Some of the text in this sermon comes from "Out of the Saltshaker" by Rebecca Pippert.
Over the past six weeks we’ve talked about several different characteristics of disciples. We’ve learned the importance of submission in discipleship. We’ve learned the necessity of prayer and study in our lives as disciples. We discussed reasons why we must make ourselves slaves to righteousness in our walk as disciples. And last week we talked about the importance of servanthood in discipleship.
If you will remember back in the beginning of June I said that my hope through this series was that you would not only be enlightened and learn something new, but that most importantly you would be transformed through this study on discipleship. I hope that each of you are striving to make these discipleship characteristics a daily part of your life. If you aren’t, I want to encourage you not to give up and become discouraged, stay with the fight. If you are, outstanding, I hope that you will keep it up. But we have yet to talk about the key to discipleship.
If you are doing all of these things in your life, but you aren’t involved in evangelism, then you are falling short of what God has called you to do. Now if you have never tried actively evangelizing or maybe you have but you haven’t led someone to Christ, please know that you are not alone. A recent church study revealed that 95% of evangelical Christians admitted that they had never led anyone to the Lord. I don’t want anyone to feel like you’re a bad Christian if you’ve never evangelized, but I also want everyone to know that God is working in a partnership with us and he not only wants us to go make disciples, he needs us to because he’s given that job to us! A disciple of God is constantly witnessing and is always prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks him about his faith. 1st Peter 3:15 says, “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.”
Evangelism is the key to disciplemaking and must be the cutting edge of any lasting ministry. Evangelism brings new life into a ministry. Whether it is here at the Wesley Foundation or in your local church, people must be added to each ministry because they came to know Christ and sought a church home. If we aren’t bringing new people into the faith, our churches and our ministries will slowly die out. If we aren’t bringing people into a relationship with Jesus, then we aren’t being fruitful for the kingdom of God. We must go forth from here as fishers of men making disciples and the key to doing so is through that big scary word, evangelism!
There are several reasons why we are scared of evangelism and why that word carries a bad connotation with it. For one we worry too much about how many people we offend. There is a myth that says all evangelists are obnoxious and pushy. Think about this though, if you are sensitive enough to realize that you could offend someone in your evangelizing, then offending other people probably isn’t your problem. God hasn’t called us to spend our time worrying about how we might offend someone, instead he calls us to be bold and to step out and witness for him.
Another myth to evangelism is that you have to do it all at once. If you have 30 minutes with someone while you are getting your haircut then there’s no way you can evangelize, because that’s not enough time to share the whole ball of wax with them at one time and get them to commit their life to Christ. Sometimes evangelism takes some time. Asking someone what they believe and sharing with them what you believe can be evangelism even if you don’t have the time to lead them through the whole gospel and then through the sinner’s prayer and into a relationship with Christ.
Now one of my favorite myths to evangelism is that if we make one mistake we’ve turned someone off from Christianity forever. If we offend someone or we can’t answer one of their questions, then it’s all over. They are doomed. Their eternal destiny rested on your ability to know all of the answers and you failed them. And rather then take this chance and possibly doom someone forever, it would be safer to just leave evangelism up to the preachers and the professionals. Now come on, is God not eternal and powerful? Don’t you think he might have the ability to reach someone again even if you messed up or couldn’t answer one of their questions? Don’t you think God has the power to reach someone even if you may have slightly offended them? So many people are afraid that they don’t know enough to evangelize or that they might offend someone and turn them off from Christianity for good so instead they just smile and let their actions do the talking. Letting your actions and deeds to others speak for you is ONE way to evangelize, but let me tell you, Girl Scouts smile a lot and they do good deeds and service for others, so that certainly can’t be all there is to witnessing for Christ.
Another myth to evangelism is that if we aren’t perfect we can’t lead others to Christ. I’m struggling with sin in my life, so I’m not good enough to share Christ with others. If everyone that struggled with sin used that excuse, nobody would ever come to Christ again. Don’t hide your weaknesses and pretend to be perfect when you are witnessing, because that isn’t sharing the whole message with a seeker.
