Robert Coleman Interview: Disciple-making Legend (Episode 154)

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Welcome to the Greg Groups Podcast.
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We're here to encourage and equip small group leaders at Brooklyn's and beyond.
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I'm Joy Gordon, Small Groups Minister at the Church of Brooklyn's.
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And I'm here alone today with a once-in-a-lifetime interview with author Robert Coleman.
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Listen in and learn from this legendary disciple Michael, an author of the Master Plan of Evangelism.
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All right, one thing I thought I would do on this and future podcast is add a scripture or start with a scripture.
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And one that I thought was really fitting today was 1 Thessalonians 2.0.
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That scripture says we cared so much for you that we were pleased to share with you not only the gospel of God, but our lives as well.
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So I just really thought that scripture epitomized Robert Cohen and the life that he has lived and the disciple maker that he has been in his life.
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And so here's the backstory of how I got a got an interview with Robert Cohen.
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Many of you have read his book, The Master Plan of Evangelism.
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In fact, I have a copy with me here, and the copy I've got is kind of old, but it says on the front of it more than 3.5 million copies sold.
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And so a lot of people have have read his book.
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And the staff at Brook Hills, we highly recommend that for small group leaders or anybody else interested in disciple making.
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There are a ton of good principles there.
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So, all right, here's the backstory.
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Some friends of mine had a chance to do a visit with Robert Coleman, and FOMO was all over me.
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I was so jealous of that.
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And so at some point writing about that, found out where he lived, how to make arrangements to do a visit with him.
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And so I thought it would be cool to go ahead and record that and eventually put it on the podcast.
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But you know, life got busy and I tried to transfer that myself to a file that we could upload to the podcast.
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And it had some glitches in it, just some very irritating things that wouldn't wouldn't work.
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And so I got some professional help to edit the video, I mean edit the audio so that we could could do that.
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And so, anyway, it's still a little bit unique.
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And also, as Robert Coleman was 94 at the time, he's still he's still kicking and doing a great job and, you know, just continuing to encourage people with his life.
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But being a 94-year-old, his voice is kind of gruff, and also he kind of rambles a little bit during the conversation.
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I can't remember if this made the final cut or not, but he he self-confessed that he rambles a good bit.
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But knowing that we might use it on a podcast, he said, uh, well, you can just cut that out if you want.
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It was well over an hour.
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You'll hear on the recording that I tried to land a plane at one point and he kind of kept going.
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And I don't know where it happened, but the podcast at some point after that just kind of cut out.
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So I hope there was nothing great at the end that we really missed.
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But there's plenty of great content here.
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So here's another way it all happened.
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If you remember back in February 2023, when I did this recording, there was uh a big revival going on at Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky, and that's where Dr.
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Coleman lives.
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The outpouring went on for about 16 days before they moved it to another location and eventually ended.
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But during that small town, it drew 50 to 70,000 people to the town of Wilmore, Kentucky.
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And so actually, just a kind of perfect storm hit.
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There was a lady in our group that lost her father, and actually Al Moller was going to be at the funeral, and there was the revival going on, and I thought, man, that would be so cool to pop in for an hour and see what's going on there, but also the possibility of the interview with Dr.
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Coleman.
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So it, you know, the trip was was just something we needed to do.
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So the podcast, I mean, the recording went way over an hour, and I I really thought it would be cool to put the whole thing out there, but you know, the length I thought, you know, sometimes it it drug on a little bit.
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But if you would be interested in hearing the whole hour plus uh recording, I would be glad to send that to you.
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At times we rambled, we had fun and laughed about his dog named Hallelujah.
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And so it it was good.
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But the book, The Master Plan of Evangelism, I read that in seminary when I was at Southwestern Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas in the 80s.
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Many seminarians have have read that, but I just say this it was a real honor to meet and and talk with Dr.
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Coleman.
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And you know, I could introduce him a lot more, but he actually talked about that on the on the recording on how he worked
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with Billy Graham and revivals and different things like that.
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So that's enough introduction.
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You'll hear more from him.
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But here's a recording of the interview that we did with Dr.
