Chapter Four — Systematic Evangelism
any Christians go their entire lives without being used by God to be the human instrument and means by which a person comes to Christ. My own call ing is not as an evangelist, but seeing another human being come to Christ is the most meaningful ministry experience I've ever had.
I once was hired by a church to be the minister of the ology, which meant that my job was to teach. They also added to my job description "minister of evangelism." I
What Is the Great Commission?
said I didn't know anything about evangelism. So, they sent me to a seminar to train in evangelism.
The minister leading the seminar talked about how to memorize an outline, how he uses key questions to stimu late discussion, and how there's a pattern to the way in which evangelism is to flow. The idea behind the method he used was to focus attention on the ultimate issue of a person's individual redemption—how can he justify him self before God? Most people will say that they have lived a good life; very few will say that they have been justified by faith alone in Christ alone.
Methods such as these have much to recommend them. They are easy to learn, and they make it possible for people to engage in discussions about Christianity, though care must be taken that one is not simply reading a script but rather is really connecting with the other person.
Ultimately, evangelism is less about the method one uses and more about the message one proclaims. Evange lism, remember, is the proclamation of the gospel—telling the story, announcing the news. Some fear that they don't know enough to evangelize. I say, "Tell them what you do know." Leave the defense of the truth claims to the apologist and hold forth the simple message of the gospel.
Systematic Evangelism
Anyone who has the ability to speak about three or four simple principles can become an effective evangelist. This is where evangelism programs and training can help.
The book of Acts tells us of Stephen, the first Christian martyr. He is stoned to death in chapter 7, upon which a terrible persecution breaks out. It looks as if the end of the nascent church might be near. But then we read:
And Saul approved of his [Stephen's] execution. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. (Acts 8:1–4)
How did the Christian church move from twelve people to an army? Then to a nation? Then to an entire empire, and eventually to become the greatest cultural influence in West ern civilization? The secret is right there in the last verse:
What Is the Great Commission?
"Those who were scattered went about preaching the word."
Who were they who were scattered abroad? There was a great persecution against the church at Jerusalem, and they were all scattered abroad, throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria—all except the Apostles. It was the rank-andfile believers who caused this enormous expansion of the early church.
Is there any structure to this spreading evangelism that we can find in the book of Acts? Yes—we see in the first chapter of Acts that the commission is given to the early church by Jesus: "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" (Acts 1:8). This description follows the pattern of the Great Commission.
The Apostles and the early believers were also commis sioned to make a specific announcement. When we analyze the preaching found in the book of Acts, we repeatedly see what theologians call the kerygma, or "proclamation," which is the same essential message in every sermon. This message consists of the basic realities of the death, resur rection, and ascension of Christ. Then, in addition to the kerygma, we find in the New Testament the emergence of
Systematic Evangelism what was called the didachē, or "teaching," which supple mented the initial proclamation of Christ's salvific work.
The organization of the church usually worked in this fashion: Christians went out and proclaimed the gospel. Other people responded to the gospel, were baptized, and then were immediately taught the content of the didachē. This was similar to what we might think of as learning a catechism or the essential teachings of the church. That's when new believers learned about the broad outlines of God's work in the world, from creation to the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to His current work through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. The church did not try to wait until the world was educated in Judaism or even in all of the theology of Christianity before calling the world to commitment to Christ.
Teaching is vitally important. But, generally speaking, it is best received after a person has responded to the gos pel. We cannot educate people into the kingdom of God. Education is something that takes place after conversion. So, the New Testament church was mobilized, it was ener gized, and it had vision to go out and, in a very simple way, present the gospel and then follow up with teaching. I call this approach "systematic evangelism."
What Is the Great Commission?
At my previous church, we began to visit people in their homes for the purpose of evangelism. When we identified ourselves as representatives of the Presbyterian church, the initial responses and assumptions of our hosts were that we were coming for money or inviting them for church membership. That's the only reason Presbyterians had ever visited them before. We would say, "We're not here to ask you for a pledge card. We're not here even to ask you to join our church. We're here to talk to you about Christ." It blew them away.
This approach was systematic, mobilized, and sched uled. At times, it seemed so mechanical and uninspiring. But we went, week after week, for a year and a half. We would come together as the church, then we would go out together in teams; before anybody set foot in that com munity, we had corporate prayer, kneeling and praying for every single person who went out into that community. They knew that the church was behind them in this mis sion. In the end, we met and explained the gospel to many people whom we might not have come across had we used a less systematic approach.