Words'nTone

I am going to get in trouble here, but that’s the way it goes.  Shouldn’t surprise regular readers of Words’nTone.  You can search the New Testament high and low and you will not find the Gospel writers (Luke, James, Peter, or John, even Paul) dwelling on the subject of evangelism.  I know to speak against or downplay evangelism (that is, contemporary, individualistic, personal evangelism) is like committing sacrilege—and it certainly would not make one a popular candidate for a pastoral position in today’s modern church.  (Maybe that’s one reason the a pastoral position continues to allude me.) I have been a student of the Bible for over 31 years, not just over three decades.  I have a Masters in New Testament Theology (with a Greek concentration).  I have been a New Testament and Greek Professor at a Bible College and Graduate school, and have pastored churches for about ten years.  And I still get strange looks and condemning comments when I ask where are the commands to evangelize.  Of course I appreciate the passion of those who are committed “verbal witnesses,” who make it part of their daily lives to share Christ with others.  I am moved by the commitment of those who weekly participate in programs like Evangelism Explosion and witnessing teams.  But as a formal command to share the Gospel or for a church to develop and plan for evangelism (and to tell people in the pews it is their job, their responsibility to do the work of evangelism), there is a lack in New Testament scripture of such a perspective and application.

Go make disciples (Matthew 28:19), of course.  The general call to preach the gospel to all creation (Mark 16:15), this is there, too.  The promise of being Christ’s witness to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8), yes, indeed that is there as well.  Some will think these are enough to suggest each individual Christian is responsible to evangelize.  My issue, however, is we all too often attach “witnessing” and “evangelism” to growing my church, our individual local congregation.  There is that expectation, as if the burden to bring “in the numbers” is a people-of-the-pew responsibility.  But go ahead, read each New Testament Letter and find me one place where Paul, James, Peter or John (or Luke for that matter) commands those individual churches to get busy evangelizing, or calls for individual Christians among the congregations to go out and bring people in.

Why I am even bringing this up?  Don’t I care about people going to hell?  Why wouldn’t I emphasize evangelism?  What’s wrong with me?  I think this cognitive approach to spreading the Gospel is an excuse for actually not doing the work of the Kingdom.  I believe church leadership uses this “place-the-burden-on-the-pew” approach to evangelism to replace their responsibility for fulfilling true leadership and the call of pastoring.  New Testament writers seems to be more concerned about expanding the influence of Jesus, His kingdom and His righteousness than making a series of individualistic, building-centered church bodies just increase their body-count (i.e., attendance numbers).  I’d like to see more biblical theology on church growth (and not just social trends and sociological studies—all good and could be useful, but not just for numerical church growth).  The church is called to be an expanding temple of Christ—moving outward, expanding outward to encompass more territory demographically and geographically.  As we seek to develop plans for evangelism, church leadership is to, well, lead (and that means do, people, do, not just talk or preach), and whole congregations should implement ways to expand the kingdom, which includes it social dimensions, not just its personal application.  It seems to me that the New Testament writers spent their writing time disciplining and assisting the local church communities to be better “Cities” on their respective “hills” and evoking the church’s leadership to lead in developing in this type of evangelism, that is, the growth and advance of the kingdom of God and God’s righteousness.

Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.