This quarter on campus, we have been studying biblical manhood and womanhood. I’ve been challenged by the unique and different ways that God has created men and women. These last few weeks, we’ve talked about dating, relationships, and marriage. Dating can be a lot of things but there are probably some things we should avoid trying to accomplish through it (e.g., evangelism). Eugene Tseng sent me a strip from a comic called, “Max vs. Max” to illustrate (click to zoom):
But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. (Acts 20:24)
I’m so encouraged and challenged to see how God is moving His church to echo the Apostle Paul in considering our lives of no value in comparison to giving all for the sake of sharing Jesus.
(Warning: Looooong post but I’m writing with my heart on this one)
These days I’ve been thinking quite a bit about evangelism. It’s the thing that believers are called to do but it strikes me that the two most common results of our intentions to outreach is, 1) it’s done infrequently, if it’s done at all, and/or 2) it’s done poorly.
It should go without saying that the best mode of evangelistic witness is relational in nature. It’s axiomatic. Relationships imply context, both for the messenger and the receiver. It’s not a one-time, close-the-sale on the first try kind of experience that random evangelism has the potential of becoming. Relationships have continuity. There is friendship and familiarity that comes from actually having a relationship with a person. The Gospel is given weight by the consistency of a person’s life and actions to his or her message. Conversely, the Gospel gets stripped of its believability when one’s life does not correspond to the message they preach. In short, relationships have staying power. That’s precisely why relational evangelism is likely the best form of outreach available to the believer. It’s simple: people hear better when they know the person who is speaking as opposed to hearing from someone they’ve never met.
Cold turkey evangelism on the other hand, while being less effective primarily due to its lack of staying power, is still something that can be good. Those who argue against its merits need to consider that many unbelievers don’t have relationships with Christians where they’re going to hear the Gospel. When I’m on campus, 9 times out of 10, the person I’m speaking to has many believing friends but still has never heard the Gospel or understood it. Any criticisms against this sort of evangelism need also to account for all sorts of “random” encounters that are recorded in Scripture (e.g., Matthew 10; John 4; Acts 8).
However, that being said, I’m coming to the greater realization that cold turkey evangelism can be harmful if we’re not managing it appropriately. Despite some of the positives I’ve already listed, the critics of random evangelism do have some noteworthy comments about the believer-approaching-stranger method that everyone should carefully consider.
Look, I know people are going to be offended by the Gospel but if they’re so offended by the messenger that they’re not even bothering to listen to the content of our message than it appears to me that we need to strongly rethink this whole enterprise of sharing the Good News to strangers. If we neglect to, we’re going to harm our cause rather than help it. While everyone cares more about what other people think of them than they care to admit, the denigration of our reputation is not something that should stop us from sharing the Gospel. That’s not what I’m arguing. What I am saying is that when we are so deficiently peddling our message because we forget that we’re conversing with an actual human being, I strongly believe we end up distorting the Gospel on top of having people hate us (which in my estimation is needless if you can avoid it).
For example, I’ve never been able to accept the wisdom of handing someone a “spiritual survey,” as a segue to sharing the Gospel. To me, it’s disingenuous. There might be some reason out there to gather an inventory of people’s stances and beliefs about religion but that should be separated from the context of evangelism. If you’re not really interested in collecting data about what people think about Jesus as much as you’re simply wanting to just talk to a person, chuck the survey and just approach them. An empty hand extended in greeting beats one holding some questionnaire whose results you’re just going to ignore later. I feel a bit of the same way about tracts. How effective is a tract in today’s culture? I’m just thinking out loud on this question. I’m sure that tracts have been used as a helpful tool in the past but I have my doubts on how serviceable they are today, especially in our culture.
I’m not intending to take mean-spirited shots at people who want to share their faith with strangers. I’m just making these comments because I’m convicted that we should be continually deliberating on how we can improve the sharing of our faith to strangers.
