Hello, everyone!
My name is Calvin Smith and I’m the Executive Director 
and Speaker for Answers in Genesis, Canada,
and I have with me today the CEO of
Answers in Genesis, Mr Ken Ham, and also my
good friend and Director of the Cross Current
Ministry, Mr Cory McKenna.
And this is kind of a momentous occasion – it's
the arrival of the
Gospel Reset Evangelism Curriculum.
I just received this in the mail yesterday
– so excited about that – and that's the
purpose of our meeting here today is to discuss
that curriculum, what it is, what it's going
to do, how it's going to revitalize your evangelism
efforts, and how all this came to be.
So anyway, good morning, gentlemen.
How's everyone doing today?
Good morning, Calvin.
Great to be with you.
Good morning, Cal.
Great to see you again.
So, yeah, that's the purpose of this call
– just to really describe the curriculum,
how it came to be and, Cory, you're the presenter
of the material and you came up with much
of the content for this curriculum, so why
don't you just break it out and tell everyone
what exactly this curriculum is.
Yeah, Cal, this is really two decades in the
making here!
So, out of the box, really what it's designed
to do, it's been customized to do, is to work
in tandem with AiG's Gospel Reset resources,
so we're intrinsically a Gospel Reset ministry,
in terms of what the personal witness system
really does is it provides believers with
fundamental tools and field tested training
to confidently share the gospel with family,
with friends, being very sensitive to the
unique culture that we live in today.
Right on.
Now, obviously, the title of the evangelism
curriculum is Gospel Reset and now, Ken, that
was a book that was released just… was it
just last year, Ken, your book was released?
Yes, it was just released not that long ago,
about a year ago and the book actually is
this one here, Gospel Reset, and also which
is a part of the curriculum is a video that
I’ve done which we did at one of our conferences
called the Gospel Reset Conference, and it's
really our message of evangelism for today's
world for our secularized culture.
Right.
So, this book is... it's kind of unprecedented
because there was a supporter of the US ministry
that actually helped do a mail out of that
book to almost every evangelical church in
the United States, I know Canada, 15 000 churches
up here received a copy of that – I mean
that's an outreach, I don't even think the Billy Graham 
ministry has ever done something like that!
It’s interesting, the book went to over
a quarter of a million churches in America,
and then every church they could get an address
for in Canada and Australia and the
United Kingdom and New Zealand.
And we've had some tremendous responses from that.
In fact, we've had many pastors tell us, as
a result of receiving this book, Gospel Reset,
that they have totally revamped the way they
present the gospel to our culture, and also
the way they equip their people in their churches
to go out and present the gospel.
Right.
Now, could you just give us a quick encapsulation
of the message – it's that whole Acts 2,
Acts 17 concept, Ken, but maybe you could
just, for our listeners here, give them an
idea if they haven't read the book why they
should read the book because really the curriculum
is kind of based on that premise that you
really understand the culture of today and
how to frame the gospel – which never changes
– but to a culture that's largely rejected
the Christian foundations it's based on.
Could you just give us a quick encapsulation
of that?
Well, you know, in America, for instance,
we divide generations according to when they
were born and those born before 1928 were
the Greatest Generation, then you have the
Silent Generation, then you have the Boomers
Generation (I’m a part of the Boomers Generation),
then you have Generation X, Generation Y is
the Millennials, Generation Z is the younger
generation, age five to twenty five, and one
of the things that we certainly definitely
notice in the whole western world is that
the oldest three generations are much more
what I would call Christianized, not necessarily
Christian but Christianized in other words
have more of a Judaeo-Christian ethic or morality,
and the younger generations X, Y and Z are
much more secularized, much more atheistic
in their thinking.
And from a biblical perspective (1 Corinthians
1:23, we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews
a stumbling block, to the Greeks foolishness)
to me it's sort of like dividing the culture
into the generations that were sort of like
the Jews, and that's the older generations,
and then the generations that are like the
Greeks, the younger generations.
There is a definite division because in the
older generations, that had much more of the
Judaeo-Christian ethic, when you say "God" they
would think of the God of the Bible – you
go to the public schools in *those* generations
and say God, and they would think of the God
of the Bible.
Whereas, if you go to the younger generations
today and say God, they say,
“Which god? There are many gods.”
It's much more like the Greeks.
And you can divide them up according to Peter's
presentation of the gospel to the Jews and
Paul’s presentation to the Greeks.
Peter's presentation to the Jews in Acts 2,
he went to preach to a culture that understood
the terms, they had the writings of Moses,
you say "God", they believed in one God, Creator
God, they knew about Adam and Eve, knew about
sin, knew about the promise of the Messiah,
knew death was a penalty for sin – the sacrificial
system that was set up in Genesis 3:21 – so
they had the foundation to understand the gospel.
But the Greeks, when Paul goes to present
the same message to the Greeks, they were
evolutionists (not Darwinian, of course, because
Darwin popularized a particular view of evolution)
but they believed in evolution, the gods evolved,
you evolved, and so on, and they believed
in many gods and, of course, there are atheists
and pantheists, a mixture of everything – everything
except Christianity, so when Paul presents
the message of the gospel to the Greeks, they
don't understand, it's foolishness to them.
And what we're saying is this, that our older
generations, like the Jews, you could have
a Billy Graham type evangelist go in there and say,
“The Bible says repent of your sin, trust in Christ”
and they understand.
And that's why you had some of those crusades
that have you know thousands of responses
and even revivals in our world.
But today when you have evangelists go in
with the same Billy Graham-type message we're
not seeing the responses that we used to see
because we're saying they're much more like
the Greeks they don't have the foundation
to understand the gospel.
