments. So a bit of the fear of the Lord causes you to say, "You know, if my eye causes me to sin today, I'm going to pluck it out and cast it from me.

If my hand causes me to sin..." And that's what walking in the fear of the Lord does. "Through the fear of the Lord, men will depart from evil," the scriptures say. Jesus said, or the scriptures say, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." And Jesus said, "Fear not him who has power to kill your body and afterwards do no more, but fear him who has power to kill your body and destroy your soul in hell. Fear him."

So you do yourself a favor and keep lust from the door if you fear God and realize the eye of the Lord is in every place beholding the evil and the good.

Dave Stone: There was an older priest that was in his 70s and he was asked a question by a younger priest: "When will I not have to worry about the lust of the flesh?" And the older priest thought for a second and he said, "You know, I wouldn't trust myself until I'd been dead for three days."

And there's a lot of truth in that. It doesn't get easier, but hopefully we take those safeguards to actually be careful of what goes into the eye gate and set up those hedges of protection. Thank you for sharing that. And yes, David is a great example. Here's this guy who, instead of being off to war when kings are off to war, instead he's hanging out on the balcony at the time, back to your beach illustration, when you're going at 9:30 instead of at 3:00 in the afternoon.

David instead is out there looking at the time when the women do their bathing. And that's when he prowls around and looks from the balcony. I always say when it comes to that story that Uriah had more integrity when he was drunk than David had when he was sober. And wow, there's just something that takes place. But we see all of these examples.

I love the chapter on King Saul because you refer to King Saul as "Mr. I Did Obey, Kind Of." And what a perfect picture of how we try to plead our case to God and yet He is all-knowing. He knows our thoughts, He knows our actions. And yet to call Saul as that person who "Mr. I Did Obey Kind Of," that's the story of my life. "Well, yeah, Lord, I did that. Well, maybe not fully, but partially."

Ray Comfort: I had an experience many years ago, my kids were little, I fed them and they grew up and it was a big problem. My daughter was about, I don't know, seven or eight, and I was in the shower and she called through the door. She said, "Dad, what color will I do this thing I'm working on in my schoolwork?"

And I said, "Well, red's a very powerful heading." And I was thinking, this is great, she's drawing my wisdom. And she called back, "What about green?" And I thought, she doesn't like red. So what about I said, "What about yellow? What a heading with a black background, that'll make it stand out." And she called, "What about green?" I said, "Green then."

And she ran off and said, "Thanks, Dad." And we tend to do that with the Lord. You know, we want to do something and we say, "Lord, I'm just giving this to you," but in our heart we're saying, "I want green." And that's really what David did. He didn't yield to God's will. And you think of how he must have set aside the fear of the Lord to do what he did.

And it took Nathan to bring the fear of God back to him. Nathan didn't come to him and speak of a wonderful plan that God wanted to give him. He said, "You've violated the commandments. Why have you despised the commandment of the Lord? You're the man." And that's when David cried out, "I've sinned against heaven."

And that's when we see the penitent prayer of Psalm 51: "Against you, you only have I sinned and done this evil in your sight." Same with the Prodigal Son. He came to his senses when he realized he was desiring pig food. And what modern evangelism does is it doesn't want to make the sinner feel uncomfortable, so it doesn't grab his head and say, "You're desiring pig food."

It says, "You know, God has a wonderful plan for your life, God wants to improve your life." So instead of going back to the Father and saying, "I've sinned against heaven, make me your servant," he goes back to the Father and says, "I've run out of money, you be my servant."

So the difference is showing a sinner that sin is exceedingly sinful so you appreciate the work of the cross, and God won't be a servant, he'll be a servant to God and have an obedient heart. Though he were a son, yet learned he obedience, of Jesus, by the things that he suffered, and being made perfect he became the author of eternal salvation to all that obey him.

And so we're not saved by obedience, but we're obedient because we're saved. You know, we've had a Gethsemane experience. And that's what each of us need, where we sweat drops of blood in prayer at the thought of witnessing to an unsaved person, but we end up saying, "Not my will, but yours be done." That's what a Christian is.

