Ray Comfort, Kirk Cameron: How to Evangelize & The SERIOUS Nature of Sin (Living Waters) | TBN

Evangelist Ray Comfort, of Living Waters Ministry, joins Kirk Cameron to discuss how to present the Gospel to those who may be unfamiliar with the salvation story. He delves into why Christians must not let fear stand in the way of evangelism and shares the fundamental question that can help start that conversation. Don’t miss this insightful interview on Takeaways with Kirk Cameron on TBN!

We’ve got a glorious gospel, Kurt. Every Christian should be crying out to god.
God used me in these closing hours of time. Help me to get rid of my fears.
Every day I scream out to the heavens.
God, give me wisdom, give me wisdom to know what to say, how to reach the lost.
Ray, I remember the first time that I met you.
And, um, I I had never seen someone do what you did.
I watched this video of this guy who was who was marching through the middle of a Hari Krishna Convention in New York City and you were carrying a casket with these pallbearers, and everyone was dressed in black.
And you set up this mock funeral, got everybody’s attention, and then let them know that Each and every one of us also has an appointment with death, and then you preach the gospel to them.
And I thought you were like a modern day John the Baptist and you spoke so articulately and reason so well with, with people who were skeptics.
And then you just reeled them in with the gospel. It was masterful.
I was waiting for you to say, and then you met me and realized us a little lunatic.
Well, I didn’t get to that part yet. You said it. I didn’t. Right.
So many people know who you are, and I can’t imagine the thousands or hundreds of thousands of people who are in heaven because of your ministry.
I truly mean that that’s not an exaggeration.
Um, but for those who aren’t familiar with the very beginnings, How did Ray comfort the great evangelist come to Christ himself?
Of humility, could you just call me your holiness and future?
Cause I just I’m embarrassed of all those. You
know? Sure.
Um, well, I got saved back in 1972. Yeah.
I was tormented by the fear of death Hebrews too.
Verse 14 15 says every human being is haunted by the fear of death or their lifetime.
It was the secret that I had that I didn’t tell anyone about.
Got to the age of about twenty and just wet one night of the thought of losing Sue.
Just she and my wife, if she died, newly married, I’d have nothing to live for.
All my material things would be nothing. So I just cried out, why am I alive? Why?
Didn’t even think I was praying. But god heard my prayer 6 months later. I heard the gospel.
The thing that converted me was the word was the words of Jesus in, uh, Matthew 5 you’ve heard it said by them of old, you shall not commit adultery.
I remember thinking, well, I’ve never committed adultery. I’m fine.
And then I read the words, but I say to you whoever looks on a woman to last for her has committed adultery already, whether in his heart.
And that’s when it was like an arrow hit my chest.
And I realized if god saw my thought life, as in big trouble on judgment day, and that’s when I understood the cross.
Came to Christ born again, new heart, new desires, And I was like a a mad man with joy that god had plucked me out of darkness, out of death, and brought me into life.
And so I started giving out gospel tracks.
I, um, actually purchased a printing press and put it in our home, put scripture on our car.
That sign writing and professional siding purchased a huge bus port scripture around there.
Started preaching at the local square in the heart of our city Christchurch in New Zealand City of 350,000 people and did that almost every day for 12 years because I’ve found everlasting life, and there’s no way I was gonna keep quiet.
So I look on myself as a normal biblical Christian. Nothing special. Well,
you’re certainly a unique Christian.
And somebody who comes to Christ and says, oh, I’ve got my sins forgiven. I’m not going to hell.
I’ve got eternal life. That’s enough for many people, but you took that to the next level and then devoted your life to evangelism.
Why why did you do that? Why not apologetic? Why not prosperity, uh, teaching? Why not becoming a pastor?
You were
an evangelist. Well, If you’re in a lifeboat and people are drowning around you, why not polish the brass?
Why not eat soup? Or would you rather reach out and pull them in?
So when you realize evangelism is the heart is on the heart of god, that’s why Jesus died, then that’s what you do.
You fall on the footsteps of Jesus. Follow after me, and I’ll make you to become fishers of men.
So every Christian should be utterly consumed in horror at the thought of anyone dying in their sense.
Every day. Just about takes my breath away, that there are people out there that don’t know why they’re alive.
They’re haunted by the fear of death. I’ve got no hope in the gospel.
