Episode 13: Beyond the Script - Evangelism as a Way of Life (w/ Jim Murphy)
When Jim Murphy showed up to a Promise Keepers event alone as a 20-year-old college student, he didn’t expect to leave with a new life. But that moment, built on years of faithful gospel conversations by friends and mentors, became the turning point that led him to Christ.
Now a co-pastor of Missio Church in Mount Ayr, Iowa, and a strategic voice in the Saturation Church Planting movement, Jim has spent more than two decades helping the Church rediscover its evangelistic calling—not as a program, but as a culture rooted in identity.
"What if evangelism isn’t a spiritual gift for a few," Jim asks, "but a Spirit-empowered calling for all?"
From Conversion to Calling
Jim didn’t grow up in a Christ-centered home. But from age 10 to 20, God kept placing people in his life who lived differently—faith and life intersected for them in a way he couldn’t ignore. That slow drip of witness, paired with the catalytic moment at Promise Keepers, led him to surrender his life to Jesus while a student at Grand Valley State University.
Not long after, he moved to San Antonio, Texas, and plugged into a local church. There, four key things happened:
He fell in love with the God who first loved him.
He discovered the beauty and necessity of the local church.
He realized he wanted to spend his life helping others find hope in the gospel.
He met his wife.
That season launched him into youth ministry, then church planting in Florida, New York, Texas, and now Iowa. Along the way, key mentors helped him realize something else: he wasn’t just passionate about evangelism. He was wired to equip others for it.
Equipping Is the Assignment
Jim doesn’t just share the gospel. He equips churches to build cultures of mission from the ground up.
Rooted in Ephesians 4, his philosophy is clear: evangelists aren’t just the people who do the work. They’re the people who equip the saints for the work. And when evangelists walk away from the church—frustrated, burned out, or misaligned—the body suffers.
That’s why Jim advocates for a vision of five-fold leadership that brings apostolic, prophetic, evangelistic, shepherding, and teaching voices together. Not to compete. But to complete each other.
"I can’t reach the city of Syracuse by myself. But I can equip the church to do it together."
The "MyCircle" Framework
One of the most practical outflows of Jim’s work is MyCircle, a training that helps ordinary Christians live on mission in a way that fits their actual life.
Rather than memorizing a script, MyCircle provides an operating system for a missional life:
Embrace God’s mission personally
Identify your MyCircle (specific people in your life who don’t know Jesus)
Pray daily for those people and for boldness
Engage weekly through relationship
Share monthly with intention
It’s clear. It’s doable. And it works. From introverted retirees to busy parents, from bold evangelists to quiet faithful servants, the stories emerging from MyCircle all point to the same truth: Evangelism becomes accessible when it becomes personal.
"Some people will reach thousands. Others will reach a handful. But we can all be faithful."
The Heart of an Evangelist
Jim’s dream? To see a national table of evangelists come together to hold the heart of God for the lost and serve the Church again. Not with a megaphone, but with a shepherd’s posture. Not to go around the church, but to go deep within it.
He believes:
The Church needs evangelists not to do the work for her, but to equip her
Evangelism isn't a moment; it's a culture
Every Christian can take one step closer toward boldness
He reminds us that the work is slow, but sacred. That we are called not to clone ourselves, but to shepherd the whole body. And that what we sow in prayer and presence, God will multiply.
"May we not grow weary in doing this work. It’s worth giving our entire lives for."
Resources
Website: mycircletraining.com
Training: Learn.Do.Lead CMA - MyCircle
Book Recommendation: Alone at the Top by Dwight Smith
Book Recommendation: God Dwells Among Us by G.K. Beale & Mitchell Kim
A final word from Jim:
"Evangelism isn’t about personality. It’s about presence. Identify who God has placed in your life. Pray. Show up. Speak up. And trust that Jesus is building his Church."
