When I was in college my Christian friends and I dealt with two things: the constant conviction to be sharing the gospel with others AND the utter fear of sharing the gospel with others. Why be afraid of something like this? They say that people fear public speaking more than death. I think public speaking was later surpassed by evangelism in terms of top fears. The social stigmas that surround a person sharing their faith were so profound. It was not uncommon to see depictions of evangelism as the a source of sarcastic jokes on Saturday Night Live, of harsh criticism in the media, and even theological debate driven by our own progressive theology professors at TCU. The bottom line: evangelism was not and is not popular, especially with those who are on the other ends of these “spiritual conversations.” The fear of rejection reigned in our hearts as it battled our convictions. Can you blame us!?! We were 19 years old for heavens sakes! But that excuse didn’t fly with our pastors and mentors. So we white-knuckled it and hit the streets, the beaches, the hallways in the dorms, or wherever we could try out out gospel presentation, the steps to salvation, towards the ultimate end of someone making a prayer of conversion.
When Jesus and His disciples started this radical message of what we call the Good News their families, religion, and nation were all in shambles. Israel was essentially a police state of the Roman Empire. Oppression was an everyday assumption. Religious leaders were fractured and polarizing. And, on top of this, scores of people dealt with diseases and abnormalities that were either caused by sin, demon possession, bad luck, or perhaps even the mysterious sovereignty of God. Somebody carrying some “good news” would sound pretty good back then. Evangelism comes from a Greek word: euaggelion (transliterated) which is essentially a two part word of “good” and “bringing” something. And then later simply translated as “good news.” Huh? Who doesn’t like to have some good news? It was right there in front of me all the time. I just couldn’t see it.
The problem is that most people in my college environment in the 1990s couldn’t see it either. My university was full of upper class young men and women whose parents forked over lots of money for their kids to have a higher education. The vast majority lived in relative comfort and prosperity. How do you share the “good news” with a popular fraternity brother whose got a cross around his neck, about to go pick up his hot girlfriend, in his new convertible, go to a frat party, and then have sex with her afterwards? He’s already got his good news despite knowing all the facts about Jesus from his Christian camp experience in high school. Yes, there were plenty of students (like me) who were not so content. Many suffered from internal issues like anxiety, depression, addiction, and more. Yet even with some of these real issues our self-absorbed culture only seemed to make a presentation of the good news harder.
“What does Jesus have for me that’s better than Oprah?” My fellow evangelists and I couldn’t blame them for asking and didn’t have very many compelling answers. “He will love you and never forsake you?” Might work for a few dejected sorority sisters who just got dumped by their boyfriends. “He has a wonderful plan for your life?” Might work for the rare student who didn’t have a solid degree plan, a semester abroad starting soon in Paris, or a job lined up with a major accounting firm. And even more difficult audiences were athletes, cheerleaders, fans, and anyone else caught up in the endless cycle of college and professional sports. Try asking someone to go have coffee during the Final Four and talk about Jesus. Not going to go over well. But we still tried soft approaches with church Super Bowl parties, laser tag outings, and scavenger hunts. We were trying to make Jesus seem more fun than the sorority formal or smoother than these new drinks called Starbucks Frappuccinos. It’s a tough sales pitch.
Boy the 12 Apostles had it easy right!?!? The good news was launched in 1st century Israel to people who were being freed from leprosy, demon possession, blindness, paralysis, hunger, and more. Jesus fed 5,000 and raised people from the dead. What is the good news for my 21st century, upper middle class, white American friends? What was I missing then as a failed evangelist? What am I missing now?
A few decades later and I’m still working through all the personal barriers and my own “stuff” that keeps me from genuine conversations about the gospel. I can be a slow learner when it comes to personal hang ups. But better late than never, right?!? I’ve had to unlearn things, un-see things, un-feel things things, un-think things, un-hear things, and then learn evangelism all over again.