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Coleman in 2023.
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So listen and have fun with this.
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It's always uh good to meet people around revival.
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That's a good place to meet.
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It is.
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Sure is.
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So hey so are you sensing any difference between the 1970 revival and this revival?
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Well, they've interviewed me uh several times about the former revival.
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There's not many still left that were here in 1915.
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Yeah.
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But it's been a different group each time.
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I I don't mind this interviewing.
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Sometimes they last longer.
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One came for 15 minutes, and it took about an hour and a half, another came for that, say for two hours.
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But I enjoy talking.
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The thing is, I get reminiscing, get off the subject.
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But the thing about it, if they can, you know, go back and edit it, they can eliminate.
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Right.
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But it's not not necessary.
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Right, right.
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And I'm the small group's minister at my church.
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Well, that's a good place to be.
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Yes.
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Small group, that's kind of like the crowd that Jesus had.
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Yes.
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So I tell the students here get you a few people around you.
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And if you have a few that will learn, you don't have to worry about teaching.
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That's the pattern of Jesus.
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And then that that few break out from there, and they'll disciple others.
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Right.
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Well, I'm curious, when did you first start studying discipleship?
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Well, I really stumbled into it when I began to teach.
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I hadn't had any training in evangelism, even.
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My training had been in other schools, not even seminary, they taught evangelism for me.
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But in studying for my class, I said, since I haven't read a textbook on this subject, we're going to just take the New Testament.
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And we'd read through the New Testament, then read it again, asking a question: what did Jesus do?
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And how does that relate to your life?
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And with that, we could pretty well cover the field.
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Yes.
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But I began to learn about discipleship as I tried to teach evangelism and discovered that you begin with Jesus and just go with him.
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And he gives us his pattern, his plan is it's end when he says, Go and make disciples of all nations.
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But really, the Great Commission is not anything new.
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The Bible begins in the first chapter of Genesis with the Great Commission when God tells everyone, fill the earth.
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And filling the earth is the way discipleship finally ends at the throne of God.
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Yes.
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The Great Commission fulfilled.
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And when you read the book of Revelation, you realize the Great Commission is already fulfilled in the time span of Jesus.
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Yeah.
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You know, I think there are there are the teachings of Jesus, and then there's the methodology he showed us.
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Yeah.
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And it seems like, you know, in North America today and maybe worldwide, we're really focused on the teaching of Jesus, but don't look at the methodology of how he spent time with his disciples.
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Why do you how why do you think we've overlooked that?
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Well, they go together because they flow together.
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But the lifestyle of Jesus is the explication explanation of his teaching.
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And the lifestyle is what we miss.
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And we make the Great Commission something that we just do as a mechanical practice, but you know, it boils down to a lifestyle.
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And it's it's hard because it's it's the way you live every day.
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And if you just look for great teaching, you may miss the simplicity of the method.
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But really, you can't have a method without some content, and the content is the teaching of Jesus.
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But he says, Look at me, I'm the way.
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Follow me.
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That's the way we understand the teaching.
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Well, I'm curious, when did you first, you know, after you learned about disciple making, when did you really get started in that?
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Well, when I began to teach my evangelism classes, I'd been a pastor for six years.
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And I was doing what pastors do.
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I had been to seminary and graduated and had my doctorate degree, but as we asked the question, what did Jesus do?
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And answered it, how does that relate to your life?
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I began to see the Great Commission is the essence of his pattern.
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Make disciples, always with the vision of reaching the world.
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There's no difference between home missions and foreign missions.
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It's all world evangelism.
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And the end is seen in the great fulfillment at the throne of God, where people are gathering from every tongue, tribe, and nation.
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And I find much joy in anticipating that name.
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And that's why I like to think more about heaven now.
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Yeah.
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How many years young are you?
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I'm 94 now.
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94, okay.
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And I lived here for five years, a little more.
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She died about five years ago.
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And I continue to teach in Gordon Conwill, but I told them I would like to just go down and teach classes that I could teach overseas or someplace in the U.S.
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So it could be with my wife.