They’re like a man on the edge of a plane, knows he has to jump. He’s got no parachute.
10,000 feet. Horrified. That’s what drives me to reach out to the loss because if god has really taken your heart and changed you and written his law upon your heart, he will cause you to walk in his statutes.
In other words, you will naturally love god with heart mind, soul, and strength.
And so the analogy I use, when I talk about evangelism to Christians, and say, could I ever get you to jump into a pond?
It’s about 5 feet deep, and it’s got big chunks of ice in it, and it’s so cold.
It’ll kill you in 3 minutes. Just say, no. What’s their four year old boy fell in there?
His feet wouldn’t touch the bottom and he’s drowning. You wouldn’t hesitate to jump in because love will do that.
You’ll grab him and pull him out. Perfect love, casts out, or fear.
And the waters of personal evangelism are freezing.
There’s no denying that, but if we love sinners, will push aside our fears and grab them.
So if you’ve got problems with fear when it comes to evangelism, don’t pray for less fear pray for more love because that’s the problem.
Don’t pray for less fear. Pray for more love.
Your style of evangelism has been going out onto the streets, and I’ve gone there with you for years.
We we did the television show the way of the master. And you Just ask people these crazy questions.
Like, what do you think happens when you die?
Uh, you ask them all sorts of questions, personal questions, questions about their secret thought life.
Uh, what’s been the response with such a bold and confrontational style of evangelism?
I’ve I haven’t been beaten up yet, but I, um, I sometimes watch the video.
Story once that you were beaten up by by by a little old lady.
Oh, wasn’t it was a young lady. It wasn’t a little old lady. We’ve gotta get this right. Oh, okay.
And it was it was my fault, Kirk. Do you remember what happened?
Santa Monica preaching to about forty people when a young lady, probably early twenties, used the f word twice to describe me.
And I said, madam, can you watch your language? Uh, there are ladies present. No. Yeah.
That’s what she said. Oh, and she says, uh, I am a lady.
I said, madam, you may be a woman. But you’re not a lady.
And that’s when she ran at me like a bat out of heaven and started beating me up.
I thought she’s Mike Tyson’s sister because she didn’t scratch and pull here.
She just went, And, uh, she got on 6 punches.
And then when I was on the ground, she said to my team who are holding her back, Let me go.
I wanna get my handbag, and she didn’t want a handbag. She just wanna get in a kidney punch.
Took 2 weeks for the bruising to go, but she doubled my crowd, and she can come back anytime she wants.
Ray, the first time that I met you was terrifying.
I had heard a message that you had given called Hell’s best kept secret.
I thought it was a great title and I listened to it, and it was a fantastic message because it helped me to share the gospel with my my elderly grandmother.
And I called you. We went to lunch together as we walked in the door.
You began passing out these little, these little gospel tracks, and they were in the form of magic tricks and, and optical illusions.
And I was sitting at the table waiting for my lunch guest to sit down with me, and you were at table after table.
And I thought, oh my goodness. He’s one of those guys, passing out gospel tracks.
I was ready to hide underneath the table, but all the patrons were laughing and asking you for more of them.
Your techniques of gospel tracks and street evangelism and open air preaching and what some would call confrontational one on one gospel sharing is is not that comfortable for most people watching right now.
Has it been effective?
Whether or not whether it’s effective or not doesn’t really worry me.
What what’s what I wanna do is be faithful to what god told us to do, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
The way I know if someone’s ready to hear the gospel is I ask myself, are they breathing?
If they’re breathing. They’re ready. If they’re dead, it’s too late.
So I I want to share the gospel with every creature. And so I’m faithfully planting seed.
And, uh, god’s the one that brings forth fruit. And you’re set as a confrontation.
I’ll tell you what’s got got rid of my my fears more than anything else. Yeah.
Because every Zakius turns into a Goliath as I’m approaching him, and they they never come to fruition those fears.
And the thing that’s done it for me more than anything else is this one question, do you think there’s an afterlife?
I haven’t mentioned god Jesus, the Bible, heaven, hell, judgment day sin, righteous all these things make him and me feel uncomfortable.
I’ve just says, hey. How you doing? What’s your name? This is Fred. I’m Ray Fred.
Fred, I got a question for you. Do you think there’s an afterlife?