And, personally, I believe it's much of the
church's fault in allowing generations of
kids to go to an education system (most of
them, 90% or more) to the secular education
system, they've thrown God out, the Bible
out, prayer out, creation out, they teach
you to explain everything by natural processes
– in other words,
they teach from an atheistic worldview perspective.
They come to our churches, we haven't given
them answers to the skeptical questions and
what they’re taught about evolution and
millions of years and so on, and so for many
of them they increasingly doubt and do not
believe the Bible and then end up walking
away from the church.
And they're very hard to reach with the message
of the cross.
When Peter went to the Jews, thousands were
converted; when Paul went to the Greeks with
the same message, it was, “What foolishness is this?”
And it wasn't until Paul defined who God is
and helped them understand that and really
laid the right foundation, got them on the right road, 
did he then see some that were converted.
And that would be like preaching to a whole
group of atheists and seeing some converted,
in other words, you can't use an Acts 2 type
message in an Acts 17 culture – it doesn't
work like it used to.
Increasingly our western world has become
Acts 17 in its culture, it's not Acts 2, so
it's very difficult to reach them with the
message of God's Word unless you understand
how to approach them as Greeks.
Right.
Well, that's quite interesting because I think,
you know, Cory and I… you know Cory, you
and I have been friends since before we were
both quite, in a sense, radically saved, with
a background in music, and so on, and I think,
when I was growing up, I would represent more
of a Greek in my thinking – I was very atheistic
in my thinking, my parents weren't Christians
so I didn't hear anything about the Bible
or church or stuff like that, but you, Cory,
you did have a kind of a Christian background,
your parents were Catholics from what I understand,
so you and I kind of represent that whole
Greek / Jewish kind of culture and it wasn't
until I had many, many questions about evolution
and that whole naturalistic worldview taken
away that I was even open to hearing about
the gospel.
But anyway, maybe you can share a little bit
about your background Cory.
Yeah, I mean, I just sincerely want to thank
God for Ken, sincerely so, I mean, I encountered
(Ken, you’ll remember this teaching) I always
carry this with me, Reclaiming the Culture,
Creation Apologetics by Ken Ham, and smack
dab in the middle, session five, is
“Why Won’t They Listen” and having served myself
as a pastor even since 2002, and an evangelist
in the local church since 2006, I can say
"yes and amen!” with experience to everything
you just said, Ken, from both sides of this
issue – from discipleship and from evangelism
– and so there's a sense in which, as Cal
and I sit here in Canada, there's a sense
in which we're time travelers to this issue.
You know, you understand that the United Kingdom
is about 10 to 12 years further down the river
than Canada, and Canada is about 10 to 12
years further down the river than the United
States, and we've seen the cultural decay
far beyond the United States, so I just want
to implore folks who are listening to this
interview who track with this resource, with
Gospel Reset and the curriculum itself, to
understand that there's an opportunity God
has given us – He's writing a story here,
I really believe this.
I posted on our social media today, “some
dreams do come true” and I don't want to
undersell this – the fact that I'm sitting
here on a call with this Australian man that
I listened to fresh out of Bible college that
not just shaped the way I share the gospel
but the fundamental philosophies of our equipping
ministry were shaped by the
“Why Won’t They Listen” Gospel Reset message.
So, I just want to encourage folks, if you're
sitting in the United States right now, you
have an opportunity to change the course of
the future through this resource,
I just can't say it strongly enough!
If folks would get out and have these gospel
conversations with family and with friends
and start to sow and water the seed of the
gospel to “de-Greek-ize”, Ken, in your
language, absolutely true, we would see the culture 
transformed, by the grace of God, for certain!
Amen to that!
You know, Cory, as I first got saved, and
then I started reading the Scripture, and
then I got exposed to the Answers in Genesis
ministry, because I mean creation apologetics
that was a key to me even coming to faith,
you know, it's what the Lord used to really
open my eyes, and then I remember you in Bible
college and I was.. you know I'd listen to
that main talk that Ken did in Reclaiming
the Culture, and then I can remember you,
in Bible college, and you were already starting
to encounter some more liberal theology.
I remember us having a conversation and, not
that you'd bought into this, but I remember
you saying something to me like, “Well,
you know, some Christians don't even think
we need the Old Testament anymore,” and
I remember rushing out and grabbing some AiG
material and saying, “Here, listen to this,
you’ve got to hear this guy, Ken” and
so on, and then you know eventually we both
read the book Why Won't They Listen, and that
was kind of the precursor to the Gospel Reset
book – I mean, similar concepts and stuff like that.
Calvin, let me just give a sort of a practical
example, it's one I give when I speak, but
it really helps people understand, and that is…
When I was a little boy, in Australia, so
I'm talking back in 1959, I had to be a tiny,
tiny little boy, and then the early 60s.
Billy Graham came to Australia, and my father
would say, “Oh, he's the ‘Bible says’ man”
– that's what he was known as, “the
Bible says man” – the “Bible says”
man is coming to Australia.
And when he came to Australia, it’s been
said it's the closest Australia ever came
to revival, and his major message was, “the
Bible says you sinner, repent of your sin,
trust in Christ, He died on the cross, He
was raised from the dead.”
And thousands were converted, 
there's no doubt about it.
Now if you go back today with the same message
(and there have been evangelists who have done that),
they don't get anywhere near the
same response.
Nothing like those days where you know the
tens of thousands that packed into the big
stadiums and you know thousands converted
and it impacted the culture you just don't
get that happening.
