Note: This is an extended written version of an audio contribution shared on Sat.11/07/2020 at a zoom conference of GBUR graduates on how to practically pursue the evangelistic call of the ministry in these unpredictable changes brought by the Covid19 pandemic using the Home-Based Evangelism (HBE) tool.

The world changes, times change. They will continue to do so. But the problem of man will not. The Good News of Jesus Christ as God’s appointed solution to it will not. The question being discussed here Is this: Is there a clear, succinct, presentable content of the Gospel at our disposal to share with people in these days when our patterns of life are irreversibly changing?

The answer is a resounding YES! For it to be effective and outlive the changing times, our presentation of the Gospel must keep together two essential aspects: There is a core message to preach and there is a real-life context of the people we are preaching to. 

1. A CORE MESSAGE.

1 Cor.2:1-5: 
And I when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech of wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him Crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. (1 Cor.2:1-5)

1 Cor.15:1-6,11:
“Now  I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you-unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas then to the Twelve…Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.”

Let’s begin with the very vocabulary we use. Gospel means Good News. The gospel is a news, and a news that is exciting, glorious and urgent, to share with people. The first key thing for the gospel preacher is to have encountered this news himself and to have been so affected by it that it boosts his joy to share it. What we need therefore to have under our belt is not a sophisticated system of beliefs but a burning story of what God has done in Christ and a burning story of how our encounter with it has altered our own lives.

The above sample Scriptures show clearly that there is a core content of that story that the Apostles preached everywhere and which, whenever met with faith, was sufficient to effect salvation for the hearers. We have no liberty to deliver any other content if we hope to produce the same fruit of salvation in our hearers.

This message as consigned in these and similar texts in the New Testament, has two essential strands: 

There is a ‘bad news’ into which the good news comes as a reverse. And though there are many facts that are really bad news in the lives of individuals and communities, the greatest bad news which is directly or indirectly the cause of all the bad news of man is SIN and the ETERNAL JUDGMENT tied to it

That Jesus Christ died for sinners and rose again to offer them a salvation that confers the believer at least three concurrent blessings:

Forgiveness for all our past sins and the gift of righteousness on Christ’s merits that guaranties there will be no condemnation. 

Hope for eternity with Christ after this life at Christ’s second coming whether by resurrection from the dead or live transformation by his glory

Grace of power for a life holiness and joy and love in all circumstances as we wait for the consummation of this hope.

If we are really saved, this is the news we must have heard; this is the news we must have received and this is the news on which we live. And as we share it, it must come through our tone, our mood and outlook that it has really been good news to us. 

2. A REAL-LIFE CONTEXT.

If the message is that succinct and concise and can be summarized in a few of propositional statements, It must never be presented as a set of abstract ideas detached from the real life context of our hearers. The testimony of Scripture abounds, that our Lord Jesus himself or his apostles never brought the good news to people without first connecting it to the life issues obvious or hidden in their lives. It has always been God’s gracious intention to come down to man and speak His word in a way that it reaches down to him in his very earthly life conditions. 

Let’s take a few examples from the ministry of the Lord Jesus and from the ministry of Paul

Jesus ‘model 

When Jesus met the Samaritan woman, he readily knew that she needed to believe in him as the promised messiah but he began the conversation from the need of water common to both them went on to her pitiful marriage problems. Only later did he firmly state that He was THE awaited messiah in whom they should believe. When she reported the story of her encounter to her city neighbours, they came out in great numbers. This resulted in Jesus spending two whole days in that town and John had this report to give us: “And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, ‘it is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world” (John 4:41-42). That Jesus is the Saviour of the World is part of that ‘core message’ we mentioned. And it was not hindered by a beginning a conversation about water to drink.

