Jesus
modelled the conventional methodology of evangelism where He went about doing
good and healing all who were sick, liberating people who were under the
tyranny of evil and sharing the message of the kingdom of God (Acts
10:38). The journey of Jesus was arduous and challenging, quite often
pushed, humiliated, turned down to enter the city and in some cases was begged to leave the place, yet Jesus was relentless in what He was assigned to
do by His Father by personally reaching out to people.
Present
day evangelism has almost replaced this personal touch by usage of technology.
Ministries use various portals - Websites, social media, Facebook,
Google Plus, YouTube for example, to communicate the Gospel. I
don't intend to rake up a debate as to which of these portals are effective and draws
people to Christ. I want to definitely echo with Apostle Paul who says in 1
Corinthians 9:22 “…So that I may by all means [in
any and every way] save some [by leading them to faith in Jesus Christ]”
AMP. What stands as a concern is that in most cases the content in the literature and in all portals addresses Christian groups exclusively and appeals to Christians only. Unless one is equipped to reach people through a different stand point, we will remain strangers to them. Note this is not about compromising.
Most
of the Christian leaders and lay people are in at least one WhatsApp Christian
group. You will concur with me that you are flooded with devotional messages,
Bible verses, quotes, videos, etc which accumulates to mass junk and needs a delete quite frequently, How great would it be if each person decides to share a quote or a thought with a Non-Christian friend and lead him/her to Christ? Think about it. We all need encouragement from each other but more than us are the people out there who need a Savior. The other thing is that people find you and include you in their group (without asking your
permission) and start bombarding you with messages and forwards. Sometimes it’s
amusing when a person is surprised to find himself/herself in a group and leave
the group with frustration wondering who added them. It verges in nuisance
sometimes. Christians, lay people, pastors’, leaders are busy forwarding
umpteen messages most of it counts to nothing more than junk.
R.
Stanley from Blessing Youth Mission often challenges us with these
words, “We are busy Evangelizing the
evangelized, Christianizing the Christians, Baptizing the baptized, converting
the converted and neglecting the neglected.”. Sad
yet so true. Most of the time people derive
happiness thinking they are fully involved in sharing and encouraging Christian
people. The truth is very different.
In
the flipside we hear of pastors and evangelists facing severe persecution
in parts of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and many parts of
Northern India and also in different parts of the world. People are trying to
connect with people in person and are braving persecution. According to World
Watch list 2018 India ranks 11th in terms of the intensity of
persecution. You can download from the given link to know which rank your
country falls in terms of persecution. https://www.opendoorsusa.org/christian-persecution/world-watch-list/ what
is our contribution to these poor missionaries?
Can
we give a serious thought to stop evangelizing Christians and educate one another to be a
witness for God in the true sense? If it is technology then is good to ensure
that one does not intend to promote himself or his organization but to lift
Christ alone. My plea is that if we could encourage people with sound knowledge to write articles, pen down their thoughts that can be sent to
the general crowd, in workplaces and any other platforms where
non-Christians make up the majority.
Blessings,
David Raj
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