EVANGELISM AND WITNESSING

Lesson 1 for April 7, 2012

DEFINING

EVANGELISM

Evangelism can be defined as preaching and spreading the good news of salvation through Jesus.

Evangelism involves spreading the word of God with an eye to convince the people who are listening, so they accept Jesus as their Savior and become His disciples.

It’s Jesus’ order, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (Mark, 16: 15)

WITNESSINGWitnessing, that is, sharing one’s personal experience of God—all with the intention of encouraging others to accept Christ—is not necessarily as organized or as intentional as radio, television, or crusade evangelism. Being a witness can be very spontaneous given that the opportunity to share Jesus can arise anywhere at any time with anyone. We must, therefore, be ever alert for opportunities to share our knowledge and experience.

Just as evangelism, witnessing involves telling others what God has done for me with an eye to convince the people who are listening, so they accept Jesus as their Savior and become His disciples.

Evangelism spreads knowledge of the word of God while witnessing spreads the personal experience with God. Both are complementary methods

The Holy Spirit transforms the believer and prepares him/her to spread the Gospel either by evangelism or by witnessing.He uses both educated and uncultured people; both eloquent and laconic people. He works effectively with anyone who throws on His mercy.

EVANGELISM AND WITNESSING

Paul was an educated person and he was used by the Holy Spirit to adapt his speech to several kind of people and to write eloquently his epistles.

That’s how rough fishermen could preach with confidence, convinced of the Gospel. “When they [the religious leaders] saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus” (Acts, 4: 13)

EVANGELISM IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

The first evangelistic effort (winning 3,000 souls) was the joint preaching of 120 people who received the Holy Spirit in Pentecost. The main preacher was Peter and his speech was based on texts from the Old Testament.Since then, the apostles did evangelism “for a living” (Acts, 6: 4).Laypeople as Stephen and Philip did evangelism too (Acts, 6: 9-10; 8: 5, 35, 40)When the time came for Barnabus and Paul to be called, God called them as Evangelists to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles (Acts, 13: 1-4)

“Now the man from whom the demons had departed begged Him that he might be with Him. But Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return to your own house, and tell what great things God has done for you.” And he went his way and proclaimed throughout the whole city what great things Jesus had done for him” (Lucas, 8: 38-39)

Although Paul’s main mission was to evangelize, he used his testimony of his own conversion to preach several times (Acts, 22 y 26)

God has given us the responsibility of sharing how He has changed our lives just as He did to the formerly demon- possessed man at Gadara.

WITNESSING IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

EVANGELISM TODAYThe Church faces the same challenge that the primitive Church faced.

Large (even world) evangelistic campaigns.

Local evangelistic campaigns.

Preaching at church or in the street.

Publishing and distributing books, journals and pamphlets.

Radio and TV.

Internet. Both publishing web sites with specific content and broadcasting all the other evangelistic methods.

Personal Bible studies.

Home meetings.

In the 21st century, we have several evangelistic methods at our disposal; for example:

“And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end

will come”(Matthew, 24: 14)

PAUL’S TESTIMONY MY TESTIMONY

WITNESSING TODAYWe find a useful model for personal witnessing in Paul’s example (Acts 22), which is still valid nowadays.

“Every man who has felt the converting power of God becomes in a sense a missionary. There are friends to whom he can speak of the love of God. He can tell in the church what the Lord is to him, even a personal Savior; and the testimony given in simplicity may do more good than the most eloquent discourse”E.G.W. (Counsels on Health, “The Christian Physician as a Missionary”, pg. 33)

1st

2nd

3rd

My life after I accepted Jesus as my personal Savior.

His life experience after his conversion (Acts, 22: 17-21)

How I met Jesus (or what influenced my commitment to Him)

How he met the Lord (Acts, 22: 6-16)

His life before he knew the Lord Jesus (Acts, 22: 3-5)

My life before I knew the Lord Jesus (or before I made a commitment to Him)

“To us also the commission is given. We are bidden to go forth as Christ’s messengers, to teach, instruct, and persuade men and women, to urge upon their attention the word of life …The gospel is to be presented, not as a lifeless theory, but as a living force to change the life. God desires that the receivers of His grace shall be witnesses to its power”

“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew, 28: 19)

E.G.W. (Evangelism, cp. 1, “Proclaiming the message”, pg. 15-16)