We were so encouraged by the testimony that came in this week that we had to share it with you!

I was inspired by your witnessing to Hayley last Friday; on Sunday after church, i got picked up by Paratransit, and there was an elderly lady on board and we started talking, and I started to share my faith with her, it felt real natural! I didn’t know it, but before she was dropped off, (at Kingdom Hall), she asked me if I’d heard about Jehovah Witnesses, and of course i had, but have never had one let me talk about MY faith before!! I hope you will continue with live on air witnessing beyond August, because I have really gained some insight on how to talk to people, God bless you all! ~ Donna Feica | London, Ontario

I spoke personally with Donna and she humbly told me that she was absolutely TERRIFIED to step out of her comfort zone to share Christ with this young lady. Well, we thank God for your testimony, Donna! We also thank you for allowing us to share it with others…pass it along!:)

Click here to read our blog posting about this episode of TCC Radio LIVE!

Click here to listen to our “wireless witnessing” encounter with Hayley on Part 2 of TCC Radio LIVE!

Well, by God’s grace, this past Friday night the third episode of our special summertime TCC Radio series aired LIVE both in the studio and on the street.

This week Dale (Grace FM), Norm Millar (Harvest Bible Chapel of London), and yours truly candidly discussed a topic that we can all relate to and rally around as Christ-followers: personal evangelism in the local church! What does the Bible teach on this subject? What types of things stop the majority of Christians from sharing their faith? To hear answers to these questions and more, visit the podcast online by clicking here.

Though we enjoyed some great in-studio discussion, there were several very helpful training tips on this subject that we just didn’t have time to cover. For example, here is a short excerpt of the personal evangelism training we provide in our Witnessing Workshop to local churches:

Seven Keys for Sharing Christ with Loved Ones

1. Pray for your loved ones.

• Use social networking resources like Facebook to put together a name list of the unsaved people God has placed in your personal mission field and then begin intentionally praying for them.

2. Be blameless as you live your life.

• Don’t be  a hypocrite! Rather, be careful and concerned about the lifestyle and life choices that you are modeling to unsaved family and friends.

3. Confront your loved ones about the Gospel.

• “Normalize” sharing the Gospel with family and friends using first person testimonial.

4. Make an agreement with another Christian friend.

• Agree together with a “preaching partner” that you will work together to witness to each other’s loved ones.

5. Be rich in good works toward your loved ones and other people.

• In addition to verbally sharing the Gospel, be involved in ministry and serving others on a regular basis.

6. Be faithful as you commit yourself to godly spiritual disciplines.

• Always seek first the Kingdom of God (Mt. 6:33) and allow God to reward your faithfulness.

7. Keep praying for your loved ones!

• Sow the seed of God’s Word…water it with good works…invite them to church or a small group…and pray hard!

In addition to the great conversation we shared together in the studio, the Lord also allowed us to take part in another “wireless witnessing” encounter by sharing the Gospel live on radio via cell phone!

Above: TCC Rep Chris Wood calls from the street to the studio to introduce Dale, Norm, and Cory to our “wireless witnessing” cell phone caller, Nadia (below).

Below: Cory McKenna shares in a great Gospel conversation with Nadia, a student at Fanshawe College in London. Pictured here are Cory and Nadia talking in the studio and on the street in real-time! Cool, eh?

Our fourth and final episode in this special live series of TCC Radio will cover the topic of Gospel Outreach in the local church. How can all the Christ-followers in your church serve together as partners in the Gospel to experience a faith worth sharing that brings your community good things for God’s glory? Tune in to find out! The show will broadcast and podcast this coming Friday, August 28th from 7pm to 8pm on Grace 105.9 FM locally in London and also on www.tccradio.com anytime afterwards.

Please be praying that the Lord uses the program powerfully for His purposes  of encouraging and equipping His Church to reach out to our community with the message of Christ!

