Steve's Letter: "What's the Gospel? What's Evangelism?" (Part 2)

I can't believe that I'm still talking about evangelism...but I am.

As I've said before, I haven't always had a great "passion for souls." Heck, I didn't have any passion for souls at all. It's not that I'm calloused or anything. It's just that I don't even know their names. A lost soul, without my knowing them, was not something that kept me up at night.

Don't get me wrong. As I said last month, I've always been faithful to the task of doing what I'm supposed to do regarding evangelism. If God put me on an airplane next to a pagan and he or she made it clear that God was going to be the subject, I would share my faith and then invite them into a relationship with Christ. I've taught evangelism courses and taken people and trained them on how to do evangelism training. And, when a text in the Bible warranted it, I've presented a plan of salvation, often saying to the person, "Don't ever say that nobody ever told you. I just told you...and now the ball is in your court."

I've even done evangelism (and trained students) on summer beach projects for InterVarsity and Campus Crusade for Christ.

Talk about being uncomfortable. When you're an old white guy, look the way I do and talk to people about Jesus on a beach filled with partying college students, they think you're a dirty old man as in, "You want to talk about Jesus? Sure you do, you old codger" (wink, wink).

What was I saying? Oh yes. I've been faithful to do what Jesus told me to do about evangelism and, with all the humility I can muster, I'm good at getting people to Jesus. It was always surprising (still is) to me the number of people who have said that I was the one responsible for sending them to Jesus and for the salvation they received from him. I guess I'm pleased with that, but I would rather have been told that I was handsome or something. (Nobody ever says that.)

So, I've done what Jesus told me to do and, frankly, I wouldn't have done it for anybody but Jesus. I just didn't care. I would care about you, if you were lost. I would care about anyone in my family, on my staff or among my friends who were lost...even to the point of tears. But everybody else could go to hell...and it wouldn't keep me up at night.

Well, that's changed and I've started caring. I don't know why exactly. Maybe it's old age or the medication I'm on. Then I suppose it could be the Holy Spirit. But whatever it is...God help me, I care...I really do care.

If you were paying attention last month, I wrote about evangelism and said that there are two truths that are integral to evangelism. Last month we saw that evangelism isn't what you do, but who you are. This month let me share the second:

The main business of evangelism isn't "them" but "us."

Now that doesn't make sense to me. But then, God never required that I understand; but when he says it, I kind of take it as incontrovertible truth.

In John 13, you'll remember that Jesus washed his disciples' feet. Now that was a radical thing to do. But sometimes the radical nature of what he said after he had washed their feet is missed. He said, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another" (verses 34-35).

And then in John 17, the "high priestly prayer" of Jesus, Jesus prays for his disciples and then he prays for us (those who believed because of them). Jesus prays, "I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one...so that the world may believe that you have sent me" (verses 20-21).

That doesn't give us much wiggle room, does it?

If I understand what Jesus is saying, it is that as long as I'm your problem and you're my problem...our unbelieving teenagers, co-workers, fellow students, teachers, neighbors and friends are never going to hear and accept the Gospel. The key isn't how well we present the Gospel, how much we know, how theologically correct we are, how pure we are or how faithful. The key is how we love one another.

But it's worse than that! Not only do we have to love everybody who belongs to Jesus, we don't even get the right to define the "one another"...who does and who doesn't belong to Jesus. That's the really hard part.

If I can determine who really, really belongs to Jesus, that definition will include people who are pretty much like me, believe the same doctrines I believe, worship the way I worship and understand the faith the way I understand it. The others may be nice people...but as long as I can define where the "circle" is and who is in it and who is outside of it, I can do the love thing.

In Mark 9, John, a disciple of Jesus, tried to draw that circle too small and pointed it out to Jesus. John said that he had seen someone casting out a demon in the name of Jesus. John was quite upset and tried to stop him because "he was not following us" (i.e. didn't believe what we believe, know what we know and follow you the way we follow you).

John expected to be commended by Jesus and just the opposite happened. Jesus said, "Do not stop him, for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. For the one who is not against us is for us" (verses 39-40).

Jesus, does that mean I have to love liberals? What about Pentecostals and Dispensationalists? And does that include Roman Catholics and even Methodists and Baptists? What about Joel Osteen and Benny Hinn and cold Calvinists and weird cultists who don't think I'm saved? What about......

Yes!!!

What do you mean, "Yes"?

I want to say to God (but thought better of it), "Don't you have any convictions?"

I did ask how I could tell who is and who isn't a part of the family and he told me that was way above my pay level.

He told me that he would sort it out in the end (Matthew 25).

I told you that I cared about evangelism...but once I understood, I almost decided that I didn't care. Do you know why? Because there is a difference between a problem and a fact. A problem is something you can fix and a fact is something you simply have to accept and deal with as best you can.

Let me give you a fact: There are some people who drive me nuts...people who use the name of Christ. There are limits and I have them. It's not a problem...it's a fact.

Did you hear about the couple who went to the doctor? He was examined and then asked to leave the office while the doctor talked to the wife. "Your husband is in very serious trouble," he said to the man's wife. "In fact, to keep him alive, you are going to have to cater to his needs, cook food he enjoys, let him rest when he wants to rest, never criticize him, and affirm him a lot more than you are doing now."

When the wife came out of the office, her husband asked her what the doctor had said.

"He said," she told her husband, "that you're going to die!

If it were dependent on me, I could say to the lost, "You're going to die and be lost for all of eternity because, frankly, there are some people who drive me up the wall and in order to see you know Jesus, I have to love them and, that being impossible, you are just going to have to stay lost."

That's when I realized what Jesus said in the text I gave you in John 13: Look at it again. Jesus said, "...just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

Oh!

The first step in loving those who are hard to love is not loving them...it's allowing him to love you when you don't deserve it. Why is that? Because you can't love until you've been loved and then you can only love to the degree you have been loved.

Okay, this is your homework assignment if you care about the lost:

Just let Jesus love you.

That's it. He asked me to tell you.

In His Grip,

Steve