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And so we moved down here and so we could spend our last years together.
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You know, the the the great issues of life become very simple when you get through them, get to the bottom of them.
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And basically, disciple making is just the pattern of Jesus.
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And the best way to learn discipleship is to go up in a home where you see it exemplified.
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If you don't have that at home, you'll have to learn it the hard way, just out where you live every day, or as you have experienced.
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And you gotta be with people to learn it.
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Not everywhere, but I have seen enough churches where the whole church is built around the site.
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I talked to someone just a few days ago who told me he had visited the Covenant Church in Singapore.
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And their model is making disciples.
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I've been there two or three times, and now when my doctoral class goes overseas, they end up their training at the Singapore city, where you get every culture in the world.
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And they go to this covenant church, and the pastor takes time to give them attention.
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And it's just a wonderful church.
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It's not the biggest church in Singapore, but it's probably one of the most rapid growing churches in their discipling.
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In revival, you have really a good foundation for discipleship.
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But the trouble about revivals, it may end in a few days.
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They don't realize revival means coming alive, and that means coming alive to the lifestyle of God, of Jesus.
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And that's the hard part of it.
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What do you think was one of the main parts of Jesus' lifestyle that impacted his disciples?
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Was it his love?
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Was it his power?
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Was it his well is the is is the motivation, but you really can't love unless you're loving like Jesus.
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He's the example of love.
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And love can be just sentimentality, and that is not love in the Bible.
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Love is sacrificial love, and it's it's hard to love.
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And that's why suffering is a part of our life, because you really have to have suffering to appreciate the depths of the love of God and the cross.
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And again, so much of our concept of love is just sentimentality.
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Romanced, right?
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And that's it's part of love, but it's not the essence of love.
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I'd love to see the church in North America get back to a discipling model.
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What advice would you tell, what would you say to pastors to encourage them in that way?
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Well, the word with W-I-T-H is the essence of it.
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Jesus was with his disciples.
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That's why he could tell them, follow me.
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The command was follow me.
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But you gotta have someone to follow.
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And that's that's the pattern.
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And the cost comes in arranging your schedule and your time to be with people, and that takes forethought on your part, as well as those that you're discipling.
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That's why in small groups you have a better platform than in a great crusade.
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Right.
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Now I believe in crusades.
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I I worked with Billy Graham for many years as uh as dean, he called it the dean of his international schools for evangelists.
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Most people don't realize.
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Billy had two great desires.
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One was to evangelize everybody in the world, and he's come as close to that as anybody I know.
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The second was to train pastors to be evangelists.
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Well, he's on the road all the time.
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How could he do that?
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Uh-huh.
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And so, in God's providence, he brought me in contact with Billy, and Billy wanted me to go and teach discipleship and evangelism.
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The two are always the other.
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Right.
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And he was able to do it.
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And I had the privilege of being involved in that for years.
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How did you meet Billy Graham?
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How did you get linked up with him?
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Well, that was early on after I visited one of his crusades, my brother, who at the time was working as sort of a roustabout under Charlie Riggs.
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And Charlie Riggs was in charge of the follow-up division of the Billy Graham Association.
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So after Crusades, it was over to Charlie to find out how to follow up these converts.
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He's the powerful discipler.
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And I got acquainted with him and really learned how he did it.
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And that was, I guess, the essence of learning.
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I got as close as him as I could for years, but and he would go with us in our schools and he would teach his specialty of follow-up.
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But I went to this crusade where I think it was at the time the crusade.
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Oklahoma City.
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Okay.
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And my brother, who was working with Billy, is kind of a roused about at the time.
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He said, You've never met Billy, have you?
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I said, No, I haven't personally.
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He said, Well, I'm in charge of the uh gate at the platform tonight, and I'll introduce Billy when he comes.
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He stays always in a place outside of the crusade.
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Usually it's a it'll be a hotel nearby, but sometimes it's just a trailer.
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And he can go over there and lay down and have some quiet and also rest.