And so, we have to ask ourselves what is the
difference between then and today?
Well, back then, in the public schools, it was, by law 
(because we inherited the British system)
by law, the students actually heard
the Bible read through by the teachers.
So, I remember even in high school, we recited the Lord's 
prayer on assembly before we went into class.
Now today, of course, teachers don't read
through the Bible in the public schools, the
Bible's basically outlawed as it is in America
and Canada, from the public school system,
and in the United Kingdom, and so on.
And, not only that, you don't recite the Lord's
prayer on assembly before you go into school,
or anything like that.
Evolution is taught as fact.
These days, the education system is much more
atheistic – I mean if you're not for Christ,
you're against – and we have whole generations
that have left the church, basically.
In America, church attendance is down to just
18% for the Millennials, I mean the older
generation it was you know 56% when you talk
about the Greatest Generation.
But that sort of exodus has occurred even
to a greater extent in Canada and the
United Kingdom and Australia.
And so, the generations today are much more
secularized, they haven't gone through a system
where they understand terms like “sin”
and why death is in the world, in fact, they've
been taught that death has been around for
millions of years.
They don't have the foundational knowledge
that, for instance, in Australia even though
it's a very pagan culture, back in the 50s
and 60s, even though most the students in
school didn't go to church, they had the foundational
knowledge to understand the message of the
gospel because they knew the biblical terms – they 
were familiar with them so they understood it.
That's what I'm saying – they were like
the Jews.
But now in Australia, the younger generations
are like the Greeks, they don't have that
foundational knowledge anymore.
So, you can't come in and build a house (the
walls and the roof – the gospel, the doctrines
of Christianity) if the foundation is not there for it;
if it's got the wrong foundation 
the walls and the roof won't stand.
And that's where we're at in our culture and
that's what the Gospel Reset book is all about,
the talk that I gave, and, of course, those
two items plus the curricula is available
in this new curriculum set – Gospel Reset,
you showed it before.
And so, I'd be interested to hear the details
from Cory, how he took all that information
and now we have: a student guide, and we also
have the leader’s guide, and we have the
DVDs in here, a 2-disc set, with all sorts
of teaching on it to guide people through
– to be able to be great evangelists in
our secularized culture, is that correct?
Yeah, totally true, Ken – what you just
said was so profound that I wonder if that's
what Paul had in mind.
I mean, our ministry is uniquely “Pauline”
or patterned after Paul.
And again, it's because I came into contact
with the “Why Won’t They Listen” message
that we actually teach, actively, the three
worlds of Paul.
I mean Paul was born a Jew, he was educated
Greek, he was he was living as a Roman, and
so that becomes kind of a tripod of western
ministry if we understand Paul's theology
and his methodology, and I wonder if that's
what he had in mind.
One of my mentors taught me that the gospel,
in this time and place, has to be taught,
not just preached.
Paul says the Lord's servant must “not be
quarrelsome, kind to everyone, able to teach”
so, as far as this curriculum goes, it is
based on Paul's three worlds and so a few
kind of key things that make this intensely
practical – we throw out a few, right out
of the gate, in session one, Ken, we throw
out a couple of catch phrases that sort of
set the trajectory for the training.
One is that the fruit of evangelism training
is found in the field.
A lot of people will approach me after training,
probably much like yourself, and they'll say
that was great training.
And my response, respectfully, is always the
same – time will tell how great the training
was, because if you leave training like this,
you invest time, you invest money, you invest
travel, and then you never share Jesus with
your family and friends, it probably wasn't
the greatest training, not for you and certainly
not for them.
So, we actually have designed this to be applied
through personal experience.
Every aspect of this curriculum is customized
to be put into practice.
So, that's the first phrase.
But the second phrase we borrowed from a gentleman
named Will Metzger.
Will Metzger wrote Tell the Truth, a great
book on personal witness, and he said,
“methodology flows from theology”.
You talk about the church sort of detouring
into the weeds, I mean, if there's one way
we've detoured it's by not starting on a theological
foundation from the very first verse of the Bible.
And so what this curriculum does is, it lays
the bedrock theology of the Seven C’s
(as is the basis for the Creation Museum and the
Answers in Genesis ministry) and we teach
people to share Christ from the very first
verse of the Bible, but what results when
we get our theology right is a very simple
three step method for sharing Christ in conversation
with any “Greek thinking” family and friends,
and I would assume most folks listening to
this call would say, “that's most of my
friends”, certainly if you're, like you
said Ken, south of 30, even south of 40; these
folks are Greek thinkers.
And so, I just want to be very careful to
say that this is designed to be put into practice.
we have several very practical tools that
come out of the box in terms of taking account
of, “Who has God providentially placed in
my life today who I can sit down and have
a cup of coffee with?”
We help folks disarm the common questions
related to the fear associated with sharing
the gospel, we all have that.
And so, both tactically and tactfully, out
of the box, this will equip people for conversations
about Christ with Bibles open –guaranteed.
So, Cory, if I can say the book Gospel Reset
and the talk I give, that sort of gives the
big picture – okay understand the difference
between the Jews and the Greeks, the older
generation the younger generation – we're
not reaching the younger generation, we're
losing them from the church, the church is not impacting 
them like it used to – what is the problem?
We have to understand the difference between
the Jews and the Greeks; we have to understand
the younger generation, how secularized they
are, and understand this approach the difference
between Peter's approach in Acts 2 and Paul's
approach in Acts 17.
So, I get people to that point where they
say, okay, we get it.
Alright, now we understand, we've got to do
it all differently, so where do we go from here?
