Who are the great evangelists?

"'May I Say' unto ya'", as the late Dr. J. Vernon McGee, might have said, that this is a good 'apologetic', offered, if not original. However, that does not alone equal, necessarily, 'a great evangelist'. I would not place Josh McDowell, or Les Strobel, to name a couple among today's crowd, as necessarily great evangelists. Granted, in the field of 'Evidences' either could, no doubt, absolutely 'destroy' most of those I listed as 'evangelists' in a logical, factual, historical debate. But the question wasn't who are the great 'apologists', was it? Had John R. Rice, or Billy Graham, or Billy Sunday or whomever along those I listed, been limited to this, I would not have included such as evangelists. Would I consider the late Billy Sunday as a great 'apologist' or great teacher? Probably not, but a 'great evangelist'? Definitely. How about three or four no one has thus mentioned in the thread - Paige Patterson, John Walvoord, Lee Roy Scarborough, and L. S. Chafer - great evangelists? Not in my book. 'Great teachers'? Probably I would rate Walvoord and Chafer in that category. Great pastors? Maybe a couple of them. Great Administrators or 'leaders'? Without a doubt, all four. 'There are different spiritual gifts, but one Holy Spirit, who divides to every man severally, as He wills.' Let's never forget that. And let us not confuse and confute one gift with another, for all gifts are not the same, but all are given by the Same Spirit, to benefit the whole body.

In His grace,
Ed

 

Expanding on my last post, and commenting on JoJ's post, he had a great example in Moody. Moody may have 'started' what became the world famous Moody Bible Institute, but it took others with the gift of administration to keep it going smoothly, and take it to where it is today.

Evangelist Bob Jones, Sr. started BJU. But BJU became a 'world class institution' under the leadership of "Dr. Bob", as Bob Jones, Jr. was known, and then Bob Jones III. Any of them 'perfect'? Not on your life. Any 'great evangelists' among the three? Yep! Bob Jones, Sr.

FWIW, I once heard it said, "It's all in our ability, and the ability God most wants from us is our 'availability'."

Ed

 

Only time will tell, on the other side.

Perhaps it will be an unknown, perhaps a woman who taught children's Church for a few decades...

2 Timothy 1:5 When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am persuaded that in thee also.


HankD​

 

Well

I have listened to a lot of great preachers, teachers, and even some not so great, I think the greatest preacher I have ever listened to was the one who really preached Jesus, That will get you every time.:godisgood: There is no one who preaches Jesus that is not great. So at that , I leave you with this one note, If you really have it in your heart to preach the Word, you have my vote. :jesus:

 

I was going to name Charles Haddon Spurgeon, but I thought again (not, I hasten to add, that Spurgeon wasn't a great evangelist - of course he was). What makes a man a great preacher? Is it his eloquence? Perhaps it is his personality, or his fine voice. But think of Moses. Exodus 4.10-12:

"10 ¶ Then Moses said to the LORD, "O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither before nor since You have spoken to Your servant; but I am slow of speech and slow of tongue."
11 So the LORD said to him, "Who has made man’s mouth? Or who makes the mute, the deaf, the seeing, or the blind? Have not I, the LORD?
12 "Now therefore, go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall say."

Then Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2.3-5:

3 I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling.
4 And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,
5 that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

So I would describe as "great evangelists" those such as the unknown and unlearned preacher under whose preaching Spurgeon was converted, in Colchester, Essex, England (which incidentally is the town of my birth). Here is Spurgeon's own account of the event, which took place in January, 1850:

"I sometimes think I might have been in darkness and despair now, had it not been for the goodness of God in sending a snowstorm one Sunday morning, when I was going to a place of worship. When I could go no further, I turned down a court and came to a little Primitive Methodist Chapel. In that chapel there might be a dozen or fifteen people. The minister did not come that morning: snowed up, I suppose. A poor man, a shoemaker, a tailor, or something of that sort, went up into the pulpit to preach. He was obliged to stick to his text, for the simple reason that he had nothing else to say. The text was, 'Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.' He did not even pronounce the words rightly, but that did not matter.

"There was, I thought, a glimpse of hope for me in the text. He began thus: 'My dear friends, this is a very simple text indeed. It says, "Look." Now that does not take a deal of effort. It ain't lifting your foot or your finger; it is just "look." Well, a man need not go to college to learn to look. You may be the biggest fool, and yet you can look. A man need not be worth a thousand a year to look. Anyone can look; a child can look. But this is what the text says. Then it says, "Look unto Me." 'Ay,' said he, in broad Essex [that is, the slow dialect of northern Essex], 'many of ye are looking to yourselves. No use looking there. You'll never find comfort in yourselves.' Then the good man followed up his text in this way: 'Look unto Me: I am sweating great drops of blood. Look unto Me; I am hanging on the Cross. Look: I am dead and buried. Look unto Me; I rise again. Look unto Me; I ascend; I am sitting at the Father's right hand. O, look to Me! Look to Me!' When he had got about that length, and managed to spin out ten minutes, he was at the length of his tether.

"Then he looked at me under the gallery, and I daresay, with so few present, he knew me to be a stranger. He then said, 'Young man, you look very miserable.' Well, I did; but I had not been accustomed to have remarks made on my personal appearance from the pulpit before. However, it was a good blow struck. He continued: 'And you will always be miserable — miserable in life and miserable in death — if you do not obey my text. But if you obey now, this moment, you will be saved.'

"Then he shouted, as only a Primitive Methodist can, 'Young man, look to Jesus Christ.' There and then the cloud was gone, the darkness had rolled away, and that moment I saw the sun; and I could have risen that moment and sung with the most enthusiastic of them of the Precious Blood of Christ."

Maybe there is a danger of us doing by proxy what the disciples themselves did when they argued about which of them was the greatest.