Conversation with a Stranger

Witnessing to a stranger allows you to do more talking, instead of just asking questions.  Because you might never see this person again, you can choose either to make him incredibly curious or give him as much information as you think he can handle at one time. In the following witnessing situation, I chose to do both.

I went sailing on a regatta once with some unsaved people because I wanted to improve my sailing. I did not know these people, but I knew that they would not be interested in talking about spiritual things, just sailing. Therefore, although I had prayed all through the regatta for an opportunity to talk to any one of the crew about the Lord, I had set my witnessing antenna on low and had not expected to see God open the door. On the sail home, He taught me an important principle about witnessing to strangers.

The moon shone full on the mainsail as a light wind blew us forward on our course. We had not won the regatta, but we had gained valuable experience for the next race, and we had become good friends during the four days of competitive sailing. The winners’ party had lasted until eleven at night, but we had not slept afterwards. Some of our crew had to be home by noon the next day, so we were heading back to home port on a six-hour night sail. Although Wolfgang and I had the first watch between midnight and two in the morning, Gerhard, our philosopher, and Max, our naturalist, were enjoying the ride on the open sea. Wolfgang was at the wheel.

The conversation started when Wolfgang related a story about a ship that went down under the Bora. The Bora is a violent, cold wind, that comes off the Russian mountains, sweeps across the high, rugged Serbian and Croatian country-sides, and drops suddenly onto the unsuspecting boats that bob like corks off the coast. When the Bora hits, people die. I moved the conversation toward the subject of sudden death and discovered that Wolfgang had a great fear of death. The others listened silently.

“No one wants to die,” I said, “but we all die sooner or later.  We spend all our time trying to stay alive just a little bit longer, or we worry about how we are going to die. It seems to me that we are asking the wrong questions.”

I paused to let them wonder which questions they should ask.  They were not yet curious enough.

“We only live for an average of seventy years, and then we’re dead for an eternity. Why don’t we ever ask the question, ‘What happens to us after we die?’”

Wolfgang answered, “No one can know that.”

“Unless someone died and came back from the dead to tell us about it,” I said.

Wolfgang answered that some people have died “clinically” on the operating table.

I objected, “And maybe some of them had an experience of seeing a bright light at the end of a tunnel, but none of them were dead for more than a few seconds or a minute or two. I mean someone who had been dead for a day or more.”

Gerhard could not contain himself any longer. “You don’t mean Jesus Christ, do you?” he ridiculed.

“I didn’t mention any names,” I answered. “Did Jesus Christ rise from the dead?”

“Of course not!” Gerhard retorted.

“How do you know that?”  I asked. “Were you around to inspect the grave?”

“You can’t tell me you believe in the resurrection,” he said.

“Gerhard, it doesn’t matter what I believe. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then we can forget about him, since He was just like all the rest of us. If He did rise from the dead, however, then we would be complete idiots not to listen to what He has to say about that experience.”

Wolfgang nodded approval, but Gerhard answered, “The only testimony we have of Jesus is the Bible. You may be a good sailor, but you can’t tell me that you believe the Bible! It’s not trustworthy.”

I allowed Gerhard to see the smile on my face, and he wrinkled his forehead, wondering what I found funny. Most people are alike. They raise questions as objections, claiming that the questions have no answers. They seem to think that the answers cannot exist because they don’t know them.

“Gerhard, have you read the Bible?”

“No, I’ve been working on my doctorate in philosophy and haven’t had the time.”

“Then how do you know that the Bible is not trustworthy when you haven’t even read it?”

“I read a verse somewhere once,” Gerhard said, defending himself.  “where Jesus said that the Christians have to drink blood. What do you have to say about that?” He obviously did not want to know the truth. He just wanted to put me on the defense. So much for using the polite approach, I thought. If he is going to act like a Pharisee, then he should be treated like a Pharisee.

“You said you were working in your doctorate,” I said.

He nodded.

“I assume you have to do research.”

He nodded again.