Dave Stone: Someone said that God's love language is obedience. And when we follow through and take that step of faith, that's when I think God really shows up, especially in our weakness when we're like, "Oh, I don't want to do this, I'm intimidated by this."

That's when I think the Spirit gives us that power when we take that step of faith. You have used biblical illustrations all throughout and real-life application. We have Christian leaders who are listening to this and they want to just excuse away what you're saying by simply saying, "Well, you know, that's how Ray Comfort is. God wired Ray to do that and God gave him boldness.

But that's just not the way my job is more behind the scenes or one-on-one with people when they bring it up." What do you say to the long-time Christian who keeps it at arm's length when it comes to sharing their faith?

Ray Comfort: I like to give an illustration of a man and I say, "I want to put you in this position. I'm not going to talk about a man, I'll talk about you. You're walking past a wooden house, two stories. You see it's on fire in the basement.

You look up and you say, man, there's a guy who works night shift, he's asleep up the second floor every afternoon he's asleep. So you take a rock and throw it at the window and it bangs on the window and he opens the window and he says, 'What are you doing? Get out of here before I call the police.'

You say, 'Your place is on fire.' He says, 'I'm going to call the police if you don't leave now.' So what are you going to do when he slams that window closed? You're going to walk off and say, 'Well, burn buddy, I don't care.' No, he's got about three minutes to live. You've got to warn him.

You're going to take more stones and throw it at his window, bang on his door and say, 'Get out, get out.' You don't want to just awaken him, you want to alarm him. You don't want him to say, 'Yeah, I see it's on fire, thank you.' No, you want him to run out. And that's the dilemma we have with the unsaved. They're in a house that's on fire.

The Bible says, "Others making a difference, having compassion, pulling them from the fire, hating even the garment spotted by the flesh." So if we walk on, it shows we've got a heart of stone. What God's done is He's given us stones to throw at the window, those Ten Commandments. Their purpose is to awaken sleeping sinners and alarm them.

That's what we're to do. And love will do that. Love can't say, "Burn, I don't care world," that shows we've got a heart of stone. And so that key is in Jude 23-24: others having compassion, making a difference. I don't see myself as a special Christian, I see myself as a normal biblical Christian.

Read the Book of Acts. They didn't stay in the upper room when God gave the Holy Spirit and put in air conditioning and padded seats and say with a little notice outside, "Tonight 7:00, all welcome." No, they obeyed the great commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature and they did it at the peril of their own lives.

That's normal biblical Christianity: leaving the upper room, leaving the pew and going out to the world and saying, "Your house is on fire. You need to wake up and repent and trust in Jesus and God will change your heart so you love righteousness rather than sin." But you'll have the knowledge that you have everlasting life all because of God's amazing grace.

Dave Stone: Wow, that was so well put and it was a challenge for every single one of us as Christian leaders to say, "Okay Lord, you expect something of me, you expect obedience. If you really are the Lord of my life, then you should be on my lips.

I should be sharing that story with others so that people can see that this relationship with Christ has totally changed my life. I was dead, I was lost beforehand, but you came into my life and you kept pursuing me. And other people sounded the alarm and as result of that now I have the opportunity to be saved and now I have the responsibility to share that with others."

You have a chapter in this book about Moses. And we have a lot of leaders who are listening to this and yet you talk about how God's judgment of Moses teaches us things about leadership, responsibility, and accountability. Can you unpack that for us a little bit?

Ray Comfort: Yeah, before I do, I'd like to mention something that's been so helpful to me when it comes to sharing my faith. The fear of man is very real, but this principle took Goliath down to Zacchaeus. And by the way, there's only one man in the Bible that Jesus looked up to, and that was Zacchaeus. And take that, Ken Ham.

So the thing that brought Goliath down to Zacchaeus for me was this one question and I started it maybe 30 years ago. When I met a complete stranger, I would just say to him, "Hey, how you doing?" He'd say, "Good. What's your name?" "Fred." "Fred, got a question for you. Do you think there's life after death?"

Now I haven't mentioned God, Jesus, heaven, hell, the Bible, sin, righteousness, judgment, all those things that will make him feel uncomfortable. I've just asked him a question: "Do you think there's life after death?" And I do this all the time.