Then, you take that and say, okay, as an evangelist,
let me practically walk you through a curriculum
to show you how to now apply this and how to use it.
Well said.
This has been happening since 2007.
What's been amazing – God has been writing
this story – that really, we have been applying
the content of this curriculum in and through
our ministry, me personally, and our own team,
and the churches we've trained – thousands
of believers, for years.
And so, for us, for this resource to come
from your heart and mind has just been answered
prayer, quite honestly.
So, that's exactly what we do.
We – get ready for this! – we start from the start.
I mean, we have this illustration in the training
whereby, I think what a lot of people do is
what I was doing for years and years, is I
was presenting the center piece of a larger
puzzle to my family and friends – the centerpiece
of Christ and His cross, the climax of human history.
And sincerely so.
I was doing that, but what I was robbing people
of is the box cover.
Now, I'm not great at jigsaw puzzles, but
when I try to take one on it's very helpful
to have the picture on the front of the box.
And so what we need to do is, we need to share
the whole picture.
No one walks into a movie halfway through
and expects to understand what's happening.
And for some reason, that's how we've diverted,
probably because we've made those base assumptions
about the knowledge and the world view of
our audience, but what this does is it starts
from the start and it lays the foundation
– tell the true story, tell God's history,
the Seven C’s – we've been using that
for years.
When you start from the start, not only does
it lay the biblical groundwork of the true
history of the world, but it provokes great
conversation because we all know which “C”
is the greatest flashpoint of deep discussion
– C number one
which happens to be Answers in Genesis’ whole focus.
And so, you can imagine, Ken, this is somewhat
like a time release resource for churches
as people start actually sharing their faith.
You know, I think it's great to want AiG resources
– I've used them for years in my own personal
discipleship, and family discipleship, as
a pastor, in church discipleship.
But what happens when I actually sit down
with someone and I lay out that history and
then I insert the centerpiece of Christ and His cross?
It provokes great conversation and it motivates
me to want more resources – there's nothing
that creates the desire for more discipleship
like actually following Jesus and sharing the gospel.
And so, this is like a time release resource.
If churches start using this resource, not
only will it get them sowing and watering
seed and get folks in that pipeline that process
of coming to faith in Christ, because that's
by God's grace alone, but it will also catalyze
an engine for AiG resources because people
will need them not just want them.
And you know, Cory, I was just thinking…
(and sorry, Calvin, if I can jump in just a second – we'll 
let you speak in a moment, Calvin
– Cory and I are speaking right now, you just enjoy 
your coffee there, we'll do all the work…)
…the thing that I see right now, (and, you
know, in 2020 we're in the midst of this COVID 19
situation and all that's gone on) and I
see a lot of churches talking about,
“Oh, we've got to talk about Revelation and we've
got to talk about the second coming, it's
right around the corner, we’re in the last
days now.”
Well, I believe we’re in the last days (we've
been in the last days for 2000 years actually,
since Christ stepped into Earth to be the
God-man) but, you know, Scripture says we’re
to be occupied until He comes and if people
think it's bad today, what's happening in
the church in the western world, well it's
nothing like Noah yet.
I mean, the whole world had rebelled, there
were only eight people that went onboard that
Ark, and it's nothing like even Sodom and
Gomorrah yet where Abraham didn't go below
10 to stop God's judgment on those cities.
There are many, many born-again Christians
in America and in Canada and Australia, in
fact, in America there are millions and millions
of them who love the Lord, so we have a great
opportunity to go out there and to impact
the culture.
But I find, for a lot of churches, they're
more interested about the end of the book
than they are the beginning; they think, “Oh,
Genesis is not important, doesn't matter,”
they're more interested in end times and yet
it's the foundational aspect of Genesis
Genesis, 1 to 11 is the foundation for the rest of
the Bible, for all of our doctrine, for our
whole Christian worldview – it’s because
much of the church gave that up that we have
the younger generations who don't understand
Christianity, they don't understand the gospel,
they don't understand the terminology, and
when you tell them to trust in Jesus they
don't have the foundation for it.
And because much of the church has compromised
with and evolution of millions of years and
in a sense erased history, I mean, people today
talk about “Oh, in America they're trying
to erase history” (I see the same is true
in Canada as well, knocking down statues and
so on, trying to erase history) while the
history that's been erased that's caused all
these problems has been the church erasing
the history in Genesis 1 to 11.
And until we get that foundation there, we're
not going to have generations that'll be able
to build the structure and the roof, in other
words, understand the gospel and Christian
doctrines and that's what…
And, Ken, I would just encourage you with
the teaching… you've been teaching this
for years, I don't even know how many years,
but it should concern us as Christian leaders,
as evangelists and apologists, that this is
still a surprising message to people and one
reason as from the evangelist perspective
this is a surprising message to people is
because they haven't been sharing the gospel biblically.
I mean, it wouldn't be so surprising if you'd
actually talk about the beginning and talk
about the foundation we're standing on, and
that's apologetics 101, that's the whole parable
of the wise and foolish builders – if we
build wisely, when storms come our house stands
because it's wisely built on the rock of Christ
and His Word; you build foolishly on whatever
other false foundation, when the same storms
come, your house falls because it's foolishly built.
The problem is, this Christian witness has
been lacking for so many years there's been
this holding pattern of leaving it to the
professionals, “I can't have that cup of
coffee I'm scared to do that” and I understand
that fully as a pastor and an evangelist.
But as people now start sitting down, having
a cup of coffee, sharing the true story of
the Bible, the history of Scripture, inserting
their gospel testimonial, law and gospel,
we get into all the biblical touch points,
we borrow Paul's Romans 1, 2 and 3 framework
there, but we start from the start because
that's what Paul does, and as people start
having these conversations, now they realize,
“Oh my goodness, this person does think
more like a Greek; they don't even know that
there was a story of Moses.”
