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Summary

In this conversation, Paul Mays shares his journey of evangelism through social media, particularly TikTok, while dealing with the challenges of Lyme disease. He emphasizes the effectiveness of TikTok as a tool for reaching a wider audience and converting individuals to Christianity. Mays discusses the importance of engaging with the audience, handling objections, and building a supportive community. He also provides practical tips for effective communication and the role of moderators in maintaining a positive environment during live sessions. Throughout the conversation, Mays highlights the significance of persistence and creativity in evangelism.

Chapters

00:00 The Struggles of Lyme Disease and Social Media Evangelism
02:48 Harnessing TikTok for Effective Evangelism
06:07 Engaging with the Audience: Strategies and Techniques
08:56 Building a Supportive Community on Social Media
12:06 Navigating Challenges and Objections in Evangelism
14:57 The Power of Personal Connection and Real-Time Engagement
18:06 The Role of Moderators and Community Support
21:03 The Future of Evangelism in the Digital Age

Transcript *This transcript was automatically generated and may contain errors.*

Paul Mays (00:01)
Yeah, okay, I got your attention. That’s what it’s like now. That’s what it’s like for me since I’ve been working social media. I haven’t spoken in like two years because I have Lyme disease. I’m currently, I feel like I’m being electrocuted right now. My head’s in a vice and it’s two years of intense torture and it’s, I mean I’m traumatized. I was forced.

to get online because I couldn’t meet my dates. I couldn’t commit because I never know when I’m going to be laid up. Last night, I got about an hour of sleep. I’m not kidding. I got woken up and I was just electrocuted all night. And would start doze off and I’d shock awake. I’m currently, I have neurological Lyme disease. My brain does not work like it’s supposed to, but I’m able to do what I’m doing on TikTok.

Evangelizing on social media, get TikTok, forget the rest, set it. Okay, so 15 years of working Facebook, I don’t know, 15 conversions? A year and a half on TikTok, over 100. Do I have your attention? Okay, it works, and I’m here to convince y’all to do the same thing, okay? I’m just being blunt. I want you to do this because it’s working. I have never had this much fruit from a work.

All right, let’s get down to it. This is what my TikTok channel looks like. We got, this is a video a girl made, her assessment of the Church of Christ. I just did a screen recording. I clicked play on her when she said something I needed to respond to, I paused it and spoke. And then I just kept going until it was done. I uploaded it. It’s got, I don’t know, 1700 views or something like that. The church sees it, they appreciate it. The middle one here, this one.

is a 46 minute video that handles 26 common objections to baptism for salvation as Jesus offers. I don’t know why people think that they can be saved without doing what Jesus said that we must do to be saved, but they can’t. And they have all these objections. You know them, oh, thief on the cross, Romans 10, nine and 10. Christ sent me not to baptize, 1 Corinthians 1, 17. So that is a response to all of those. I have them broken down into individual videos.

And then I have them in one continuous video. So somebody says on my TikTok, they say, ⁓ here’s one of them right there. They’ve made a comment there and I just grabbed the corresponding video, click send. It takes about three seconds because I put in the work. I put about five hours into making that video. Somebody says thief on the cross, I go click, click send. And they have the information on the thief. This one is just, have you obeyed the gospel?

detailing how that works. And I was doing that until I saw Travis Thomas using it live. And I was like, okay. And I watched him and I was like, okay. And then I was triggered. I wanna do that. So I got it all dialed in. ⁓ Let me just do this now, right here. It says not interested. You’re gonna go on TikTok and you’re gonna see something you don’t want to see, okay.

Same thing happens to you in your living room. You turn on the cable TV and you don’t wanna see it, you know what you do? You go click and you change the channel, right? Okay, this is the change the channel on TikTok. Not interested. So a girl shows up, she’s not wearing enough clothes and I click not interested. This happened in one day, one day, okay? That’s how long it took to take care of it and then it’s over, okay? So the next video, it’s the same thing. Not interested. Next video, I don’t know, some RC car or something and I linger it on.

And so the algorithm’s like, you lingered on that. So it’s gonna, okay, so you get the idea. So what I just gave you was a warning. Don’t linger on stuff you’re not supposed to linger on, okay? Next video shows up, it’s a dog catching a frisbee and I linger. And next video, a girl not wearing enough clothes, not interested. I did that one day, maybe six or 15 times I did that. And I never had to look at it again, okay? That’s off the table now. No excuses, TikTok’s bad. No, it’s not.

