What do you do when you love your church, have taught evangelism, modeled evangelism, created opportunities for evangelism—and your people still don't seem interested?

In this episode of Gospel Talks, George and Jeff respond to a pastor's wife who wrote about the discouragement of trying to cultivate a culture of personal evangelism in a church that largely defines evangelism by door knocking, handing out tracts, and inviting people to church events.

George and Jeff talk honestly about pastoral discouragement, leadership, patience, modeling, discipleship, and the difference between doing evangelistic activities and actually living evangelistically. They also explore why relational evangelism requires more than simply telling people what to do—it requires showing them what an evangelistic life looks like.

Most importantly, they ask a deeper question: Is evangelism something we do, or is it part of who we are?

If you've ever felt alone in your desire to reach people with the gospel, this conversation is for you.

Hey guys, I want to describe a situation to you.

A pastor and his wife love their church,

have invested years trying to cultivate a culture of personal evangelism,

taught it, modeled it, created opportunities,

but the congregation just hasn't bought in.

We got an email this last week.

I'm going to read it to you after the intro.

And

We're gonna see if we can answer this question to the best of our ability.

But there are times when your church just doesn't share your heart for evangelism.

This is Gospel Talks Podcast,

where we help Christians all over the world become more effective

in relational evangelism and discipleship.

My name is George Binocka, and with me today is Jeff Musgrave,

the author, founder of the Exchange Ministry.

And very excited to jump into this episode together.

Jeff, how are ya?

Doing great. Good to see ya, George.

I I said that the other day and my wife was listening to the podcast and she said,

You can't see him. I said, Well,

I can see him just 'cause you're not listening on on video doesn't mean

I can't see him.

Yep, that's right. We can see each other.

We even have a guest in the studio today.

~ R Wrangler is there and the puppy dog.

And so you you guys won't get to see him on camera,

but ~ he that is an awesome dog that can be in a podcast studio.

~ very rare that you get dogs on a podcast,

but ~ but we have one for you guys today.

Well, Jeff, this is ~ an email we got from somebody you know,

Erica and

I want to just read the email if I can to begin with,

and just just read what she wrote,

and then we'll just kind of jump into answering her questions.

She says, Thank you so much for responding.

I I don't know how often you or Jeff get requests,

so ~ hope I'm not overstepping.

You are not. ~ we love questions like this.

I I've really enjoyed so much of the podcast,

she says, having grown up in

Pastor Jeff's church. It's so nice to hear him speak again and still continuing

to teach all the things he preached to us for so many years.

My husband has been in full-time pastoral ministry for 11 years now

at our current church. He's the assistant pastor.

We love these people dearly, but we find that our view of evangelism

is almost antithetical to the church culture.

My husband and I have been here for five years and feel pretty comfortable

challenging people in their view.

They are currently a church that sees door knocking and leaving tracks

at a restaurant as the only real modes of evangelism.

If they are very adventurous, they will invite somebody to church.

It is usually for big events like Christmas or Easter.

We live in a very small town and we found that people are hesitant

to trust members of our church because of the past reputation of our church.

They were a very internally focused church,

and when they did venture into the community,

it was usually only for things like

Knocking on doors and inviting to a church event,

there was no real love shown or interest in neighbors or community

or community events. In the last three years,

we've tried to disciple and teach people that evangelism requires more than just

a track. We have ~ implemented some gospel outreach in our community,

things like good news after school Bible club,

leading ~ fellowship of Christian athletes at the high school

and inviting unsaved neighbors to spend time in our home,

including at least one church family at the same time.

So they can see personal evangelism in practice.

Recently taught in Sunday school,

~ they divided the men and the women on personal evangelism,

pulling from giving the exchange,

and personal evangelism from nine marks.

And unfortunately, this has not seemed to have much effect on their way of thinking.

They ~ appreciate that we use these methods,

but they have no interest in adopting them themselves.

we even sometimes receive pushback because we do not organize door knocking,

gospel outreach on behalf of the church.

When we encourage them to open their homes and their lives to their neighbors,

we are usually told that they don't believe their neighbors would have

any interest in talking about spiritual things,

or they just complain about their neighbors.

~ sorry this is so long. I just wanted to set everything up to ask

my question is there anything else we can do to instill in our church

the importance of their personal outreach to their neighbors and the people

in their sphere of life? And on a personal level,

Could you and Pastor Jeff offer encouragement to pastors and their families

who feel that they have exhausted every avenue and invested so much time

and energy into teaching their church members how important this is

and not seeing people start to take those steps in their own life?

