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Ray Comfort

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Ray Comfort
File:5.5.07ComfortDebate.jpg
Ray Comfort, following a debate with Brian Sapient and Kelly in 2007.
Born (1949-12-05) December 5, 1949 (age 75)
New Zealand
Occupation(s)Evangelist, Author, Television host
SpouseSue Comfort
ChildrenJacob, Rachel, Daniel
WebsiteLiving Waters

Ray Comfort (born December 5 1949) is a New Zealand-born minister and evangelist.

Comfort is the founder of Living Waters Publications and The Way of the Master in Bellflower, California, and has written a number of Christian books.

Early life, personal life, and conversion

Born Jewish, Comfort was raised with next to no religious experience; in his words: "I went through life without any Christian instruction at all. I think I went to church about three times in about twenty years. I hated it. I found it an insult to my intellect. I remember joking, 'If I couldn't sleep one night, I'd employ a preacher to come preach to me; and it would send me off.' I was serious; it seemed to me to be completely boring, except for one church, where they had communion; and they brought around real wine."[1]

He says he became a Christian on April 25, 1972, "... at 1:30 A.M. in the morning", aged 22[citation needed] For many years, he served as an itinerant minister and associate pastor in his former hometown of Christchurch, teaching around New Zealand and Australia. In the 1970s, he began open-air preaching, which he has since done several thousand times. Around 1981-1982, he started using the principles of what he calls "Biblical Evangelism" (see below) after reading Charles Spurgeon and the New Testament books of Romans and Galatians.

According to Comfort, he has designed dozens of gospel tracts since the 1970s, leading to the tract ministry of Living Waters currently selling millions of tracts each year.[2] In 1989 , he accepted an offer from Hosanna Chapel (of the Calvary Chapel fellowship) in Bellflower, California, to begin full-time ministry in the United States. Comfort has no theological degree and has had no formal training.[3]

As a pastor in the Calvary Chapel fellowship Comfort believes he receives his teaching straight from Jesus Christ through the Bible. [4] Currently, Comfort lives with his wife Sue in Southern California, and they have three adult children: Jacob, Rachel, and Daniel.

Open-air preaching

In his time in the United States, he has conducted open-air ministry in a variety of venues in southern California. At first, he worked in MacArthur Park in Los Angeles, giving out sandwiches and preaching to the homeless there. At the same time, he led weekly outings to the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica on Friday nights.

Most recently, he began in April 2006 open-air preaching at the base of the Huntington Beach pier on Saturday afternoons.[2][5]

For roughly two-and-a-half years, Comfort and his son-in-law LWP general manager Emeal "EZ" Zwayne would most weekdays open-air preach at the Bellflower courthouse a few blocks from their ministry. However, on September 30 2005, Comfort and Zwayne were approached by two county police officers, who informed them that "Judge William A. MacLaughlin issued a court order forbidding public speech on the public property of any courthouse in Los Angeles County" (the judge had issued the order on September 13 2005). They have sued the county for $25 and are being represented by the Alliance Defense Fund.[6] They have since lost the case according to October 2006 newsletter and were restricted from preaching on court property in LA County, after the judge changed the area in front of the court house from public property to court property.[7]

Current ministry

Template:WOTM

In late 2001 and early 2002, Comfort paired up with celebrity Kirk Cameron to launch a ministry called The Way of the Master to teach Christians how to promote their faith "simply, effectively, Biblically ... the way Jesus did". Comfort and Cameron were also involved in rewriting some key scenes in the movie Left Behind II: Tribulation Force, which co-starred Cameron.

He believes that evangelization is the main reason that the Christian Church exists and that many of the evangelistic methods used by the church over the last century have produced more false conversions to Christianity than true ones. The key component Comfort uses is the "Moral Law of God" (The Ten Commandments) to speak about evidence of sin in the lives of his listeners before presenting the gospel of Christ to them. (See Biblical Evangelism for more details.) His realization of this method led to him in the mid-1980s to formulate two sermons entitled "Hell's Best Kept Secret" and "True and False Conversions."

He currently continues in itinerant ministry as a preacher and speaker at many churches and evangelism seminars, including Worldview Weekend events. Ray also preaches most Saturday afternoons at Huntington Beach, California, with a mechanical gorilla named Link, which helps him to draw a crowd and argue against the theory of evolution.[citation needed]

As well as co-hosting The Way of the Master Radio Show, he is, together with Cameron, the co-host of The Way of the Master Television Show, since December 2003. The show has aired two thirteen-episode seasons, and is currently filming the third season, expected to air in 2007.

On March 17 2006, Martin Bashir interviewed Comfort and Cameron about The Way of the Master on a segment of Nightline.

He has recently challenged popular late-night talk show host and political satirist Bill Maher to a public debate on Creationism versus Evolution but this is yet to take place. [8]

Comfort has experience debating atheists. At the 27th National Convention of American Atheists in Orlando, Florida on April 13 2001 (Good Friday), Comfort debated Ron Barrier, the National Spokesperson for American Atheists. [9] Despite the hostile crowd, Comfort later stated that "[t]hey laughed at my humor, and although there was unified mockery at some of the things that I said, I was able to go through the Ten Commandments, the fact of Judgment Day, the reality of Hell, the Cross, and the necessity of repentance, and no one stopped me." [10]

File:5.5.07Debate.jpg
Comfort, seated behind Kirk Cameron, at a debate on the existence of God at Calvary Baptist Church in Manhattan, May 5, 2007.