It surprises people when I tell them, half
of the people that we would speak with in
Christian witness in Canada, don't even know
anything about the ten commandments, certainly
if they're under 30 in our culture.
Yeah, I'd like to interject here for a bit
because you've touched on some really important
parts of this curriculum in the last little
bit here, Cory, is number one,
the practicality of your teaching.
I mean, many people who are going to hear
this don't know who you are.. you know,
you and I have been friends for a while, I mean,
I became the apologist, you became the evangelist
– but there's a lot of interconnectivity 
between that.
I know I get re-energized every time I sit
down on one of your teaching sessions.
It inspires me to share the gospel even more.
I think I'm a fairly equipped person but it's
the practicality of your training and what
you've embedded into this curriculum that
I think is really going to be eye opening
to people because it's not like extreme team
stuff – I mean, I've seen you do that, you
go out on the streets and you're incredibly
dynamic…
Shout out to Ray Comfort because I cut my
teeth with Ray.
I mean, I was preaching with Ray in Huntington
Beach, so I love Ray, and God bless him.
If it wasn't for Living Waters Ministry, I
wouldn't be here.
I'm being very serious, but we have taken
a different approach in terms of conversational
evangelism (family and friends) which is the
majority of where we spend our time as Christians.
Right.
And that's what I think people are really
going to see with this curriculum here is
it's like, look I don't have to be a superhero,
you've got some incredibly practical tips
as just how to reach out to the people around
you, close family, friends, maybe people at
work, share the gospel biblically, and then
continue a follow-up process that's not going
to be antagonistic, it's not going to be setting
off a grenade with the relationship…
As a matter of fact, one of the things I think
people are going to be so encouraged about
is I think, many of us out there have relationships
where, maybe we tried to share the gospel
in the past and perhaps it didn't go so well,
and so, you know, Gospel Reset – you've
incorporated practical things like resetting
that relationship.
I mean, “Hey, let's start over again, forget
about what happened in the past” you know,
maybe someone was a little aggressive or they
were a little enthusiastic or bombastic or
whatever it is, even that kind of thing I think is one of 
the most important parts of the curriculum.
So, could you just share a couple of practical
things that you've included, just to get the
people to understand how this curriculum is
going to help them.
Yeah, absolutely, Cal.
So, starting from Scripture we just see the
simple biblical pattern of “pray, sow, water”.
We pray fervently and passionately for folks
to come to faith and for us to have the boldness
to share Christ, we sow the seed of the gospel
(man sows the seed, he sleeps, 
he knows not how that seed grows),
and then we water the seed knowing that only 
God alone brings the increase.
So, that is the rhythm we encourage folks
to adopt in their life and witness –
we pray, we sow, we water.
We would consider sowing the seed as starting
the conversation.
Otherwise, if you're trying to water unsown
seed, you're just arguing.
If you haven't heard the gospel, what hope
are you presenting to people?
We need to calibrate – that's apologetics
101 – we point to the standard.
Well, Jesus is the standard.
And so, really simply, we encourage folks
first of all to take inventory, to sort of
account for the people God has providentially
placed in their life – we've got this little
“top 10” tool.
Now, it's nothing new, but we've just really
developed it in tandem with Gospel Reset so
it all links together into a system of gospel witness.
So, write down the folks God has providentially
placed in your life, start to pray for your
witness with those people – that's pretty
straightforward.
But then we encourage folks to develop two,
what we call, practice partners –
one for discipleship (a Christian), 
one for evangelism (a non-Christian).
These are people that we already know that
we can politely approach and just respectfully
say, “Look I'm taking training to learn
how to articulate why I'm a Christian and
part of the homework is for me to ask someone
if they'd be my practice partner,” sort
of a sounding board to have a spiritual conversation
over a cup of coffee.
Now we encourage to start with the Christian
because then you have a buddy system to hold
one another accountable for sharing your faith
mutually, I mean, Jesus sent them out in twos
for a reason, so if Cal chickened out then
Cory could say, “Cal don't chicken out next
time” and if Cory chickened out, vice versa.
And so we encourage folks to have a test run
with a believer and we can sort of role play
through that.
But that practice partner who's an unbeliever
is vital because there's good news and bad
news associated with that meeting when the
last amen is shared.
When you sit down and you tell the history
of Scripture, you teach the gospel in terms
of your testimony, and then you start to take
the time to water that seed to continue the
conversation where apologetics becomes very,
very important, good news and bad news – good
news is, you did it; bad news is you did it
and you can do it again.
You can do it again!
I remember a young person years ago who took
this training, and he came up to me afterwards
and he said, “Mr McKenna,” I liked him
already!
And he said, “You know what, I could have
a practice partner every week.
I've got all kinds of unsaved family and friends.”
Yeah, I'll give you your name list, it's called
Facebook because people, most people, just view
Facebook for bantering and bickering, but
what if we viewed these people God has providentially
placed in our lives and if we stewarded those
souls for the glory of God and we just started
to have one conversation, what if that was
once a month and we started to sow and water,
we start the conversation but, like Ken says,
de-Greek-ising takes time.
Anyone listening, this is not – hear it from the heart 
of a pastor – this is not a simple problem.
We have Greek thinkers sitting in the church
who profess Christ -- that's complicated enough
but if you go talk to your neighbour, they're
not almost Christian, let's be really honest here.
