One reason your evangelism isn't working

ONE REASON YOUR EVANGELISM ISN'T WORKING

We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.

2 Corinthians 5:20

For good or bad, many of us grew up in churches where evangelism was a focus. If you are like me, you might have decided to live with the guilt of NOT doing much evangelism, rather than face the social consequences for doing it.

I was thinking about this recently when I got the strangest sales email. I was meeting a friend for lunch. I arrived before he did. So I pulled out my phone to take a quick glance at any messages. And in my inbox was a note that essentially said,

"Have I got a deal for you! My book is launching in two months. The Amazon price is going to be $2.75. But if you order today, I'll give it to you for $2.50. Don't miss this exclusive opportunity. The sale ends tonight."

Now, I should say, I have bought this person's stuff before. The content is good. But I didn't "push" the buy button. And I had a chuckle about this email. Why? Two reasons.

1. I don't know how poor the author thinks pastors are. We aren't rolling in the dough, but 25 cents savings isn't enough to pressure me into a sale. It just isn't. Leverage only works when what is being leveraged is highly valuable. The possibility of loosing a quarter just isn't motivating for me.

But more importantly

2. The email didn't really help me understand WHY I should buy the book. It told me what the book is. It's a book about church communications. It told me a little bit about the content. This author things that social media is the key to modern communications. So the title was something like "Church Communications in a Social Media Age" (I made that up, but that's the gist of it).

But it never said anything about what benefits I would get if I read the book. Will I spend less time repeating myself? (Sold) Will more people know what's happening at church with half the effort? (Sold) Will anyone on any team be able to plug and play their announcement? (Sold)

I wonder if our attempts at evangelism often fall into the same problem.

We tell people WHAT we want them to do. Accept Jesus. Become a Christian.

We tell them HOW they can do it. Come to church. Say a prayer. Read the Bible. Open their hearts to the Holy Spirit. (I'm just giving some examples.)

In the midst of the WHAT and HOW - it's easy to forget the WHY. (note: this framework comes from Simon Sinek who gave one of the most popular TED talks of all time on this topic)

Whether we use Sinek's framework of "starting with the WHY" or talk about "benefits vs features", the point is that people are generally not motivated by facts and features. Who cares? We are motivated by emotion, passion, hope and possibilities.

So as you seek to share your love for Christ - I would encourage you to get really clear on the why. 

Why do you want someone to accept Christ?

For me - I believe that following and accepting Jesus is the ONLY way to live at peace with others, with God and even with myself. I have found that anxiety and worry and that feeling of "not enough-ness" is destroying people left and right in our world. And I think everyone, everyone, everyone needs what Jesus offers to help relieve that so we can live joyful, happy, fulfilling, meaningful lives.

What's your reason? If you don't have an answer - spend some time thinking and praying about that this week. It will make ALL the difference.

Grace and peace.
Stewart



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