I'm at the ministry at the moment, if a plumber comes in and I've never seen him before, I'll just walk up to him and say, "How you doing?" "Good. What's your name?" "Jim." "Jim, question for you. Do you think there's life after death?" I haven't spent two years building a relationship with him.

I've cut to the chase really quick and talked about a subject he thinks about all the time. And this is what Jim will say: he'll stand to his feet and say, "Whoa, that's a heavy question." I say, "Do you think about it much?" He says, "All the time." His "all the time" just dissipated my fears.

He's a human being, he's not the Antichrist, he hasn't stabbed me to death, he thinks about the issues of life and death. So I say, "Well, do you think heaven exists?" and he'll say something like this: "Boy, I hope so." So now his "hope so" has just completely got rid of the fear of man, so I say, "Well, let's go through some of the Ten Commandments and see how you're going to do on Judgment Day."

"Okay. Do you think you're a good person?" "Yeah, really good." "Ever lusted after a woman, lied or stolen or blasphemed? Boy, Jim, you're in big trouble." He says, "Man, I can see that. Never heard this sort of thing before." "Do you know what God did so you could be forgiven?" Out comes the cross.

And it's so simple and it's just like the woman at the well. Jesus didn't sit on the well for two years. No, he immediately talked to her about her violation of the seventh commandment, but he started with water. Something natural. He didn't go straight in and talk about her adultery, he says, "Give me a drink. I've got water you know not of."

And so we do the same thing with the will to live. We talk about something he thinks about and then swing slowly to sin, righteousness, and judgment.

Dave Stone: Amen. Wow, and that is textbook of how Christ went about it. Ray, while you're talking, I've got thunder and lightning just pounding away and it is giving the exclamation point to everything that you're saying on the power of God and also the love of God.

In this book, you have a chapter where you talk about Moses. And I think it's important for us because you talk about how God's judgment of Moses, it teaches us about leadership and responsibility and accountability. Can you unpack that a little bit more because we have a lot of leaders who are listening to this podcast?

Ray Comfort: Yeah, the name Moses is synonymous with the law. Jesus said, "Moses said," and he was saying the law said. So Moses had incredible authority, but I think it's very interesting that he wasn't allowed to enter the promised land. You say, that's a bit unfair. Well, there's a hidden type in there.

When you're sharing your faith, Moses cannot enter the promised land. Moses has nothing to do with the gospel. Moses brings us thunderings and lightnings, the darkness and blackness of the law. That's the job of Moses: to paint the blackness of sin and make the light of the gospel shine.

It was D.L. Moody who said, "The law can only chase a man to Calvary, no further." And the Bible likens the law of Moses to a mirror. When you and I got up this morning and looked in the mirror, we were trying to see what damage had been done during the night.

That standing-hair style, pale face, puffy eyes. We didn't take the mirror and try and wash with it, that would be crazy. No, the mirror just reflects what we are in truth, unclean, and we go to the water to wash. That's the function of Moses. The law came by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

And so it acts as a mirror. So when you hold up the law of Moses to a sinner, he should say, "Whoa, we're all as an unclean thing and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags," and then go from the mirror of the law to the water of the blood of Christ to wash. The law is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.

And I guarantee that if you begin expounding as a pastor the law of Moses in your church, that suddenly you'll uncover false converts. Those who've been sitting in the pews thinking they're saved but they've never had a knowledge of sin, and it'll drive them to the foot of the cross.

If I could speak to pastors, this is what I would say to them: "Pastor, join a gym, join a racquetball club. Break out of the little cozy click of Christianity that often Christians live in. Like we're like a monastery without walls. Monks and monketts with a vow of silence. Break out, go out to your congregation, go out to the local whatever sporting club or ever and get to meet an atheist.

And then come back and then testify from your pulpit. Stand up and say, "I just want to tell you something. On Wednesday, I was at a racquetball club, I've joined just so I can rub shoulders with the ungodly because I hate just being the cozy click of Christianity. And this guy was an atheist and I said to him, 'Do you really believe that nothing created everything?