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And in the crusade that night, my son Lyman, younger than me by five years, he was in charge of the gate that would lead up to the platform where Billy would sit and where he would have all the sponsoring pastors of the of the city, depending on the size of the city, but he'd have usually 15 or 20 pastors up there sitting.
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And I was waiting there at the gate when Billy came walking down the path, and Clemon sat down and says, Billy, I want you to meet my brother, uh, Robert Coleman.
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And Billy looked at me and says, Robert, what are you doing?
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He says, Well, I'm a professor of evangelism now at Asbury Seminary in Kentucky.
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He said, Well, I've never been there, but that's a good school.
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He said, I know about it.
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And this is very characteristic of Billy.
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One thing he likes to do is to help young preachers.
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That's a passion of him.
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And so he said, Robert.
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Well, he called me Bob.
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And he always called me Bob.
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Bob, come up here and sit on the platform with dinner.
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He didn't know me from Adam.
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So I walked up behind him, up those steps, three or four steps, and sat down behind him on the platform, just like all the other people on the platform.
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And that was my first introduction to Billy.
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And that's very characteristic of Billy.
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If he can find a practical way to help a young preacher, it feels it just makes him feel good.
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That's good.
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And I was just a young seminarian, been a pastor for six years, but I hadn't really had much training.
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Was Master Plan of Evangelism your first book?
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Was Master Plan your first book?
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It was uh first book.
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I wrote some Bible studies for four, three or four of those before, just for mainly evangelists to get people started.
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Billy had Bible studies.
00:19:10.079 --> 00:19:15.359
And I I a lot of Westlands didn't have Bible studies that were their theology.
00:19:15.359 --> 00:19:18.079
I happened to be a Westland in theology.
00:19:18.079 --> 00:19:20.160
So I wrote three or four.
00:19:20.160 --> 00:19:28.160
Those books really gave the Master Plan a run in stars because a couple hundred of two or three thousand of them were sold.
00:19:28.160 --> 00:19:34.880
Well, when they heard about this book, Master Plan, see, people have been followed up in Crusades.
00:19:34.880 --> 00:19:37.599
That was a natural boost.
00:19:37.599 --> 00:19:38.160
Good.
00:19:38.160 --> 00:19:41.920
And more of those Bible studies were sold than the master plan.
00:19:41.920 --> 00:19:42.319
Wow.
00:19:42.319 --> 00:19:49.359
Eventually, the master plan overtook them, and that's been the book that's been most widely read and translated.
00:19:49.359 --> 00:19:52.240
And that's one of the great joys.
00:19:52.640 --> 00:19:57.279
What's the difference in the Master Plan of Evangelism and your book, The Master Plan of Discipleship?
00:19:57.599 --> 00:19:58.880
Well, they're the same thing.
00:19:58.880 --> 00:20:04.079
The Master Plan of Discipleship a little later is built on the model in the book of Acts, but it's the same plan.
00:20:04.079 --> 00:20:04.640
Okay.
00:20:04.640 --> 00:20:06.400
Just a little later.
00:20:06.400 --> 00:20:11.599
But 133 languages are now translated to the master plan.
00:20:11.599 --> 00:20:16.079
And a lady that I hadn't really figured out all the different.
00:20:16.079 --> 00:20:22.000
I have letters requested permission that have come either from publishers or from a missionary.
00:20:22.000 --> 00:20:26.559
If you wrote the publisher, he'd asked for, you know, a royalty or something.
00:20:26.559 --> 00:20:30.319
They send it asked for it, send it to me as I give every missionary for me.
00:20:30.319 --> 00:20:37.119
And that was a blessing because missionaries don't have any money.
00:20:37.119 --> 00:20:38.720
And that's where the people are.
00:20:38.720 --> 00:20:39.599
That's right.
00:20:39.599 --> 00:20:43.119
And I've lived long enough to see the principles.
00:20:43.119 --> 00:20:56.799
You see, the master plan is written in terms of principles, not techniques, not programs, not tech, not even not even basic plans.
00:20:56.799 --> 00:21:10.960
The master plan is an attempt to see the lifestyle of Jesus in the way he lived to accomplish his purpose in what in saving the all the peoples of the earth.
