‘Winning this world to Christ one soul at a time’

Dusty McLemore, pastor of Lindsay Lane Baptist Church, Athens, in Limestone Baptist Association, said he didn’t meet his church’s minister of assimilation at church.
   
He was McLemore’s next door neighbor.
   
Except back then, Randy Brown liked beer and didn’t like church so much. That was until McLemore and other men in the church forged a friendship with him.
   
“He liked landscaping and other things, and we went to him to build a relationship, not to condemn him,” McLemore said. “Through that Intentional Evangelism, he came to know Christ and is now on staff at our church — he’s a wonderful Christian man.”
   
Intentional Evangelism is not a program, McLemore told the messengers present during the annual meeting Tuesday — it is a way of life. One of the first instances of Intentional Evangelism happened in John 1:40–42 when Andrew brought Peter to meet Jesus.
   
“We know what Andrew did — he led his brother to Christ,” he said. “The question we ask is why?”
   
McLemore answered the question he posed with a video clip of three passersby interviewed about their views on spirituality while on the street in Las Vegas.
   
One man said the way to heaven is “a big ladder.” Another said God is different things to different people, adding that there are “no guarantees” on getting to heaven. The last said heaven and hell exist on earth, not in the afterlife.
   
“This is the ‘why’ — people don’t have a clue who Jesus is and people need the Lord,” McLemore said. “That is the purpose of Intentional Evangelism — winning this world to Christ one soul at a time.”
   
Many people can quote the Great Commission and Acts 1:8 but get so enamored with the project that they lose the purpose — and people around them die and go to hell, he said.
   
“These aren’t just people in Russia or somewhere else overseas. They are in Las Vegas, and they are right here in Alabama. They are our friends, neighbors, co-workers and classmates — real people who need Jesus,” McLemore said. 
   
“I am convinced that this (Intentional Evangelism) is one of the best campaigns in the Southern Baptist Convention,” he said. 
   
“We just need to keep our focus on the ‘why,’ and He will bless it if we do that.”