That's scientifically impossible.' And he said, 'Whoa, I never thought of it like that.' I said, 'You going to heaven when you die?' He says, 'I hope so.'" And the pastor shares from the pulpit. His congregation will begin to say, "Pastor condescends to the irksome and lowly task of evangelism," and that pastor will begin to reproduce of his own kind.

Because if he majors on prophecy, if he majors on prayer, that will be the major in the church. If he majors on the very reason Jesus came to the earth was to seek and save that which is lost, then his congregation will begin to do the same and you'll have genuine church growth.

Not musical pews, but genuine church growth. People bringing unsaved people into the church after they've witnessed to them. And that's the key to reaching this nation for Christ. Not leave it up to the pastor, but for the pastor to equip the people to do the work of the ministry.

Dave Stone: And Ray, that's what I love about the book *Idiotic Things People Did in the Bible*, is because it is evangelistic. Yes, it can be used for Bible study groups, it can be used for a person just reading it from a devotional side, but it can be given to someone.

Because there are some crazy things that happen in the Bible, let's not shy away from those things, but what can we learn from the mistakes of others? And how it is that this can be something that opens a door to conversations with non-believers. You impress me as being a guy who is very creative.

And I've heard a little bit about something that you are doing for the Olympics, the Summer Olympics that are going to be taking place in LA. And I'm very intrigued by it, but I also think it's so simple. It's so simple of a plan. I want you to share what your plan is. I don't know if you have a coin with you, but if you do, tell us about what you're doing at the LA Olympics and how can we become a part of that.

Ray Comfort: Firstly I want to say that my father was very creative and I inherited his genes. Read Genesis chapter one. That's my father: Creator. And so we should be creative too. Olympic Games are two years away, but what I want to do, and I know our donors will support us in this—we've got very faithful donors—I asked my son to write to China and get them to send us a coin made of gold, not real gold, but a coin because I want to make it like a gold medal.

And put an Olympic image on one side, just a runner running, not too Olympic. And on the other side, the gospel. And so my son got it from China, he's part of our ministry, and he handed it to me and I could not believe what I felt. This weighs the weight of a golf ball. It's that heavy.

We want to print a million of these and give them away at the LA games to people who come from around the world. And they are going to grab this and take it home with the gospel on it because it's got perceived value. But this is where it's going to go on steroids: I want to contact a thousand churches here in Southern California, and I've got the means of doing this, and to say to those churches, "We want you to be biblically hospitable to people from around the world, Christians, who will come to LA.

Open your home for a week. Give them transport, food, and accommodation so they can go out and get these coins free to give to people who come to the games." And I think this is going to be huge. And people who what we'll do is we will just hook up churches in Southern California—have a list of a thousand churches somehow—with churches from around the world so that people who come, families who come, groups who come, will be vetted by the pastor so they won't be crazies.

They'll say, "Oh, this is a genuine member of our church, they love the lost and they would love to come. Would you hook them up?" and then we'll get churches to hook up together. So this is going to be huge. It's two years away, we're in the conception stages, but if people go to livingwaters.com to sign up for our newsletter, we will keep people informed because we're starting to get things done.

We've got 250 of these coins coming just to make sure that they work out good, they're all designed. And then we'll go for a million well before the games in case there's a hold-up with tariffs or some things going on in Iraq or whatever stopping shipping coming through.

So I'm so excited for what's going to take place because people are going to want some memento. And when they see it's gold, and when they see a runner on there, they're going to say, "This is great for me to take back." They're probably going to take more than one. And boy, when they see that other side, and who knows how many people they will show it to?

So God's going to do something through that. I've got a girl that we pray for regularly who is trying to make the women's pole vaulting team for LA. And if she makes it, I'll be there handing out coins with you, brother.

That's great. Let me just share something with you that's not up, it'll be up within a couple of weeks: livingwaters.com/gold. That's where we're going to have the information. So I'll get my guys to prioritize it, just a real skeleton of a site just so that people know where to go: livingwaters.com/gold.