After a lot of mistakes and soul-searching, here is my simple approach to sharing the gospel today, even to my 21st century, upper/middle class, white American friends.
- (1) Care for my family, friends, and the world with a genuine heart of compassion.
- (2) Listen to the bad news in their lives and the lives of others all over the world.
- (3) Invite them to join me to the table of Jesus where we can cry out for mercy for us and the whole world and follow Him to share His good news with the world through our faith in action.
(1) Care for my family, friends, and the world with a heart of compassion.
I based this principle on a well known quote from Theodore Roosevelt when he said, “people don’t care about what you know until they know that you care.” So first, I have to eliminate my own self-interest. Now how could sharing the gospel be self-interest? I hate to admit it. But there are many times I can’t really say I truly cared or was truly concerned about those I shared with. I was more caught up in my role and fulfilling my perceived purpose. People were more objects in my ministry than humans in my world. I think that’s why success in evangelism is measured by numbers and statistics instead of names and stories. I can hear clearly the echoes Vacation Bible School announcements and how many kids “gave their lives to Christ” or “re-committed their lives to Christ.” Why question these positives statistics as the applause unfolds in the church auditorium? Because I started to realize that I didn’t know these kids. I didn’t know their stories. I didn’t know their families. And, to be honest, I didn’t real know anything lasting had occurred. But surely someone else does right? So I’d ask a few follow up questions about where these scores of kids were a year later. My annoying questions were followed by a shoulder shrug from the youth pastor as he revealed that he had no idea where the kids were that he baptized one year ago. But, he insisted, the transaction, pardon me, the salvation did occur. That’s what led me to the second principle I’ve needed to embrace.
(2) Listen to the bad news in their lives and the lives of others all over the world.
One of the simplest things that I’ve been missing as an evangelist is the backdrop to the good news. What was I missing? The short answer: the bad news. I was trying to lop on good news from God on top of a litany of perceived “good news” in the world. So before sharing the good news I simply start by asking about the bad news. This could be on a personal level or on a global level.
I’m a conceptual thinker but it’s probably important to be practical here. To share the gospel with people I just start by praying for them and asking them about their lives so I can pray more and better for them. Many people will resist a pitch. Very few will decline the offer for prayer, especially if it’s from a genuine heart.
But this heart should not be microscopically focused on one person. That’s just a natural start to conversations (e.g. “how are you and your family doing?”) We live in a world that is suffering. And, while my specific demographic might find it hard to relate to 1st century Israel the majority of the 21st century world does not. The gospel is for everyone. The bad news affects everyone. Suffering is everywhere. The good news permeates it all. What’s the bad news in our world? Starvation. Human trafficking. War. Sexual abuse. Racism. Slavery. Domestic violence. Poverty. How does this bad news relate to me and my 21st century white American friends? Ask John the Baptist.
John the Baptist provides a great example for evangelism. Out of all the Christian virtues ascribed to Saints I doubt compassion has been on John’s top 10. But that’s because His version of compassion came by telling people not what they wanted to hear but what they needed to hear. He was surrounded by the same things my culture is plagued with: indifference, apathy, ambivalence, pride, and the most irritating of all for John: self-righteousness. His gospel message: Stop! Change! Turn! Go the other way! Now! He has much more poetic and graphic ways of putting these messages. And it would certainly be awkward if I started a gospel message to a friend by saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Or how about this smooth line that goes, “Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.” These aren’t even his most scathing sound bites. Sounds almost bizarre to hear these messages anywhere today except from the discounted street preachers that everyone passes by thinking he might be mentally unstable.
But before we quickly dismiss these messages let me propose an exercise. Sometimes to help me get a grasp on reality I superimpose sound bites I often hear from Christians today on to biblical texts. Here’s how John’s story might sound if he were trained in modern evangelism.