On in Chapter 6, John reports another story from which we learn again that Jesus often began his teaching with the real pressing needs of the people even when he knew he was heading to some uneasy-to-swallow truths of his message. A crowd of around 5000 men and uncounted women and children had been following him and he resolved that they should have something to eat. The other gospels specify that it was the third day and he had compassion on them. He eventually did the miracle; they ate their fill. the following day they tracked him across the lake trying to get him to do it again. After a long discussion with them trying to shift their attention from their need of physical bread to their need of a spiritual one he sternly declared to them: “ Truly, truly  I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever” (John.6: 53-58). Again, here we note that his intended message was that HE is the bread of life. But he did not overlook the real need of the people for physical bread. He found a way from the discussion on physical bread, to bring them to the reality of their most tragic need, the bread from heaven without which they would die.

It is instructive and encouraging at the same time , that these two stories both from John’s gospel present a ‘happy-ending case’ and a ‘sad-ending case’ of a gospel presentation connecting with people from their life needs yet with a firm intention to bring them to the core truths of the good news. If the two types of outcome were recorded in Jesus ministry (probably as representative from many others), we should not be surprised that they also happen in ours. We should not be deterred from following His example if we don’t get desired results and we should not be utopic with them. 

Even in some conversations where he did start an evangelistic conversation straight from the core truths of his identity, the sin of man and his answer to it, there is was because it was actually the pressing life issue for his audience. That was the case of Nicodemus for the example. When Jesus cut through his long introduction with ‘Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again. he cannot see the kingdom of God’(John.3:3), he was addressing a question that had seemingly given Nicodemus many sleepless nights.

Obviously, applying this principle in our contexts, there is a practical question of particular situations we may meet. We may have no answer to the problem that face our hearers as we engage them with the gospel. Or the logistical situation might not allow us necessarily to address their problem before you share the good news. In fact, we are not saying we should solve these problems. Jesus himself did not feed everyone who was hungry in his audiences or heal everyone who was sick everywhere he went. Our point is that gospel conversation needs to be down-to- earth, real to life situation as it presents itself both to the hearer and the sharer. In the case of physical pressing needs, just an evidence of sincere concern might suffice to prove that realness of the preacher and win attention of the hearer.

Paul’s model

When Paul and Barnabas came to Antioch, their first point of contact with the city was the synagogue because being Jews they had a common cultural ground with them. When they were given opportunity to share with the people, they delivered their message from Abraham, to Exodus, to Judges, to Samuel to David and fast forward to John the Baptist and Jesus! (Acts.13:16-25). Then they applied it to the audience by another tour of the events of Jesus’ crucifixion woven with prophecies about it, proofs from the psalms that Jesus is the fulfilment of all the promises given to David for their sake (Acts.13:26-37) and then made an ‘altar call’: “Let it be known  to you therefore , brothers, that through this man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you and by him everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses….”(Acts.13:38-39). The conclusion of Luke shows that the message had produced genuine professions of faith “… And after the meeting of the synagogue broke up, many Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who, as they spoke with them urged them to continue in the grace of God”(Acts.13:42-23)

When they arrived in Lystra, a city of the gentiles, they healed a crippled man and the people thought they were visited by the gods in human form. So they began offering them a sacrifice as they would to God. Paul and Barnabas could not of course afford to be taken as gods, let alone as God. They tore their clothes in sign of outrage and began from that incident to preach the gospel to the people. Soon after the sacrifice ceremony was stopped, he was beaten and chased from the city probably before he got his message to its last point. But he had already delivered a major part of it. We are not sure how he would have formulated that end part but we know how he framed its beginning. Not with the God of Abraham or the Fathers or the Law or the prophets.  “…we bring you the good news that you should turn from these vain things to a living God who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them. In past generations he allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways. Yet he did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness”. (Acts.14:15-17)

Then he went on to Athens, a city which was full of idols. When he toured the city, he was troubled by how the people were erring in the worship of many idols. Clearly, they were hunted by an anxiety to be sure they are worshipping the true God or every god that may exist. It seems they wanted to ensure every imaginable deity has an altar or object for its worship such that no god is left out. Then came an opportunity to speak to some residents of the city in their conference hall, the Areopagus. How did he begin his message? Again, not with a verse or a story in the bible. He just begun from their search of the divine and preached to them the message of the true God   and His attributes to which they could relate to as human beings:  “…the God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man nor is he served by human hands as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place…being his offspring then we should not think the divine being is like gold or silver or stone. When he had laid that foundation he could now connect to the key point of the good news: …the times of ignorance God overlooked but now he commands all people everywhere to repent because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed ; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead. 

