Jesus, undeterred, went right ahead and gave his charge: “God authorized and commanded me to commission you: Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then instruct them in the practice of all I have commanded you. I’ll be with you as you do this, day after day after day, right up to the end of the age.”
— Matthew 28:19-20 (The Message)
When Jesus gave his disciples this Great Commission, it immediately became a Christian responsibility that would guarantee that the movement He started would live on for many generations to come.
While the Great Commission lists a few things that we should do in passing on our faith to others, the one thing that it ultimately summarizes it is the (apparent) command to evangelize. Therefore, evangelism would become the charge of every Christian right up to the Second Coming of Christ.
I recently had the opportunity to teach the Fall ’09 Evangelism Ministry course at Sarasota Bible College. In this course of study we work through The Master Plan of Evangelism by Robert Coleman and Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God by J. I. Packer. We then cap off the semester by hitting the streets for a few weeks of ‘evangelism lab’ (our fancy term for ‘street witnessing’). But this semester, one of the highlights was when we had the opportunity to Skype video conference with author Dillon Burroughs.
Dillon shared some advice from the Scriptures for the class as they look to integrate these skills into their normal, everyday lives. This was such a great discussion that I want to share it here with you.
The video playlist and thoughts from the discussion with the class:
- on evangelism (colossians 4:2-6)
- on dealing with failure in evangelism
- on gradual evangelism
- on initiating conversation in evangelism
- on making evangelism a part of everyday life
- on the value of listening in evangelism
- on evangelizing to other faiths
- on using tracts in evangelism
Also, if you’d like to see some of the other Dillon Burroughs work that has been featured here at BibleDude.net, then you’d probably like to check out these posts…
I'll have to check this out. Evangelism (more specifically, discipleship) is something I've become keenly interested in recently. Obviously it should be a first priority for Christians, and with all the new, expanding technology, the game is being changed. As Christians, I think we're behind on these issues… technology and evangelism.
-Marshall Jones Jr.
This is a really exciting series of posts on Christian evangelism, and I was totally stoked to get Dillon Burroughs to share on the subject! And you are right, the game HAS changed with new technologies, and the church does have some catching up to do!
Thanks for check this out Marshall! I look forward to hearing more form you on what you think of all of the posts in the series as they go up!