In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, “Ask Jesus into your heart” For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Convince everyone that Jesus is the only way.’ Now John was relevant and used key strategies not to bore people but make the gospel relevant for them. Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, and they were hosting conferences and concerts and many people came forward for the altar calls.
All this sounds irreverent and sarcastic I know. But as long as our language, our key messages, our norms are so far a field from actual biblical examples I think these provocations are fair, even necessary. The world is full of bad news. But we don’t seem to have even a pinkies worth of the guts John had to call for change. Do we coddle our audience? Do we shy away from polarizing and issues that seem political when they are just simply a part of the human condition. I have colleagues that haven’t likely been to church in a while. But if I asked them to pray with me for the family of George Floyd they’d likely agree. If I confessed my unconscious biases against minority races they’d likely give me 15 minutes. If I asked them hard questions about their estranged sibling they hate they might accept the feedback. If I invited them to come prepare manna packs for Feed My Starving Children they will at least feel convicted to hear me out. I can hear John my evangelism coach in Heaven cringing even as I write. He’s likely saying, “What are you afraid of? Listen to the truth! Tell the truth. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life!”
Genuine compassion and hard conversations are not opposites. They go hand-in-hand. But these can’t happen in a world that is divided and divisive. That leads to the 3rd and final principle that has helped me.
(3) Invite them to join me to the table of Jesus where we can cry out for mercy for us and the whole world and follow Him to share His good news with the world through our faith in action.
For anyone who knows me today knows I frequent mass celebrations. And like Philip shared the good news with Nathaniel my gospel presentation is three words: “Come and See!” I participate in Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, and other settings. To quote James K.A. Smith at mass I am “re-habituated” through liturgy. In a culture that tells me I am ok, I am immediately reminded of my baptism and the need to be continually cleansed body, heart, mind, and soul. In a world were I am tempted to see myself in control and glorify athletes and celebrities, at mass I enter by bowing on my knees to Christ the King. Surrounded by self-righteousness I am immediately led to confess my sins in my knees. Enveloped in the noise of the media and countless, self-destructive lies I tell myself I am asked to sit and listen to the Word of God. And then when the “good news of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” is about to be read I’m reminded to stand in solidarity to hear the truth of His word. Stuck in a society that is self-focused, I’m reminded next to start praying for the world before I get to my own personal needs and concerns. Caught in a world of self-gratification I am fed my daily bread in the Eucharist. And constantly pulled into the metaphorical recliners of our apathy and indifference to a suffering world I am simultaneously blessed, challenged, and sent to “go forth to share the good news!” This is what mass means. It’s essentially short form of a Latin phrase meaning, “go forth, you are sent!”
For readers who haven’t been to mass in a while I’m likely losing you. But hang with me. Because regardless of whether you are on the sending or receiving end of a gospel message I think we all need a dose of this principle.
In my earlier days evangelism trading the set up was about a proposition, a treatise, even a debate. The point was to convince someone who didn’t believe that something was, in fact, true. Or, even to take this further, evangelism would go hand-in-hand with its cousin apologetics as we defended the faith against other false teachings. This approach was beautifully demonstrated recently as my friend recounted his evangelism strategy with a Muslim friend of his. “Here’s how I did it Gordon,” he said with confidence and intensity on his face. “I told Habib, ‘I’m going to tell you true things about Jesus and you stop me when you hear anything you disagree with.’” He went on to describe the “dialogue” and was stumped when Habib didn’t interrupt him to debate the veracity of his claims about Christ. Yet at the same time it was clear that Habib wasn’t close to converting. “I don’t get it,” he said to me frustrated. Phillip wasn’t frustrated. He was confident. And Nathaniel wasn’t upset. He was curious.