And people go, I said it’s the big one, isn’t it? I said, yeah.
Do you think about it much? Your own death? And he says all the time.
His all the time dissipates my fears. He’s not the antichrist. He hasn’t stabbed me in this road.
He’s a human being with a will to live, and he’s interested in the message of everlasting life.
You know, Kirk, think of how a waitress approaches a table.
There’s 3 guys sitting in three piece suits. They got little leather satchels, and they’re very very important.
1,000,000 of dollars at stake. What does she do? Stand back and go, ah, these look like important.
Mina, she walks up and says, can I take your order? She just backs in. Why?
Because she knows she has what they want. They’re there to eat.
So she comes up and says, what do you wanna order? And they said, yeah. I don’t know.
They stop with them wheeling and dealing to talk to her. And you and I have what the world wants.
No one in his way and mine wants to die.
Every human being is saying, oh, I don’t wanna die. So we know we have what they want.
They don’t know it, so we have to be bold. Remember what Jesus said to the woman at the well?
If you knew who was talking to him to you, you would ask of him, and he’d give you living water.
And so that’s why I’m bold.
I’m like that waitress, and that’s why you and I need to be bold and just push our fears aside like a firefighter.
No firefighter shows up and goes, oh, cringing goes, oh, he wouldn’t be a firefighter if he didn’t know how to get rid of his fears.
So that’s the key just to look at, the person love them and and realize that you’ve got the message who are lasting life, and they haven’t.
And, uh, you’ve got it.
Ray, working with you and ministering alongside of you has revolutionized the way that I think about evangelism.
And its relationship to apologetics and the concept of friendship evangelism, it’s it’s changed everything.
And I’m so grateful uh, the per first person that I shared the gospel with after listening to your message, Hell’s best kept secret, was myself It made me question my own salvation.
I thought, why did I come to god? Did I come for a better life?
Did I come for, uh, some happy plan, or did I come because I’m a sinner who is in need of god’s forgiveness, and that only comes through faith in the gospel.
And I remember I remember sharing the gospel with myself because nobody else really had the way that you were sharing the gospel with others.
And I’m so grateful. How do you overcome the fear of talking to people that you don’t know?
I do it daily. It’s not something you do, and then it’s all over.
It’s like you continually have to battle fear. But if you wanna meet someone, you just meet them.
You know, if you care about someone, you can talk to someone and say, hey. How you doing? I’m Ray.
And they say their name. I says, nice day. We can all do that. Yeah.
And then you just ask them if they think there’s an afterlife.
And I have when I go fishing for me and Kirk, I have one bait that’s the best bait I’ve ever had.
And a picture’s worth a thousand words, that’s my dog, Sam, and every day, and I’ve done this for years, probably 5 or 6 years.
I put Sam on the bike. He’s wearing sunglasses.
And as I ride around, I hear women call out how cute, and that’s when I say so is the dog.
And, uh, he’s my bait when I fish for me, and I can write up to any person.
The first thing they say is, I love your dog. What’s his name? And it says, name’s Sam.
How do you get the sunglasses on? He says he’s a really well trained dog.
Plus, he’s got elastic behind his head and under his neck to keep him on.
But he and then I just I’ve got a friend.
You’ve got a friend for life if you’re talking about a dog.
And so that that’s probably one of my greatest tools, and that’s when I get a lot of interviews.
We’ve got over 2 and a half thousand interviews on our YouTube channel, which has just passed a 180,000,000 views living on what is YouTube.
Which is wonderful. So each day I go out and get those, uh, those interviews.
So how do you start the conversation with somebody?
I mean, I mean, let’s say I’m a, I’m a person on the street and I think, Hey, that dog is a really cool dog.
I mean, how would you get into a conversation with me? What would that sound like?
Um, say, uh, oh, this is a role play like we used to do.
Well, you know,
I’d say, yes. I say, so you what’s your name?
I’m an actor. I can do this.
Yeah. Okay. What’s your name?
My name’s, uh,
Kirk. Hey. Hey, Kirk. I’ve got a question for you.
What’s that?
Do you think there’s an afterlife?
Do I think there’s an afterlife? Well, that’s kinda personal, but, uh,
because No one’s ever said that to me.
No? Right? I I would probably say, yeah. Yeah. I I I think so. Yeah. Probably. And
then I’d say, do you think about it much?