For His Glory Alone,

Cory

2009 XTM Barrie Team (l to r): Derek Hunt, Tom Briggs, Steven Baptist, Dale Halldorson, John Gonciarz, Jeff Mardling, Chris Wood, Cory McKenna (Not pictured: Randy Lutchman)

Praise the Lord for Who He is…and for blessing us with an awesome day of Gospel outreach this past Saturday August 15th! We also need to extend a very special thanks to all those witnessing warriors who joined us for our very first Xstream Team Mission (XTM) to Barrie, Ontario.

Right: TCC Rep Jeff “SONshine” Mardling “breaks the sound barrier” by open air preaching for the very first time…you’re a champ, Jeff!

In addition to our seed sowing army of seven, the Lord also allowed us to hook up with a few brothers from Barrie as well: Pastor Les and Hugh (Harvest Bible Chapel of Barrie) and Derek Hunt, who had joined us on the streets of Hamilton at an evangelism conference we lead in 2008.

Left: Randy Lutchman shares the Gospel at his very first XTM event.

The 2009 Xstream Team Mission (XTM) Toronto! We praise God that He graciously gave us favour as we hosted one of the world’s most multi-cultural cities to almost twelve hours of fun-filled, power-packed Gospel outreach!

Here was our itinerary for the local mission trip:

8:00am | Met at Cory’s house for team worship, prayer, and briefing

9:00am – 2:00pm | Fought 400 traffic to arrive at the Barrie waterfront

2:30pm – 9:00pm | Prayer, one-to-one witnessing, and open air preaching at Caribfest on the Barrie waterfront

9:00pm | Team “took a knee” in prayer before leaving our salvation station

9:30pm – 11:30pm | Shared a meal together in Barrie

11:30pm – 3:00am | Fought traffic AGAIN on the way back to London

Left: Cory “Rockstar” McKenna preaches about life, death, and the Gospel at sunset on the Barrie waterfront. BTW…that’s Randy “Lazarus” Lutchman under the sheet:)

Our next Xstream Team Mission: Niagara Falls!

On Saturday September 5th, The Cross Current and Co. are invading the vacation and honeymoon capital of the world for the third year in a row! If you’ve never attended we know the Lord will use this outreach event to powerfully transform your life and witness for him!

Click here to view the entire 2009 XTM Barrie photo album

Click here to submit an application to join the XTM Niagara Falls Team

Click here to contact us about having your church partner with us at XTM Niagara Falls

Click here to contact us about sponsoring a local missionary for this event

Right: Tom Briggs hits his knees for a full hour to plead with a passerby about repenting and trusting in Christ.

Well, that’s all for now…stay tuned for more 2009 XTM Barrie testimonies and we’ll make sure to provide a full field report in our next newsletter!

For His Glory,

The Cross Current Team

“In the studio…and on the street LIVE with TCC Radio!”

This past Friday, August 14th we broadcast our second episode of TCC Radio LIVE! In the studio sat the “triple play” of Dale Elliott  (Grace FM), Dan Anderson (Harvest Bible Chapel of London) and yours truly. For the first half hour we enjoyed a great discussion together about the role of the Evangelist in the local church. During the second half hour we went “wireless witnessing” on the streets of London, Ontario. What’s “wireless witnessing”, you ask? Well, picture this…

Pictured left: open air-waves preaching! These are pictures of a live Gospel conversation taking place from the studio to the street between Hailey and I this past Friday night.

Please pray hard, tune in, and tell all to do the same this coming Friday night as we talk shop about a topic that all of us can rally around as Christ-followers: Personal Evangelism in the Local Church!

In Him,

Cory

Discipleship and Discernment are so important to our santifying journey and go hand in hand. John Macarthur points out that discipline by its very nature requires discernment, and where discipline is neglected, discernment declines. I have cut and pasted a daily devotional I think Ya Alll will be challenged by.

Key Bible Verse: Now the Holy Spirit tells us clearly that in the last times some will turn away from the true faith; they will follow deceptive spirits and teaching that come from demons (1 Timothy 4:1). Bonus Reading: Jude 1:12-13

The Greek word translated as “deceptive” in [today's Key Bible verse] is planos, the word from which our English word “planet” is derived. The ancient Greeks called those bright orbs deceivers. Why?