Dave Stone: We'll put that in the show notes, Ray. And brother, I can't thank you enough. You've given us creative ideas, you have saturated this talk with scripture, you have challenged us to be bold in sharing our faith, and also you've taken us back to the gospel and how each one of us is a sinner in need of Christ's forgiveness and His sacrifice.

Thank you so much and may God continue to use you in a powerful way.

Ray Comfort: Oh, thank you, brother.

Dave Stone: Well, I thoroughly enjoyed Ray's conversation and I just I've listened back to it already a couple of different times because he's so intentional in the way he approaches evangelism and sharing his faith with others.

It was refreshing to hear his story of how he came to faith and how scripture has played such a huge role in his life. And he reminded us that people don't embrace the gospel until they understand their own guilt before God. Boy, that was a really cool takeaway for me personally, was just the the importance of sharing the law.

I loved how on college campuses he will just ask that question and say, "You know, well, which which one of these do you think is the hardest one to keep of the Ten Commandments?" What a great way to approach that. And he also shared about how ChatGPT and AI is something that that he's using, and here he is in his mid-70s.

His book, *Idiotic Things People Did in the Bible*, has so many great stories in it that he pulls from from God's word. But he shared those two reasons why why this book is important: one is because God put those in there as warnings to us, and the other reason was to show us that God is still sovereign and His plans won't be thwarted by our human frailty.

Check out Ray's book as well as the link to his ministry, Living Waters, in the show notes that we've got below. Also, he mentioned that coin that they're going to be distributing at the Olympics in a couple of years. You can go to livingwaters.com/gold and you can see what that coin looks like.

But I applaud his creativity and just the way he is always waiting for God to cross his path with someone. Well, to wrap up our episode, the story that I want to share today is a story of Dorothy Fletcher. Dorothy was on a transatlantic flight from Manchester, England, all the way to Orlando, Florida.

She was going to see her daughter get married. But in the middle of the flight, Dorothy Fletcher was traveling with another one of her daughters when all of a sudden the 67-year-old woman just said to her daughter, "I don't feel very well." And with that, Dorothy Fletcher slumped over.

Her daughter immediately pushed the button to call the flight attendant and informed the stewardess that she thought her mom was having a heart attack. The flight attendant immediately made an announcement over the intercom and said, "Is there any medical personnel on board? If you would just ring your flight attendant button."

In an instant, 15 people pushed the button. All 15 were cardiologists. You see, they were all in route to Orlando for a World Health Association conference with over 10,000 people attending. They all sprang into action with what little equipment was on board. They performed a minor surgical procedure and they had the plane land in North Carolina.

And after Dorothy spent five days in the hospital, she was able to attend her daughter's wedding the next week. Now, I don't know what you think about a story like that, but it reminds me of the fact that God puts people in our pathway. God crosses our path and intersects it with other individuals who desperately need something that you have to give.

And Ray has reminded us that every person we come in contact with is in desperate need of Jesus Christ. Those cardiologists did a great job, they they lengthened the life of Dorothy Fletcher. That was years ago, she's still alive today.

But to think what we have the opportunity to do is not just to lengthen someone's life on earth, but we have the opportunity to introduce them to Jesus Christ, the one who can give them life eternal. Take advantage of every opportunity you have to do just that.

I hope this episode has encouraged you. And before we wrap up, let me point you toward our Pastor to Pastor resource page. It's free to sign up there, and and when you do, we'll send you free resources to help encourage and equip you in your calling. There's a link in the show notes below.

As always, thanks for listening to Pastor to Pastor. We drop a brand-new episode every Tuesday. It's designed to encourage, inspire, and to challenge because leadership can be lonely, and that's why we call this Pastor to Pastor. It's to remind you, you're not alone. So until next time, I'm Dave Stone, saying God bless.

Guest (Female): Live your truth. A lot of people say that, don't they? But truth isn't something we decide. God has decided it for us, and it's our job as believers to share His truth with a world in need.

I'll encourage you to do that through my podcast, Refocus with Jim Daly. I visit with fascinating guests about important topics like gender confusion, cancel culture, and more, while helping you share God's love with others. Listen at refocuswithjimdaly.com.