We certainly aren't giving up on continuing all the things we've done,

but it is very discouraging. And my husband is currently pursuing a senior pastor.

We're very concerned that when we leave,

any sort of personal evangelism through our church will completely fall apart.

Yeah.

Thank you

so much for slogging through this long email.

So Jeff, ~ when you read this email,

what I'm just curious what man,

what jumps out at you?

Yeah. I George, discouragement is real.

Mm.

and and frankly, partnership with like minded people is necessary.

And when you find yourself alone,

it it it it it is discouraging.

I mean it's n it's it's not like ~ you can tell yourself I'm just

not gonna be discouraged. Frankly

personal faithfulness is commendable,

but most good leaders, and I know this young man,

he is a good leader, are not satisfied until the people that they're

trying to influence are are following and are and are ~ responding.

So my heart really hurts ~ for them and I I I feel bad.

Right, right. Yeah, I know you see this a lot.

That's my first response.

~

I I'm with you. My heart aches for them.

so I let me just start.

~ we could talk about this, ~ kind of get your thoughts on is it possible

for a pastor to have a genuine burden for evangelism and the church that

he serves at just doesn't share that burden?

Because that's kind of like one of the questions that comes to my mind.

~ you know, what what's your thoughts on that?

Yeah, I I think it's not only possible,

but I actually think, George, it's it's probable.

And the reason I say

Hm.

that is because ~ I I I remember as a young pastor,

I felt really strongly about something the Lord I felt led on our on

my heart for our church. And so I was meeting with our leadership team.

And ~ was literally, I mean, I could just see in their eyes,

getting zero response from most,

negative responses from a few of the key leaders.

And I I admit that when we got done with the meeting,

I complained

Mm.

to the Lord and and it and I I was saying,

you know, God, why? I mean, why are you giving me this burden

and you haven't touched any of their hearts about it?

And and I'm not saying God.

~ spoke to me out loud. I I'm not,

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

but I sensed

the Lord saying to me, Jeff, that's why I gave you to them.

you see, God

~

gives the burden to the pastor so that the pastor can employ that burden

on on the people. And it's it's part of our responsibility.

God God wasn't just building my church and our leaders and

he was literally building me and my leadership.

And so ~

Mm.

he gives the burden first to the pastor and and allows the people

to ~ come around to that leadership.

That's that's what ~ leadership is all about.

So leadership in the church is often a long,

patient, but I I like this word persistent process.

I mean it it it's you know, it patient it is.

Critical. You can't push people.

But

Yeah.

just giving up isn't good either.

And we have to be persistent. And I I I must say at the very beginning,

although I know ~ the couple that ~ is behind this email,

I really don't know a lot about their circumstances,

and I I am in no way in the way I'm answering these specific questions you're giving

me ~ implying anything about them.

Hmm.

~ I

I just know that ~ leadership in general

is that ~ slow, ~ persistent process.

It demands building relationships with the people that we're ~ leading.

It demands that we show our heart and then literally praying that God would

use us to effectively lay that burden on other people's hearts.

Yeah, yeah, amen. it it's changing

a culture, molding a culture is not an easy thing.

And ~ one of the issues is ~ and I'm

not trying to besmirch the senior pastor of this church.

I don't know him, I don't even know the name of the church,

but all the leadership and at the very top of the leadership everybody

has to be bought in.

Absolutely. That's what culture is.

~ you yes.

I mean culture is

we all buy into this concept.

Yes. very much. So much rises and falls on leadership,

and I mean the very most senior leadership.

And so it ha the leadership all has to be together and bought in before

you can expect the church to be bought in.

~ so Jeff,

how would you distinguish between a church that is unwilling to evangelize

and a church that simply hasn't been taught and modeled how to evangelize?

'Cause it sounds like he's trying to teach and he's modeling it,

~ you know.

Yeah. I I I think John i is is definitely working towards

~ modeling ~ and doing ~ good at ~ training.

I I do think in general, the first step is determining,

you know, what's what's wrong.

how how is it?

I mean, I sometimes it's almost impossible to figure out,

but sometimes you look at a circumstance and you just say,

Okay, I get it. I I know why this isn't

~ happening and so I think that's really the first step.

we really have

to recognize and we have

to effectively show people. It's not enough for us to to just tell them.

We have to show them and I think that we have to ~ we have

to show them by connecting relationally to them.

So in other words we're

We're talking about relational evangelism where I connect with a lost person,

show them who Jesus is, and in the process of doing so,

help them to love him as much as I do.

The same thing is true with the people we lead in church.

~

Mm.

we have to form connections with them.

So it's not enough to say things from the pulpit,

it's not enough to ~ just do ~ the right things.