You know what? During during this pandemic and everything? Yeah. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, actually.
Yeah. Uh, so most people do. And then I say, you’re afraid of death.
Well, I I mean, I’m I’m I’m a I’m not looking forward to it.
I hope I hope there’s not a lot of pain involved.
Yeah. Yeah. And then I say, do you know why we die? Do you know what the Bible says?
Why we die? And people say no? I say, I say, wages, and then the person says, wages. Yeah.
That’s as god is paying you in death for your sins.
It’s like a judge in a court of law, looks at a heinous criminal murdered 3 girls after he raped them.
And he says, you’ve earned the death sentence. This is your wages. This is what we’re paying you.
This is what’s due to you.
I sin I say sin is so serious to a holy god that he’s paying you in death for sins.
He has put you on death row. Capital punishment.
I said, do you think you are that much of a sinner that god has justified in putting you to death?
Well, I would think most people would say, no. I I haven’t I haven’t
murdered anybody. You know, I’m not that bad.
It’s exactly what people say. So, well, let’s check.
Let’s go through the 10 commandments, god’s standard to see if you are a good person or if god is justified.
How do you do that?
So, well, you think you’re a good person? You say yes.
Most people do to how many lies of your top.
How many lies? I don’t know. Uh, maybe a a dozen.
So what do you call someone who tells lies?
Uh, I call him a liar.
If a stolen something
Stolen something. Maybe something something small. Nothing big.
Yeah. Like a diamond ring or something?
Well, not even no. No. You know?
And so you’re lying to you. Have you ever used god’s name in vain?
Sure.
Okay. Would you use would you use use your mother’s name as a password? Hit your thumb with a hammer.
But instead of using an s word, would you take the name of your mother and use it in place of that filth word of expressed discussed?
No. I wouldn’t.
Course not, but you’ve taken the name of the god who gave you your mother, gave you life, the holy name of god, and aligned it with that filth word to express disgust.
Kirk, that’s called blasphemy punishable by death in the Old Testament.
Jesus said, if you look at a woman and lust for her, you commit adultery with her in your heart.
Have you ever looked at a woman with lust?
Sure.
Sex before marriage. Sure. So here is the summation. Kirk, I’m not judging you.
I’ve just met you, but here’s the summation.
You have told me you’re a lying thieving, blasphemous, fornicating adulterer, heart, you’ve earned your wages.
And the people go, yeah. I’ve earned my wages. God is justified.
So what are you gonna do? I’m gonna clean up my life. Well, that’s not gonna work.
It’s like saying to a judge in a court of law. I’m guilty committing that crime.
I’m gonna be good from now on. The judge is gonna say, so you should be. You’re gonna jail.
So you need mercy. That’s what you’d fling yourself on in a court. You can’t justify yourself.
You throw yourself on the mercy of the judge, and god has rich and mercy to all the call upon him.
He sent a savior. You and I broke god’s law, and Jesus paid the fine.
That’s what happened on the cross. That’s why I said it is finished.
If you’re in court, someone pays you fine. A judge can let you go. Speeding fines. Someone pays them.
He says you’re out of here and can do that, which is legal.
And god can legally dismiss your case because Christ paid the fine in his life’s blood rose from the dead, defeated death, and all you have to do, Kurt, to find everlasting life is repent of those sins, turn from them, and trust alone in Jesus like a trust of parachute.
So that’s how it normally do it. I’ve said that a million times.
See, all of this makes so much sense to me, uh, as somebody who’s been given the gift of of faith.
I love god. I’m so thankful for what he’s given to me in in Christ, but surely you’ve had conversations go bad.
Yes.
Where people get angry and people begin to push back.
How do you know when it’s time to stop the conversation about Jesus? Before it explodes.
When I see the knife Okay. Or the Fair
enough.
They can get caught No. I I can tell.
You can tell by people’s body language and how they react and they’re they’re just help, you know, when someone’s uncomfortable, you can feel it.
And so I say, am am I making you feel uncomfortable? I’m sorry. Let’s just leave it here. You know?
And they say, no. No. It’s alright. I can handle it.
And then I say, can I give you a gift? And speaking of gifts, can I show you this?
What’s in the box?
This is not a box. This is a vault this is full of precious things. Woah.