And so, as we sow the seed and start the conversation
and help them understand those 7 C’s and
how we have encountered Jesus Christ – what
does it say?
That which was from the beginning, which we
heard, we looked upon, we touched… they've
had an experience with the risen Christ, as
we share that experience, in the context of
the true history.
And then we continue the conversation; we
frame that up and say, ‘hey, why don't we
just keep getting together?
I can hear what's going on in your life and
hear what's going on in culture and maybe
we can talk about, what does the Bible say
about racism?
And everyone on this call knows that it's
insufficient to build your response to racism
on a sandy foundation, it doesn't make any sense.
In the Martin Luther King era, it was 
“I am a man” that was the argument,
not "I am a black man."
It was an image bearing discussion which is
what we teach in the curriculum.
We have to build our conversations on conversational
common ground which is really about image
bearing and the biblical foundation of the
Seven C’s.
So those are just a few things, but we can
continue those conversations until God grants
repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth
which is what Paul says in 2nd Timothy 2.
So, let me just ask you, Cory, in the Gospel
Reset Curriculum now, that's been put together,
so in that box we actually have the book that
I did, Gospel Reset, which you can read in
two hours and get the whole message of the
Jews and the Greeks, and then I teach it in
this video here which is basically my teaching
of the Gospel Reset book with, you know, lots
of personal aspects added in and some other
aspects as well, and then we have what you
have put together is a leader's guide and we have 
a student guide and we have this two-disc set.
So, what does one find in this two-disc set here?
In that two-disc set there's going to be
four roughly 20-minute sessions, or a little
more than that, but it is very, very accessible
for folks.
The leader’s guide gives leaders everything
they need to know, they do not have to be
Ray Comfort to facilitate a study of Gospel
Reset – by design it's something we are
moving through together, we are learning how
to share the gospel to an Acts 17 culture.
So, within those discs though, Ken, you're
going to have four sessions that are going to be:
Number one is evangelism reset, where we basically
reset our understanding of the gospel and
evangelism from Scripture, we always start
from Scripture.
Session two, we follow Paul's example.
Paul says follow my example as I follow Christ's
example but, in the life and ministry of Paul,
we have basically a playbook for evangelism
and apologetics in this time and place and
as a ministry we've been living that since
2007 so, again, we are based on Paul's three
worlds which we get into, Paul's formation,
Paul's foundation, and that's all session two.
Session three is foundation rebuilding.
Obviously, if we're going to share it, we
have to know it, and so we get back to the
7 C’s, we get into law and gospel.
Paul's biblical pattern for sharing the gospel emerges 
in Romans 1, 2 and 3, and we get into that.
And then it's Gospel Reset evangelism whereby
we take all that theology and it gets shaped
into three simple action items, three simple
steps, for Gospel Reset evangelism, specifically
with family and friends – conversations
about Christ, Bibles open.
Yeah, I'm so excited about this because I've
always seen the Answers in Genesis ministry,
and you know whenever I saw Ken speak and
I read his materials, I could see that heart
for evangelism embedded in the apologetics
and I think there are many people that have
a misunderstanding of what Answers in Genesis
is all about – “Oh, you guys argue about
the age of the earth and you talk about creation
and evolution and all that stuff” – but
it's always been about the gospel.
I mean, that's the only reason I do what I do.
If this was just, you know, a discussion on
science or something like that, I'm personally,
I'm not a scientist – I love the scientists
that work with Answers in Genesis and so on,
but it's the heart of the gospel and when
I see you using the 7 C’s and how all that
lays out and how it just aligns with everything the 
Answers in Genesis ministry has been putting together…
Yeah, that's the booklet.
Yeah, these need to be passed out with every
gospel conversation, I'm being very serious,
because what this will do, this gives us our foundation 
whereby we can now continue the conversation.
You've already got your framework for the
conversation, it's going to be within one
of these C's, I mean, just take your pick,
and so this is where Christians – all of
those years of sermons, all of those years
of discipleship, all those years of Sunday
school, will come to life when your best friend
says, “What do you think about this?”
I’ll tell you what, you'll be remembering
what your pastor said then.
Cory, if you look at those Seven C’s, if
you hold that booklet up again, you know, a
lot of evangelistic tracts, you know the last
three C's... well it goes:
Creation, Corruption, Catastrophe, Confusion
(that's Genesis 1 to 11 which is the foundational 
history for everything),
and then: Christ, Cross, Consummation – so
a lot of gospel tracts, evangelistic tracts,
really start with the last three C's – Christ,
Cross, Consummation – you must be born again,
put your trust in Christ, you sinner, repent
of your sin – and so what we're saying is,
we have a radical approach.
Well, it's really not radical, I call it a
radical approach to evangelism – let's present
the gospel the way God does it in the Bible
by starting at the beginning, and so we're
starting people at the beginning to lay the
right foundation, to understand a perfect
creation marred by sin, that's why we're sinners,
that's why there's death in the world, that's
why we need a saviour, so that they will understand
the message of the cross,
and that's what it's all about.
And you know…
Ken, I just want to encourage you because
I know you would be okay with what I'm about
to say is, as much as we appreciate Ken Ham
and Answers in Genesis, what you just said
is actually Holy Spirit breathed through Paul's ministry.
I mean Paul started with the fifth C in his
initial presentation – he preached the resurrection,
that's how he started – he was called a
babbler (fairly saucy term, not a real nice
term, a hack philosopher basically), and Paul
did what you just described.
So it's not as though we're introducing some
new teaching.
Matter of fact, we're just getting back to
the Bible and doing what Paul suggested.
The gospel hasn't changed; God's Word hasn't
changed.
