For one of my seminary classes, I decided to research different methods of evangelism by surfing to Google and typing into the search engine, “how to share the gospel.” To my research dismay, of course, I noticed that there were 9,160,000 related entries to satisfy my search. Nonetheless, praise God that this question is at least a popular topic of online inquiry and conversation.
However, during my browsing of the first and second pages of results, I found two articles that were considerably impressive and another article that was an impressive waste of time. Ultimately, the distinguishing factor between the two good articles and the one awful article was the emphasis upon what type of message to share and why. For example, the two good articles emphasized the overarching story of the Bible from Genesis 1’s account of creation to Revelation’s 22 finale of restoration; the bad article, on the other hand, only talked about heaven and hell, failing to even mention Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection which accomplished salvation. The following blog will analyze each of the three evangelistic articles and will explain the strengths and/or weakness of each from a biblical point of view.
First, the article “The Best Method for Sharing the Gospel” from The Christian Post faithfully emphasized the clear, biblical communication of the gospel message at the heart of evangelism. Here are two great quotes from the article that truly convey its overall sentiment: “If you don’t master the message then your method will be robotic and rote rather than relational and real” (4), and “Your goal when sharing the gospel should not be presentations but conversations” (5). These quotes can generally serve as useful guidelines to govern every Christian’s evangelistic intentions or methods. Furthermore, the article also included a helpful acrostic that simplistically explains the grand story of God all throughout Scripture. The acrostic GOSPEL stands for the following six segments of the whole gospel-story of the Bible:
God created us to be with him. (Genesis 1-2)
Our sins separate us from God. (Genesis 3)
Sin cannot be removed by good deeds. (Genesis 4-Malachi 4)
Paying the price for sin, Jesus died and rose again. (Matthew-Luke)
Everyone who trusts in him alone has eternal life. (John)
Life with Jesus starts now and lasts forever. (Acts-Revelation)
You can read the whole article here: http://www.christianpost.com/news/the-best-method-for-sharing-the-gospel-82820/.
Furthermore, the second article “How to Share the Gospel Clearly” from Bible.org also conveyed what it truly means to share the gospel by emphasizing what approaches, phrases, or rituals does not constitute as sharing the gospel. The article discussed the dangers associated with ‘praying the sinner’s prayer’, ‘asking Jesus into your heart’, and using other extra-biblical phrases that do not clearly or necessarily convey biblical, saving truth. The overall emphasis of this article can be seen in its conclusion where the author states that evangelistic effectiveness means, “we are clear in our motives, in our gospel content, in our statement of the condition for salvation, and in our invitation to believe” (75). This article was quite thorough, and you can read it in its entirety here: https://bible.org/article/how-share-gospel-clearly.
Lastly, the third article “How to Share the Gospel like Jesus” on wikiHow ironically gave the worst advice out of the three articles for explaining how to share the gospel. In fact, the article did not even share the gospel after all. It listed eight different steps any Christian individual could use to lead any normal conversation into a completely ordinary spiritual presentation about heaven and hell (sarcasm mine). The 8-step agenda in the article could ultimately be described as socially off-putting, personally upsetting, and extremely uncomfortable. For example, step 1 involves initiating conversation about the ‘natural realm’ such as casual chitchat about how a person is doing, the weather, and more. Then, step 2 encourages you to lead the conversation into the ‘spiritual realm’ by asking questions like “did you watch that Christian program last night on TV?” and “did you go to church on Sunday?” and “what do you think will happen when someone dies?” (2). To me, this approach is the social equivalent of going from the kitty pool to the high dive from zero to sixty in a speedo without floaties—and someone, or both of you, will be drowning in 6 feet deep of awkwardness before they even know it. And unfortunately, the content in each of the 8 steps was about as theologically hollow as the transitions between each step were socially awkward. For instance, there was no mention of the grand metanarrative of Scripture about God’s plan to redeem and restore humanity and the cosmos through Christ; there was no mention of Christ’s life, death, or resurrection that accomplished salvation; and there was no mention of how an individual must repent and believe the gospel to lay hold of Christ’s offer of redemption. If you so choose, you can read the rest of this article here: http://www.wikihow.com/Share-the-Gospel-like-Jesus.
Overall, I thought that the first two articles fittingly emphasized both the gospel message and a cultural methodology of sharing it. The third article, however, improperly conveys both the gospel message and what is socially effective. I would endorse the first two articles because of their arguments to share the overarching biblical message of God’s redemption in Christ and also to be unique and creative with how to share it. On the other hand, I do not endorse the third article for its approach of social awkwardness and faulty ‘gospel’ message that mentions no bible metanarrative or the critical significance of Jesus.