“I wonder what your thesis is going to look like when you are finished. If you treat your sources like you treat the Bible, your thesis will be a jumble of run-together quotes, ripped out of their contexts and stuck together to make everything say what you want it to say, with no thought or concern for what the various authors really meant.”

Gerhard’s expression indicated that no one had ever returned his attack so blatantly.

“No one,” I continued, “reads any kind of literature in the same way that you just misquoted a part of one verse out of the Bible. You pick up a book that you have never read before, open it to page 167, run your finger halfway down the page, pick out half of one sentence, misquote that half, and then claim that you can’t understand the book! That is really intelligent. And you’re working on your doctorate! Gerhard, I’m ashamed of you.”

I had spoken these comments rapid-fire, and I made the last comment with the wave of my hand, indicating how useless I thought his octorate would be under the above-mentioned conditions.  Gerhard’s face contorted in anger. Max got up and checked the jib to hide his embarrassment.  Wolfgang had not noticed, or did not care about, Gerhard’s feelings. He laughed.

“I’ve never been to college,” Wolfgang said to me, “but I can see the logic in what you just said.”

Max returned to his comfortable spot in the cockpit and exchanged glances with Gerhard.

“For me, God is in the stars,” Max said, piously, as he looked up at the clear night heaven and waved his arm in a wide arc, indicating the millions of glittering stars overhead. “When I think of God, I think of the trees and nature.” The finality in his voice communicated that here was a noble and permanent belief.

“That’s an interesting way of looking at God,” I said. “That viewpoint has been around for thousands of years. As far back as the Egyptians, we find people who believed that God was equal with nature.

“I have two problems with that, however. I can best explain what I mean by using an illustration. Let’s say that I am a carpenter, which I’m not, and let’s assume that one day I build a beautiful boat. You and a friend come along and see the boat, but I’m not home, so you only see the boat.

“When you see the boat, you make assumptions. You assume that somebody made the boat. You don’t believe that it came into existence all by itself.”

Max was listening intently. Maybe he really was seeking God I thought, but too much pressure from Gerhard was keeping him from showing much outward interest.

“You are so impressed with the boat,” I continued, “that you want to get to know the person who made it. As you start to leave, your friend says he wants to stay with the boat a while. You leave and come back a few minutes later to find him talking to the boat. You ask him what he is doing and he says, ‘I’m getting to know the person who made this wonderful boat.’ What would you think of your friend?”

Max could see what I was saying, but he was smiling, so I continued. “Granted, when I made the boat, I put a part of me into it, but no one would ever assume that I and the boat were identical. I am a living person, but that boat, as beautiful as it is, is just a dead boat. If you want to get to know me, you wouldn’t talk to my boat. And if that dead boat is beautiful beyond description, then the living person who made it must be far more interesting that any of his creations.

“I don’t understand how a person can look at those stars, their vastness, their order, their hidden mysteries that attract us to study them, and not want to find out what kind of a Being created them and put them out there.”

A short silence followed and then Wolfgang said, “Never looked at it that way before.”

Max reminded silent.

Gerhard’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Have you studied the stars?”

I smiled at him again – a smile can be very unsettling – and spoke directly to him. “Stars give off light. Have you ever wondered what light is?”

No answer. They obviously had not studied physics.

“I spoke with a physics professor once and asked him if he could define light,” I said. “He began by telling me that sometimes light acted like waves and sometimes like matter or particles. I interrupted him and said that I didn’t want to know what light was like, but what light was. He thought for a moment and then said, ‘We don’t know;  we can only describe it.’ I asked him if he had ever thought about God, and he said he had no interest in that area.

“Here was a man, who through his studies had received a small glimpse of the wonder of light, with all of its secrets. He was thoroughly fascinated by light and its intricacies. I was astounded. The possibility exists that there is a God who not only made light, but he thought up the idea ‘light’ and planned how light would work. This physicist couldn’t even tell me what light is; he could just weakly describe some of its varied characteristics. And he did not have the slightest interest in the vastly more complicated God, who stands behind light.”

I shook my head in disappointment and said, “To talk to the stars or to the sun is like talking to a boat or to a light bulb. What would you think of someone who spent his time talking to a light bulb?”