We have to form connections with them and and then

~ we have to ask God to begin

to let them ~ appreciate ~ our heart and what we're doing here.

Does it does that make sense?

Hundred percent. We've said this a bajillion times,

basically, people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care.

~ when when people know you love them,

they know the motive behind your ~ what you're encouraging them

to do, you know, that course of action you're you're kind of modeling for them.

When they don't and I'm not saying that ~

These this couple is not loving the church.

I imagine they are. I mean, the the fact that they're this concerned,

even though when he's already kind of looking at transitioning

to a different ministry in a different role,

the fact that they're still concerned that in leaving the church,

the church will be left in this state,

shows me that they really love these people.

Yeah. Yeah.

~

it's just a matter of like we disciple an unbeliever,

so we disciple ~ believers around us.

And ~ one of the things that's impressed me,

Jeff, is you know, like people say you don't.

teach a training course on living the exchange.

It's because it's the same model of discipleship.

Unbeliever and believer, you're doing the same thing.

They're just at a different point in their life.

Absolutely, absolutely. I I ~ I feel that probably

in in most cases, and I'm not saying this in this specific case,

but in most cases, ~ Christians get excited about seeing new Christians.

And if we can ~ begin to help them

see ~ people trusting Christ coming into the church,

being baptized, becoming active.

attenders and eventually active members in the church.

~ That that's really going to awaken people.

And frankly, ~ if it's not awakening people,

then it's possible this these people are not going to be awakened.

I don't know if you remember, but in ~ I

the the name of the book just s ~ escaped me but it ~

the ~ and it's not coming back.

I'm so sorry.

That's okay.

I

I read a book once in which the author was talking about talking to some

of his people as a pastor, and one of the men just simply said,

I co I just don't care about the people on the other side of the world.

Why would I want to go there and help them?

Mm.

And ~

I ~ they're just in some places we're not going to be able

to effectively move people. ~ I I

So I I just think we have to figure I mean,

there's no silver bullet. And frankly,

Right.

just like not everybody I give the gospel to is going to be saved,

not every church is going to become the light and the dark world the Lord wants them

to become.

I I think you're exactly right,

Jeff, because the the problem actually could be way upstream.

If somebody who says, I don't care about the other people on the other side

of the world, they ha there is a problem in their relationship with God.

God said, If you love me, you will love others.

~ So

Yeah, I no no question. And ~ so I think we have to

~ think in terms of ~ we really in this situation

we don't know which that is and I think that we just

Right.

have to ~ recognize that we as God's people have to discern those things

for ourselves. Nobody else can tell us.

Right.

Yeah, I think you're right. So looking at our email,

the church there seems to define evangelism primarily as door knocking,

passing out tracks. We're not against tracks.

You know, we sell tracks on our website,

inviting people to church, special outreach events.

~ as you look at that, Jeff, what would you say is missing

~ when we define evangelism primarily around programs?

I know you have a great answer to this.

So

go tell

Yeah.

us, tell us about the distinction there.

Well, I I think when Jesus said go and make disciples,

the the terminology underneath of that is while you are going,

be making disciples. This is a lifestyle.

Mm, mm.

This is not

just something I do once a week and I fulfilled my obligation.

You know, when Jesus walked through the crowds,

he walked slowly through those crowds and he recognized ~ needs of

Every single person they saw. Now,

obviously, I'm not gonna recognize needs of every single person,

not God, but I can walk slowly enough through the crowd in which

I begin to recognize specific needs of specific people.

~ I I feel like sometimes when it comes to event-oriented evangelism,

you know, let's get everybody to come to this event.

~ really what we've said is.

we're gonna get the professional to get the gospel.

That's the best way to get people saved.

And you know, there are people who are gifted at evangelism far greater than I am,

and I I totally believe in that.

But I also believe that God gave to every single individual

the Holy Spirit residing inside of us.

Jesus said for a reason, it is to your advantage that I go away because

the Holy Spirit is coming, and the implication being.

that this is not about even the best evangelist,

Jesus, being able

Right.

to preach the gospel. This is about every single person going through life

to preach the gospel.

Yep. Yeah, I I think sometimes as Christians,

it's like me with the weeds in my backyard.

I kind of come home sometimes.

I just wish that I can come home and it'll just be somebody else will do it.

But that is not gonna change the situation back there.

It doesn't happen, does it, George?

Does

not happen. ~ we are all gonna give account on to Christ.

As to whether we obeyed this command he gave us or not.

