Evangelism Road Show

I am spending part of this week leading events for the Nebraska Region of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). This annual event is called the Evangelism Road Show. The name causes me to envision myself as a carnival barker out selling cheap junk to an unwary public.

I understand that this annual event started because it was almost impossible to attract church leaders to a centralize evangelism event and it was thought that making attendance more convenient by offering several sites would attract larger crowds. There is some wisdom in that thinking and making the events convenient does seem to draw a better crowd. But I sense that inconvenience is not the major motivator in the lack of attendance.

Evangelism is something that the mainline church doesn’t exactly excel at. (Yes, I know the preposition shouldn’t be at the end of the sentence.) No argument here since our churches are dwindling at a rapid rate and surveys say that only 20 to 32 percent of the U.S. population is regularly attending church worship services. I suspect that part of the problem has been the “homogenization” of our theology and concept of God to make it blend in with other world religions. We don’t want to offend people of other beliefs by purporting to adhere to a “superior” religion – a religion that can produce better or different results than theirs. Over the past 50 years our theologians have led us to believe that it really doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you are sincere. All religions are interchangeable, Christianity is not unique and there is really no such thing as ultimate truth. In this system of thought, one may believe as one pleases and God will be alright with that. Maybe God is just thrilled that we have even thought about God. Such a belief system pretty much takes the wind out of our evangelism sails. Why bother with evangelism? We, as Christians, have nothing unique and life changing to share with others – so we don’t.

In our efforts to make God more socially acceptable and as we work to develop a god made in our image, we have endowed God with the mistaken present day philosophy that if you really love someone you must approve of everything they do. Since God loves us, He/She is just thrilled with whatever choices we make and whatever lifestyles we choose to live. Obviously those who espouse such a philosophy either have never had children, have very low expectations of their children or are not paying close attention to their children. My parents loved me often in spite of the choices I made. They had no problem letting me know both that they didn’t agree with me and that they deeply loved me. It works people – give it a try. Anyway, the more we have humanized our God; the more we have developed a God who is not that helpful or interesting and not worth talking about.

God is no longer to be feared. He/She has become a benevolent grandparent who thinks whatever we do is okay and certainly would not punish us for our behaviors. As one seminary professor said, “Evangelism isn’t as important as it once was since we canceled Hell.” I am not a big proponent of preaching a hellfire and damnation God theology. I am so profoundly impressed with a God who loves me, that is just about all I can talk about. Heaven’s great and I want to go there and take as many people with me as possible, but I am so impressed with how knowing and following God can impact our lives in the here and now, I find that to be sufficient motivation to share my faith and faith story. But the reality is, the God of Scripture can be ticked off and the results of His/Her anger is universally unpleasant. An angry God is not my favorite subject, but it is one that must be faced and understood.

My question about evangelism, or the lack thereof, comes down to this. If I have a going, growing, living, life-impacting relationship with the God of the universe, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords who loves with an amazing love, how can I keep from sharing that God with others? If Christianity is just an activity in my life and God is just an idea, maybe not. But if God is real, and I believe He/She is, then you can’t shut me up. Evangelism will just happen. How about you? Is the God you know worth talking about?

Instead of staying home this coming Sunday morning and worshiping the God you made up in your head, why not go to church and worship the God who has been revealed through Scripture? While you’re at it, why don’t you bring someone you want to introduce to that wonderful God?

Copyright © 2012, William T. McConnell, All Rights Reserved