In ancient times, the navigators of ships knew that they could, with reliability, sight in on most stars to accurately determine their location and thereby sail the right course to their destination. They also learned that the “deceivers” (planoi)—the wandering stars—would only lead them to confusion or destruction if they tried to determine their position by them. They, of course, didn’t know that those “stars” were actually planets that revolved around the sun.

It isn’t difficult to see why the Holy Spirit stirred the apostle Paul to use this word to warn us about the demonic enterprises of these last days. We dare not take our directions from the no-such-thing-as-absolute-truth relativism of our culture’s attitudes toward almost everything. And we would be wise to see the profound analogy between the erratic movement of a non-light-producing planet and the deceiving spirits of this world.

—Jack Hayford in The Anatomy of Seduction

My Response: Why is succumbing to deception often followed by moral compromise?

Thought to Apply: We are oftener deceived by being told some truth than none. —Fulke Greville (English courtier)

Thomas Woodburn

Thanks so much to all those who took the time to pray last week for our TCC Radio LIVE debut! Click here for a brief blog posting about how the first show went. We praise God that He came through again. Not only did we enjoy great in-studio conversation about evangelism in the local church, but our very first “wireless witnessing” encounter went off without a hitch too!

Just in case you “missed the memo”, for the entire month of August we will be broadcasting TCC Radio LIVE both “in the studio and on the street” for one full hour (7pm to 8pm). Each episode will feature in-studio commentary about various aspects of evangelism in the local church, and a live “wireless witnessing” Gospel encounter with a non-Christian on air via cell phone!

Tonight we will be talking about the role of the Evangelist in the local church. You, your family, and your friends can tune in locally in London on Grace 105.9 FM or listen live at a distance on www.gracefm.ca. Please pray that the Lord uses this series powerfully for His purposes of equipping His Church to reach out to the culture.

PS: It would also be greatly appreciated if you and all your Christian contacts could pray for our local mission trip to Barrie, Ontario tomorrow as well. Click here to read all about it!

Thanks again for your partnership in preaching the Gospel in Canada!

For His Glory,

Cory

This coming Saturday August 15th, The Cross Current (and co.) will be stepping out into our first Xstream Team Mission (XTM) to Barrie, Ontario.

If you’re new to the concept of “XTM’s”, these are local missions trips we take several times per year to major cities in Canada in partnership with qualified local churches. These evangelistic events invite all those believers who are “burdened beyond” to set aside an entire day to pass tracts, share the Gospel one-to-one, and even preach open air! XTM’s facilitate an inspirational and intentional opportunity to experience the power of the Gospel first-hand by “leaving it all on the field”, and allowing God to stretch us into greater dependence on Him. Click here for more postings related to TCC XTM’s

By God’s grace, XTM Barrie will be another ground-breaking and life-changing event for all of those who step onto the field with us! However, I can also personally testify that I’ve learned the hard way that prayer and evangelism go hand-in-hand.  Click here for an awesome article on Evangelism and Prayer

Would you commit to personally praying for us for the rest of this week and on Saturday as well? Would you also invite any other believers you know to do the same?  Remember: prayer is ALWAYS to be our first priority, not our last resort!

Click here to find out more about regularly praying for our local mission and missionaries

For His Glory,

Cory

Well, the Lord did it again. Though there were many technical and logistical details that had to come together to make TCC Radio LIVE! happen, tonight’s debut episode broadcasted relatively “casualty free”!:) In fact, the only unfortunate mishap was that Grace FM experienced technical difficulty and the show didn’t get recorded.:(We still love you Dale!:)

It was such a blessing to have my pastor, Norm Millar, join me on the program! We spent the first half hour defining the biblical  Gospel we’ve all been called to preach and then we had a great dialogue about evangelism in the local church.

During the second half hour we went “wireless witnessing” to broadcast a Gospel outreach encounter with a young, non-Christian man by the name of Jay (pictured above with TCC Rep Jeff and his daughter). A VERY special thanks to Jay for taking the time to talk to us on air.

