January 22, 2004
Attraction
We wonder about evangelism. We chop it up in decades. We spend tons on it. We quantify it. We “plant” churches and “make” disciples.
We fret over all the gray heads in the pews and pulpits. We want more young people. We create a special ministry for that and call it youth “work,” without a clue for how that sounds, what it implies.
Will there ever be an end to “mission statements” that try to one-up the Baptismal Covenant as if it never existed? Could there be a sillier, more self-serving notion than “bringing somebody to Jesus”?
Ever so often, just so we don’t get too serious about all this, we stop playing church and start playing God. We errant selves will tell you all about the inerrant word. We’ll hide our pretense to subvert the church behind sex, insulting along the way our Creator who made us that way. We’ll tell you all about how you should live your private life while we ignore our public responsibility.
We churchers can be a pitiful sight. A large part of evangelism would seem to be to be known. And not just to be known, but to intrigue folk to want a piece of the action, not be repelled by it.
At a college where I was chaplain, a middle-aged woman undergraduate was dazzled by her professor’s judgment and knowledge, but even more so by her calm and obviously secure bearing in class. She never seemed defensive and always spoke and listened with winsomeness.
One day, after class, the student asked her teacher how she came by such demeanor. The answer startled her, but intrigued her even more. “Through my church.”