What Evangelism is Not

[Part Two in an ongoing series]
Considering the challenges that we face in our churches in regard to evangelism, before we can consider a healthy approach to evangelism we need to deal with some common misconceptions about evangelism, notions that we often use to excuse ourselves from this vital Christian faith practice. First, a story.

A few years ago, a congregation I was serving was looking for a pastor who would offer leadership in evangelism. While we had a surprisingly difficult time finding candidates who were comfortable with that role, the real wake-up call came about halfway through the search process when the call committee staged a mini-revolt. One member of the committee summed up, “We don’t want a pastor who will make us stand on street corners or go from house to house ringing doorbells!”

The first word we need to hear is that evangelism is not confrontation. In the book Bluebeard’s Egg, Margaret Atwood tells about a woman who had an encounter with a former missionary. Atwood relates that, for this character, “religious people of any serious kind made her nervous: they were like men in raincoats who might or might not be flashers.” Commenting on that line in Evangelism for “Normal” People, John Bowen concludes, “This is how one of Canada’s most articulate and sensitive writers views evangelism: it is dehumanizing, violent, and inappropriate.” Bowen uses this image of “flasher evangelism” frequently, and not surprisingly, as an indictment against what has, too often, been perceived as the standard M.O. for evangelism.

I remember once encountering a zealous Christian. His brow was furrowed, he seemed anxious and impatient, and he sounded angry. Then he told me God loved me.

Rebecca Manley Pippert, Out of the Saltshaker

Evangelism is not something that we ‘ought to’ or even ‘need to’ do. All the talk we hear these days of “reclaiming the Great Commission” is based, at least in part, on the assumption that evangelism is a task that we can “work ourselves up to,” if only we have enough faith. Bowen writes, “For Christians to talk about the gospel is a sign of health; to talk about evangelism is a sign that something is wrong. David Watson says something similar: ‘Having to stress the Great Commission, and having to urge people to witness, is not a sign of spiritual life, but a sign of spiritual decadence.’ ”

Evangelists are not Lone Rangers who have in their hands the power to set the world right. Evangelism is not an announcement designed to scare people into avoiding judgment and condemnation. Evangelism is not simply a matter of saving individual souls, of keeping individuals out of hell or even guaranteeing their entry into heaven. Evangelism is not the pronouncement of a surefire way to find happiness, self-fulfillment, self-realization or prosperity.

Evangelism is not a matter of delivering memorized speeches, nor is evangelism dependent upon knowing the proper technique. Bowen writes, “The hunger for ‘how-to’ books (not to mention how-to lectures, seminars, conferences, videos and tapes) is the fruit of a particular modernist culture, one that says things such as these:

• You can do it.
• You don’t need help (apart from this book).
• You are competent (once you watch this video).
• What matters is to get the job done.
• You get more achieved if you think of life as a series of projects.
• Get the results you want.”

And he concludes, “I believe that kind of attitude has hampered the life of the church, and not least the activity we call evangelism.”One of the best biblical examples of evangelism can be found in the story of Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well. It would be difficult to support any of the above assumptions about evangelism on the basis of this story. Indeed, if the above expectations were at work in the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman, Jesus would have greeted the woman with the words, “Good day, Madam. I am the Messiah and you are a sinner. Repent and believe in me.”

To put this into a modern parable, consider what would happen if you walked up to someone on the street and asked, “Are you ready to marry me today?” If we can identify what is missing in such a proposal, then we are well on our way to identifying what is missing from our most frequently held ideas about evangelism.

Next: Evangelism is God’s Idea, Not Ours

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