Max did not appear to be offended, while Wolfgang chuckled. Gerhard made no response.

I continued, “The other thing I don’t understand is something that goes beyond mere knowledge or curiosity. All human beings have problems, and many people have problems for which they can find no solution. When a person is faced with such a problem and sees no way out, how can that person get comfort or help by talking to a star? To which tree should I go when my wife runs off with another man? To which star should I speak when my baby dies? How can nature answer my questions about death and suffering and pain? If nature is all there is, then these questions have no answers, and the entire history of the human race is one big accident. It becomes nobody’s fault that thousands of people die yearly of hunger or cancer or AIDS.” I looked directly at Max, then asked rhetorically, “Is that satisfying to you? What good is an impersonal god? It makes more sense to believe in a personal God on whom we can blame everything!”

Gerhard was not to be moved. “Belief in a personal God is a crutch,” he said. “Everyone believes that truth is relative. Every nation and people has different laws, and they are often applied arbitrarily. What evidence is there for an absolute God who gives out absolute truth?”

“If there is only relative truth, then my own laws are as good as anybody else’s.” I informed him.

“Right,” Gerhard answered.

“And if according to my law, I say it is right to kill other people, then I have the right to do so within my law system.”

“That’s ridiculous!” Gerhard protested. “Society says that killing others is wrong.”

“Which society?” I retorted, “and why should I listen to what society says? Different societies have different standards of what is right and wrong. Headhunters in South America don’t think killing others is wrong. If all truth is relative, then those headhunters have just as much right to practice their beliefs as you do.

“If I believed that all truth was relative, then I could take your girlfriend for myself, whether you liked it or whether she liked it, and the only question left to ask would be,’Who is stronger?’ ‘The survival of the fittest’ becomes our final rule of life.”

Wolfgang added, “When one looks at all the wars into which man has got himself, it would seem that most people believe in this final rule.”

Max nodded.

I continued, “But if there is a God, then everything depends on what kind of God he is. If he is only a superhuman God, like the Greeks imagined, then he is no different from people, just more dangerous. We don’t talk about loving an arbitrary God; we only talk in whispers about fearing and appeasing him. This kind of God will always ‘survive’ and win because he is the strongest. If God is absolute, however, then doesn’t He have the right to set down His absolute law? He certainly has the power to enforce it!”

Gerhard’s violent reaction broke the calm of the breeze blowing through the sails. “I totally reject such a God who can force me to do anything! I do not believe in such a being, and if such a one exists, then I want nothing to do with him! I am free to do as I wish. I have a free will, and God is going to dictate anything to me!”

“Gerhard, thank you for stating that so bluntly,” I replied. “If you promise not to throw me overboard, I would like to point out two things you may have overlooked.” I said this more as a question than a statement.

Gerhard realized how viciously he had spoken and laughed to cover up his reaction. “Sure, we’re just having a discussion. It has no meaning,” he said with a shrug.

“If I were to stand out on the main road at six o’clock on a Friday afternoon and say to myself, ‘I don’t believe that thousands of cars are going to run over me; I don’t believe . . . .” Smash! I slammed my hand down onto the deck hard.

All three men jumped and stared at me in surprise.

“It doesn’t matter what I believe; I would be dead. My unbelief did not change the fact of those cars. Nor did my unbelief keep them from running over me.

“If there is a God, my choosing not to believe in Him will not make Him go away. Only children believe that they can wish something away.”

Gerhard looked like he wanted to throw me overboard. I judged the coastline to be about five miles away.

“And secondly,” I continued, “you’re right that every person has a free will to accept or reject God. Whether acceptance or rejection is good or bad, depends on the God that is accepted or rejected.

“I have no problem rejecting a hateful God, who hurts men for his own enjoyment. But let me picture another God for you. What if God is a God of love and sees me as I am with all my imperfections? And what if He accepts me as I am? What if He wants to communicate with me and becomes a human being to do so? What if He wants to make me better or even make me like Himself? What if He is willing to give me the entire universe? What if He is a perfect God and the only way to make me perfect is to die for me – to become a man and to give His life for me?”