I mean, that's the reality. We will stand by ourselves and our pastor won't

be there to answer for us. And he's gonna ask us,

Did you do this? let me ask another question,

kind of playing off that a little bit.

Because we see yeah, yeah, yeah,

Can I get you to pause for a minute?

yeah.

Thank you. You can ask another question in just a second.

I'm going to come back in just a minute.

Yeah, you're good.

All right, I'm back. Sorry about that.

~ no problem. All good.

You're

gonna have to back up and ask that question again.

Yeah, no problem. ~

Is door knocking wrong or do you feel like it's just a substitute

for some people because they don't want to develop a genuine relationship

or one on one relationship?

Yeah, I door knocking is not wrong.

~ I I mean it frankly,

I started a church forty years ago and I have knocked

on thousands of doors in my lifetime.

many, many I mean, th it I would just

say if in our ring doorbell,

no soliciting culture.

There are more

Yes.

effective ways to touch the world with the message of Jesus.

And so I I mean, I but but is it wrong?

Absolutely not. I have a I have a pastor friend.

He frankly is extremely effective at connecting with people.

He really shares his faith ~ often.

~ he has had multiple people join

his church through salvation and baptism.

~ I mean, this is not a guy who who isn't ~ urgent in wanting

to see people saved and and that sort of thing.

Mm.

when he gets to these dry and I d I don't know whether you feel this way or not,

George, but I think all of us go through dry spells in terms

of relationships with lost people.

It's like we get focused

Right.

in on something besides evangelism and before we know it,

we we're not really working on seeing someone come to Christ and

When he gets to those dry spells and he doesn't have contacts,

he often goes through the neighborhood around the church

and just introduces himself, expresses his desire to be of a help to his community,

offers to pray for them. And actually what he's doing at that door

is trying to develop genuine relationships with them.

So I it it can be an excuse,

but it it

Mm.

you know I'm gonna do that instead of ~ I I

I feel like sometimes even though people know it's not gonna work very

well, they still demand to do it just because they feel duty bound.

And I just think,

Right.

you know, let's let's just find a way in which we can reach people that's going

to be a little more effective.

Right. ~

I think you do a there there's a great thing on the homepage of the website,

exchangemessage.org, on on the differences between programmatic evangelism

and relational evangelism. And I think that's the philosophy that under

ge GERDs and guides ~ our approach to this.

there is a difference between doing evangelistic activity,

whether that's door knocking events or whatever else,

and

actually living evangelistically.

~ could

Yes, exactly.

could you

kind of work through that? How would you help somebody understand that?

I I feel like living evangelistically is ~

l walking slowly through the crowd,

~ trying to connect with as many people as we possibly can,

engage in conversation with as many people as we can,

take conversations deeper ~ every time we get a chance.

So I mean there's this there's this lifestyle of getting to the gospel through soul

needs.

that just engulfs us. We just live that way everywhere.

I I feel like ~ in the situation that we're talking about,

how do we do that in a church?

I and I think there's two steps.

We have to model it and then we have to actually train it.

In other words, people don't this is not it's not natural to our flesh.

I mean my flesh gets busy, it gets ~ preoccupied,

it gets ~ focused on something else.

I mean there

I I have to I have to do it on purpose and I have to help our people

do it on purpose. And and frankly,

~ just we're telling people you have

to get into the gospel. If if we haven't thought through a process

or a strategy that's gonna actually get us there,

it's not it's not even usually possible for people.

And so helping people number one,

see it in our own life, and then number two,

learn the tools to be able to

Make conversations happen.

Yes, it's like it's not about what you're doing,

it's about identity. Sometimes I think we are answering the wrong question,

right? We're saying, What should they do?

And the question is, this is not a this is not a question of what.

This is a question of who are you?

This is an identity thing. You an evangelist is a type of person,

it is not just an activity. The activity is the fruit of the type

of person that person is

And that's why we say some of these issues are upstream.

It has to do with how people see God.

~ be because i if if people see God as evangelistic,

as somebody who's interested in evangelism,

then they'll realize the why behind what they're doing.

And sometimes we start with what,

we're really eager to answer what and how to do it,

and we forget the why. And really,

why is I think where we're we should start.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. it just seems to me that.

People feel like relationships and being evangelistic on

the platform of relationship is harder than handing out a track,

which is funny because I actually now find relationships easier than handing

out a track. ~ just approaching somebody cold like that,

you know, just off the street,

not knowing them. ~ why do you think some people find this so hard and kind

of shy away from it?

Yeah. Well, ~ I think y to to your point,

rel relational evangelism is easier because ~ you get to the place where someone

wants you to talk to them about Jesus because of the relationship.

