Why Do We Evangelize?
February 4th, 2008At first glance the answer may seem fairly obvious. “Well, because Jesus commanded it in The Great Commission.” And by the way, who invented that phrase anyway, “The Great Commission.” It’s not in the Bible. And if it’s so great, why is it that the Bible has so little to say on the subject? Why are there no epistles from Paul on soul winning? Ponder on that for a moment. I’m not trying to be a contrarian like some other bloggers I know (just a little joke), but I am trying to make a point.
This week at Northland Church in Longwood, Florida over 500 Christian leaders from around the world met for what was called the North American Global Congress, 
kind of a strategizing conference for spreading the gospel worldwide. Its purpose was to discuss how to reach the remaining 2 billion people who have never heard the name of Jesus. Participants were introduced to ideas and resources for sharing the Gospel including the latest technological tools for missions.
Former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, Rev. Bobby Welch, was one of the conference speakers on hand emphasizing the importance of soul winning as the highest priority of the local church. “Hell is no joke. Hell is a horrible reality. Hell lasts forever. Any person that misses heaven will go to hell eternally. There must be a wholesale revival.”
Who could argue with that? But I return to my original question. Why DO we evangelize…really? As Joan Rivers says, “Can we talk?” Though we’d never admit it openly and maybe not even privately or to ourselves, I fear the real reason is somewhat less noble then we’d like to think. Let’s face it. We win souls because that’s how we build churches. Am I right? We win souls because that’s the criteria for successful church growth. I know you EV Free guys are beyond this, but when pastor’s get together, guess what they talk about? They talk about numbers. How many in attendance? How many did you baptize? How many services are you running?
And the contemporary crowd is no different. All this talk about “Post-modern” “Purpose Driven” “Seeker Friendly” programming is still designed to do one thing and one thing only and that’s stimulate church growth. Oh we may talk a good talk about how we love the Lord and have a burden for the lost and we may even really mean it. But I contend that if we were truly serious about “revival” we would stop for a moment, set aside our high tech marketing strategies and examine the New Testament biblical record of evangelism to see God’s plan for increasing His Kingdom. It’s called holiness.
“So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved” – Acts 2:46-47.
Notice it doesn’t say “and the believers added to the church daily those who were being saved.” The work of evangelism is the work of the Lord. It always has been. I’m not saying that believers don’t play a part. Without question we are commanded to. But I maintain that real evangelism is more about surrender than it is about strategies. Where in the world did we get the idea that God somehow NEEDS our help to save sinners? God doesn’t have a single need in which His own nature has not already provided. Soul winning then is merely the blessing in which God allows believers the privilege of joining Him in the glory of ushering sinners into the Kingdom. Let’s face it, guys, we’re just along for the ride. It’s that simple.
So here’s a strategy for soul winning you might try. Let the church devote itself to God’s Word, prayer, and unity, and then step back and see what God will do. I believe that as God’s people surrender more and more to His plan for their lives He will bless them with more and more opportunities to usher people into the Kingdom and the LORD will add to the church those who are being saved.
February 4th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Well, as one of those “EV Free” guys, I’ll certainly take your words as a complement, whether they were intended that way or not, but it is interesting how true I find them to be. I can identify, from my Baptist days, with exactly what you’re talking about, Don. The emphasis on “numbers” was at times encouraging, but at times almost nauseating. So much of this can be such a subtle thing. Yes, every person won to faith in Christ is a soul that will not spend eternity in hell. What I’m concerned about, sort of a corollary to your words, is the significant watering down of the gospel, the cheapening of it in many ways, so we can “count” more people, and I’ve been in situations where the “counting” of people came across as a massive ego thing. I’ve got a friend (who will remain nameless) who is a good guy, doing a good work, but frankly, not a guy I will ever be real close to, in part because EVERY time I speak with this guy, he manages to talk about the numbers he’s running in his church (and they are large, admittedly). But at what price? And with what means?
A guy walked into our church building a week ago with some problems, wanting some counsel. I took a couple hours to explain the gospel to him, including talking about where Jesus says, “count the cost”, and the fact that Jesus was going to CHANGE his life if he trusted Christ. He trusted Christ. He met me for lunch the next day, and is again tomorrow. He was in church with his girlfriend Sunday, perhaps for the first time in his life for all I know. Know what I’m interested in seeing? Not how many people I can get to “make decisions”, but whether this fellow’s life is different three months, six months, a year from now. That’s where the proof will be in the pudding. And that’s where our work as a church—not me, but all of us—will play a role.
February 5th, 2008 at 3:33 am
Byron,
What a great example of what I’m talking about. Be sure and let us know how things work out.