What is Evangelism?
The spreading of the gospel by public preaching or personal witness.
Also evangelism is the commitment to, or act.
Whenever I use the word evangelism which is in my below message. You should remind yourself that I need to be a witness. That sounds good? Yeah
Why it is so important? And what is my commitment towards it?
Evangelism is suffering and we hardly see that happening. I am also talking to myself and believe it is true for you as well.
God showed his love by sending Jesus who showcased God’s love for his creation and brought renewed hope for all of us, that we can directly access God . He gave a gift of salvation for all of us that whoever believes in him, repents and loves God (i.e. I will sin no more, I will trust him unconditionally) receives salvation.
So after we have received the Hope and a promise of eternal life, what is next for us? Should I be happy with that, and live a successful life and call it as a success? As we attend church, mid week groups, we love Gospel songs, we love to pray, love to read the word and we love to be with a bunch of fellow Christians.
Is that Evangelism?
No, it contradicts with what Jesus taught his disciples. After Jesus was resurrected and before he ascended to heaven what does he command to his disciples?
The Great Commission
16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
So , the background is this ?Jesus was born , he taught about God’s love and brought salvation for everyone and he called 12 men who were his disciples. He invested heavily on them. He taught them, loved them, corrected them and he died for them as well.
When Jesus was alive, the Gospel did not spread across the globe. What is Gospel? It is the message of Salvation. The Gospel spread across the globe only after Jesus was ascended into heaven.
And it was the disciples who took the Gospel across the globe, to you and me . You know why?
Because they did not live their entire life in Phase 1.
Phase 1 (SAVED) of the life of disciples were spent with Jesus i.e they were lost and one day Jesus called them to follow and they followed him.
And the same thing was for us. we were in the darkness, Jesus called us and saved us. BUT
Phase 2 (CALLED) of the disciples lives were more significant than phase 1. The gospel reached across the globe. How that happened? It was all about EVANGELISM, it changed everything.
The disciples lived only 3 years with Jesus but the rest of their lives they lived in EVANGELISM.
EVANGELISM is a heartbeat of God. And the promise which God gave them and us was All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me
What has gone wrong with us? Evangelism is going out of our limits / capacity to witness among our friends / neighbours / Unknown people.
Because we are happy to live our entire life in Phase 1: Most of us including me, we are happy to live in phase 1. It is like the feeling of heaven, were we can see his face , we experience our salvation everyday. (i.e Lord , I am a sinner , you have saved me experience) .
It is ok if we live our life in phase 1, but it is not enough.
Jesus not only came to SAVE us, but he CALLED us as well, for the Great Commission.
The way he called the disciples, the same way he has called you and me as well.
Tell your neighbour “I am not only saved but also called for the Great Commission”
There are two ways we can do Evangelism (You can add your own ways for evangelism as well)
Intentional Evangelism :
It is trying intentionally. Creating a way for evangelism. Just want to share a short story. I know even you may have loads of stories like this. Sandra and myself decided that we will opt for a first class pass for travelling to our respective workplaces. In reality, we did not need it, because, when we travel , we avoid the peak hour crowd and we usually get a seat in Second class. But we decided that we will opt for first class where we won’t have that much crowd and also, we will get time and space to interact with others. And the money which we spent for both of us was quite significant. We made lot of friends.
We opted for it intentionally , sometimes I miss trains to meet intentionally.
Unintentional evangelism
Unintentional means , we don’t have to wait for a specific day or occasion . It becomes a life style.
It’s like the way we witness, it becomes our life style. The conversation which we have is inclusive of personal witnessing.
The need of the Church and our Nation is personal witness of who is Jesus and what he has done.
The prayer walk is evangelism asking God for an opening . The church is for evangelism where we invite our friends in . Our work in hostels / colleges / townships is for evangelism.
Few reasons we are not able to evangelise
- Still in phase one of SAVED
We are still in SAVED phase and we are very happy with it and we don’t feel that we are responsible for the great commission. We feel it is others responsibility not mine.
- Engrossed with own personal issues / problems
We are so engrossed with our own personal problems that we have hardly anytime even to think of witnessing to others.
- Fear / No Time (Practical difficulty)
There is fear and no time practically may be because of the hectic schedule or work pressure, family commitments etc. This practical challenges stop us to be witness.
Ways to evangelise
- We reiterate our commitment over and over again.
We have to remind ourselves that we are Called to be a witness
- Believing in the Authority which is given to us. (The Authority is given to us)
God has already given the grace to us to be witness. It is just our initial step of faith which matters and believing in the authority which God has given us.
Let us look from the scriptures passage which talks about evangelism.
John 4: 1-42
Jesus Talks With a Samaritan Woman
4 Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. 3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.
4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph.6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])
10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again,14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
17 “I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband.18 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.”
19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, 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 the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
The Disciples Rejoin Jesus
27 Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”
28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.
31 Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”
33 Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”
34 “My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. 35 Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. 36 Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. 37 Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. 38 I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”
Many Samaritans Believe
39 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. 41 And because of his words many more became believers.
42 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.”
Jesus interacts with the Woman and he interacts with her intentionally and we all know the story. In return, this Samaritan woman goes back and testifies about Jesus. We read in verse 39 that the entire town believed in Jesus because of the Samaritan Women’s testimony.
This is amazing, she testified what she heard, and the results was the entire town believed the women’s testimony.
Friends, in verse 35
35 Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest.
God asks us to open and see the fields. The fields are the places where we spend most of our time. Maybe for few of us it is our workplace or Homes, Schools, Colleges, bus / train / cab in which we travel, this can go on and on.
To be a witness is the heartbeat of God. Are you ready to move in Phase 2 of our life that is we are Called for the Great Commission?
Virjil Selvan is Pastoring the New Hope Community. The New Hope Community is situated in the heart of the city between Old and New Panvel. We can confidently share that New Hope Community is a Church in Kamothe, Church in Khandeshwar, Church in Khanda Colony, Church in Panvel, Church in New Panvel because we are centrally located and these places surround our church Venue.
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