Evangelizing the Hell Out of People!

There are different schools of thought on evangelizing the unsaved: some want to put the hammer down and demand repentance, while others want to softly sidestep the sin issue in steering people to Jesus. Over-using either of these ‘methods’ doesn’t seem to represent the Jesus of the Bible. 

Consider how Jesus and Paul handled each ‘sinner’ in the following Biblical examples: 

-The demon possessed man in Mark 5 was delivered and set free, then told to go home. His heart was so overwhelmed with love and gratitude that he wanted to physically follow Jesus, but Jesus said to him: “go home and tell others what God has done for you, this is how you follow me.” This man’s life was likely spent telling others of the goodness and love of God, even though Jesus never demanded repentance.

-When Jesus met Saul on the road to Damascus He didn’t tell him to repent – although it’s likely that Paul immediately realized his sinfulness as he stood in the presence of Jesus Christ. Paul had an immediate conversion and gave his life entirely to the purposes of God, even though we have no record of him confessing his sins to Jesus. 

-In Acts 17 Paul very creatively spoke to the men of Athens, telling them the statue which they’d labeled as “unknown god” was the God of the universe. He then gave them the complete Gospel message – including the need to repent as part of the message. 

We see a different means of approaching people in each of the examples above, likely dependent on the circumstances and heart of each individual. But without seeking the wisdom of the Holy Spirit we do not know how to perfectly minister the Gospel to the lost.  And while repentance is important, the idea that we are to present God as an angry being who is solely demanding repentance is not accurate. We must remember that repentance is a gift from God which leads to relationship with the living God – this is the message of reconciliation! There may be times when it’s necessary to drive a hard point home to someone’s heart, but we generally see this more stern approach when Jesus and others are dealing with religious leaders who know better but choose to continue in their sin. 

Trying to evangelize the hell out of people may very well be the thing that puts an unholy fear in them and leads them to an external sort of ‘law’ mentality: what things must I DO or NOT DO to be right with God and look good to others? While we need to have reverence for our holy and powerful God, fear that leads us to following rules instead of wholeheartedly seeking to know God is religious fear. What drives the hell out of people is a growing knowledge of God and relationship with Him.  That requires us to do more than simply evangelize – it requires mentoring, teaching and developing relationship with one another. 

In the end, the Holy Spirit must decide how we are to evangelize the Gospel in each circumstance. Anything short of that can lean towards usurping the authority that God has given us by following rote patterns of ministering to people instead of seeking God on how to best minister to each person’s heart.
God bless those who evangelize, but let us do so through the leading of the Holy Spirit, for the glory of God!