You may be the person that gets a
person interested in the gospel but are unable to get a
commitment from them and then another person comes in and
they respond quickly to the gospel. In the last chapter we
looked at what we can do to help a person go from unbelief
to belief. Each person is at a different stage and needs to
be approached differently.
The truth is, we will likely relate
better with one type of people better than others. There are
those of us who prefer facts to people often. These people
have a rock solid foundation for their beliefs. They may be
best able to reach out to people who are looking for answers
because they have researched their own beliefs and they have
good support and evidence for what they believe.
Then there are others of us who are
more relational. These people may be lost in when trying to
explain the answer to a tough question in understandable
terms but may do very well with a person who knows they need
something in their life but can’t figure out what it is.
Common interests between yourself and
another may be the greatest opportunity you have. If your
greatest interest is in NASCAR and you are trying to relate
to someone who loves to crochet, you may have more
difficulty than if you are relating to another sports fan.
Sometimes it boils down to something so simple.
This doesn’t mean that person isn’t
worth presenting the gospel to or that you should focus your
efforts somewhere else. If God gives you an opportunity, you
should take it regardless.
The emphasis of Paul’s writing in 1
Corinthians is that we are all working together for one
common goal. People are not evangelism projects. We don’t
claim non-believers and tell others to stay away because you
got there first. Such an attitude would be foolish. One
thing that we need to watch for are some small number of
people who are insensitive about non-believers and may give
Christians a bad name. Occasionally it may be necessary to
shelter a friend from someone like this, but otherwise we
shouldn’t view people as “ours”.
(What do I mean by this? Unfortunately
Christians aren’t perfect. If there was a person in your
church who was racist and you brought a friend of another
race to church with you, it would be best to steer them away
such a person or they might mistakenly get the impression
that they are not welcome in your church, or worse, that all
Christians are racist. Ideally this would not be a problem
and you would be able to address such a problem with another
Christian. Realistically though, every church has people in
it who give Christians a bad name.)
It is the church’s job to bring a
person to Christ and see them grow into mature Christians.
Anytime there is a new person at your church you should go
out of your way to make them feel welcome. When they are
consistent in their attendance but uninvolved in church
activities you should be willing to invite them to a church
special event, Sunday school, or Wednesday evening service.
It doesn’t matter if someone else brought them or if they
showed up on their own. Even the Christian who feels like
they are unskilled to teach or talk about the Bible to other
non-Christians should be able to do these simple things.
These are important parts of the entire evangelism process.
Next Section -
An Example from Real Life