00:21:10.960 --> 00:21:15.759
Which he gives us the essence of it before he goes back to heaven.
00:21:15.759 --> 00:21:19.680
And his last command is, do what I've been doing, make disciples.
00:21:19.680 --> 00:21:24.640
That's so easy to understand what his command is to the church.
00:21:24.640 --> 00:21:30.000
And to break it work, the simpler you can be, the better it is.
00:21:30.000 --> 00:21:36.240
The man who's one of the navigators, the head of the navigators at the University of Kentucky.
00:21:36.240 --> 00:21:42.000
And the navigators basically is just a master plan among the layman.
00:21:42.000 --> 00:21:45.920
One of their principles is don't let anybody know you're doing it.
00:21:45.920 --> 00:21:48.079
So they just mingle into the.
00:21:48.079 --> 00:22:07.680
The minister's conference used in the middle of winter, usually in the month of February, they had a pastor's conference at Asbury.
00:22:07.680 --> 00:22:12.319
There was a pastor that would come up from Mississippi, I knew him well.
00:22:12.319 --> 00:22:15.920
He wouldn't stay over with the ministers.
00:22:15.920 --> 00:22:22.960
He would usually go to a hotel or they would live in a nice dormitory at the seminary.
00:22:22.960 --> 00:22:25.039
They have places where you can stay.
00:22:25.039 --> 00:22:32.640
He wouldn't go with one of the students from his church and stay in that student's dormitory room during the conference.
00:22:32.640 --> 00:22:33.279
Wow.
00:22:33.279 --> 00:22:35.519
You know, he was practicing the master plan.
00:22:35.519 --> 00:22:37.839
He never read the book.
00:22:37.839 --> 00:22:39.440
But that was his lifestyle.
00:22:39.440 --> 00:22:41.440
That's the way he would come to minister's conference.
00:22:41.440 --> 00:22:48.400
No wonder his church was alive, and there was a stream of people that would come out of his church to Attenbury Seminary.
00:22:48.400 --> 00:22:48.799
Wow.
00:22:48.799 --> 00:22:49.279
That's cool.
00:22:49.279 --> 00:22:50.960
Who were following their pastor?
00:22:51.119 --> 00:22:51.759
Yeah.
00:22:51.759 --> 00:22:53.519
Let me ask you a question.
00:22:53.519 --> 00:22:54.640
Okay, I'm curious.
00:22:54.640 --> 00:23:04.880
If you were helping a church set up a plan to do discipleship, would you use some kind of curriculum or just use the Bible alone as your curriculum?
00:23:05.200 --> 00:23:07.519
Well, all you need is the Bible.
00:23:07.519 --> 00:23:12.000
And if you have some kind of a program, that would be fine.
00:23:12.000 --> 00:23:13.200
Just follow that.
00:23:13.200 --> 00:23:18.000
I wrote Bible studies for little groups.
00:23:18.000 --> 00:23:29.759
And anytime I was teaching, whether in a seminary or in the Billy Graham School, the focus of what I was teaching was the master plan.
00:23:29.759 --> 00:23:36.400
And it's easy to teach this eight principles or more, but you could teach it anyway wanted to.
00:23:36.400 --> 00:23:40.160
And that's what I taught on overseas for Billy.
00:23:40.160 --> 00:23:43.519
And that's one reason so many books are translated by missionaries.
00:23:43.519 --> 00:23:48.720
You know, we in fact Billy has written the introduction to the new edition of the book now.
00:23:48.720 --> 00:23:55.680
You know, I've been blessed so much with opportunities that I could never have planned in advance.
00:23:55.680 --> 00:23:58.319
I could never have anticipated.
00:23:58.319 --> 00:24:01.279
How God would have directed my ministry.
00:24:01.279 --> 00:24:07.759
I started out as a pastor, but I was preaching on the street, just doing evangelistic work before I became a pastor.
00:24:07.759 --> 00:24:10.720
I started out really as a street preacher.
00:24:10.720 --> 00:24:21.440
In a meeting that the Baptists were done in Temple, Texas, and they saw me standing around and asked me to come up and say something.