Another temptation in cold turkey evangelism comes with trying to preach the entire Gospel during the course of one conversation. That’s when we can make a host of mistakes: a talking “at” the person instead of talking “to” the person, a needless rushing of every facet and dimension of the Gospel that we can think of, etc. Though it surely springs from a laudable motive, here we would benefit from the reminder that we need to exercise the same kind of faith that we’re imploring the people we talk with to have. We should trust that God might send someone else in their lives to supplement, reinforce, and build on top of what we have been able to share with them during any given conversation and fill in the gaps in whatever we’re unable to address. As Chris Castaldo oftentimes shares, evangelism should be thought of getting a person one step closer to understanding and accepting the truth of the Gospel. And it’s with such a mindset that we may avoid some of the pitfalls that typically accompany random evangelism and instead employ patience, being willing and grateful to be used by God to acquaint that person with the truth of the Cross, even if it’s to a limited degree.
I know people may bristle at this but I really do believe that you can actually do more harm than good by evangelizing if you don’t approach it carefully. Don’t get me wrong. I’m very much encouraged that people are actually willing to endure through the natural trepidation and anxiety that accompany random evangelism. And I try to take out collegians to go witnessing to their fellow students on a weekly basis. But we need to always analyze how we share the Good News, looking for ways to improve and even being willing to abandon conventional methods if the passage of time or our individual contexts deem them unserviceable or ineffective. It grieves me that good intentions notwithstanding, we have the potential to create more obstacles to outreach than what already exists if we’re not careful.
I’m curious to know people’s thoughts on this. Our sharing of the Gospel is of utmost importance. There’s nothing more rewarding than sharing the beauty of a God who pursues and restores the fallenness that we so clearly see in and around us by sending His Son to die on our behalf, all by undeserved grace. And it’s because this is so vital that I welcome any feedback. I love you all!
School’s not technically in session for me but for all those that I’ve been called to minister to (i.e., collegians). I enjoy summer vacation as the next guy but I’ve looked forward to the start of this school year for a number of reasons. And here’s a representative sampling of a few:
1) Seeing old faces and catching up.
An interesting thing that God has been doing is leading a lot of people who are originally from NorCal in becoming a part of the college group. This is great except during the summer when everyone goes home for 3 months. Many people that have become familiar friends over the course of the school year are now suddenly zapped from my day-to-day life. But now that it’s late September, it’s good to see many of them back with us in SoCal, which is where I know they’d rather be, so I guess we’re all winners here.
2) Getting busy with ministry again.
Though I got a few weeks to regroup after subbing in for P. Peter during his sabbatical, I’m eager to dive into what the Lord has for me to do this year in the college group. Ever since graduating from seminary, I’ve grown in my heart for teaching, counseling, and shepherding. Nowadays, something seems off if there’s any hiatus from the normal routine of ministry. The start of the school year provides the regular ministry setting that I’ve grown accustomed to and thankful for.
3) Teaching to more than 10 people at Friday night Bible study.
Instructing (and learning) the Scriptures on Friday night shouldn’t really be affected by the number of people who attend any given Bible study but I must confess that it’s nice knowing that I’m preparing a study that will benefit more souls as a result of people coming back down for the start of school. But with that said, I will miss having a more expansive list of post-Bible study dinner options to choose from because of the smaller and more manageable group size during summer break. I guess McDonald’s and Jack-in-the-Box aren’t so bad though.
4) Meeting new freshmen.
Wide-eyed, lost, and generally confused, I love seeing the transformation that God does in young people’s minds and hearts over the course of the school year. They present both a challenge and an opportunity and I’ve already been given a chance to meet several of them. Now hopefully we can come up with enough people to give them all rides to church on Fridays and Sundays. Sophomores, where are your cars???
5) Being filled with abundant opportunities to evangelize.
