Evangalism

Know this one thing about human beings and you will never struggle to evangelise ever again.

I evangelise almost everyday. Easily. I enjoy it very much. In fact, the highlight of my day is when I share about Jesus. To increase my scope and capacity, I have lined myself up to practice street preaching in the coming couple of weeks.

How did I get myself to enjoy something that a lot of Christians dread so much? By learning the nature of human beings.

Jesus’s interaction with the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:1-42) is an evangelism masterclass that highlights this concept very well.

The woman had an issue to which she was bound -an unquenchable thirst for something she couldn’t name but kept chasing through relationships.

“I don’t have a husband,” she told the half-truth when Jesus asked her to bring her husband -an admission he brought vulnerably home to touch the heart of the matter:

John 4:17-18 “…Jesus said, “You’re right! You don’t have a husband— for you have had five husbands, and you aren’t even married to the man you’re living with now. You certainly spoke the truth!””

Can you read the knowing in that, “You certainly spoke the truth”?

Now, the story is 42 verses long. That’s a very long story, and with good reason: Jesus and the Samaritan woman were having a back and forth -which is exactly the way evangelism goes most of the time.

She had a lot of questions!

1. “You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman. Why are you asking me for a drink?” John 4:9

2. “…Where would you get this living water?” John 4:11

3. “…do you think you’re greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us this well? How can you offer better water than he and his sons and his animals enjoyed?” John 4:12

4. “So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship, while we Samaritans claim it is here at Mount Gerizim, where our ancestors worshiped?” John 4:20

She also had some strong assertions!

“…”I know the Messiah is coming—the one who is called Christ. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”” John 4:25

Do you see the point? She was talking about everything and anything -except the main point: the thirst she had, and the cure for it that Jesus had in his possession and had invited her to partake of.

This is the secret to evangelism: the thing that appears to be the point of objection is not the real thing that is being objected.

It’s usually not God they are rejecting, but the boundaries He has created that they do not like.

Neither are they anthropologists majoring in the study of historical Hebrew marriage for them to care so much about Abraham and Jacob having two wives – they just don’t know how or do not want to deal with that strong part of their humanity.

God is not a lost entity to them as they might make you believe; they only feel that they have fallen too far off the line and are now irredeemable.

What often times looks like exegetical objection is, usually an unwillingness born out of pain or fear, to trustfully surrender to the Lordship of the one who actually loves them the most and the best.

So the next time someone seems to argue about doctrine, history, or Scripture, pause. Listen for the ache beneath the questions and like Jesus did with the Samaritan woman, channel the conversation in the direction of their urgent ache.

That’s where Jesus still meets people today.

Photo: Katumba Badru