I looked at each of them as I asked the next question. “Have you ever had anyone die for you? Imagine sitting on a railway line with a friend, and a train comes along. Your friend sees the train, but you don’t. Your friend has just enough time to jump or push you. He chooses to push you, and he is spread over the next mile of track. What would you think of this friend?” I gave them a few moments to think about the illustration.

Gerhard looked thoughtful.

“You probably wouldn’t forget him very quickly, would you?” I asked. “But we must not forget to ask another important question. What did your friend think of you? He considered your life worth more that his own.

“Would you go around claiming your friend did not exist? Would you tell everyone that he was an evil, wicked person? If you did, what kind of person would you be?

“Now imagine a God who loves you so much, that He has done all these things for you. He has even gone so far as to send His Son to die on the cross, so you can go to heaven and live with Him forever. The only thing He requires of you is that you love Him in return. Have you ever thought about loving God?”

They clearly had not.

“I know,” I said, raising both hands as if to ward off the obvious objection, “most people picture God sitting in heaven, looking down on humankind, and thinking up all kinds of crazy laws to put man under, just to make life miserable. But what if God isn’t like that? What if He wants to be loved by you and me? If He is a loving God, has given us His Son, wants to give us the universe, wants us to live with Him in a love relationship for ever, doesn’t He have the right to be loved in return?”

Make the punch line good, I told myself.

“And then we choose to spit in His face and reject Him, all the time continuing to accept, without thanks, the very air we breathe. And with this air we breathe out threats and rejections toward him.”

I looked right at Gerhard as I said, “And we do it all in the name of intellect. Doesn’t God have the right to get angry at our insolence and hard-heartedness?”

I began to wonder if I could swim the five miles to shore. Gerhard would have been delighted to feed me to the sharks, I thought. I had attacked his stronghold – his intellect – the unforgivable sin in academic circles. It was his turn.

“Most Christians I know act ‘holier than thou.’” he said.  “And they aren’t any more intelligent than the average Joe on the street.” He pointed at me as he made these comments. “They act like they are perfect and don’t have any problems. If you ask me, I think they’re all hypocrites.”

I laughed out loud at this comment. “Gerhard, I haven’t met a person in my whole life who wasn’t a hypocrite in some area of his life, myself included! No true Christian would ever claim to be perfect.”

Gerhard was speechless.

“Maybe all those people you know are not true Christians,” I said, still chuckling. “If we read the Bible to find out how Jesus defines a Christian, we might discover that there aren’t as many Christians around as we thought.”

Gerhard’s pride had been severely damaged, but was still afloat. He wouldn’t look at the other two men. I saw no softening in his glare. A true Pharisee to the end. His pride would eventually consume him completely. I had only a few minutes left to make one final attempt at helping him see himself as he really was – an empty shell hiding behind a mask of pious intellectualism.

We were nearing the port, and Gerhard wanted to have the last word. “That all sounds good, but isn’t it all a bit simplistic? Just believe, and everything will be rosy! That is much too easy. It has to be harder than that!”

I was aware of the tremendous pressure Gerhard was under. He had no further arguments or questions to cast doubt onto what I had said, and Max and Wolfgang were beginning to see through his façade. The considerate thing to say would have been, “You may be right. Let’s talk about that sometime.” Gerhard needed something more direct.

“Gerhard, you may be right,” I said. “But if you’re not, then you’ve built your whole life on a foundation of sand – your own pride and intellect. And when you die, you’ll stand before God naked and empty. You won’t impress God with your doctorate degrees. When you tell him to let you into his heaven, he’ll say, ‘Why should I? You never let me into your life on earth!’”

The harbor light had come into view. We would have to drop the sails in a minute or two. Time to close. “Take your pick, Gerhard,” I said. “Waste your life on yourself or spend an eternity with the living God. If you choose to reject God, then enjoy as much of this life as you can. Eternity is a long time to regret it. Let me know what you decide. I’m interested in your decision.”