One of his arguments for the existence of God is the comparison of a Coca-Cola can to the banana, noting what he perceives to be several similarities and proofs that the banana was intelligently designed (a perforated opening with a tab to open it up, for example).[11] He then began using this banana argument (dubbing the fruit as "The Atheist's Nightmare") as a preaching tool, and it received considerable attention and ridicule after widespread distribution over the Internet where it was often noted that the modern banana is the result of generations of breeding by humans and bears little resemblance to the original fruit.

Comfort and Cameron participated in a televised debate with atheists Brian Sapient and his colleague and girlfriend, Kelly, of the Rational Response Squad, at Calvary Baptist Church in Manhattan on May 5, 2007. At issue was the existence of God, which Comfort stated he could prove scientifically, without relying on faith or the Bible. Nightline correspondent Martin Bashir served as moderator at the event.[12]. No official winner was declared by the event producers due to business practices held by ABC, and audience reaction was mixed, with support shown for both sides. Highlights included Cameron and Comfort repeatedly referencing the Ten Commandments and denouncing the theory of evolution; conversely, the RRS provided several counterarguments, in favor of atheism and the evolutionary theory. [13] While many atheists contended that Comfort violated the rules by talking about the Ten Commandments, Cameron later stated on the Way of the Master radio show that the rules of the debate did not say that the Bible could never be referenced, but rather that Comfort simply had to come up with one argument that didn't reference the Bible or faith. [14]

He has also written many books and is a regular platform speaker at Southern Baptist State Conferences.

Books

Comfort has written over fifty books and tracts. Some of the more recent works include:

  • Hollywood Be Thy Name. Bridge-Logos Publishers (July 1, 2007) ISBN 0882703943
  • Intelligent Design vs. Evolution - Letters to an Atheist (2006), a collection of correspondence between Comfort and James D. Franz, an American atheist.
  • Springboards for Budding Preachers (2006), a transcript of Comfort open-air preaching with his son-in-law Emeal "EZ" Zwayne.
  • The Way of the Master. Genesis Publishing Group (2006) (previously 2004 by Tyndale House)
    • The 2004 version itself was a revised and updated version of Revival's Golden Key, which itself was a revision of God Has a Wonderful Plan for Your Life.
  • The Way of the Master Minute. (co author Kirk Cameron) Bridge-Logos Publishers (April 8, 2006) ISBN 0882702203
  • How to Live Forever ... Without Being Religious (2006), a version of the Gospel of John with Comfort's commentary.
  • Whitefield Gold: Pure. Refined. (compiled by Comfort) (2006)
  • Spurgeon Gold: Pure. Refined. (compiled by Comfort) (2005)
  • Overcoming Panic Attacks. Bridge-Logos (July 11, 2005) ISBN 0882700146
  • What Did Jesus Do? A Call to Return to the Biblical Gospel (2005)
  • How to Bring Your Children to Christ ... and Keep Them There (2005)
  • What Hollywood Believes: An Intimate Look at the Faith of the Famous. Genesis Pub. (August 25, 2004) ISBN 0974930016
  • Hell's Best Kept Secret. Whitaker House (December 1989, updated 2004) ISBN 0883682060
  • Scientific Facts in the Bible: 100 Reasons to Believe the Bible is Supernatural in Origin. Bridge-Logos Publishers (October 15, 2001) ISBN 0882708791
  • The School of Biblical Evangelism Textbook (2004)
  • 101 Things Husbands Do to Annoy Their Wives (2004)
  • Out of the Comfort Zone: The Authorized Autobiography. Bridge-Logos Publishers (May 2004) ISBN 0882709437
  • God Doesn't Believe in Atheists (1993, 2001) ISBN 0882709224
  • How to Win Souls and Influence People. Bridge-Logos Publishers (October 1999) ISBN 0882707884

References

  1. ^ Taken from the MP3 recording of his Christian testimony, downloaded from, accessed 8 May 2006.
  2. ^ a b Template:Harvard reference (Page [citation needed])
  3. ^ Bashir, Martin (March 17, 2006). "Kirk Cameron, From Sitcom Star to Evangelist (page 3)". Nightline. Retrieved 2007-05-17.
  4. ^ The Philosophy of Ministry of Calvary Chapel.
  5. ^ "Open Air Preaching"; accessed 8 May 2006.
  6. ^ FreeSpeechRights.com; Accessed 8 May 2006.
  7. ^ Preaching Outside the Courts, Court Case
  8. ^ Bill Maher Challenged to Intelligent Design Debate
  9. ^ 27th National Convention of American Atheists; Accessed June 14, 2006
  10. ^ Ireland, Michael; "Atheists National Spokesman Debates Christian Author on Good Friday at National Convention"; April 16, 2001; Accessed June 14, 2006.
  11. ^ Comfort, Ray (1993). God Doesn't Believe in Atheists. Bridge-Logos. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  12. ^ Bashir, Martin; "Prepare for a Conflict: The Nightline 'Face-Off' No-Holds Barred Battle Over the Existence of God"; May 7, 2007
  13. ^ http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/story?id=3148940&page=1
  14. ^ Way of the Master Radio, May 9 2007 Hour 2, Was somebody lying or just plain forgetful?
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