What is evangelism? It’s just sharing the greatest message on earth with people who haven’t heard or understood it. Did you know God wrote a book?
The key to evangelism is knowing God’s person, purpose, plan, people, and processes. Once you know who He is and what He is doing, it’s just a matter of caring about other people enough to tell them about God’s grace to you. It’s about loving God and loving people. It’s about sharing the gift that you have received so that they can receive it, too.
God’s Word, what God has said, is all that we have to share with other people. Faith is believing God. If you believe God, the way that you think, act, and say will line up with His message.
At its core there are four things people need to know: Perfect; God is perfectly good. Not perfect; There is a penalty due each of us for not being perfectly good. Jesus provided the perfection; Jesus Christ paid the penalty due to us. Believe; Each person must receive the gift by faith to escape judgment.
Of course there is a lot of background and history to fill out the story so that those key points are clearly understood. I mean – Who says? Who is God? Who is Jesus? What do you mean by perfect? What is good? What gives God the right to decide? What is the penalty? For doing what? Clearly communicating the message depends a bit on what the audience already knows about God and whether or not that information matches what God says about Himself. So, it’s kind of important to know what God says about Himself to get it right when telling other people.
The people who were told “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” had already heard about the identity of Jesus. So, you might have to fill in some gaps for people who haven’t heard God’s story.
Here are some great resources for filling in those gaps. Maybe one of these will help you know God’s story better, too.
- What is the point of the Bible?
- Come and See – comeandsee.online
- Interlocked – interlocked.online
- The Lamb
- The Stranger on the Road to Emmaus
- Video book – send100.org/bible
- By This Name
- All That the Prophets Have Spoken
- Teteslestai Video Series by Arlen & Cynthia Isaak (Light in Action)
- What is the Good News?
- More!
- Cru Evangelism Resources – https://www.cru.org/us/en/train-and-grow/share-the-gospel/outreach-strategies/evangelism-resources-strategies.html
- https://www.christianwitnessingtools.com/materials.html
- Tactics by Greg Koukl – https://youtu.be/csrSA3nPP7I
- https://youtu.be/bY__LA5pzQU
- Navigators – Evangelism – https://www.navigators.org/topic/evangelism/
- The Way of the Master – https://www.livingwaters.com/outreach/way-of-the-master/