So, it is clear from Jesus example and Paul’s example that the good news has a central timeless truth to its message but never comes to people from the vacuum or detached from their everyday life concerns. God communicates with people from the situations where they are.  We will be more fruitful if we keep both challenges in the balance. 

3. A CURRENT ISSUE IN THE RWANDAN CONTEXT

While each individual may have his own life context and issues, there are some issues which are common to a whole community that an evangelist needs to readily know. In the current context of Rwanda I can suggest two related problems that are likely to prompt a negative feedback in almost every evangelistic conversation:

Disappointment by the institutional church : This problem goes back to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. While most other institutions that interact with the people had to reinvent themselves and come up with new versions of their service, generally the church seemed to continue its services in the former formats and approaches, failing the challenge of rethinking itself. The subsequent strife and conflicts in the churches left the general opinion of the public about the church as a failed institution. It is true that in a context like ours, failure of an institution can be just due to failure of the leadership. And of course, we wouldn’t agree with generalizations that condemn all church leaders under this assessment. But the nuisance caused by the ‘tare’ leaders has massively obscured the good testimony of ‘the wheat’ leaders in the field, both in the faithful preaching of the core message and in the values of discipleship and institutional management it should produce.

Disappointment by the standard of godliness/integrity of believers: The average believer doesn’t mount up the expected standard of Christian integrity. This is probably connected to the above institutional failure. Though obviously individual believers who stand true to their faith are not few, the calibre of discipleship that many believers exemplify in society, in public services, in business, in relationships etc, lead to a general opinion that ‘so-called born again Christians don’t live up to standards expected of a born again Christian’.

An evangelist must therefore be prepared to give an effective apologetic presentation of the good news despite the disappointing systems of the institutional church or the lifestyle of individual believers they may know in their relationships. The challenge is to keep the relevance of the good news, while acknowledging those unfortunate facts. I think one way would be to emphasize the necessity and the importance of personal relationship with Christ over the belonging to an institutional church and the wisdom to link up with sound Christians instead of looking at a general trend of Christian standards among the so-called born-again believers. The necessity of belonging to a specific local church and bearing with compromising believers would be a later step in discipling those who have responded with faith to the Gospel.

4. Take away from Q&A:

Language: Communicating relevantly to an audience with an internal language you don’t understand.

Q. Some particular groups especially youth groups speak a language of their own which is not common to all people. How could you connect to the life issues if you don’t know that language?

A: Every nation has a broad culture and subcultures, the wider society and subgroups in that society, the main official language and sub-versions of the language which are only known to the corresponding sub-groups. Youth, women, men, urban groups etc. all may have such sub-language tips known only to them. But we need not be scared by that because all those subgroups in a society, also know the commonly accepted communicational language of the wider society. This the language they hear in the news on TV and read in newspapers, used in schools, in public and community functions etc. Be natural and sincere. Speak the language as it is. They will surely understand the message. The decisive factor is the content of your message and your own authentic experience of its beauty. 

Approach: Risk to speak into the ‘bad news’ of earthly life than address the ‘greater bad news’ of sin and judgement

Q.: If we emphasize the approach, to begin our evangelistic conversations from the realities of life people are facing, are we not going to end tying them more around those life issues rather than lifting them up to see the greater trouble of sin and judgement? The readily felt mood in evangelistic conversations today is that you may offend people if you will ever bring up that central truth of the gospel message about sin and judgement. This anxiety to not offend your audience you may coast around discussing their life problems and never get to pointedly confront them with the message of the cross.  

