post<\/a>, there is another aspect of evangelism that needs to be re-thought for those coming out of fundamentalist or evangelical backgrounds.\u00a0 Many of us were taught to think of evangelism as \u201cwinning souls.\u201d\u00a0 We were to engage, speak to, and \u201cwin\u201d the person to Christ.\u00a0 Yes, we knew we had to pray, we knew the Holy Spirit had to work, but we still were taught to think about this process as \u201cwinning.\u201d\u00a0 The very language of \u201cwinning\u201d is unhelpful and actually negates, or downplays our supposed reliance upon the Spirit or prayer.\u00a0 Further, \u201cwinning\u201d has nothing to do with it.<\/p>\nI remember many pastors and deacons asking me and those around me: \u201cAre you a soul winner\u201d?\u00a0 Although I know they did not mean it this way, what this quickly devolves into is: \u201cAre you getting people to agree with you, see things your way, and then getting them on board with our program?\u201d\u00a0 And by \u201cprogram\u201d it meant the follow-up of making sure they understood baptism and reading Scripture like we do and coming to our church.<\/p>\n
And this concept or paradigm of \u201cwinning\u201d also, unfortunately, can easily lead one to think they are \u201cwinning\u201d arguments or \u201cwinning\u201d by wearing people down.\u00a0 I actually remember Christians who thought they had \u201cwon\u201d even if the person became angry and rejected their message.\u00a0 In their view, the person just couldn\u2019t handle the \u201ctruth,\u201d was willingly rejecting the Holy Spirit\u2019s leading, and clearly in rebellion against the things of God.\u00a0 More often than not however, the person was really just rejecting them and the way they chose to practice \u201cevangelism.\u201d\u00a0 News flash: Being a jerk is not winning.<\/p>\n
So, let\u2019s try and think about evangelism differently.\u00a0 There are two passages in Scripture that can help us and these are also, ironically, two key passages used by evangelicals\/fundamentalists and those who use the \u201cwinning souls\u201d language.<\/p>\n
The first is the \u201cGreat Commission\u201d passage in the Gospel of Matthew 28:16-20:<\/p>\n
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, \u201cAll authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in[a] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.\u201d<\/em> (ESV)<\/p>\nSee, it\u2019s right there\u2014plain as day.\u00a0 It reads we are to go and witness, to verbally share our experience and faith and to then ask for a response.\u00a0 Well, no, it doesn\u2019t say that plain or otherwise.\u00a0 It says we are to make \u201cdisciples.\u201d\u00a0 Making disciples is a process, a journey. \u00a0Making disciples is about a conversation between two people sharing lives together, over time.\u00a0 Yes, it has to begin somewhere, but it hardly means just telling someone about your experience and faith.\u00a0 And if that is all one does, then one is not doing what we are commanded to do in this verse.\u00a0 The reason evangelicalism\/fundamentalism is a mile wide and only an inch deep is because they think in terms of \u201cwitnessing\u201d rather in terms of making disciples.\u00a0 There is a huge difference between the two.<\/p>\n
The second is Acts 1:8:<\/p>\n
8 \u201cbut you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.\u201d<\/em> (ESV)<\/p>\n\u201cSoul winners\u201d are taught the importance of being a \u201cwitness,\u201d which they seem to understand in only one sense, which is sharing their \u201ctestimony.\u201d\u00a0 They further understand this to mean a verbal telling of how they became a Christian and how the person they are sharing with can too.\u00a0 Once the personal history part is shared, the conversation normally then moves into where the two are sharing abstract ideas about what they believe and why. The problem here is that the word \u201cwitnesses\u201d or \u201cwitness\u201d in the Greek is the word martyr<\/em>.<\/p>\nJesus is telling his followers that from now on, wherever they find themselves, they are to be his \u201cmartyrs\u201d.\u00a0 Okay\u2026wait, what?\u00a0 The Greek word martyr<\/em> that we translate \u201cwitness\u201d has more than one meaning.\u00a0 Yes, it means being a first-person eye-witness of some person, event, or experience.\u00a0 But how are we to communicate that testimony?\u00a0 We focus too much on the communication part, the verbal telling, and not enough on the ethos of its conveyance.<\/p>\nThere are layers to what it means to be a witness.\u00a0 To be a \u201cwitness,\u201d to be a \u201cmartyr\u201d is really to live and die for the other.\u00a0 That is our witness.\u00a0 Jesus didn\u2019t call us to \u201cwin\u201d others to a way of thinking or the way we understand theology.\u00a0 He calls us to die for our neighbor, or, our enemy.\u00a0 How do we do that?\u00a0 We live sacrificially.\u00a0 We live with the other\u2019s well-being in mind.\u00a0 We live concerned about their physical needs as much as their spiritual needs.\u00a0 We live aware of their needs before our own.\u00a0 We live to raise them up, even if it means we lower ourselves.\u00a0 It means we often listen more than talk.\u00a0 It means we try to see things from their point of view.\u00a0 It means we become their protector and advocate\u2014especially if they are on the fringes, the outer layers of society\u2014the \u201cleast\u201d of these.\u00a0 It means we journey with them as friends.<\/p>\n
Christian: Quit trying to \u201cwin\u201d souls and start trying to die to yourself instead.\u00a0 That<\/em> is being a witness; that<\/em> is evangelism.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a follow-up to this post, there is another aspect of evangelism that needs to be re-thought for those coming out of fundamentalist or evangelical backgrounds.\u00a0 Many of us were taught to think of evangelism as \u201cwinning souls.\u201d\u00a0 We were to engage, speak to, and \u201cwin\u201d the person to Christ.\u00a0 Yes, we knew we had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3524,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[146,194,494,503,506],"class_list":["post-151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-evangelism","tag-humility","tag-winning","tag-witness","tag-witnessing"],"yoast_head":"\n
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