I have been in the ministry for 26 years now, and I have preached a lot of sermons on Evangelism.
What a waste of time.
We don’t like to think about evangelism.
We don’t like to do evangelism.
We always want someone else to handle the evangelism programs in our churches.
I’m not sure why we don’t like that word.
Maybe it is because when we hear it we’re afraid that the pastor is going to make us work at something that is awkward and embarrassing.
We don’t like to knock on the doors of the homes of strangers. Most of us don’t like to give out tracts and pamphlets to strangers. Most of us don’t feel like we have the training to do evangelism. Many people believe – that’s what we pay the preachers to do – let them do it.
I want to suggest something today that may come as a great relief to many of you, and that is that we should just drop the concept of evangelism altogether.
We’re not really doing it anyway. So let’s solve the problem of evangelism by dropping the whole subject.
Let me suggest that we do something else with our time and energy.
How many people like the idea of getting an invitation?
I do!
Someone invited me to their home for dinner last week. Wonderful. I always like it when someone else is going to cook for me. And of course, an invitation to someone’s home for dinner is more than just food, it’s good conversation, good stories, good fellowship.
I like the idea of being invited to go somewhere.
For example, I live in expectation that one of you will get tickets to the Superbowl and invite me to go with you.
I live in expectation that one of you will invite me to be your personal chaplain on a cruise around the world. Feel free to invite me any time.
We love getting invitations.
And most of us are good at giving invitations to others.
We invite people to come to our home for a dinner.
We invite a friend to come to a movie with us.
We invite someone to meet us for lunch during the day.
We enjoy a good book, and we invite our husband or wife to read the book.
We find a television show we enjoy, and we like it so much we invite others to watch it.
How many of you are parents?
How many parents here have had pictures made of their brand new baby – the hospital usually does this for parents for a small fee.
When your child was born, or your grandchild – did you not invite people to look at the picture of the baby?
Of course you did.
Now folks, you know I’m headed with this.
We have a beautiful savior.
We have a wonderful church.
We have great things happening.
Forget about evangelism.
Think invitation.
We should be inviting people to come to church.
1. EVANGELISTS ARE GREAT AND POWERFUL, WELL LOVED PEOPLE – BUT ANYONE CAN SEND INVITATIONS
We have this impression that evangelists are great and powerful people – they are well loved and famous. How many of us fit that mold?
But invitations? We all know all about how to invite people to do something or to go somewhere. You don’t have to be a great and powerful person to send someone an invitation.
And that is what this woman at the well does in the Gospel of John. She becomes an agent of invitation. She invites people to meet Christ.
Some people would say she was an evangelist. But she is not great and powerful, she’s not well loved.
Take a look at verses 28 and 29 of this chapter – what does it say?
“Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, "Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?"
She is not holding up a religious tract in someone’s face and asking, “Have you heard the Four Spiritual Laws?”
She is not going to someone and challenging his or her lifestyle.
She is simply saying “come.”
“Come.”
It is an invitation.
“Come and see this man… he might be the Christ.”
Chapter four of John’s Gospel opens up with Jesus going on a journey. He is always going on a journey from one place to another and in this case he is on his way back to Galilee and he has to go through Samaria.
Picking up in verse 5, we read, “So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about the sixth hour.”
That is an interesting verse because what it tells us is that Jesus is a stranger in this land. He is an alien. He’s an immigrant, if you will. He is a Jew traveling into Samaria and Jews and Samaritans do not get along. And yet, everywhere one turns in this area, there are reminders of a common history they share – and a common God they worship. Jews and Samaritans both honored Jacob, and here they are at Jacob’s well.
Now it is strange that this woman would come to the well at the sixth hour. That’s not six hours after midnight – the sixth hour is six hours after sunrise. In other words, it is about Noon. The hottest time in the day.
People in that culture would draw a day’s supply of water from the well at the beginning of the day and in the evening, but not during the hottest part of the day.
This woman does go to the well, however, at this odd time. She does this because she is an outcast. She is not part of the community – she is not accepted by her neighbors. Now we think that to be an effective evangelist, you have to be accepted by people. You have to be liked by people. You have to be someone like Billy Graham. Well, maybe. But remember, we are not talking about evangelism. We’ve dropped evangelism. We are focusing on being an agent of invitation.
And to invite people to experience something, you don’t have to be part of the “in crowd.” You can be an outcast.
I know this woman is an outcast because of what Jesus says beginning in verse 16: Jesus told her, "Go, call your husband and come back."
“I have no husband," she replied.
Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true."
Now the modern American reader looks at that and thinks the wrong thing about this lady. Many think of her as a slut. She’s promiscuous. She’s gone from husband to husband and now she is living with someone without being married to him.
No.