Becky Pippert shares a story about an atheist that she led into a relationship with Christ. The woman gave several reasons why she became a Christian but told Becky there was one thing that affected her the most. She said, “all my life I used to think, how arrogant for someone to call himself a Christian, to think he’s that good. But then I got to know you Becky, and you are far from perfect, yet you call yourself a Christian. So my first shock was to discover that you blow it like I do. But the biggest shock was that you admitted it, where I couldn’t. Suddenly I saw that being a Christian didn’t mean never failing, but admitting when you’ve failed. The more you let me inside your life, the more impossible it became to keep the lid on Christianity. Even your admission of weaknesses drove me to him.” Becky says in her book about this experience, “I had always thought I should cover up my doubts and problems because if she knew me she wouldn’t become a Christian. But the more open and transparent I was, the more real Jesus became to her. She saw the real me and that gave the gospel more power, not less.”
Don’t let your weaknesses and your struggles keep you from evangelizing, because God can use them as you witness. This isn’t just a myth to evangelism, but it can also be a poor approach to evangelism. You can’t remain detached from someone if you are going to lead them to Christ. You can’t shout the gospel from a safe distance and hope the person will become a believer. We can’t lead someone to Christ if we don’t reveal some of ourself to them. We must open our lives enough to let people see that we too laugh, we hurt, and we cry. If Jesus left all of heaven and glory to become one of us, shouldn’t we at least be willing to leave our circle of church friends or groups to reach out to someone who needs Christ?
Another poor approach to evangelism is getting caught up in legalism. It’s vital that we help seekers see the connection between belief and behavior, but we can’t communicate God as a distant tsk-tsking God who will have nothing to do with seekers until they get their act together. Everyone in here has seen the so called evangelists that come out to the south oval and shout at people and condemn them to hell. This is obviously a very poor approach, so we as disciples have a challenge to show people the right way to evangelize.
Another poor approach to evangelism is being so anxious to lead someone to Christ that you fail to present a clear and honest picture of Christianity. We will be reaping a poor harvest if we do not convey both the costs and the privileges to following Christ. We must communicate that salvation is tied to a relationship with Jesus; but it also requires total response and discipline. We can’t just present Jesus as something that gives us a warm fuzzy feeling inside.
Well we’ve learned how not to evangelize, so let’s talk about how we should evangelize. Christians say they want to communicate their faith naturally instead of seeming artificial. So in their pursuit of this they investigate every witnessing technique and method on the market. While there are some wrong ways to do evangelism, there isn’t one right way. As long as Christ is proclaimed, the integrity of the seeker is honored and the motive that drives us is the love of God, there is no form of evangelism that can be faulted.
There are however some good ways to go about evangelizing. I think the most important thing we can do is follow the example that Jesus gave us. If you live by the same values and priorities he had, you will find evangelism happening naturally. IT will become a lifestyle and not just a project. If you look at the life of Jesus, you see that he made it a priority to be with people, to care for them, and to love them. Jesus demonstrated that everyone is someone to God. He identified with the unimportant, the weak, the poor, and the powerless.
Mark 10:46 They came to Jericho. As he and his disciples and a large crowd were leaving Jericho, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the roadside.10:47 When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!"10:48 Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, "Son of David, have mercy on me!" 10:49 Jesus stood still and said, "Call him here." And they called the blind man, saying to him, "Take heart; get up, he is calling you." 10:50 So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. 10:51 Then Jesus said to him, "What do you want me to do for you?" The blind man said to him, "My teacher, let me see again." 10:52 Jesus said to him, "Go; your faith has made you well." Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.
To everyone but Jesus, Bartimaeus was just an insignificant begger who wanted to interrupt the schedule of the king. However, Jesus stopped everything he was doing so that he could speak to the man and heal him. How many times do you look over someone because of their appearance or because of something you may have heard about them? Jesus took the time to get to know the insignificant, the widows, the children, and the lepors. This opened the doors to a lifetime of ministry for him. We must be willing to do the same.
Evangelism means being concerned with people. You cannot lead someone to Christ if you don’t take the time to get to know them and show a genuine interest in them. It takes cultivating. When I was younger I told my parents I wanted to grow a garden. I thought it would be cool to grow different vegetables and fruits, but I wasn’t aware of the work it took. We had to plow the soil, then we had to plant seeds, then we had to water it daily, and every couple of days we had to pull out the weeds. It took a long time before I was actually able to pick vegetables from my garden. My garden didn’t last very long, because I didn’t like the cultivation process. Evangelism is like the garden, you have to take time to get to know a person before you can share the gospel with them. You have to love them and care for them.