But the culture has, and the method by which
we present the gospel needs to change in accord
to where the culture is at.
And the culture has changed from being more
like Acts 2, in our western world, to Acts 17.
So, what did Paul do?
He started at the beginning, with creation.
You know, really the origin of this for me
goes back to 1975 – I gave my first creation
apologetics talk in 1975.
I became a public high school teacher and
the students knew I was a Christian and they
said, “So, how can you be a Christian?
We know the Bible's not true.”
How do you know the Bible's not true?
“Because of evolution and millions of years
and what's in our textbook.”
And it wasn't until I dealt with that and
then laid the foundation from Genesis that
they even were willing to listen, let alone
understand, the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And that's when I started speaking, in that
year in 1975.
So, yeah, that makes me a little bit older
than you, maybe, and Calvin, but that really
is part of the journey, that was sort of the
beginning of that journey in many ways.
Right.
Now, Cory, you'd said that, or Ken, you'd
said that the gospel never changes but of
course the culture is, so the way we present
it, and stuff like that.
I think not just the culture changing and
the way we present, but also the mediums that
we can get this information through and so
this Reset Curriculum is designed for
small group settings where you could have a study
group in your home and you can watch the videos,
and then everybody's got the workbook, and
somebody leads it and stuff.
You could do that in your church, etc.
But, from what I understand, this teaching
is also going to be available on Answers.tv,
did I get that right?
Yes – Answers.tv is our streaming service
and now you can watch our programs all over
the world, so we have on there our teaching
programs, conferences,
future conferences will be streamed on there.
We have programs that you do from Canada that
are on there, you and Patricia and those involved
in the Canadian Answers in Genesis.
We have creationist nature programs for the
whole family which are absolutely phenomenal.
We have music programs, we have adventure
programs…
I mean, there's hundreds and hundreds... in fact there's
about 2000 as of us speaking right now,
2000 programs on Answers.tv.
It's very inexpensive – for a whole year
it works out at just over three dollars, US,
a month, and that's for an entire year, and
you have a seven-day free trial, so very inexpensive.
Now, for our curricula like this, we're actually
putting up the videos on Answers.tv and then
the curricula is available as a PDF so that
they can download.
So, you can actually get the curricula if
you subscribe to Answers.tv.
Now, you can order the curriculum from the
Answers in Genesis bookstore, AnswersinGenesis.org
and they can order from the Canadian bookstore
because we have a bookstore there in Canada,
and we can ship that out to people so you
can ship it out in the box, but if they subscribe
to Answers.tv, they can also get the curriculum
there as well.
And we have other curricula going up there
too – there's one that's actually being
put up there now, by Dr Charles Ware who's
an African-American pastor dealing with the
race issue in his ministry, Grace Relations, we'll see 
more and more of that go up there over time.
So, Answers.tv is going to be very versatile,
not only as a streaming service for all our
teaching and other programs, but also to have
some of these curricula up there as well 
that people can use.
Right.
I know this is kind of a dream come true.
I was actually talking to Cory yesterday and
the package arrived – the Gospel Reset – and
I just said to him, brother, this is like
a dream come true; we've been talking about
things like this for years.
We both read your book, Why Won’t They Listen,
years ago and I remember us talking about
our personal witnessing situations and just
saying, “How do we get them to listen?”
Why Won’t They Listen – we understood,
okay, this is the challenge – and then Cory,
becoming an evangelist…
I just want everyone hearing this to understand,
Cory would never say this himself but, you
know, he is an incredibly dynamic teacher.
He's got some incredibly practical stuff,
and the thing about Cory is, it's not theory
– Cory McKenna is the guy who shares his
faith more times in a month than most Christians
will ever do in their lifetime.
You just go out for coffee with Cory and all
of a sudden he's having a gospel conversation,
and I believe that's a gift, but it's a gift
that he can teach.
And that's the thing I'm so excited about,
is this marrying of the apologetics and the
evangelistic zeal that so many people have, being able 
to come together in a curriculum like this.
I've been saying to pastors for years, what
most churches need is three things:
• you need apologetics training so you really
understand what the Bible teaches, don't compromise
with evolution, millions years, all that kind
of stuff understand what the Bible teaches
• you need evangelism equipping
• and you need replacements for what the secular
school system is teaching.
Answers in Genesis has all of that in scope
now with this evangelism curriculum as that
component, it all pulls together; it's just
fantastic!
But Cory, we're gonna have to wrap up here
shortly but,
this is not just this curriculum and that's it.
You've got other things on the back burner
and other teaching and stuff like that.
What do you kind of envision for the future
as to the things… because I know since COVID
you've been doing a lot of online evangelism
training and stuff like that, why don't you
give us a brief glimpse into what…
Yeah, we're on the same wavelength.
I was just going to say this and, to say that
Ken Ham is a visionary is probably the biggest
understatement of the day, but we'll go with
it, and Cal, you know, when COVID hit back mid-March,
you and I had some deep conversations about
"what now?"
I mean, mission and mobility are certainly
close cousins, as we as we read the pages
of the Bible, and now all of a sudden apparently
the mission stalls out because we can't gather
for weekend worship services.
Is that true?
No, that’s not true.
I mean, we know that the mission continues,
Christ still builds His church, and so what's
been very exciting for me personally, and
I did this kind of kicking and screaming,
I'll be really honest – I think social media
is more often misused for gospel ministry
just because of the bantering that goes on
and… but what it forced me to do with our
team is to really kind of think through and
pray through, how can we express this same
content – so obviously Gospel Reset Evangelism
Curriculum was not ready yet – but we took
the same training that we've been running
for years and we literally digitized it for
social media seed sowing.