She’s not doing anything.
She’s a victim.
In that culture women did not have the power to leave a husband and divorce a man. It just didn’t happen. It certainly never happened 5 times.
No – she’s not leaving anyone. She’s being thrown out. She’s being discarded by men.
In that culture it was almost impossible for a single woman to survive. She had to have the security of a husband, so one after another accepts her as a wife, but then throws her out. And now she is living with a man who does not even respect her enough to marry her.
This woman at the well is the most powerless person in the Gospel of John.
And yet, she brings others to Christ.
You don’t have to be a great and powerful person, or a well-loved part of the in crowd to invite others to experience Christ.
2.
EVANGELISTS ARE DEEP THINKING THEOLOGIANS
BUT ANYONE CAN SEND INVITATIONS
So forget about evangelism – think about giving invitations.
Another reason to forget about trying to become an evangelist is that we tend to think that evangelists are deep thinking theologians. How can we become an evangelist when we don’t have a PhD in theology? Or when we don’t know much about the Bible? If we can’t answer people’s questions about the Trinity and explain the doctrines of faith, how can we possibly be an evangelist?
Like I said, forget evangelism – think about giving invitations.
That’s what the woman at the well does.
She’s not a very deep thinker. Certainly not well educated or highly trained. In the Gospel of John she tries to engage Jesus in a theological discussion about worship. In verse 20 you see her saying to Jesus, “Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem."
What Jesus does beginning in verse 21 is to answer this woman’s concerns about worship, but in a way that is beyond her ability to understand or fully comprehend. She is not a theologically trained expert.
21 Jesus declared, "Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.
22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews.
23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.
24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."
Now I love the response the woman gives in verse 25: "I know that Messiah" (called Christ) "is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us."
It’s as if she is admitting she doesn’t have a clue what he is talking about.
When she goes to town to tell her neighbors about Jesus, she does not try to debate the people, or lay out a complicated lecture or thesis. She can’t do that. She is not a highly trained theologian.
All she does is to invite people to check out this man who might be the Messiah. Looking again at verse 29, she says, "Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?"
Most of us don’t try to engage in evangelism because we don’t have the mind for it, the training for it, the theological knowledge for it.
Fine. Forget about evangelism.
Think about sending an invitation – that’s all. Just invite people.
That is all this woman does.
3. EVANGELISTS HAVE A BURDEN OF RESPONSIBILITY OF CONVINCING PEOPLE TO BECOME CHRISTIANS – BUT ANYONE CAN SEND INVITATIONS
Now there is one other reason why many of us don’t want to do the work of evangelism – it’s a burden. It’s stressful. Not just in the sense of time, but in the sense of responsibility.
Think about it – evangelists have the burden of whether people go to heaven or hell.
If you are an evangelist and bring someone to a saving faith – that’s wonderful. But if you are an evangelist and the people you speak with reject the faith. That’s a terrible burden.
But when you give an invitation to someone, you know that the person you invite has the responsibility of either saying “yes” or “no.” You can’t make someone come to your house for dinner. You can’t force someone to have lunch with you. You can’t require someone to go to a movie with you. All you can do is ask.
And that’s all this woman does. She just invites. She doesn’t get any blame when people reject Christ. She doesn’t get any credit when they accept.
All she does is to give a simple invitation to people.
Because of that, in verse 39, we learn that the Samaritans were willing to accept her invitation to take a look at Jesus and to listen to what he says, but what makes them believe in Jesus is not anything that this woman does or says. What brings them to Jesus is Jesus himself.
Take a look at what it says in verse 40: “So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers. They said to the woman, ‘We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.’”
We think about evangelists as having a great burden – the immortal soul is in their hands. But forget about evangelism. Drop it!
Think about inviting people. No burden. It’s up to them to accept or decline. And if they accept, the credit goes to Jesus, not you. So relax.
Now we have a great savior and a wonderful church.
You need to invite someone to come try out Good Shepherd. Whether they accept or decline is up to them. All you need to do is open the door.
We have a picnic coming up next week. Most people would love to go on a picnic. All you need to do is invite them.
We have an event coming up for the middle school and high school folks – Whitewater Atlanta trip is in August but tickets have to be reserved no later than tomorrow – so you have a few more hours to invite other young people to join you.
The Women’s Backyard Book Review is this Friday. Invite someone.
The Women’s Enrichment Fall Bible Study Kick Off Brunch is coming up in September – you have plenty of time to invite someone.
And there are Bible Studies. And worship. And small groups. And Sunday School classes.
Evangelism may be complicated. So you can forget about that.
But we all know how to invite someone to something. We can all open a door for folks.
Copyright 2006
Dr. Maynard Pittendreigh
www.pittendreigh.com