Becky Pippert recalls another story in her book Out of the Saltshaker, she says: “I remember being with a Christian student on a beach during an evangelism training week. Bob and I met several religious skeptics and began talking about all sorts of things. Eventually the conversation got around to Christianity, and it was a lively and invigorating discussion. We even exchanged addresses before leaving. I was feeling very good about the conversation, but Bob seemed very quiet. When I asked him what was wrong, he said, “I thought it was an absolute failure. There are four major points to the gospel and you only brought in two of them, and they weren’t even in the right order!” I said, “What were the names of the three people we met this afternoon?” “Oh I don’t know”, he said. “What in the world difference does that make? There were two females and one male. Or was it the other way around?”
Here we have a young man, Bob, who genuinely loved God and he was very sincere in wanting to lead others to Christ. But he missed the entire point. He was so sure of his agenda and his 4 points of the gospel that he failed to even learn the people’s names. He failed to get to know them as individuals and to show them the love that Jesus shows us.
Don’t get caught up with a particular formula for evangelism, or you will be very unsuccessful. Focus on people and get out and get to know them like Jesus did. Once you do this, you will have the opportunity to begin sharing Jesus Christ with them. As you get to know them, be ready to open up to them and share what Jesus has done for you and what he can do for them.
The best way to do that is by sharing your testimony. It is hard to communicate the gospel with others unless you share with them what Jesus Christ has done for you in your life. Your testimony is one of your greatest evangelistic tools. Your testimony is the prime evidence that what you are talking about really works. Your testimony is your authority to speak about Christ and the gospel.
Whether you think it or not, all of us have a testimony. It may not include some miraculous change and it may in fact be pretty simple, but there is a change in everyone that takes place once you accept Christ in your life. A testimony can be really long and a life changing story or it can be very simple, yet still powerful. Paul often shared part of or all of his testimony in his life on earth as he witnessed for Christ and you can easily use his testimony as a guideline for what your testimony should look like. His entire testimony is shown in Acts 26. Your personal testimony should include three things:
1. What your life was like before you had a personal relationship with Christ. In the first part of Paul’s testimony he told of how he persecuted the believers and how he did everything he could to oppose Jesus of Nazareth and his followers.
2. How did you come into a personal relationship with Christ. In the middle of Paul’s testimony in chapter 26 he talks about his meeting with Jesus and about the light that came down on him from heaven. He tells of Jesus’ promise to him to rescue him form his own people and from the power of Satan.
3. What was your life like after you accepted Christ into your life. Paul sums up his testimony by speaking of the daily help he receives from God and of the great things God is using him to do.
Can you speak intelligently and clearly about your relationship and encounter with Jesus? If you’ve never shared your testimony with someone, consider spending some time this week writing out your testimony and becoming comfortable enough with it to share it with non-believers. And in all things ask God to make your bold and ask him to give you the courage to find seekers and to share your testimony and to share your message with them. We can’t sit back and passively wait for someone to come up to us, we must be bold and go to them.
In Acts chapter 4, Peter and John were seized and thrown in jail for preaching the good news of Christ to non-believers. The following day they were questioned before the Sanhedrin. The council then conferred among one another and then told Peter and John that they were no longer allowed to preach and teach to the people. Peter and John said they could not stop speaking the truth and after being threatened again they were released. It is in verse 29 of chapter 4 that we see part of their prayer to God that we should make our own prayer. It reads, “Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.”
Next week we will continue our talk on evangelism and we will look at some easy approaches to doing it, we will also look at some applicable scriptures that can be used in evangelism and most importantly we will learn how we as disciples can make evangelism a way of life for us.
But no matter what instructions I give you, you will not be evangelists unless you pray for boldness. Boldness does not mean reckless impulsiveness, it means having courage through our fears and doing what we know is right. Go from here praying for boldness and actively seeking opportunities to witness for Christ. Cast aside your fears of being persecuted, your fears of inadequacy, and your fear of rejection. Give these fears to Christ as you seek boldness from him to go and do his work. You have been given a great gift, an eternal gift, the free gift of everlasting life that gives you endless hope and that gift is available to all, so why would we want to keep it to ourselves? Go from here Always being prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.”