But I the the I think I knew you were gonna ask me this question,

so I kinda thought through it.

I think first of all, it takes a lot more time and effort to build

a relationship with people.

than it does just to simply knock on the door and tell them something they don't

want to hear. And so ~ I I think it's the time and effort that is a problem.

I think the other thing is we have to live what we preach,

so to speak. And so ~ it it's not enough I mean,

I can go and knock on someone's door and tell them something and they only

get this one moment of impression from me.

But if I'm building a relationship with them,

I have to actually live Jesus in front of them all the time.

~

Yes.

so ~ I I just think I can't really even say

any of that without adding to it.

And also you'll be invested in the long term of that person's life

and you're gonna literally build be building lifelong ~ relationships as a result.

I mean to me there is there is no other better lifestyle than living this lifestyle

of building relationships with people that I can help ~

With their relationship with Jesus.

So then comes the million dollar question.

What does a genuinely evangelistic church culture look like?

I think this is probably a question that thousands of pastors and

~ people in churches and the pews have of

Yeah.

and not just what it looks like,

but how to get there. But I know we only have a couple minutes,

so we might have to pick this up the rest of the way next week,

but go ahead. W

maybe start us off, what does that even look like,

a culture like that?

Well I actually have this conversation with pastors in

a sit-down one-on-one meeting,

~ almost on a weekly basis. And you know,

there's all kinds of things. There's a shared burden,

there's a shared vocabulary, the the that's what culture is.

I mean culture ~ is is when we share those culture those ~ heart

~ felt burdens. But frankly, you can see it,

you can recognize it when the hubbub in the lobby is ~ about meeting the coworker.

I'm gonna have meeting with my coworker this week over coffee,

be praying for me. ~ the chatting before church is is about praying

for a neighbor or a family member,

pray for me. ~ pray for the fellowship after the service is about wanting

to apply the message to a situation with a friend that I have

from the gym. You know, those when we find those kinds of conversations

in small group, in ~ in the lobby of the church,

~ that's that's really when we begin to see the culture shifting.

I I feel like ~ discipl discipleship ~ when when

the church starts taking discipleship seriously

So in other words, it's not enough to just say I'm going to see people saved.

That's evangelism.

Hm.

But disciple making, what God's called us to,

is far deeper than that. And so when a church begins to

get serious about discipleship,

when a church is seeing adults baptized

~ in their in their services, those those are the things that's going

to begin to say this church is developing that culture.

Hm. Yeah, I I I think you're right.

~ there is fruit marked evidence of what an evangelistic church looks like.

I mean, the biggest thing is evangelistic churches grow.

And they grow organically. ~ churches that aren't evangelistic

are are usually churches that struggle with growth or are simply doing what

I would call sheep trading with other churches.

and the most exciting thing in a church is when

the church sees people one to Christ.

I mean, when they see that fruit and get a taste of that fruit,

they will want more.

Yeah.

And I think that's what leads to.

to a continued sustained culture.

Absolutely.

Absolutely. I I appreciate you adding those things because I agree with

you a hundred percent.

Yeah, I I think it's it's very interesting all this the stuff we think about

as pastors all the time, but ~ but it's good for people in the pew to think about

it too, because the you're you are the church.

~ the church is not just the sum of the leadership and it is not the building,

it is the people. So we'll have to pick this up next week.

Erica, great question because we have about eighteen more pages of content.

So this is probably gonna be a three part series for everybody in the audience.

But

we

we love you guys. Pray to the Lord of the harvest.

I want encourage Erica and her husband,

pray to the Lord of the harvest that he would send forth laborers.

So one thing you can't skip in building a culture of evangelism in your church,

it is the most important ingredient,

I would say, right alongside of truth is prayer.

~ if God's not in it and he doesn't come down and touch it,

it won't take off. So

Absolutely, absolutely. And frankly,

for those of you who are listening today who ~ are are kind of thinking about we're

talking about ~ pastors and pastor discouragement,

would would you just remember to to pray for your pastor?

Mm-hmm.

being a pastor is a hard thing

and pastors need people in their church

who are praying for them. They need people in their church

Yes.

who are relentlessly encouraging them.

And I would just urge

Yes.

all of you, ~ just take it upon yourself.

I want to be that person for my pastor.

Hmm, love it. ~ well,

pray with us, like I said, as we pray to the Lord of the harvest.

Keep going. Subscribe if you haven't already.

Share this episode with your pastor,

share it with people in your church,

and if you've got more questions,

email us George at exchangemessage.org.

G E O R G E at exchangemessage.org.

All one word. We love you guys.

We'll see you next week.