From Pastor Lee
August 1, 2023
One on One Evangelism
As unique individuals, we differ in many ways, especially when it comes to taste. For example, for as long as I can remember I loved the smell of coffee but never thought it tasted as good as the aroma I encountered whenever someone made a pot. Some years ago, I acquired the taste for coffee and have it every morning. Not only do I look forward to drinking it every morning but now prefer it to be stronger than I did when I first began drinking it daily. In the same way, we have differing ideas and tastes on what evangelism means. Some don’t care for it at all while others like it light, and then some prefer to go on the heavy side. It reminds me of when I attended a gathering on Evangelism, specifically local evangelism a few years ago. The facilitator of the meeting spoke about one-on-one evangelism, and as he did, he included statistics and numbers on how many people have responded by not only saying “yes” to Jesus but were “actively” involved in church. It seems that if you’re going to use numbers and statistics to measure evangelism then it should be more than what I have often heard in the past from others when they would spit out how many “salvations” or how many prayed the “sinner’s prayer” or “made a decision” for Christ. To me it always sounded a lot like those giving these fantastic reports on souls that had been saved were taking credit for it, not Jesus. What really concerned me when I would hear someone giving such awesome reports is the question of do all of those who “made a decision” or prayed the “sinner’s prayer” make them a faithful follower of Jesus Christ? Is that really evangelism that they were engaged in? Was there any follow-up? Any real, lasting relationships? Having said all that, it did appeal to me when the facilitator of that gathering said, they didn’t keep count of how many responded with their mouths, but the number of relationships that grew out of the encounters. It is more than just how many verbally pray or claim it, but how many who truly accept Jesus’ invitation to follow. Bottom line, it seems to me that real evangelism is ALL about the relationships that have at the heart of them all the relationship with Jesus Christ. As I’ve read lately in several of my daily readings, our relationships are the mission. To understand evangelism in that way seems to lessen the fear or the connotations of how most Christians think of evangelism, which generally is understood in terms of literally traveling far from home, preaching and teaching before strangers. Don’t get me wrong all those things are a part of evangelism, but when we limit evangelism to only those sorts of things, we fail to see the importance of what Jesus is truly calling us to do in loving one another and those around us. Real evangelism happens within the context of relationships. I hope and pray that all of us will take advantage of the many opportunities around us to engage in evangelism by taking an interest in others we encounter wherever we may go. Hope to see you Sunday.
Lee
