On John Blanchard

I had the pleasure of listening to John Blanchard this morning. He came to speak at my college on the topic of modern evangelism, it was thought provoking and pretty helpful. Here is a reason his work is so important today.  ”But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect..” 1 Peter 3v15 is in his view the motivation and basis of apologetic style evangelism.  His thesis was simple; we need contact points or spring board topics with unbelievers (which he says actually don’t exist, unbelievers that is) in order to gain common ground that will allow fruitful conversation. It was pretty helpful, he outlined three things that Christians, skeptics and other spiritualists have in common: Humans all have dignity, Humans all have some sense of morality, Humans are rational.  I think that in a shifting post modern matrix we can debate where exactly people will find common ground, but having said that they are areas we can all see eye to eye on. I won’t go into the details of his talk but one thing struck me when he read the verse, he left out the last bit, “But do this with gentleness and respect…”. Now, he was not doing an exposition on the passage, so i am not faulting him but it does highlight something that is important in evangelism: love for the guy you are telling has a completely wrong worldview.

 A friend and i chatted about this issue today, the need for genuine community that attracts outsiders (you know what i mean by that) as well as developing sincere motives for evangelism. The fact that i just said we need to DEVELOP sincere motives highilights the problem here. Gentleness and respect, i think that is why in so many ways our witness within the gathered church and the “soldiers for Jesus” that send out into the world has in fact set back our out reach. Perhaps you are an exception to this, but we are very rarely sincere, gentle or loving about our evangelism. The more i read Paul and his letters the more i begin to understand a man led by the Spirit whose motivation for reaching the lost was the same as our Lord’s: love. Not the sentimental, self seeking, insipid love that only Hallmark can thrive on, but genuine biblical love that desires only the good of others.

The question is: if our church is not like this, how do we create that kind of atmosphere? i think the presupposition there is wrong, we can’t create sincerity of love, it’s a fruit of the Spirit. It’s a discipleship issue. John Piper has a great little story of How Christ Enables the Church to Upbuild Itself in Love. Let’s find ways to reach out in genuine care and concern, not in the power of programs but in personal interaction.

~ by Anthony on March 8, 2007.