Your car, your SUV out there, I’m gonna go get it and I’m gonna go knock over a bank with that awful thing you’ve got out there called a car. No, no, I’m gonna pick somebody up and go to church. It’s just a tool, okay? TikTok’s a tool, okay? You can use it for bad or you can use it for good. ⁓ This guy is a Christian in Ohio as of like two and a half months ago from my channel. This guy, Jock, Christian in Scotland. That one took the longest to make.

everything happened to get into the water. ⁓ This Christian, he found out that instrumental music wasn’t acceptable and it’s not abiding in the doctrine of Christ, it’s vain. ⁓ he found out through ⁓ Chad Brough, and then because he had seen me teaching the truth, he’s like, is that right? I’m like, yeah, that’s right. So he studied and studied. He’s an hour and 40 minutes from the closest congregation that doesn’t use instruments.

He’s 19 and his car is a 53 Bel Air that doesn’t run. We worship online together. I can’t go in church buildings because the water fosters mold and it just reduces me to tears most of the time. This is a fresh year old HVAC and that’s why I tested it out on the way down. I didn’t even know if I was gonna be able to speak. 11 hour drive took a chance for 30 minutes to beg y’all to win some souls with me on TikTok.

Lots to talk about here. ⁓ These are three screenshots of what I’m doing. Does that look like preaching to you or is that an ax? Yeah, that chopped through a 14 inch log twice in an hour and 15 minutes and converted a man named Simon. He’s Christian now, while I was doing that. It’s not different. ⁓ This, I’ll bring that up next. That’s the same event. This.

I have a 71 Sears tractor with a 77 deck and the deck belt inside the deck itself had broken. So I replaced it. It’s not different than when you’re at your house doing something like that and your friend drives by or a neighbor walks by or somebody walks up and you keep doing what you’re doing, you keep talking to him and all of sudden Jesus is in the conversation. It’s the same thing. So I’m there doing that and

When people are scrolling through Facebook, I mean TikTok, and they see this, they’re like, what does that guy do? Wait a minute, he’s talking about Jesus. Baptism is essential for salvation. Who does he think he is? There it is. So you put that up there. You put that on the top above your head right there, just stays there. People scrolling through, triggered. No, it’s not. The thief on the, I will tell him, I will show him. All right, so you see where we’re going with this.

This guy was baptized on the left and the center, was baptized the same hour of the night. If you wanna see that, you can point your phone at that right now. You can put your camera on, you point at it, zoom in on it, and it’ll give you a link to the video that I re-uploaded to YouTube so you can see how it works in real time.

What happened was he got it. I’m sitting here chopping and I’m asking him to read it for himself. Rob Whitaker? Yeah, read it. Make him read it. So guests with an open Bible are welcome. You you need to read from your Bible and reason with your mind. A lot of times I put Isaiah 1.18. I put different images like that up. That one was just a down and dirty quick one I made in a minute or something like that. I brought him up and… ⁓

He was willing to reason, he was honest, and it was a great exchange. Took about an hour and 15 minutes for him to say, before he was ready to say, before he said, I’m ready. So you’re ready to do it now? All right. At that point, I jumped on that tractor. You can see the muffler there, the front tire there. I lit up that with the LED lights that I put on my old tractor, and I drove out of the woods, and I drove up to my house, and I changed the broadcast from my phone to the iPad, and then I…

texted Matt Wallen with his city and state and the term urgent. We have a code. It’s Chad bro and myself and Matt Wallen and we have a code. If the person gets it and they know that they’re lost and they need the blood of Jesus now which they meet in the water, then I say urgent. And then Matt Wallen has his resources and he’s like, he’ll text me right back and say, that’s Bob so and so at such and such and here’s his information. And I call him right then.

I have learned, don’t use the term TikTok when you call, but I do say, Bob, I’ve been evangelizing online. I’m a member of the Lord’s church. I’m a Christian. I’m a of the Church of Christ. I got your contact info and there’s a believer in your area and he’s ready to be baptized for the forgiveness of sins. You ready to be a servant? And I do, I put them on the hot seat like that. And if they get squirmy with me, I’ll be like, you got an elder? Y’all have elders? Can I have their number? Yeah, I just move right on.

I don’t waste time. And sometimes I’m juggling like two or three calls at a time and it usually takes between an hour. Worst case scenario has been, ⁓ well, Jock, he took like five days, but mostly it’s between an hour and 24 hours, something really cool happens. In the comments section, when it happens, the Christians just get in a feeding frenzy. They get so excited. Praise God, praise God, we love you.

Thank you for being so honest with this. Reminds me, you’ve got to get on their good side, comfort them, make them receptive by saying things like, thank you so much for reading that. Thank you. Thank you. You blessed all of us by reading that passage. Thank you so much. You gotta do that. You gotta comfort them and joke with them. Just make them, just be real with them. Just be a human being with them. Yeah, I just busted my knuckle off. Knocked off the wrench. Oh, no.