But not everyone is like Philip. There’s a pervasive angst in a world of evangelicals that wants to evangelize through convincing, heavy rhetoric, and intense, emotional experiences. For example, my son’s Christian camp director was outwardly disappointed when he heard second-hand that Sam would not be able to work an additional week as a counselor for Junior High students. He called Sam directly in his cell saying, “Sam, if you don’t work that second week there are some kids who won’t get saved!” Thank God my son had the maturity to resist this heavy handed approach. Regardless of his bosses intent the message was clear: he’s trying to convince Sam to convince other kids and with a strong sense of urgency. What’s wrong with this? Sounds like a page from John the Baptist right?!?
The camp puts on a depiction of the crucifixion each week as a way to help campers see that Jesus died for their sins. “You mean all those times I didn’t make my bed!?!” some might ask themselves. “Or was it when I got hooked on porn and social media!??” others might be thinking. Regardless what of what goes through through the mind of a 13-year old enrolled in a private Christian school and the proud owner of an iPhone 14 the message is clear: “Accept Jesus. Ask Him into Your Heart. Give Him your life. Give your heart to Jesus. Surrender Your will to Him. Believe that He died for you. Raise your hand. Come forward. Pray this prayer. Re-commit to your life to Him. Make Him the Lord of your life.” Ok, as I reflect on the actual language we use to urge people to “get saved” maybe the message isn’t always that clear. John the Baptist put a message out there. But he didn’t negotiate the response. And His success rate was never determined by his conversion rate. It was determined by his faithfulness to the message.
Now I’ve been a hard on my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, all the youth pastors of the world, and several other well-intended people. But, honestly, I’m being the hardest on myself. Because I’ve had blind spots in these areas and so much more. I don’t claim to be anywhere in the same league as the Apostle Paul except when he says, “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.” Paul came from a religious, self-righteous background and so do I. So based on my bad habits and mindsets I had to start with me and practicing these things: Caring, listening, inviting. The Apostle Peter somehow did it all in his famous 5 minute sermon. His final invitation, “Repent and be baptized.” Sound like a viable gospel message today? Who knows? Three thousand Jews thought so that day. I guess when the Holy Spirit is on your side it’s easy to cut to the chase. 🙂 What did they do next? Care for each other. Eat together. Pray together. Listen together. Let’s stop trying to convince others and just invite them to experience Jesus Himself at work in the lives of others and the heart of our fellowship around His table. Heck, that was clearly Jesus’ strategy from Day 1. His disciples were initially awful theologians. But they got a first hand boot camp in the compassion of Christ, the healing He offered a desperate world, and the fellowship of His table.
Here’s a shocking simple truth: we all need this! Christians. Unbelievers. And everyone is the messy, muddy middle categories. We all need the gospel, every day! We need good news! We need grace! We need mercy! Evangelism is not a one-time transaction of doctrine it’s a continual transformation of the heart. The world has enough converts who recall a single event when they prayed a prayer, raised their hand, or went forward for the altar call. I meet many in these categories who find themselves lost, ambivalent, apathetic, and searching all over again “to feel close to God.” And guess what? It’s rare that they ask me for better ways to share the good news because they are not experiencing it themselves on a daily basis.
So this is my gospel message to myself and all who are listening:
God made this beautiful world and put the crowning jewel of creation in it: human beings made in His image, deserving of dignity, and called to glorious purpose.
The bad news? We have totally corrupted this world and it’s now full of hatred, violence, abuse, and death. And what’s worse is that those who have the greatest capacity to address these travesties are apathetic, ambivalent, and selfish.
The good news? Jesus Christ…
the Creator of every marginalized, ignored, or abused human being…
the very Son of the Father of orphans and widows…
the Savior of the slaves, victims of sex trafficking, and genocide…
the King of kings who trumps all other corrupt politicians and judgmental, self-righteous spiritual leaders…
the Redeemer of that all that has been corrupted or lost or defiled…
Jesus has come into this world. He has come into the hearts and minds and souls and bodies of many who are being formed more and more into His image. And one day every knee will bow to Him, and every tear wiped away in a glorious kingdom that will never end.
This is the gospel. This is the good news! Join me in sharing! Amen!