"…I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes…" (Revelation 7:9)

 Try to picture it -- thousands upon thousands of people clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ … with eternal life. When I remember the event pictured below, I can almost imagine what that awesome future gathering of the people of God might be like. What a glorious day that will be!

Since 1997, I have had the privilege of being invited to South Asia to use the art of Illusion as tool to reach the lost; a total of nine projects so far.

Through my participation in what we call, The South Asia Project, I have personally shared the gospel with 175,000 Hindu’s, Muslims, and Buddhists through our program alone.

Can you picture it now – the masses? What we experience in South Asia is really a microscopic glimpse of John’s vision as recorded in the book of Revelation with one significant difference – the masses we are brought before have never clearly heard about who Jesus is and His power to change lives.  Judging from the overwhelming response at our programs, it’s clear that people in the countries we minister in desire to know truth.

Mingling with the Eastern Mystics

Since we are celebrating 10 years of international ministry and we will be in South Asia this fall for our 10th South Asia Project, I thought I would highlight one our last tours. Ten thousand people attended the program in six days! My wife, Tiffanie, wowed our audiences with her fantastic rope escape & comedic role "balls flyin’ overhead" routine. With humidity and heat that makes Arizona like paradise, we were blessed to have a great team and a good tour.

One program (with air-conditioning!) was in a university with an intimidating audience of students and faculty, including the dean. I was told it was one of the top universities in India. Why was it intimidating? In community events with families attending there seems to be a genuine interest. On the university campus, there is an entirely different "spirit," you might say -- eager to say, "you westerners think you have it all figured out." Fact is we don’t.

You must understand that the Indian way is to stay in the religion in which you were born. To deny your culture and birthed identity is taboo -- sadly, at the cost of truth. So, when we share our own life experiences as followers of Christ and our lives being changed by our living Lord, this suggests that one ought to change their culture (Mistakenly).

Needless to say, the program went very well and was pleasantly received with a unique ministry time after the program. As often as I can, I try to field questions from the audience at the close of our program. In the country we were in, students are usually reserved but this group really opened up.

An intense dialogue ensued as students and a visiting professor of philosophy from Oxford University, a native, hammered away at my presentation of the Gospel and the Christian faith. Not an easy situation to be in, in fact, it’s frightening! I would prefer to be a bug on the wall.

You can never fully prepare to have a Q&A session in a foreign country after an evangelistic event. By God’s grace, after an hour and a half of Q&A’s, many walked away challenged to consider the claims of Christ.

As I attempted to present a logical and compelling case for Christ’s unique and exclusive claims, I could see their struggle to avoid their own contradictions. Of all the questions I received about truth, the bible, and the nature of God, the greatest contention raised, as was expected, was Jesus’ claim of being the "only way."

All Path’s Lead to… What?

Many Eastern religions (like Hinduism) believe in being inclusive and pluralistic. You say Jesus died for your sins; they may say "great!" and add that thought to the hundreds of other beliefs in the many deities within the pantheon of Hinduism. In other words, every truth claim is equally valid. However, if you say Jesus is the only way then the tension in the air rises.

That is how this group initially reacted. The very first comment was about how accepting they were of all religions. In the same breath, this student denied the Christian religion because of Jesus claims to be the only way. Do you see the contradiction? As I pointed it out, most of the students did see the mistake and this REALLY created an open door for dialogue in the hour to come.

The hot debate ended in peace with many challenged minds. Challenged by a fact I usually stress during Q&A… that truth is exclusive. So, the question is not whether we are inclusive or exclusive, the question is, are Jesus’ claims true?

Then I took the students back to what I shared during the program about how only Christ provides the most reasonable, evidential, and experientially relevant answers to life’s deepest questions. That a faith full of contradiction and devoid of truth is an empty one.

I will often repeat what one of mentors often would say, "If you take an empty bottle and put a label on that bottle… Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Buddhist… it makes no difference what label you put on it. The bottle is still empty. What matters is what is inside the bottle." An Indian young person can relate to this very well.

Bridging the Culture Gap…

Another University we shared in had well over a thousand students in attendance, predominately Muslim. This was as much, if not more nerve racking than the previous account.

It was a typical outdoor program. I could sense the tension. I am an American in an Asian country – that used to be good. Not so much during this project. I could see everyday in the media the discontent in the public’s eye towards our country’s foreign policy, particularly relating to Iraq. What am I to do to gain credibility since I am now starting with such a handicap?

Typically I would ignore political issues and comparing governments and countries where we come from. This time, I decided to use their perceptions to our advantage. For a Hindu or a Muslim, their culture and their politics are interwoven with religion. They do not share the same secular/sacred "separation" sentiments that many Americans do.

My approach was to emphasize my personal search for truth irrelevant of what my culture or family believed. Choices and experiences I would not normally share. For example, how I did not always agree with my parents beliefs – even becoming a follower of Christ outside of their direction, something very hard, if not, impossible for those in our audience to do.

How Tiffanie and I "rebelled" against the current cultural norm of pre-marital cohabitation, even going so far as to reserve our first kiss for that moment when our pastor said "you may NOW kiss your bride" on our wedding day. Yes, that is radical for Americans. However, Americans are radical to many in South Asia. And our life choices connected with this audience, obliterating any preconceived ideas of what Tiffanie and I were like.

I shared that I did not always agree with my own government, not admitting one way or another as to my views about current U.S. policy. I not only wanted to intrigue them and develop a common ground, I wanted to remove two primary stumbling blocks to every person in that audience. First, the false perception that Christ is a foreign and western belief, therefore unwanted. Second, "we are to remain as we are born." If a Hindu, you stay a Hindu; if a Muslim, you stay a Muslim, and so on. To convert out is to shame your family and risk being ostracized and even physically hurt.

Removing these stumbling blocks is the key to open up to the gospel.

Remove Every Stumbling Block…

I truly believe that is our responsibility – to remove every stumbling block except that of Christ. I don’t convert people. I share my life. The Lord does the work. I just clear the bushes so they can see Him.

I shared how my first perception of Christ was that He was from Mexico. I would always get a laugh. My mother is from Mexico and the only time I would hear about Jesus was with my grandparents at mass in Nogales, Mexico. I actually hated going because I wanted no part in some "foreign religion." In my fathers house we did not have religion. Then…click! The light would go on. Our audience could relate. "If I was born an atheist, should I not stay an atheist?"

I rejected Christ simply because I thought he was foreign to me (from Mexico). Even this audience laughed at how ridiculous that is. Yet, that is exactly why they would reject Christ… Jesus is foreign and I should remain as I was born. Yet, I later accepted Christ based on truth going against what I was "born" into in my father’s house and against my misconceptions of Jesus’ origin.

I would end my message by sharing that as I grew up in a non-religious home, I learned that Christ was not from Mexico, not even from the West, but from the East and that we must base our judgment of Him on the truthfulness of His claims. Something I spend much time doing as I share how His miracles and His resurrection are unexplainable by the greatest magicians, psychics, and guru’s that have ever lived proving His claim to be God in human form.

It was clear, that God made a potentially hostel audience become a very open one, even giving us a long standing ovation after our program.

We made many friends and connected with a deeply religious but lost people. The bottom line, we simply shared the truth by using a tool… the art of illusion. While in South Asia I said everything they did not expect me to say and violated all of their preconceived ideas of what I might say. Patriotism is good, cultural identity is good, but not at the expense of truth, salvation, and eternity. That is where I had to step against the grain and for that, I believe they were truly thankful.