Actually, yesterday, day before yesterday, four or five days ago, I was fishing off a pier in Key West and doing this. And I caught a fish while I was doing it. And it’s exciting. And people see it and they get engaged and it’s just another tool. It’s just another tool. mean, this is a tool. This is a tool. Just like TikTok is, the things you do are a tool. If you can carry on a conversation and do something else at the same time, just do it.

It absolutely works.

So he was converted that night. All right, gotta deal with Pearl Tramplers, okay? What do you think happens when you are dealing with somebody, I know some of y’all done this on Facebook, Joey Farrell.

What happens when you get somebody, Paul Mase, what happens when you get somebody and ⁓ you just keep giving that pearl over and over again and they just keep on trampling it? What happens to that pearl? The honest people don’t get to hear it. They don’t get to hear the gospel. You gotta cut them off at some point. You need to have Christians in the comments section.

who are moderators, give them mod powers, whatever it’s called. You just click the settings and you give them power to mute people or to block people. You have to do this because somebody’s gonna come in and they’re gonna say really horrible things about Jesus or really horrible things about you, like really nasty things I won’t repeat. Mute, immediate. if they get, actually if they get that nasty, that’s a block.

⁓ You need Christians in the comment section. Come to me. There’s a group of us of Christians on TikTok and we will get your back. We’ll come and help support. ⁓ Here’s how it goes.

Yeah, let’s just say you take them to Acts 2.38. Can you please read Acts 2.38? You can read it and I need you to read it. Can you please read that for us? Why don’t you want to read it? Well, I need you to read it. Well, you just read it. I need you to read it, okay? And if you read it, it’ll be between you and God. I just tell them. Yeah. If I tell you that baptism is for the remission of sins, you can be like, forget Paul. I don’t believe him. If I quote it for you, yeah, it’s a little better.

But if you read it for yourself, then you have to say no to God, okay? So then they read it. So what is baptism for according to Acts 2.38? Yeah, but what about the thief on the cross? No, no, hang on, hang on. We need to stay right here. What’s baptism for according to Acts 2.38? You’re teaching work salvation. mean, seriously, I really need you to just answer that question. What did God tell you that baptism is for according to Acts 2.38?

Christ sent me not to back click. Yep, that’s what it is. That’s exactly what I do. I tell them and then I let them go. And then another person comes up because there are billions, literally billions of people on TikTok. And the next one comes up, may be willing to reason because I practiced this 100 souls in a year and a half.

Just imagine.

I mean imagine if I could get, I don’t know, maybe 40 of you in here to do what I’m doing. Just take some of your time. I was forced to do this. Like I was holding a gospel meeting every month. I was bearing fruit, repentance and conversions. I was holding a gospel meeting, singing, preaching, revival meeting every month all over the place, Florida and Michigan and Oklahoma and Kansas and all over my area, Virginia and West Virginia.

I was all over the place, but now I’m like stuck here and I made the most of it. And then I realized this is better. This is better. How many of you guys have a phone?

How many of you guys have a phone? Yeah. Oh, look at all those pulpits. Oh, how many pulpits in this room? All right, let’s say 40 of you are like, okay, I’ll try it. And you’re half as successful as I am in a year and a half since that’s the number that I’ve been doing that. That’s 2000 Christians.

Just give it a quarrel. Watch me do it, see how it works. You do need to be prepared. You need to be ready. When they say Ephesians 2, 8, 9, you need to have them look at Ephesians 2, 5 and Acts 19, 1 through 5 to show that that’s when they were saved by grace through faith.

arm yourself and don’t be afraid to do it. Just get up there and do it. It’s just TikTok. It’s not like you’re in front of a billion people. It’s usually like five to 45 people in my room. And all I need is like one, one person to reason. But it’s like, know, five, 15, 30, 45 people. I think I’ve had it up to like 90 something once or twice, but it works.

It works. You just got to take them through the scriptures and patiently and slowly have them read it. Encourage them. Leave dead air. When they read something potent and you know they’re chewing on it, don’t say anything. Just let it sit there. Leave the dead air and it’ll work.

It doesn’t take long to tell you how to do that. I’m done, I mean it works. The purpose here is we proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom so that we may present every man perfect, complete in Christ. That’s the purpose of doing this, and it works. Here’s some, that’s a QR code to my TikTok. You can watch it in real time. I don’t have a schedule because I don’t know when I’m gonna feel okay.

Going live looks like this. You click the live button from these options down here. You click go live. You click this button right here, right here. Then you hit this plus and that gives you the ability to put those signs like baptism is essential above your head. And that’s just the mechanics of it. ⁓ I think I pretty much covered it. It doesn’t take long to talk about this. And y’all got questions? You want some nuts and bolts on this? Yes sir.