And so, what's amazing about that is… and
we saw huge fruit, I personally saw huge fruit,
people that I hadn't talked to in a long time
who are really, really fearful of what's going
on and building that bridge of hope and sowing
that seed and watering that seed.
I'm still in those relationships over social
media right now.
So, we literally took all of the components
and we digitized them.
Ken mentioned PDFs, so the top 10 tool becomes
a PDF fillable, and there was teaching undergirding
that, so perhaps down the road we can we can
express the same content for those who are
in university, maybe for older folks who are
not able to go to coffee shops or those situations,
we found a huge market space – I say that
in a biblical way – we saw that we found
this huge market space of people who were
desiring to share Christ and here's their computer.
Let's be honest, if it wasn't for technology,
if it wasn't for Zoom, what would we be doing?
I mean, God has used this powerfully.
So, just to say that on the side.
But as far as our ministry – really, as
a ministry that equips the church by example
to normalize sharing Christ in personal and
community relationships – and so the way
that takes shape, Cal, is that we offer gospel
ministry services to churches, for certain,
but really our heart and passion is to help
churches and help leaders assess and improve
their gospel health, we call it, through gospel
missions partnership.
And so, when we establish missions partnership,
now all of a sudden what we can do is we can
train up an evangelism and apologetic “lead”,
we call this person a “church champion”,
whereby we mentor them, digitally, just like
we're doing now, we have an entire online
training system to do that and you can imagine
when that discipleship pipeline is established,
now all of a sudden we have a very captive
audience to move resources through.
And so now, as people get a hold of this curriculum
in our partner churches, which is a growing
list, they start to spread their wings and
put this into practice what we hope is that
we can now circle back and get the Answers
Bible Curriculum, we can actually start to,
if you will, I say this lightly, consult people
or counsel people biblically because they're
going to see very quickly that their foundation
is not the best either.
Nothing exposes one's foundation like a biblical
conversation at a coffee shop, trust me!
And so now, all of a sudden, we have an opportunity,
through gospel missions partnership, to really
double down on those churches for the long
game and move the needle on gospel health proper.
Right. So, when you're sharing the gospel with somebody and they hit you with,
“Yeah, but what about dinosaurs, and how do you explain millions of years?” that comes right back to the
Answers in Genesis ministry, Ken, where…
Like, how about at the supper table?
I've had more dads say to me, “Man, my kid
asked me that and I couldn't answer it,”
and you think you're gonna have a super conversation
at the water cooler
if you can't answer that with your children?
I mean, we believe the health of mission starts
with health of marriages, we really teach that,
and so we've got to get our households
in order.
Build your house on the rock, I think that's
illustrative but it's also very practical.
My house has different rooms in it and we
want all of those rooms, one at a time, submitted
to the Lordship of King Jesus.
That's the way Christian witness works – we
want to be consistent.
Well, a lot of this necessitates starting
by building your house on the rock first,
so I say that in the curriculum, “Look,
folks, this presupposes that you've got a
solid foundation if you're trying to expose
someone else's” that only makes sense.
So people need these resources.
If anyone's listening, get the ABC curriculum
for certain, get the Gospel Reset book, get
the Answers series, my goodness, everyone
should have that on their shelf.
Well, Ken, I just want to thank you for taking
the time to speak to Cory and I.
Hopefully you're as excited about this as we are, 
and why don’t you just give us a brief update
on how the Creation Museum and the Ark Encounter
is going now with people being able to access that.
Well, lots of Americans are coming, 
no Canadians yet.
Well, our borders closed down!
I guess there's a reason for that, but I'm
sure they'll invade as soon as they can.
We have been doing very, very well, way better
than any of the secular attractions in regard
to the percentage of people (compared to last
year) … all the bus tour groups cancelled
all across America but we're within a one-day
driving distance of two-thirds of America's
population and people love a family-friendly
clean place, and we have a very safe place,
very clean place, and people come from all
over, it's very easy to get to.
Can't wait for the Canadian borders to open
and then I know the Canadians will pour down here
because we're used to having Canadians every day, 
at the Creation Museum and the Ark Encounter.
But we have some brand new exhibits, we've
got a brand new virtual reality experience
at the Ark Encounter, we've got some new exhibits
we opened at the Creation Museum, and our
new planetarium is now operational – the
laser projection system – and we have some
new animals in the zoo at the Ark Encounter
as well, so lots of great things, so check
it out at ArkEncounter.com.
And for the resources Cory was talking about,
and for the Gospel Reset Curriculum, go to
AnswersinGenesis.org.
Absolutely!
Well, we've got to wrap up here.
Thank you, Ken, for taking the time again;
thank you, Cory.
For those of you who want to know more about
Cory's ministry it's
TheCrossCurrent.com – some great resources there.
Obviously AnswersinGenesis.org.
If you’re in Canada, that will take you
to the Canadian landing page.
You can order all of our Answers in Genesis
resources from Canada at Canadian costs,
no over the border shipping, all that good stuff.
We look forward to come and visit you soon,
Ken, when the borders do open.
And I just want to encourage people, get a
hold of this Gospel Reset Evangelism Curriculum.
It will revitalize the church and your evangelistic efforts.
I think everybody has been praying for a revival
for so long but we need to understand that
if you don't share the gospel you're not going
to get a revival and this tool is ultra-practical,
it will get people sharing the gospel
– I just want to encourage pastors.
Thanks so much, gentlemen, really respect you and 
everything you do, and hopefully we'll talk soon.
