The Church, for the most part, has reverse engineered EVANGELISM and inverted DISCIPLESHIP. For the purposes of this article, I will make a distinction between the two, but I do not want to suggest that such a distinction is necessarily biblical.
With regard to evangelism, we’ve put the cart before the horse and changed the destination. Evangelism is simply the preaching or proclaiming of the Gospel. One of the results of good gospel preaching is the salvation of souls. It is not, however, the only, nor the ultimate result. To make individual conversion the primary point of evangelism is to set a skewed trajectory which targets “decisions” and does not produce disciples.
- We preach the Gospel to glorify God, not ourselves.
- We preach the gospel out of obedience.
- We preach the gospel because it demonstrates our love for our neighbor.
- We preach the gospel to express our gratitude for God’s work of grace in us.
When we preach the gospel to “win souls,” or to make converts, then all of the bullet points above are jeopardized. Simply put, when we evangelize to convert, we run backwards from the finish line holding up a mirror so that we can see where we’re going.
In the second part of this article, I will defend the proposition that the church has inverted discipleship and put the onus on it’s hierarchical leadership rather than the “non-leading” congregational masses. But for now, a few questions:
In your opinion, is evangelism’s primary objective the salvation of souls?
What benefit does evangelism have for those who already believe?
Is there a clear and biblical distinction between evangelism and discipleship?
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For Related Posts, see:
Would You Sign This Evangelism Accord?
7 Types of Evangelism to Avoid, and 7 to Embrace
Okay, Now can we Stop Evangelizing and Start Discipling?
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In your opinion, is evangelism’s primary objective the salvation of souls?
No, the primary goal is a new people that would be a praise to His glory. The glory of God is the purpose of evangelism. We herald the news because the we are bonded servants of the King sent to the world to bring Him glory by proclaiming Him and His Kingdom. In John Piper’s words, “Mission is not ultimate. Worship is. Missions exists because worship doesn’t. Mission is a temporary necessity. Worship is ultimate because God is ultimate.” (That’s from memory but it’s pretty close).
Conversion, the start of the process making-disciples results from announcing the news of the King and His Kingdom. When God gives the grace to believe, a process that will never end begins. Literally, it will never end. Even when we are made holy in a twinkling of an eye, our finite minds will go on for eternity plumbing the depths of God’s mercy and grace in Christ.
Thanks for the comment Marty.
You said, “Conversion, the start of the process making-disciples results from announcing the news of the King and His Kingdom.” Would you say then that evangelism is part of the disciple making process?
Perhaps we can distil the four reasons for evangelism that you provide. They all contain the same essence, and to get the full benefit we really need to taste that essence.
Here they are again…
We preach the Gospel to glorify God, not ourselves.
We preach the gospel out of obedience.
We preach the gospel because it demonstrates our love for our neighbor.
We preach the gospel to express our gratitude for God’s work of grace in us.
And here’s the essence…
We contain an amazing, wonderful and exciting truth about Jesus and the new way he offers. We love this life in him and we can’t help sharing it!
In other words it’s not so much a matter of glorifying him, or obedience, or loving others, or gratitude. All of these are important, but they burst out of our very being. If not, perhaps we haven’t yet felt the truth in our deepest being, merely accepted it intellectually.
What do you think?
Chris, thanks for the comment.
I want to believe that that evangelism is, as you say, the supernatural outburst of being consumed with out love of the Lord. But, I think we must be careful in judging our faith or that of others by “having felt that truth in our deepest being.”
Even when my love wanes or my feelings in low tide, I must press on.
I agree that we have made evangelism and conversion an end in and of itself to the detriment of the Church. I think it’s helpful to remember that evangelism (euaggelizo) is literally the act of telling the good news. This is to God’s glory and for those who have ears to hear, leads to salvation. Thats awesome, and the gospel must be proclaimed (Romans 10:14) but that is not all Jesus told us to do. He told us to make disciples, baptizing them and teaching (didasko) them. (Matthew 28:19-20)
Take Acts 11:19-26 as an example:
Men of Cyprus and Cyrene preached (euaggelizo/evangelized) Jesus to the Hellenists and a great number who believed turned to the Lord. The church in Jerusalem hears about it and sends Barnabas to investigate. He determines this is the real deal and then goes and gets Saul/Paul who spends the next year there and taught (didasko) many people.
It seems from this passage that evangelism is the first step in making disciples, but that teaching is the next step. Lets face it, teaching people to follow all that Jesus commanded is hard and messy and often full of gray areas. Evangelism is clear cut and maybe thats the real reason we stop there.
On a side note, if we look at baptism as being immersed in something and the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as describing the authority and character of God rather than just a moniker; how would that effect the way we make disciples?