00:24:21.440 --> 00:24:27.839
So I gave a testimony which turned into a little mini sermon on the street.
00:24:27.839 --> 00:24:29.920
And I saw the blessing of that.
00:24:29.920 --> 00:24:33.440
Jesus preached on the street more than he did in pulpits.
00:24:33.440 --> 00:24:37.359
I try to tell my students that too.
00:24:37.359 --> 00:24:46.480
And when I was here at Asbury on Friday nights, usually Friday night, I'd go with some of my students, the Lex that we preached on the street.
00:24:46.480 --> 00:24:49.519
There's already a place on the main street lexin I haven't preached.
00:24:49.519 --> 00:24:52.880
And oh, I have stories.
00:24:52.880 --> 00:25:02.960
I wish I could write them down because I was so tired when I got home after teaching all day and then going with a carload of students to Lexington.
00:25:02.960 --> 00:25:05.440
I was just exhausted when I got back.
00:25:05.440 --> 00:25:06.880
I didn't write down.
00:25:06.880 --> 00:25:08.640
I have some memories.
00:25:08.640 --> 00:25:16.799
The problem is when you go to these formal schools, and by the time you get to the seminary, you think that's going to be all you need.
00:25:16.799 --> 00:25:19.200
You don't get discipled.
00:25:19.200 --> 00:25:29.440
Unless that is a definite objective and you put it as a priority, and you don't do it by teaching in class.
00:25:29.440 --> 00:25:34.799
When I started teaching, I realized I couldn't do it by myself.
00:25:34.799 --> 00:25:43.440
And so I'd make a little group of, you know, it's usually to choose between the five and six or seven, one morning a week.
00:25:43.440 --> 00:25:47.839
And we would get to there, it'd usually be on a Thursday.
00:25:47.839 --> 00:26:06.480
A time when classes are not meeting, we'll meet at six o'clock or six fifteen or an hour until usually one uh uh usually would meet it and start at six, go to seven fifteen, because classes would usually start at seven thirty or eight.
00:26:06.480 --> 00:26:08.319
They have to go home take breakfast.
00:26:08.880 --> 00:26:11.519
But so you would disciple six or seven.
00:26:11.519 --> 00:26:13.119
Six or seven.
00:26:13.759 --> 00:26:13.920
Okay.
00:26:14.480 --> 00:26:21.839
And some of my I don't think Andy's heard the story of the of your boys and and the names written in the Bible.
00:26:21.839 --> 00:26:22.319
Oh, yeah.
00:26:22.319 --> 00:26:24.720
How many, how many names are in that Bible?
00:26:24.880 --> 00:26:28.720
Well This is an old Bible, but I would write a new Bible.
00:26:28.720 --> 00:26:32.720
And it was falling apart, so I I put tape around it.
00:26:32.720 --> 00:26:38.960
Again, and now it's this Bible goes back about ten years.
00:26:38.960 --> 00:26:42.000
And the tape is gonna have to be redone.
00:26:42.000 --> 00:26:45.599
You see, there's there's the list of what of six years there.
00:26:45.599 --> 00:26:46.319
Wow.
00:26:47.039 --> 00:26:47.519
That's neat.
00:26:47.519 --> 00:26:48.079
Could I say that?
00:26:48.240 --> 00:26:48.960
Yeah, you can see that.
00:26:49.119 --> 00:26:50.079
I'd love to see it.
00:26:50.079 --> 00:26:51.759
That's neat.
00:26:52.720 --> 00:26:57.279
But if you go through there, you'll see sometimes in the margins of the Bible names.
00:26:57.279 --> 00:26:58.960
Those are mostly students.
00:26:58.960 --> 00:27:01.680
And it had several different Bibles.
00:27:01.680 --> 00:27:06.160
My last Bible was given me by a missionary.
00:27:06.160 --> 00:27:14.720
I was preaching it to at a Baptist church over in North Augusta, south from where my brother lives.
00:27:14.720 --> 00:27:18.640
This was on the South Carolina side, North Augusta.
