Evangelist Ray Comfort recently told CBN’s Tré Goins-Phillips he wants to “guard” the microphone when he speaks on college campuses and deliberately keep Christians off the stage so the secular students in the room hear something new. That revelation comes on CBN’s Faith in Culture series, where the ministry veteran explained his tactical approach to evangelism in a hostile environment.
This isn’t a publicity stunt — Comfort is the founder and CEO of Living Waters and has built a lifetime of street and campus evangelism on plainspoken, unapologetic Gospel witness. He’s long been known for taking the message straight to young people where they live and think, often engaging them directly on college grounds.
Conservatives should applaud, not scoff, at that choice. Too many of our people confuse being bold with being performative, turning pulpits and panels into echo chambers where friends applaud and enemies tune out. Comfort’s method — allowing skeptics an uninterrupted hearing and keeping the platform from becoming a Christian pep rally — is simply good strategy for winning hearts and minds where it matters most.
Anyone with eyes can see that universities are no longer marketplaces of free ideas but curated stages for progressive orthodoxy, where dissent is shouted down and nuance punished. The results are predictable: debates collapse into mob scenes and thoughtful persuasion is replaced by virtue-signaling theatrics. Ray’s decision to “guard” the microphone is a practical answer to that poisoned environment, not a retreat from conviction.
It’s time for conservative Christians to grow up and stop playing into the left’s narrative that we only care about spectacle. If our brothers and sisters want to reach unbelieving students, the first rule is simple: don’t turn every event into a fight over who gets applause. Guarding the mic when necessary preserves the message — and the souls — we claim to care about.
The same media elites who smear moral clarity will always try to turn principled evangelists into caricatures, and Ray has felt that pressure before. Rather than fall into defenses or petty infighting, the church should rally around smart, results-driven ministry that actually makes disciples instead of scoring cultural points.
Christians who love truth and liberty should back ministers who will engage where hearts are hardened, even if that means sacrificing the limelight. Help support campus outreach that prioritizes conversion over clout, and train young believers to speak winsomely, not merely loudly. That posture wins conversations and, more importantly, wins souls.
If you care about reversing the rot on our campuses and reclaiming public life for faith and freedom, start by backing people who understand the field and the fight. Ray Comfort isn’t bowing to cancel culture — he’s refusing to let our side be reduced to a circus act while the real work of evangelism goes undone.
