Reid Sanders has proclaimed the Gospel of Jesus Christ in both word and deed in over ninety nations and across the United States. Today he shares a powerful story that will encourage you to diligently pray for your lost loved ones until they are saved.
Website: https://reidsaunders.org
If you are interested in evangelism coaching, call Evangelist Daniel King at 1-877-431-4276
Transcript:
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (00:00):
Reid Saunders has proclaimed the gospel of Jesus Christ in both word and deed in over 90 nations and across the United States today, he shares a powerful story that will encourage you to diligently pray for your lost, loved ones until they are saved.
Evangelism Podcast Host (00:21):
Jesus said, go into all the world and preach the gospel. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Welcome to the evangelism podcast with Dr. Daniel King, where Daniel interviews, full-time evangelists, pastors, missionaries, and normal everyday Christians to discover how they share their faith, their powerful testimonies and amazing stories that will inspire you to reach people with the good news. And now here’s your host missionary and evangelist Daniel King.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (00:56):
Welcome to the evangelism podcast. I’m Daniel King, and I’m excited about telling people about Jesus today. I have a very special guest with me, evangelists, Reed, Saunders. Thank you for being with me today,
Reid Saunders (01:07):
Daniel, so great to be with you and all of you watching, and it’s just a blessing to serve Jesus and proclaim the good news that Jesus and we’re live for Malawi. It’s amazing.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (01:15):
Yeah, it’s so wonderful to be here together. We’re participating in the love Malawi festival with a global network of evangelists, a ministry under Louis Palau’s ministry and both you and I serve on the council of the GNE. And really the vision of the global network of evangelists is bringing evangelists together. Collaborative events. Tell me some about how you got involved with a G and D and in what you’ve been doing with them.
Reid Saunders (01:46):
Yeah, well, I gave my life to Jesus. They just 17 at front of that moment on Daniel. God gave me this burning passion to reach as many people as possible for Jesus. And I have one passion and that’s for Jesus and to reach people for Jesus. And so after coming to Christ, God brought some great mentors in my life and one of them was Louise plow. So Louise plow and Billy Graham both encouraged me as an evangelist. And one thing our members started entering with Luis when I was going to seminary back in 2000. So 21 years ago, the thing that was so great as seen when we worked together and that’s what we do at genie, right? The global network of evangelist is when you think about it, Daniel, when Jesus said behold, the fields were right for harvest, he said, pray for more workers. Right? And that’s what the beautiful thing with you, myself and others on that genius council is that we together, we can reach more for Jesus Christ.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (02:28):
Amen. And so we are here together in Malawi, tell us what God has been doing.
Reid Saunders (02:35):
Yeah. You know, it’s incredible Daniels. See the hunger people have for Jesus Christ. I love how the Bible says that when Jesus is lifted up, he’ll draw all people to himself. And that’s what we’ve seen through the school ministry, through the marketplace outreaches and through the festival, we see Jesus being lifted up in Malawi and he’s drawing men and women and boys and girls to himself. And I just think Daniel, you know, coming out of, or still being in COVID bedridden, the season, people are so hungry for hope. They’ve been living in fear. They’ve been asking this question, is there, God, does he care about me? And we’ve seen here in Malawi, people literally running to give their life to Jesus. I mean, last night when you were pitching, I mean, you saw the response, people raising their hands on the wall, outside the festival, they’re raising their hands, coming to Jesus. It’s exciting times. I believe the best days are ahead for evangelism. Urgency is great. Now’s the opportunity. Today’s the day of salvation. Let’s go.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (03:20):
I love your passion for Jesus and your passion for evangelism. How did you realize that you had an evangelistic gift on your life?
Reid Saunders (03:29):
Well, when I came to Christ at 17, I knew all I want to do is tell people about Jesus. And I was amazed when I would share the gospel with Jesus, that people would respond. And remember we share, but God saves, but it gave him a such a burden. And I just naturally, all I want to do is tell people about Jesus shortly after giving my life to the Lord. I got to leave my mom to the Lord. I got to leave a couple of my friends to play football, American football with me to Jesus. And I just saw the fruit that God would use me to share and people would respond. And I remember one of my mentors told me, he said, read you’re an evangelist, go out and share the good news. And I’ve been doing that ever since
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (04:00):
Yesterday at the pastor’s conference, you shared a really powerful story about how you prayed for your father for many years. Could you share that with me?
Reid Saunders (04:08):
Yeah. You know, I just wanna encourage all of you out there listening and watching it. You know, if you have someone in your life that doesn’t know, Jesus, don’t give up, keep praying for them. So I came to Christ, Daniel, as you know, when I was 17, I’m 47 now. And so for 30 years, every day, I would pray for my dad to come to know Jesus. He wouldn’t come to listen to me preach. He just, he didn’t want to be around that. And we had a good relationship with my dad, but there’s always that little distance. Obviously I prayed for my dad. And then just this last year, he came to hear me preach and at the invitation to receive Christ, I’ll never forget this. Daniel. My dad came up to me and I mentioned yesterday. I’ve only seen him cry three times when his mom died, when my mom left him after 30 years of marriage. And then that morning, when he gave his life to Jesus, he gave me a hug and he said, read, I’m so proud of you. And I want to give my life to Jesus. Jesus changed my life. So my dad said, I’ll never forget that Daniel
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (04:53):
Such an encouragement that you prayed for him every single day for 30 years and for 30 years, not seeing any fruit, not seeing anything, but then that moment where he came to know Jesus. And there’s nothing more exciting than leading someone to Jesus. How do you feel when you have the opportunity to stand in front of a crowd and preach to people and invite them to come to Jesus? How does that feel?