And these aren’t just $1,000,000 bills. These are far more important than more valuable.
These are actually gospels of John that look like a bundle of $1,000,000 bills.
Oh, wow. Look at this. Can you can you see this? We’ve got a $1,000,000 bills here.
An internal over.
But if you open it up inside is the gospel.
Now I’ve said to people, can I give you a gospel to John? And I’ve had a guy say, no.
Absolutely not. No. No. I said, can I show you? No. And I showed him, and he took it.
Because who’s gonna resist this? Say goodbye to rejection.
That’s that’s incredible.
It’s very exciting.
Ray, what’s something that people could use to, um, if they’re not comfortable sharing the gospel verbally, but they want to, They want a little tool that could help them break the ice and get into a conversation.
And then and then want to be able to sort of train in your way of sharing the gospel with people?
What where can they find some people?
Living waters.com. You can get gospel facts. We’ve got $1,000,000 bills there that are very popular.
And if you don’t know how to give these out, let me show you. Yeah.
Someone’s gonna pick that up. It’s a $1,000,000 bill.
You know, just dropped me at your window on a freeway. I’m joking.
But, yeah, there’s there’s audios and videos that you can listen to can go to our our YouTube channels.
I said a 180,000,000 views and watch people come under the sound of the gospel, watch the conscience, do its duty, watch atheist backslide, And, uh, that’s one way to get trained.
Just keep watching them again and again.
And the other thing, Kirk, is you can share our u YouTube channel with other people.
You can listen to our podcast.
We have a living waters podcast that’s very popular where we talk about how to how to sheer faith and a Christian life.
So, plus, there’s the hell’s best kept secret audio that you listen to.
They can hear on the homepage of living living waters.com. You just go to the bottom of the homepage.
What have you found to be, uh, the response to your sharing of the gospel on college campuses these days?
Young people today have less knowledge of the scriptures, less knowledge of the gospel than than you had growing up because our culture is moving further and further away from the Bible.
Are you finding that that the message of the gospel is still as relevant today as it was back in the days of Billy Graham?
Of course. You you’ve gotta realize what you’ve got in Christ everlasting life.
That is relevant to those who are sitting in the shadow of death. God’s placed eternity on their heart.
They’re not primates. They’ve got a will to live, and that’s what I tap in on, and that’s what this is about.
Every one of us has got a will to live, a cry of, I don’t wanna die.
Plus, there’s the conscience. Jesus appealed to the conscience.
The rich young ruler came running to Jesus and said, good master. What shall I do to inherit Turner wife?
Jesus didn’t even answer his question. This is mark 10 verse 17. He said, why do you call me good?
He approved him. And that’s because everyone has a wrong understanding of god’s character and nature, and that’s what the commandments show us.
You study that portion where Jesus gave 5 of those 10 commandments to rich young ruler.
You know what he did? He threw in something he wasn’t even supposed to be there. He said, defraud not.
Right in the middle of the commandments. To fraud not.
And I suspect that the rich young ruler got his money by fraud. That’s why he went away.
That’s why he loved his money.
And that’s why Jesus added that one to the commandments to fraud not, but the commandments bring the knowledge of sin and show us any of a savior.
That’s what happened to me the night of my conversion.
When I saw that god sees the thought life, lust as adultery, that brought the knowledge of sin and showed me why god sent a savior to pay the fine on my behalf so I can hear you the lasting life.
So we’ve got a glorious gospel, Kirk, every Christian should be crying out to god.
God used me in these closing hours of time. Help me to get rid of my fears.
Every day I scream out to the heavens. God give me wisdom.
Give me wisdom to know what to say, how to reach the lost. You know? Yeah.
None of us could leave someone in a burning building, walk off because we’ve got something more important to do.
And the Bible uses that analogy in scripture in the book of Jude, others having compassion, making a difference pulling them from the fire hitting them in the garment spotted by the flesh.
So if we see ourselves as firefighters and remember that analogy that you gave the first time we ever did a way of the master program about a firefighter who listened on his earphones while people died what a betrayal, and yet we’ve got multitudes of professing Christians who are doing everything but reach out to the last.
And the reason for that is they’ve never bothered to train themselves.
If they wanna do it, they’ll train themselves.
If you wanna get rid of your fears, you’ll get rid of your fears.
That’s a it’s a matter of your will.