Some thoughts on Evangelism...

Someone I know was having a conversation recently with a gentleman who was actively sharing the Gospel in his community.  My friend had been taught how to share the Gospel from doing work with Campus Crusade.  While I have personally moved some distance away from certain aspects of Cru.’s methodology, I still hold a lot of respect for the movement and it’s awareness that people need to hear the life-giving message of Jesus Christ.  I also think that Bill Bright got something right when composing the four laws: the first law is “God loves you and created you to know him personally” (it used to be… “and has a wonderful plan for your life,” but that was later changed after the realization that the call to discipleship is not always a call to a “wonderful life” but it is always a call to a life giving relationship with God.)  I like the first for many of the same reasons that I identify with the “reformed” tribe of theology: it starts with God.  The Bible does the same thing… it begins in Genesis 1 with a creative God forming, shaping, and lovingly crafting humanity into his own image.  The second law goes on to say that there is a problem: sin has entered the world… and the third law says that Jesus came to save the world.  But before we speak about sin or redemption, we speak of the love of God.  The context is love… we don’t speak to someone of their problems and difficulties unless they realize that you care for them.  The context is also that God has created humanity with a purpose… your life means something.  I do believe that God has a wonderful plan for our lives: that we would worship God and enjoy him forever.  I think we do that through our lives.

So as my friend was dialoguing with this individual who was sharing his faith, she expressed all of these things to him.  He said that he “respectfully disagreed.”  Instead, he asked, “if you were in a building in 911 and you knew your lives were going to end… how would you share the Gospel?”  Obviously, (for him) the answer would be to call them to repent so they would be saved from hell!  I (also) respectfully disagree.

For me, the question is… “what is evangelism?”  If we are people who are called by Christ into the labor of Matthew 28, to invite people into relationship with Christ… what exactly are we doing.  I have a fundamental disagreement with this second, common, approach because of some key assumptions that it makes about life in general.  If the whole idea of evangelism is to announce that we’re saved from hell so we can go to heaven… what happens to our lives right now?  This might be controversial to some, but I’m not really that big on the classical conception of heaven and hell.  The Bible used different language for what happens after death: resurrection.  Resurrection involves our bodies, it’s carnal in nature.  In scripture, you don’t find many references to a disembodied existence. 

So what is evangelism?  In my opinion, it’s inviting people to a new way of life.  It’s joining people for coffee and conversation, it’s sharing lives and hearts together.  It’s calling people to join in community together.  It’s saying… I want you to come and see what this new life is like.  Ultimately, it’s showing people what it’s like to really be human.  It’s saying… look, Jesus calls us to live this way, and it’s so much better than anything else I’ve experienced.  It fills my soul with worshipping God, it meets my human needs of relationship, and it gives me a calling… to live my life to God in union with his spirit and experience and share true, holy joy.  Now, in the OT perception of death… you walk with God… and then you keep walking. In the NT Jesus speaks of heaven coming down to this world.  We don’t need to go to heaven, heaven comes here. What happens in DEATH is very closely related to what happens in life.  You’ll still have a body… you’ll still be doing the same types of things you do in this world… because you’re not whisked off to a different place!  You’re resurrected!

Over the past year or so… I’ve been trying to develop what I call a “carnal” theology.  People often think of carnality strickly in relation to sin (don’t drink, smoke, swear or chew, and don’t you hang out with the girls that do!)  But… what if we started our theology not with sin, but with the image of God.  What if we thought of the body not as bad, but as created good and whole… even though life is tainted with brokenness.  The Gospel, in my opinion, is not about escaping our bodies but living our lives to the fullest.  It’s about using our talents to the glory of God.  It’s not about getting out of here, but bringing heaven here… each and every day we have the chance to witness to the wonders of God in the way that we live our lives.