Evangelism

I can access the usual resources again. Not sure what happened to them, but I'm glad that they are back.

Evangelism is a subject that I am perhaps a bit touchy about. I personally don't feel called to be an evangelist. Of course, Apostle Paul admonished us to do the work of an evangelist, and he doesn't seem to be talking to just those that have 'the gift' (some would say that that's just written to Timothy, but it seems kind of silly for it to be in the Bible if it were only intended for one man). Of course, there have been a lot of people who have 'evangelized' without wisdom. It can be particularly difficult to talk to someone about God who has been the victim of an over-zealous, under-compassionate evangelist in the past. The United Sates is generally regarded as a Christian nation, but our founding fathers taught religious tolerance, so all religions are welcome here. On the other hand, if you look around at those of us who call ourselves Christians, there isn't a lot of practicing of the faith (Jesus told us that we could identify His followers by their fruits, and Paul was nice enough to list those fruits for us). I posted last week on the subject of 'What Do You Believe?" Do you believe that you are going to Heaven because you have accepted Jesus as Lord of your life? Do you believe that there are people around you that are going to Hell because they haven't accepted Him? Do you think that they deserve that (more than you do, that is)? Jesus told us to compel them to come in, but that doesn't mean to push them. Pushing them only moves them farther away (in some cases, just telling them that they are going to Hell without Jesus will push them away). Every person is an individual, with their own wants and needs (okay, everyone needs Jesus--but not everyone knows that they need Jesus). On the other hand, there are a lot of people who know that something is missing in their lives, and are very much afraid that whatever it is could keep them out of Heaven, so if you don't tell them, they won't listen to anything else you have to say.

Last night we had a visiting pastor speak at our church. He is from a country that is predominantly Buddhist, and they have laws against converting a Buddhist to any other faith. He has found, though, that if you go in, and find out what people need (and everybody needs something), and help meet those needs (physical needs), then, not only are they more receptive when they finally ask, "Why are you doing this?" and he tells them it is because he is a Christian, even the ones that don't want to even consider converting are less likely to call the authorities. My point is that you can "shotgun" people with the gospel, but you're probably going to do as much harm as good (if not more), or you can spend some time and get to know the person. Find out what they need, where they're hurting. I'm sure that there were a lot of people during Katrina that needed to hear the gospel, but most of them were more concerned with where they were going to sleep that night, what they were going to eat (or when they were going to be able to eat next), what they were going to wear the next day, when would they be able to take a shower... Don't talk to me about where I'm going to go when I die right now, I'm too busy just trying to stay alive. Of course, there were probably also a few that were so convinced that they weren't going to survive that they wanted to hear all about Jesus (or Buddha or Mohammad or Krishna or whoever else might have some impact on where they would spend eternity). We have to be open to what people need right now; that means listening to God because He knows exactly what each of us needs.