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Main Idea
Build intentional bridges that support the weight of truth.
Outline and Core Passage
I - What Relational Evangelism Is
II - Why we do evangelism
III - It is what Jesus modeled for us
IV - How You can live this out
The Domino effect
How can someone preach unless they are sent?
How can someone hear unless the sent one preaches to them?
How can someone know Jesus if they have never been introduced to Him?
How can someone know why Jesus matters if they don’t know anything about Him?
I - What Relational Evangelism Is
The description for what evangelism is and why it is essential to the Christian life can be found throughout scripture, but the Bible isn’t overly descriptive on how to do it.
There are many different ways to evangelize.
Entire ministries train you to go out into a community and strike up gospel conversations.
Many churches canvas an area and go door to door.
Others take a megaphone and do street evangelism.
And then there are those who play the long game to form relationships, which is what we will be talking about today.
This isn’t to say there there isn’t value in certain methods, and during the lifetime of this church, we won't limit ourselves to this one method, but as a core value, we will use this method as the primary method of evangelism.
Definition
Relational Evangelism is the method of evangelism which focuses on building intentional friendships with non-believers that grow into redemptive relationships that give you a solid platform to speak spiritual truth into their lives.
Consider the passage from Colossians.
What do we do in relation to the outsider (or non-believer)?
We walk with them, making the best use of our time.
Walking with them implies that you are in some sort of relationship with them, or else you would just be talking to them.
As we walk with them, we are careful to use our words in a gracious way, seasoned to perfection, so that our words land.
Knowing how to answer each person also implies that we know them well enough to speak into their current circumstance, which again, shows that we know them beyond a mere acquaintance.
Why We Choose This Method
It's personal‌.
Sometimes there is resistance to this way of evangelism because it takes time, and seems way too passive to be effective, because to do this effectively, you have to let others into your life and you have to step into theirs.
This means, you might not work the gospel into the first conversation, or the second, or the fifth.
This method requires that you walk in wisdom.
But, in time, they will trust you because you have shown that you care for them, and that personal touch will earn big dividends when God’s timing for a spiritual conversation comes to pass.
It's testimonial.
This means you get to share what God has done in your life.
While the person you are trying to reach may have some objections to this whole Christian thing, who can truly argue against a personal experience?
Telling your story is also nearly always non-evasive.
Shouting at them with a Megaphone will likely cause them to throw up some tall walls, but most people will be willing to hear about how God took you from darkness to light… from death to life.
We have some friends who were missionaries overseas for a number of years, and they would tell us stories about how they got their feet wet for those first crucial months on the ground.
Maybe it would be helpful to put ourselves in their shoes for a moment.
Think about how you would reach others with the gospel if you were living in the Sudan, Nepal, or Argentina.
Would you go straight out on the street corner?
Probably not.
You might get a lot of attention that way, but I doubt you will reach many people.
On the other hand, if you try to build a relationship; if you try to learn the local language and understand their culture, you are far more likely to connect with and get traverse any walls to spiritual conversations they might otherwise construct.
So, in essence, relational evangelism is a bridge that you build over time, which will support the weight of truth.
II - Why We Do Evangelism
The necessity of the gospel
We know as followers of Christ who adhere to biblical authority that unbelievers are:
dead in trespass and sin
blinded by Satan
enemies of God
lovers of darkness
under God’s wrath
We know their state of affairs, because we used to be in that same position!
We cannot be so preoccupied with ourselves or our own Christian bubble that we neglect those who need Jesus.
We can’t act as though we are living in a middle-school dance where all the boys are standing against one wall and the girls are on another.
And, we should never strike up a single conversation because we feel like we have to.
Instead, compassion and love should lead us into every conversation, because we do not want to see any person live in such a horrible state of affairs!
Our hearts should be moved by these grim realities to speak, so that they do not live dreary, dark, sinful, and unfulfilled lives that place them under God’s wrath and sprinting down a road that leads to an eternal damnation.
That would be the ultimate display of hate toward that person.
In his book Joy Unspeakable, Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones puts it this way:
If we have no sense of responsibility for the condition of humanity at this moment, then there is only one thing to say - if we are Christians at all we are very poor ones.
If we are only concerned about ourselves and our own happiness, and if the moral condition of society and the tragedy of the whole world does not grieve us, if we are not disturbed at the way in which men blaspheme the name of God and all the arrogance of sin - well, what can be said about us?
We should all love the lost enough to tell them the truth about their condition and point them to a better way, because we know...
What faith in Jesus gives
we are made spiritually alive
we live a life in communion with God, filled with joy in His presence
we are given a new heart that loves God
we are filled with the fruits of the Spirit
we live under God’s undeserved grace
we get to be in a family - becoming sons and daughters of the King of kings
we gain eternity with Him and all those who are in Him
We evangelize because we know the depths of sin that we once lived in.
And, we know the un-surpassing riches of knowing God and living a life that is in constant communion with Him.
We know that death came through Adam, but life and grace comes through Jesus Christ.
It's a command from our King
The letter of Ephesians lists a gifted person as an Evangelist, but that gifted person shouldn't be confused with the Great Commission for all followers to go and proclaim.
The Great Commission
The Great Commandment
Telling others about the badness of sin and the goodness of God is a sacred call for all who believe.
How will they hear the good news if no one tells them?
Ask yourself this question.
“What if I were lonely or struggling with a particular sin or anxious or ashamed of my past or scared of being judged.
What might a Christian do or say to attract me to a different way of thinking?
III - It is what Jesus modeled for us
If Jesus modeled it, we should imitate it.
After all, that is what it means to be a disciple.
So, if Jesus modeled a relational way to spread the good news, shouldn’t we?
He sought the disciples
As Jesus went throughout the region to recruit the Twelve, what did He constantly say? "Follow me" was His request.
In the grand scheme of things, Jesus came down from heaven to seek and save the lost by dwelling among them.
Just that is a perfect portrait of relational evangelism, but even from the very beginning of His earthly ministry, it was Jesus who went in search of His students.
Remember, the disciples weren’t Christian at this point in time.
They were Jews who were looking for a mis-construed version of their Messiah.
They weren’t looking for someone like Jesus.
He sought them out with the intention to share Himself with them.
He shared His life with the disciples
When Jesus taught the twelve disciples, he went way beyond practical teaching like we know it today.
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