Reid Saunders (05:20):
Amazing. Two things on that first, like with my dad and those of you who know people who need Jesus, don’t give I’m harmonic, Galatians six, nine. It says, let us not become weary in doing good for the proper time. We’ll reap a harvest. We don’t give up. I just remember that with my dad and I’d given up, continue to pray. And the second question you asked me, it is such an honor. I really feel so unworthy at times, you know, to get up there and preach the good news. But I remember that with Christ, I can do all things and there’s nothing greater in my life than getting up there and sharing the good news of Jesus and watching God move to me. There’s no greater thrill. There’s no greater excitement than to get up there and share the message of the cross, the message of the empty tomb and to call people to Christ. To me, that’s the greatest joy, the greatest thrill in. I love it.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (05:58):
So right now, I want you to imagine that you have a crowd here in front of you and give me a little illustration or something that, that you share with people to help lead them to Jesus. Yeah.
Reid Saunders (06:08):
I love that. I love that. One of the things I talked to you about all the time is the story about this monkey, where he’s from India and this monkey. These has been trapped, trying to capture them for years and they just can’t capture this monkeys too fast. But one idea, one day I, 100 grand idea took a coconut emptied its of its milk, tied a rope around the coconut, put it down by the tree where the monkey plate took the other end of the, of the rope and hid behind a tree. And he wait for the monkey and the monkey would come, would pick up the coconut. He’d shake it. He’d hear the rice, obviously you’d want the rice, right? So he stick his hand in, but once his hand easily could come in the hole, once he felt the rice, he would latch on Daniel.
Reid Saunders (06:42):
And at that moment, his hand was too big. He couldn’t release it and he wouldn’t let go. And so he was stuck and the hunter would come and capture him. And I used that illustration to talk about all that monkey had to do was let go of the rice and he had been free, but he wouldn’t let go. And I talked about so many people, they won’t let go. They won’t go let it go. Their pride, their sin, their lifestyle for fear, many reasons. But Jesus calls us to let go and grab his hand. And that’s why I tell people, what are you holding on to? That’s keeping you from coming to Christ, let your hands go. Cause Jesus said, then you’ll know the truth. They’ll choose to set you free in that truth chooses Jesus. So that’s the illustration I use all the time.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (07:15):
Tuesday night, I heard you use that illustration. And it was actually a very difficult service because the, we found out right before the service was to start that the generator had died. And so instead of using the big sound system and the beautiful lighting system and in the screens and everything that we had, we were stuck with it, just a tiny sound system run by a little tiny generator. And there, there were thousands of people and that it was very difficult for them to hear. And so you were standing up on the, the boards that the, the bike riders use and, and the people were straining and struggling to hear you and kids were playing and they’re running all over the place, but you just stood up there, confident in who you are in Christ began to preach the gospel. And you shared that story. And so many people came to Jesus.
Reid Saunders (08:04):
Yeah. Amen. Exactly. And just a reminder is the Vangelis, we gotta be flexible. Right. And realize too, there’s this spiritual battle. And we noticed that with our team, just a spiritual battle a couple of days ago. But then we saw the big victory and I say this all the time, January when we pray, God moves. So yeah, we gotta be flexible guy be moving. But the cool thing is, despite the chaos, the spirit of God just gave me that calm. You know, the power of the holy spirit works in us. And through us in that moment for God to preach, I just had to call myself and say, Lord, this is crazy right now, but you’re the God of calm. You’re the God who’s going to work in people’s hearts. And then we just saw God, move. God moves despite chaos. You’re right with Jesus. We get
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (08:37):
Victory. Amen. You know, I so appreciate your attitude several times, since you arrived here, you’ve come to me and say, oh, it’s just, I’m so happy to serve Jesus with you. And that is true. It is wonderful to serve Jesus with other people who love Jesus and just have a passion for Jesus. Isn’t that wonderful.
Reid Saunders (08:56):
It is wonderful. Daniel. And you know, I always say all for Jesus, right? He gets the glory. And I remember hearing the same ones, Daniel, that when I think about collaboration, like what we’re doing here in Malawi, that great things can be accomplished for God when no one cares who gets the credit. Right. And just like Psalm 1 15, 1 says not to us, the Lord, not to us, but to your name, be the glory because of your love and faithfulness, we need more. There’s so few of us, right? We need to work together that Jesus would get all the glory. And I think he’s honored and he’s glorified when we work together for his glory.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (09:23):
Amen. So if someone wants to know more about you or find out something about your ministry, what is your website?
Reid Saunders (09:30):
I can just go to reidsaunders.org. Love to pray with you, encourage you any way that I can. We got a lot of work to do, but the fields, right for harvest all for Jesus. Let’s do this. Be encouraged.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (09:44):
Amen. Well thank you for being on the evangelism podcast. I appreciate it. Daniel Love you brother. Thanks so much for listening to the evangelism podcast today, our ministry is supported by people like you, who help us go to the nations to preach the gospel. Our goal is every soul. It only costs us an average of about $1 for every person. We’re able to tell about Jesus. And so could you do me a favor, go to my website, king ministries.com and become a partner with us for as little as $1 a month, you can start to partner with king ministries and help us lead. At least one person to Jesus every single month. Imagine for $1, you can start a party in heaven every single month. So right now, go to king ministries.com and partner with us and help us to preach the gospel to those who need to hear the gospel. The most, the least reach people in the world. Also, I’d like to ask you to go to apple podcasts and give the evangelism podcast a five star review. Your positive review will help other people find this podcast who are excited about evangelism. Thank you so much. And God bless you
Evangelism Podcast Host (11:07):
For more information about how to share your faith or to financially support our worldwide evangelistic outreaches. Visit king ministries.com. Again, that’s king ministries.com.
