Author Stresses Urgent Need for Fearless Witnessing

by Allie Martin
September 22, 2004

(AgapePress) - A Georgia-based evangelist is trying to motivate and equip believers to reach friends and strangers for Jesus. In his book One Thing You Can't Do in Heaven (Genesis Publications, 2004), Mark Cahill says when it comes to witnessing, Christians can overcome fear and have confidence instead.

Cahill says every follower of Jesus Christ is called to be a witness, and each believer needs to redeem the time and make the most of every chance life affords to share the gospel with the lost.

As the minister is fond of pointing out to fellow Christians, "We can worship God in heaven, we can praise God in heaven, and we can sing songs to God in heaven, but one thing we cannot do is share our faith with a nonbeliever in heaven -- because they're not going to be there."

Passionate about communicating a sense of the urgency of witnessing and helping people come to a saving knowledge of Christ, Cahill suggests that, for unbelievers, time is swiftly running out. Therefore, he says, "if we're going to reach them, we have to reach them here, and we've got to reach them now."

The author of One Thing You Can't Do In Heaven says Christians have opportunities to share their faith in Christ on a daily basis and must not be afraid to talk about the realities of hell to unbelievers. However, he suspects that many believers who forego these opportunities do so because they are afraid of rejection.

But Cahill says he learned in his own spiritual walk that God's Word addresses his fears about being rejected by unbelievers as he shares the gospel. "When you read the scriptures," he notes, "it says that they're actually not even rejecting me -- they're rejecting Jesus Christ [Matt. 10:22a]. And if you really think about it, it ought to hurt me a whole lot more that they're rejecting Jesus and not that they're rejecting me."

Mark Cahill

However, it can be easy to forget this, Cahill says, "because of our prideful ways as people" and to think, as he has, "Oh, they rejected Mark Cahill." But today the Great Commission-minded minister says, "Forget Mark Cahill. They're rejecting the Son of Almighty God."

And that, the evangelist says, is what should bother believers far more than any personal rejection. "That should bother us to pray for these people," he says. "That should bother us to share our faith to make sure they don't go anywhere near hell."

Cahill resides in Stone Mountain, Georgia, and often leads witnessing efforts at music concerts, art festivals, sporting events, and homosexual gatherings in the metro Atlanta area. He also travels around the U.S., addressing more than 25,000 people annually at churches, retreats, conferences, and camps, in an effort to equip and challenge more of the saved to go out and reach the lost.