Thank you, I’m so sorry, thank you. So somebody will be in the comments and they’ll say, you know, what about the thief on the cross? And I’ll say, hey Bob, would you like to come up talk about the thief on the cross? And they have the option to request to join or I have the option to invite. If they request to join, I choose whether or not I’m going to accept them. If it’s a jerk, then I don’t. And if it seems like they could reason, I accept. And I invite them proactively and do that a lot.

people that aren’t ready to ⁓ step up, they’ll accept it. And I’m really cool with them. welcome, so glad you came up. Thanks for joining us, man, thanks. Awesome. You believe God is God? Yes. You believe Jesus is the only way, John 14, 6? Yes. You believe the Bible is the truth, John 17, 17? Yeah? All right then. And I also say things like, ⁓ if you believe God is God, Jesus is the only way, John 14,

14.6, that the Bible is the truth, John 17.17. But you don’t think you need to be baptized to be saved. I would love to have a conversation with you. Just say stuff like that. Just be real with them. I saw a hand up here.

I’m Neander Paul Mays, like Neanderthal a caveman, but Paul, yes, that’s my old musician.

Thank you, thank you for asking. So I go live, I’ve got the sign over my head, that triggers people, period. Greetings, my name’s Paul, I’m a Christian, just a Christian, not Protestant Catholic, not Orthodox, just a Christian. I was added by Jesus to his one church when I obeyed the gospel, Acts 2.47. Jesus added me to his church that he promised to build. Matthew 16, 18, I’m not part of a denomination, I’m not a hyphenated Christian.

I preach Christ crucified, just repeat on repeat on repeat. yes. ⁓ Cool.

Got it. ⁓

Lost it.

You preach Christ crucified on repeat. You just keep doing it. When there’s a lull, go, the gospel is the good news about the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, 1 Corinthians 15, one through four. Believe in your heart under righteousness, confess with your mouth unto salvation, Romans 10, 10.

do what those Romans did. Acts two verse 10 says they were there, they gladly received the word by being baptized, Acts 2.41. Of course I don’t go brrrr

Sure. Yeah, yeah, you need moderators. So she asked to talk more about moderators. So you have Christians who are gonna be in the broadcast, you know, okay, that’s Aaron. I know he’s solid. So Aaron has all control and I trust him. He preaches the doctrine of Christ. He’s in the comments with me and he will see somebody say, you know, they say horrible things like Jesus blanks.

children.

Yeah, it’s hardcore. And so you just block those immediately. And so what happens is to me is I’ll get into conversation with somebody, I’m chopping wood, I’m talking to Simon, I’m not looking at the screen, but the Christians are handling the comments. And there’s Bible studies going on in the comments between the Christians and the people who think they’re Christians. That’s who we’re dealing with. We’re dealing with people who think that they’re Christians. And look Protestants are the ones who I’m converting. That’s who’s being converted.

Chopping wood, with that sign there, and you’re just chopping wood until you’re notified, because you have Christians down here, maybe talking back for us. So when you go from chopping wood to getting involved.

I preach while I’m chopping wood. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. yeah, yeah. just, yeah, it’s the death barrel and resurrect. I do. I mean, seriously, I absolutely do. And it works. mean, people see, it’s just off, it’s muscle memory at that point when you deliver the invitation. I needed to say this. So I said, know, 50-50 chance, this is gonna bother you for a minute, but you’ll get it once you do it. That’s like three or four hours.

go

live, you don’t go for 20 minutes, you don’t go for an hour. You think you’ve gone for 45 minutes and it’s been three hours. That’s what happens because you have these engaging conversations and it’s just like pop, pop, pop, pop, pop and all of sudden you’re like, whoa, I just missed my chiropractor appointment. True story. Yep. The longest one I did was almost eight hours.

You don’t notice it, it just disappears. You just go and you have people that need Jesus and they’re right in your palm of your hand. And when you watch somebody, give them, I have no idea what time it is, I’ve got two minutes. Thank you. You’ve got somebody in the palm of your hand. You’ve taken away the thief, it’s during the Law of Moses, Jesus did not say to you, today you will be with me in paradise. Yes? Have it.

That’s good. My health is so erratic and I never know when I’m just laid out. Five to 35 hours a week and it’s just random. I’m like, gotta, I changed the oil. I have put a soft top on my daughter’s tracker. I have, I mean, I’ve done so many things. You can hike?

You can walk. You can get yourself a selfie stick and just walk and preach Christ crucified. You can just, it just works. I’m telling you, if you put this above your head and they hate, ⁓ there’s a lot of Protestants that hate us because we’re preaching the same thing and they complain about it. There’s all these people preaching water baptism, water dogs, and Campbellites. You know the deal. Yeah. All right.