Please pray for Jay and that next week’s episode will continue equipping the Church to engage the culture in real time as we talk about the role of the evangelist in the local church!

In Him,

Cory

If you think the main title of the upcoming August 3rd issue of McLean’s magazine is twisted, check out the small print! It says, “They (kids) can hurt your career, your marriage, your social life, your bank book. Why bother?” Am I disgusted by this? Yes. Am I shocked? No. In fact, I would suggest that the more shocked I am by such an article, the less likely that I really understand (or believe) how depraved humanity truly is.

Christians often ask me whether I review and analyze secular media on a regular basis. “Nope, I just read the Bible.” is often my response. Now, before I try to justify what you may think is an over-simplified (and perhaps irresponsible) attitude towards a very dangerous threat to our culture, let me first assure you that I do thank God for solid Christian media watchers, like my ministry peer Brett Ullman. However, I also believe that I need to take seriously God’s command: “Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life” (Pr. 4:23).

As an evangelist, I encounter the depravity and deception of humanity so frequently through conversations with unsaved people that it’s really no surprise to me when such stories make the front page of secular publications. In fact, it’s been my experience that all I need to do is fill my heart again and again with the book of Romans and just one occasional dose of secular media bears witness that God’s Word remains true! Trust me, just one such magazine as this one every blue moon will confirm the counterfeit. So why pollute my well spring any more than I have to?

However, what DOES often shock me (and should!) are the crazy ways that supposed Christians often respond to such depraved foolishness. My wife and I recently watched guests of a Christian talk show kick off their discussion of this article making such statements as, “we can’t judge people’s reasons for not having children” and “I’m not even sure if my husband and I are going to have children either.” Are you serious? Talk about missing the point! Though I haven’t yet read the article, I’m guessing that the agenda the writer has is more philosophical/religious than it is societal/financial. Perhaps more time immersed in God’s Word and less time immersed in such foolish secular philosophies would give His ambassadors for Christ more insight and discernment into His big picture for humankind and the ministry of reconciliation to which we’ve been called?

Just a little food for thought.:)

In Him,

Cory

Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ. ~ Acts 5:41-42

This past week was my busiest yet of the summer. I had the privilege of preaching a message called “Faith Worth Sharing” at my home church last Sunday, I facilitated our final training session for our upcoming Atheism series on TCC Radio, and I ended the week by teaching at the Christian Youth Worldview And Leadership conference and leading a group of 20+ teenagers onto the streets of Guelph, Ontario (along with several other TCC Cross Trainers, of course!). I praise God for a great week of ministry! However, by the time I arrived back home on Friday night, I knew that I needed to pass the leadership baton to another TCC team leader and spend some quality time with my family.

What happened on the streets this past Friday night in my absence reminded me of a funny story from my childhood. On June 27th 1988, my best friend’s brother (Greg) went to see the famous boxing match between Mike Tyson and Michael Spinks on closed circuit. Now, for those of you reading this post who are either not boxing fans or too young to have a clue what I’m talking about, the trademark of “Iron Mike Tyson” in his prime were short and terrifying fights! Well, after managing to get his hands on very valuable tickets to see the boxing match, Greg made the mistake of stepping out for popcorn just when the Tyson/Spinks match was about to start…and he ended up missing the whole 3 minute match! Man, we laughed. Too funny.

Well, in a similar (but different) sort of way, I sort of felt as though I stepped out for popcorn this past Friday night and missed out on being part of a lulu of an opportunity to suffer for the Name of our Lord! After speaking with two of our TCC team members, from what I can gather they encountered 3 very arrogant and confrontational Atheists who dished out quite a bit of trash talk towards our Lord and His soul-winning slaves! To make matters more interesting, I also understand that there were a few new evangelists out with our team as well. Talk about baptism by fire!

For all those who joined us on the streets this past Friday night, please know that you are deeply loved and cherished by the Lord and The Cross Current and let’s rejoice together that we were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for His Name. Let’s also make a pledge together that we will not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ.

I thank God for you all!

Cory