What a wonderful analogy. We work for God and he tells us that the only way to him is through his son. SO we have nothing else to do but promote his son. In promoting his son, we do exacly what he did as he did. Love, no greater love than this than a man lay down his life…by this all men know that ye are my disciples if we have love one with the other…we are told to love our enemies and our friends -are they not the same. We were put here to love and when we love we share…what do we share. Jesus, was born of a virgin, lived and taught us how to live, died on a cross, rose from the dead, assended to heaven…before he left, he told us to continue the things be began to do and to teach.

Coach, I love the analogy of you and your atheiest friend…both do great things, yet there is a major difference.

Tammy

I enjoy evangelism and our church is engaged in what we call “street witnessing”. I do believe we miss Matthew 28 a bit when it says “Go ye therefore”. What this really means is therefore, as you go…tell others about the good news of me…when you are in the store, work, play, game, etc. share the news…be ready when the opportunity arrises.

I know that others have a set approach, however, I do believe you can not script this too much…you must first know the message and be flexible and adaptive to change the course at any given moment. I ususally change my approach depending on the person I am in contact at the moment. I like to personalize most engagement, unless I am speaking to a group then that would be different, however one on one requires you to deal with just that one. You are right in your article. Jesus does tell us to compell them, however, it is more about the attitude first in which we Evangelize…then the attitude will drive the actions.

Sometimes, I start the conversation off simply building the relatinship…then I move in depending on the person. When I want them to do more talking, I ask open-ended questions. When I want them to talk less, I ask closed-ended quesitons. Sometimes I simply say, “What are some special prayer needs you may have or that the family may have? or Are there any special prayer needs.” Then, depending on what they say, I proceed from there. I never like to invade people’s private time…this is why we have to be guided by the Holy Spirit and not simply Evangelize because we have a mission to get 10 people to evangelize on the “2nd Saturday in September”, etc.

Yep, you got it. My atheist friend is a nice guy who loves to fund clean water projects and serve in Habitat for Humanity. He’s a great guy.

We both do nice things, for different reasons.

Chris

I didn’t realize that point, about the non-christians friends and there love. I was so blinded by my own hurt that I left out the most important part and that is where this wonderful LOVE came from.

I wanted to so desperately to show others love that I focused on myself and the acts of LOVE that I ignored the ONE who gave it to me.

Thank-you for being honest. I will grow from this.

Sincerely, Maria

After HE began showing HIS LOVE through HIS ministry then the people were drawn to HIM. When people heard about what HE was doing they wanted to see who this MAN was. Who would want to heal people, who would want to feed the multitudes. who would want to raise the dead, who would want to forgive a prostitute, who would want to give HIS life for other people? Because of HIS LOVE being demonstrated it was drawing the people in.

SO if we show the same LOVE that JESUS showed, one by one we will draw the people in.

Sincerely, Maria

You’ve made my point:

“So then the person is drawn to what made this person show them this kindness or LOVE, Then this opens the door to share JESUS in a real way.”

What I think many fail to do is take that second step — sharing JESUS. If we only show LOVE but don’t explain our faith at some point, we’ve missed the point and the recipients of our action can draw all sorts of conclusions and make guesses as to what it means.

Every person has the capacity to show love. My athesist friend, my Hindu friend, my Buddhist friend, my agnostic friend.

What difference does it make to the recipient of our action unless we can explain why our faith motivates us? How does our action set us apart from anyone who does random acts of kindness?

Of course my friends can explain their motives just as well, so the recipient still needs to be drawn to the Love of God that is found in Christ.

Thanks for chiming in.

Look at JESUS HE always met the need of other people, HE always GAVE of Himself. He put others before Himself. We are to imitate HIM and what better way to imitate Jesus by being HIS HANDs and FEET.

Sincerely, Maria

LOVE draws people in, maybe not at first but it will eventually. GOD is LOVE and HIS Spirit is in us and if HIS Spirit is in us then HIS LOVE is there so if we practice WALKING in HIS LOVE then we will be better at wittnessing when the time comes.
Sincerely, Maria