The Love Factor

What comes to your mind when you think of the word “evangelism”? You probably think of that maniac on TV who is always yelling at people for no reason and making no sense whatsoever. Maybe you think of that guy on the corner of the street downtown who is yelling into his megaphone and throwing bibles at people. Some of you who have been on mission trips might have a better idea of evangelism than others. You probably see it is sharing the Gospel with people, no matter what method it is. Let me ask you a question? When do you think the last time YOU evangelized was? Think about it for a minute. 

Evangelism is simply defined as “proclaiming of the Gospel”. Nowhere in that definition do you see anything about megaphones, TV screamo pastors, or even uncomfortable situations. It is simply proclaiming the Gospel. Lets be honest, we all worry about and perhaps even dread bringing up Jesus or church or God with our non-Christian friends. It is NOT an easy thing to do for most people. You constantly look for ways to rapidly switch up the subject from sports to God. While there is a place for random God conversations and random Gospel sharing, I am going to suggest and much more simple and most likely more effective type of evangelism. 

Here is the most effective type of evangelism: LOVE PEOPLE!!!!! The greatest commandment is to love God and to love one another. LOVE ONE ANOTHER! LOVE PEOPLE! Love non-believers! The single most important need that human beings have is to love, be loved, and to be significant. If all you are doing is beating them over the head with a bible or pestering them about God, how is that loving them? The way you act and the way you treat people is evangelism. Treat people like Jesus treated people, act like Jesus acted, love like Jesus loved. We have the perfect model of evangelism in the New Testament and we straight up ignore it. We pass out John 3:16 tracks and focus on conversions instead of on loving people. Not everyone Jesus talked to chose to follow him, some people, even after encountering Jesus, chose to walk away from Him. Evangelizing is not about selling the Gospel in order to see how many conversions we can get. Evangelism is about living like Jesus and loving people to no end. 

Beating someone over the head with bible is not loving them at all. People desire to love and be loved more than anything else in the world. Jesus loved people. He loved EVERYONE, not just the people he liked or his close Christian friends. Here is my suggestion for how YOU should evangelize. Love people, and help them feel like they belong. In our generation, belonging leads to believing, not the other way around. When a new person shows up at church, don’t wait for them to believe until you decide to love them. You must love them into believing!!! 

So how are you supposed to minister to your friends? I am not saying that talking directly about the Gospel out of nowhere is a bad idea, because it is not, it is an awesome idea. I am just suggesting that maybe the best way to show Jesus to your lost friend is to simply love them, make them feel like they belong, and to act like Jesus. Get rid of your cynical self, get rid of your unloving self, get rid of your selfish, bubble filled world, and go love your friends like Jesus would have loved them.