The boat rounded the last beacon, and we started preparing the yacht for docking.

Gerhard and I eventually did meet for lunch once and he began to read John’s Gospel with me. After three months of reading together, he broke off our lunch dates. At our last meeting, in a packed restaurant, he screamed at me, “It is not human to have a Lord!”

“Exactly!” I told him. “That’s exactly what Jesus wants to be – your Lord, nothing more and nothing less.”

For several years afterwards, I met with Wolfgang occasionally to talk about sailing and the Bible.  He was always afraid to read it.

Principle #11:
Be ready, at any time, to get involved.

When you witness to a stranger, you do not have a lot of time and might never see the person again. Although you don’t have the time to make friends, the principles of friendliness remain the same.

The Lord used Wolfgang’s openness to show me that I should witness to him. To have kept quiet and talked just about sailing would have been the same as telling the Lord, “No, I’ve got something better to do today. You’ll have to get someone else to do this job for you.”

The Lord might want you to witness to someone at two in the morning, just to see if telling others about Him is a top priority in your thinking.

A state of readiness requires some preparation. Carry things with you that you can use to start a conversation. I often use books as a jumping off point. Maybe you could use knitting and talk about the interweaving threads of life.

The next principle appears at the beginning of the conversation. Wolfgang brought up the subject of death, and I used it as a springboard. I did not, however, mention God or anything religious at this point. I let Wolfgang and the others bring that up.

Principle #12:
When you first open the conversation,
do not mention God or the bible unless they do.

Try to find something with which they can identify. Find common ground and do not be in a hurry to turn the conversation around. Get to know them a little by asking them questions about themselves and your common ground. Start looking for a connecting point between your common ground and something that could lead to talking about spiritual things. In this conversation I used the subject of death.

The subject of death never leaves us. You can easily start a conversation about the many causes of death. Everyone is concerned about health. As you speak with someone about their or your health, you can throw in a one-liner, “It seems ridiculous. We spend our whole lives trying to stay healthy, and we die anyway!” Or, “There are so many books on how to stay healthy, and yet they don’t keep us from dying. I wonder why no one has written a book on how to die?”

No matter how you start the conversation, these are the questions toward which you are working. “What happens to us after death? Is there life after death? How can we know? Has anyone ever died and come back to tell us about it? Why do we die? What started death?”

All of these questions lead to reading the Bible to find out what it has to say about the subject of death.  Even though you may never see them again, you want to have planted a seed and dug away a bit of their false foundation.

A number of times on the boat, the conversation started to lag. The others would have gladly dropped the subject, but I felt I would not get another chance to make them as curious as possible in such a short time span. Therefore, I kept the conversation going by asking a question, making an observation, giving an illustration of what had just been said. If you are witnessing to a stranger and you sense he is getting bored or too uncomfortable, ask him a question or give an illustration, in order to arouse his curiosity again. Questions make people think, and they will usually listen to an illustration, if it is interesting. Plan your illustrations for different parts of the gospel ahead of time.

Many of the principles that you used with your friends can and should be used with strangers. Consider, for example, how the following principles can be used.

Principle 3. Look for a person’s need to use as a conversation starter, as I used the subject of death with Wolfgang.

Principle 4. Making them curious is a must.

Principle 5. Ask lots of questions!

Principles 6 and 7. Do not defend yourself and do not try to prove anything.  You do not have enough time to cover all the ground, even if you tried.

Principle 8. You will have accomplished a lot if you cause a stranger to doubt his own false viewpoints.

You obviously cannot follow principle 1 (become their friend) because you do not have the time, and you might never see them again anyway. You might or might not want to follow principle 2 (do not condemn them) and 9 (do not answer their questions; let the Bible do that). These will depend on the situation.

If you sense that further contact might be possible, and if you sense an openness on the stranger’s part, carry out principle number 10. Ask, “Would you like to read the Bible with me?” You might be surprised with a positive answer.

Do It!

1.  Think of something you can do to make a stranger ask you about your faith this week.

2.  Think of one illustration you could use to make a stranger curious about your views of life or the Bible.

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