A: No! just as mentioned above, if Jesus our master and Paul the apostle to the gentiles both fulfilled their mission using this principle, we have no liberty to act otherwise. 

It all begins by the passion, the burden to see people get the answer of a serious problem under which they live but which they don’t know. Jesus was the most down-to-earth evangelist that ever existed. He had a sincere engagement with the people in their problems. He was God in the flesh but he could stand in the streets of Jerusalem and cry with real tears because of the burden he had for the state of lostness of his people. Can you imagine a person who is self-conscious of being God in a physical body, but whose engagement with the problem of the people and their inability to access the answer could move his emotions to come out in tears! Paul said he lives with unceasing anguish for his fellow Jews who are not in Christ. 

Nothing can replace the need for the gospel sharer to have encountered this good news and always be warmly aware of where it found you and to have a real burden for the fact that your people don’t know this great news. 

When you have this personal story with the Story of the gospel and you have this burden, approach will be no big challenge as it sounds to be. If it is relevant in your own real-life issues, we will not need to pull our hair to find how it is relevant to the real lives of our hearers.  The stories I shared above about Jesus and Paul can’t be improved on as patterns we should follow. Real love reaches out to people beginning from where they are.

This has actually been my recent personal diagnosis in ministry. I have noticed that I can grow into a big profile minister, moving all around in the land, yet suffering all along of serious spiritual dysfunctions in that I lack some very basic elements of spiritual health like personal evangelism. Picture me for instance in a city neighbourhood where I stay like for 3 years, near a boutique from where I buy every day necessities. Is it not pathetic that I should talk almost every day to this person in the boutique about the things I shop, yet never bother to share with him/her the news of an answer I know about a big problem hanging over his/her head? What we are saying about approach is simply that when you begin to sincerely introduce the good news to this person you should begin from those realities of life where you connect with them. 

Our difficulty with approach may rather betray another misconception we have about evangelism as the hit-and-go time to preach or share the 5 points of the gospel story. There is a dichotomy we have developed over the years, leading to man-invented concepts of ‘evangelism’ as a separate activity from ‘discipleship’. Evangelism has come to be understood as the bulk of activities mostly run as events, leading a person to ‘receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior’, often by a formula of confession by a ‘repeat-after-me’ prayer or a signing of a card. And discipleship has been understood as the subsequent set of activities aimed at helping the new convert to be established in the faith especially as regards to assurance of salvation, connection to a local church and baptism. It should be said again that this conception is mere human invention. The Bible does not know the kind of hit-and-go evangelism of our day. If God in his sovereign grace did bless here and there such evangelistic events to produce genuine converts, it is a great presumption to make it a standard of ministry. It is true that some renown open air evangelists appear to preach to crowds in sessions of around 30 minutes with some mediatized great results. But for the few of them who are known to be serious and fruitful evangelists, their evangelistic efforts actually span long before and long after the proclamation event to ensure that these new converts will be really established in the faith and nurtured in a given local church. We are very much mistaken when we try all sorts of gimmicks seeking to emulate their effectiveness in our own proclamation events without an intentional process to prepare our audience and disciple the new converts after the events.

With that passion and these principles, evangelism will be our lifestyle, woven in every phase of our lives and any changes life may bring will find us ready to adapt to every situation carrying out our mission. In fact, the need for this discussion should not be misguided as if what we need to adapt to change caused pandemic like covid19. In the Bible God had given to the Church since its beginning an approach to the Christian life that was to survive all changes that the hostile world may bring. God saw to it that the gospel begun under persecution so that the early disciples would develop patterns of life and ministry that cannot be inhibited by circumstances as far as spiritual fruitfulness is concerned. Our task now is to go back to the Scriptures and rediscover it and defying all the obstacles that this end time gospel-unfriendliness is bringing on our way. Otherwise even if Covid19 recedes, open opposition to the gospel may break out as it happens in many other contexts and we should not think it strange (1 Pet. 2 Thess.) 

Syldio Determine Dusabumuremyi

Preach The Word