Evangelism of Love

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Evangelism. It’s a thing that every Christian is called to do. The Great Commission found in all four gospels. Yet how many of us Christians actually tell others about Christ on a daily or even weekly basis?

It seems to be something that scares us. I know our churches have many programs that teach us how to witness to a person but oftentimes that can feel structured and impersonal. We wonder what if I get it wrong or what if the person doesn’t accept Jesus. 

But what if we learned to evangelized to others from a place of love and relationship based on our own relationship with God? What if we went to the world with an evangelism of love. A love that helps them to understand who they are in God and that they were created with a purpose. 

What if we saw everyone we met through the eyes of God, as He created them to be and not as they actually were in the moment. Let me tell you a story. 

MY NEW FRIEND JASON

For a number of years, I’ve been asking the Lord to help me to understand how much He loves me so that I can love others in the same way.

Recently we had this conversation again and I felt such a passion in my heart to be able to do this, that I asked him once again to help me to love others as He does. 

That very same night I made a new friend. His name was Jason. 

I’d gone to buy dinner around, on that evening and as I was about to start the car to drive off, a young man approached and asked if I’d like to have the car washed.

I thought it strange that he’d be washing cars at that time of night, plus it had been raining so who in their right mind would want a car wash in a muddy car park? 

I politely said no but then he asked if I had any change to spare. I’ll be honest, immediately I thought drug addict or alcoholic so I said “not today”.

I chose my words carefully. I hadn’t checked to see if I had actually had any change I could spare so I didn’t want to  say no, but saying “Not today” I really meant that I wasn’t going to give today. 

You see this is usually a bit of a challenge for me… saying no to someone on the street who asks me for money. The truth is I find myself in these situations quite often. You know, where someone is asking for money… and I probably give way more than I should, so for a few weeks prior to this I was actually practicing my “Nos”. (I’m sure there’s another lesson that I need to learn in there somewhere).

I started the car and reached for my phone to play my new favorite song. It was Lauren Daigle’s new single “You Say”. It speaks about believing only what God says about us. 

Before the song could even begin, I heard the Holy Spirit say loud and clear, “Aren’t you going to tell him who he is?”.

I sighed and looked at my daughter who was with me. She said “ You’re going to give him money aren’t you.” I said “Probably, but first I have to tell him what God wants him to know.” (Which is probably what I should have done in the first place).

So my daughter and I put together some money to give him and I called him over. 

Usually before I hand over money in a situation like this I try to find out a bit more about the person and how they got on the streets in the first place. So I asked him his name and asked him to tell me a little about his situation. 

Basically, he was not working but was trying not to be idle. He washes cars during the day but it had been raining that entire week and he hadn’t made much money. He was just trying to make enough that night to get something to eat. 

By this point I had turned off the car and leaned on the side of the driver’s window and he had turned down his bucket and was sitting on it as we chatted. 

I told him who he was. That he was a child of God with a purpose, a purpose that was determined even before he took his first breath on this earth, and his purpose was waiting to be fulfilled. Then i asked him what he liked to do.

He told me that he liked to fix things, anything. I knew he was thinking along the lines of the things he was accustomed to doing to make a living but I was trying to get him to think about his natural talents.

So I asked him what he would do even if he wouldn’t get paid. He then replied that he loved anything involving art and crafts, he loved to makethings with his hands. I encouraged him to do so. To ask God how he could use the talents He gave him to provide for himself. 

I didn’t have to do much prompting for him to ask God. Jason already had some relationship with him. I’ve seen this a lot when I talk to people on the street. They know God at a certain level but they don’t make things that they can have a full relationship with him. 

When I left Jason that night, he was encouraged to go after his passions. I haven’t been in that particular food shop since then but when I do I hope I see him. I’d like to get an update on how he is doing. 

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love

1 John 4:18

PERFECT LOVE CASTS OUT FEAR

I know my story doesn’t really mention love or evangelism I could literally feel the love of the Father for Jason as I told him what the Lord was saying.  

My question is do we focus enough on the Love commandments? Those two commandments (Matthew 22:36-39) put simply say, “Love God, love people.”  Whenever we mention love there is always the pushback of “Oh we have to tell people about hell too”. 

Sure we have to tell them about hell, we should tell them about hell. Hell is a real place, an awful, awful place where there is no God, therefore there is no good. Where there is no Jesus, therefore there is no hope. 

But to come to God because of a fear of hell is to build a relationship based on fear. 1 John 4:18 says “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love”. 

It should be our greatest desire for all to come to know the perfect love of God. I will tell you, maybe it was fear that brought me to God, but it’s His love that keeps me. A Love that will never let me go. 

When I mess up, or feel discouraged, when I feel like I’ll never accomplish all that he’s called me to do, it’s His Love that brings me back from that dark, miry place.

It’s the thought that He created me out of love, an exquisite work of art and sent me here with a purpose. That’s what encourages me again. 

I always say, if the world only knew how much God loves them, they’d come running to Him. Maybe they don’t know because we haven’t told them. 

If you meet someone this week and think that there is something God needs them to know, just ask the Lord what he wants you to say. It might just be one word, but that might be all they need.

Come back and let me know how you showed the love of God this week.