What I’m most excited about with the start of another fall quarter is the opportunity to share my faith with young people and exhorting people in our college group to live as purposeful evangelists. The university campus remains the gathering place for an eclectic mix of people, where ideologies, political opinions, and religious faiths oftentimes intersect and clash. Amid this chaotic brew is the common denominator of unbelief. Christians were once dying people who were saved by the gift of God’s grace to us in Christ (cf. Eph. 2:1-7). As people who glory and delight in the Gospel, is there any greater privilege than to be called to carry that message to the remotest parts of the world, beginning here with the strangers sitting next to us in the lecture halls and classrooms? Is there any greater Savior to proclaim? Is there any greater love to speak of?
(HT: Zach Nielsen)
(Note: I can’t speak to the accuracy of Pastor Mark Driscoll’s comments regarding the filthy sponge but there is historical precedent, and the basic point remains unchanged)
Last week’s Bible study through Malachi was challenging and thought-provoking. We covered Malachi 1:6-2:9, better known as the Second Disputation. The passage focuses on the defiled priesthood in post-exilic Judah. Through the efforts of Zerubbabel, Ezra, and Nehemiah, the temple has been rebuilt, the priesthood has been reinstated, and the sacrificial system is restored. Everything is operating just as it was designed before the Temple was destroyed a century earlier.
But there’s one problem: the heart was missing.
God’s hatred for dead orthodoxy causes Malachi to rebuke the priests, who offered up blemished sacrifices and defiled offerings. This defective worship spoke poorly of the God to whom it was directed, and reflected accurately the hardened hearts of the people.
These priests shirked their responsibility to act as faithful mediators between God and men. Sadly, their failures were consistent with a long legacy of a disobedient priesthood (see Nadab & Abihu, the sons of Eli, etc.). Safe to say that in view of the entire scope of Israel’s history, the priests did not live up to expectations.
BUT JESUS DID.
He was a faithful high priest, entering into the very presence of God rather than through an early tent that only symbolized the divine presence (Heb. 9:11). He gained access into that holy presence, not by the blood of sacrificial animals but by virtue of His unblemished self (Heb. 9:12). He did not offer up bulls and goats but came empty-handed, only to lay Himself across the altar as a perfect sacrifice for sins (Heb. 9:26). And by the sufficient, single offering of Himself, He put an end to the unending work of generation after generation of priests before Him, sitting instead, once and for all, at the right hand of God (Heb. 10:11-14).
The perfect, Christological fulfillment of an Old Testament shadow is simply breathtaking.
Startling also is the apostle Peter’s declaration to his persecuted readers:
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. (1Pet. 2:9)
Jesus has lived up to the tall order of the priesthood in a way that Old Testament priests never did. In the New Testament passage cited above, Peter takes all the rich imagery found in the OT and applies it to the Christian today. It caused me to meditate deeply on the high calling of living as a “priest” today, mediating God’s Word, representing a holy God by living righteously, and in the words of Paul, seeing myself as a, “living sacrifice” (Rom. 12:1).
And then I read Paul’s description of his own ministry as a missionary and apostle to the Gentiles during my morning devotions.
[I am] a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit. (Rom 15:16)
Startling. Paul pictures himself as a priest–not a priest offering up further atonement for sin, as he was fully aware of the sufficiency of Christ’s death on the Cross, but as a priest mediating the Gospel to the lost.
His offering? The Gentiles.
He hoped that by God’s grace, his labor to offer up Gentiles through his evangelistic efforts and the blessing of the Spirit, would be acceptable to God. There is no mistake that our God is a redeeming God and His heart is very much in rescuing pitiful, lost sinners from the depths of wickedness (cf. Mt. 9:35-38). If that’s what He desires, what more pleasing thing can we then offer as those reconciled by His abounding grace, than calling out to other men and women who were dead in transgressions through the preaching of the Gospel?
My open admission is that I am a poor witness for Christ. But I do know God can empower me, and other believers, to live in consistency with our calling as a “royal priesthood,” that we too might proclaim the excellencies of Him who called us out of darkness and into His marvelous light.