00:27:18.640 --> 00:27:26.960
And as I often do when I'm invited to a church, I preach around the master plan.
00:27:26.960 --> 00:27:33.599
And a missionary came up and he said, Um, I want to come to your class.
00:27:33.599 --> 00:27:34.720
I want to be one of your students.
00:27:34.720 --> 00:27:36.720
I looked at him, he was 80 years old.
00:27:36.720 --> 00:27:38.720
I said, Well, you can just come anytime.
00:27:38.720 --> 00:27:43.359
Don't ask, don't pay any money because just be as my guest.
00:27:43.359 --> 00:27:49.039
Because if you do come in, you have to usually pay a fee to be a guest of the seminary.
00:27:49.039 --> 00:27:53.680
And he said, Oh no, I want to get credit for the class.
00:27:53.680 --> 00:27:55.839
And I just like a student.
00:27:55.839 --> 00:28:02.880
I said, Well, he says, You'll have to do that with them, and but if you come, you'll certainly be welcome.
00:28:02.880 --> 00:28:04.880
And I thought I forgot about it.
00:28:04.880 --> 00:28:05.440
Uh-huh.
00:28:05.440 --> 00:28:16.559
Well, he he came and signed up in the class, and I knew it when I saw him sitting in the classroom.
00:28:16.559 --> 00:28:19.440
It turned out he was 86 years old.
00:28:19.519 --> 00:28:20.000
Oh wow.
00:28:20.240 --> 00:28:23.759
He retired as a missionary under the Baptist Chelsea Baptist.
00:28:23.759 --> 00:28:24.240
Uh-huh.
00:28:24.240 --> 00:28:27.759
And he became the darling of the class.
00:28:27.759 --> 00:28:31.279
He'd always sit on the front seat, right in folk from the desk.
00:28:31.279 --> 00:28:37.680
And uh he gave me a Bible, dedicated to me and my wife.
00:28:37.680 --> 00:28:40.559
And it's around here someplace.
00:28:40.880 --> 00:28:42.880
Do you have a favorite Bible verse?
00:28:43.440 --> 00:28:51.519
Well, I have the Bible verse that I was going to write my next book on, but I've decided I'm not going to write the book.
00:28:51.519 --> 00:28:55.359
Like, I don't think I'll have time to write another book.
00:28:55.359 --> 00:28:59.119
And I'm not sharp enough to do it now.
00:28:59.119 --> 00:29:00.960
But I have the case.
00:29:00.960 --> 00:29:10.720
If any man among you seem to be wise, then first become a fool that he may be wise.
00:29:10.720 --> 00:29:16.079
Because the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.
00:29:16.079 --> 00:29:17.359
That's really my last one.
00:29:17.359 --> 00:29:19.839
It's going to be dedicated to the seminarians.
00:29:19.839 --> 00:29:24.880
See, I've been a teacher for 65 years.
00:29:24.880 --> 00:29:34.079
I think I'm by far the oldest teacher of evangelism anywhere in the country or twice as old because I've been in different, three different seminaries.
00:29:34.079 --> 00:29:36.240
I tried to make disciples.
00:29:36.240 --> 00:29:41.359
And we would meet early in the morning, one day a week.
00:29:41.359 --> 00:29:48.319
And I would require them when they entered the class, you have three days, you can drop out.
00:29:48.319 --> 00:29:52.400
If you stay after the third day, that means you'll be here the rest of the semester.
00:29:52.400 --> 00:30:00.000
And if you miss at least one day without a legitimate excuse, you have to be excused from the class.
00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:01.200
You have to be dismissed.
00:30:01.200 --> 00:30:07.279
I can only remember one time I had to dismiss a student.
00:30:07.279 --> 00:30:08.319
They come.
00:30:08.319 --> 00:30:10.160
See, that's the part of the discipline.
00:30:10.160 --> 00:30:12.160
Now I usually have six students.
00:30:12.160 --> 00:30:26.079
Anyway, each each one of them would disciple one, and I would tie take each one of those disciplers of a group of three, I would take one of those group leaders as my responsibilities.
00:30:26.079 --> 00:30:34.400
I try to select students that look like they wanted to fit into this.
00:30:34.400 --> 00:30:36.880
If they were just interested in getting other credit, that wasn't.
00:30:37.359 --> 00:30:38.400
What did you look for?
00:30:38.400 --> 00:30:40.720
What did you look for in the students?
00:30:41.359 --> 00:30:42.720
It had to be sharp.
00:30:42.720 --> 00:30:48.240
And I usually take him to dinner or over to the house for supper or something like that.
00:30:48.240 --> 00:30:54.480
My wife, she always worked with me, and she was the best hospitality person that I ever knew.
00:30:54.480 --> 00:30:56.720
That's why I said she was a better disciple.
00:30:56.720 --> 00:30:59.519
And she loved entertainment.
00:30:59.519 --> 00:31:06.480
Hardly a week would pass without us having at least one or two guests at our table.
00:31:06.480 --> 00:31:11.359
And people loved her because she was just natural.
00:31:11.359 --> 00:31:21.920
And you know, when she was with me and I'd go out, I never worried about getting it into problem because any problem that would come up with me, she could get me out of it.
00:31:21.920 --> 00:31:25.039
She was so sweet.
00:31:25.039 --> 00:31:26.880
Everybody loved her.
00:31:26.880 --> 00:31:34.799
But you know, God was so good to give me a woman like that to live with.
00:31:34.799 --> 00:31:37.279
We raised three kids.
00:31:37.279 --> 00:31:43.519
I was a pastor for six years, and the first two churches were in Indiana, churches on a circuit.
00:31:43.519 --> 00:31:44.000
Okay.
00:31:44.000 --> 00:31:47.119
I've always had churches that were circuits.
00:31:47.119 --> 00:31:52.240
And I like that planet's more like the planet Z move around from place to place.
00:31:52.640 --> 00:31:53.680
We've kept you an hour.
00:31:53.680 --> 00:31:59.599
Well, so I appreciate your time, and I want to appreciate, I do want to let you know I appreciate it.
00:31:59.599 --> 00:32:01.200
Enjoy visiting with you.
00:32:01.200 --> 00:32:03.599
Thank you for one of the time for us.
00:32:04.160 --> 00:32:05.279
And that's what I believe.
00:32:05.279 --> 00:32:07.680
Wesley believed the Bible was inerrant.
00:32:07.680 --> 00:32:08.559
I just inspired.
00:32:08.559 --> 00:32:09.519
Inherent.
00:32:09.519 --> 00:32:11.119
It doesn't make mistakes.
00:32:11.119 --> 00:32:11.440
That's right.
00:32:11.440 --> 00:32:12.880
God can make mistakes.
00:32:12.880 --> 00:32:16.880
And one thing I liked about Billy Graham, he was just like me.
00:32:16.880 --> 00:32:25.920
Even though his father was converted in a Methodist church, really didn't care whether I was a Methodist or a Baptist.
00:32:25.920 --> 00:32:29.039
And he didn't care about any denomination.
00:32:29.039 --> 00:32:32.079
He was ecumenical in the true sense of the word.
00:32:32.079 --> 00:32:34.960
That's one reason he didn't go anywhere in the world.
00:32:34.960 --> 00:32:46.720
So thank God that I had that privilege, not just to work along Billy Graham, but to work with pastors all over the world.
00:32:46.720 --> 00:32:47.200
Yeah.
00:32:47.200 --> 00:32:48.480
All over the world.
00:32:52.799 --> 00:32:55.039
Well, I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did.
00:32:55.039 --> 00:32:56.720
That's about it for the episode.
00:32:56.720 --> 00:32:57.839
Thanks so much for listening.
00:32:57.839 --> 00:32:59.680
And here's the challenge for today.
00:32:59.680 --> 00:33:04.240
What one thing did you learn that you can put into practice in your group?
00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:12.720
Please subscribe on your favorite podcast app and your record future podcasts, but also visit Greggroup.org and listen to another 450 episodes.
00:33:12.720 --> 00:33:14.000
Thanks for listening.