I Would Rather Not Be Doing This

Dear Brothers, Sisters, and All Those In Between,

Let us dispense with the pleasantries - the mandatory "hallelujahs" and the obligatory "amens." Because I would rather not be doing this.

I am coming to this project from a place of deep reluctance. I have thought of doing this many times during the past six months, but I have always dismissed it as too public, too obnoxious, too preachy. I may have been right on all counts.

You see, I am the absolute last person that should be considered an "evangelist." Consider these words from that bastion of knowledge, Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/)...

Evangelism is the preaching of the Christian Gospel or the practice of relaying information about a particular set of beliefs to others with the object of conversion.

That's gross. The first thing that I have a problem with is that I do not feel like preaching the Christian Gospel. It's problematic. It's messy. It's unpleasant at times. People don't like it, and I really like people to like what I say. The second problem is that "set of beliefs" that I would need to relay information about. On my best day, I'm not really sure what my "set of beliefs" entails, and Facebook has seen to it that anyone on my 253-strong Friend's List can see just how fickle my beliefs really are. I'm not good with doctrinal statements or theological creeds. What made sense to me today might seem like absolute nonsense tomorrow. This kind of theological shiftiness does not a good evangelist make. As my former Drill Sergeant might have said, I'm still a bit "itchy-scratchy" when it comes to having a "set of beliefs."

And then we get to the last part of the definition of evangelism: CONVERSION. I do not wish to convert. When I think of conversion, I get images in my head of the Picard/Locutus transformation. "Resistance is futile!" is what I imagine evangelists shouting to the unwashed, unbelieving hordes. Conversion is a yucky word. You don't convert people. You convert old storage buildings into guest bedrooms, you convert basements into bomb shelters. Conversion is a thing that you do to things, and I do not want to be seen attempting to do it to people.

Alright, I'm glad that I have that off my chest. Now you all know why I am super, mega-unfit to be an evangelist. Everyone take a coffee break, because I'm about to tell you something important.

I'm going to tell you why I absolutely must be an evangelist. (I'll wait.)

Being a Methodist, I'm going to go about this Methodically.

Preaching of the Christian Gospel

 So, as I was raised in various reflections of the Southern Baptist tradition, I always thought I had a pretty good idea what the Christian Gospel looked like. It was always about being saved from HELL. That's where we're going when we don't believe in Jesus, right? We're going to burn in a lake of burning hot magma forever and ever and ever, amen - unless we get our life right and accept Jesus into our heart and beg at the feet of God for forgiveness of our sins. That, in a nutshell, is the Christian Gospel.

Kind of, it turns out, but not really.

Fear is a really great way to get people to the altar, but it's not a particularly good way to preach the Gospel. For more information on the word Gospel, I return to my good friend, Wiki.

The word gospel derives from the Old English gōd-spell ^[11] (rarely godspel), meaning "good news" or "glad tidings".

"Good news, guys! If you accept Jesus, you're not going to be tormented for eternity!"

That just doesn't cut it for me. Not being pulled apart by demons is pretty good news... for people who believe in demons. For the average person, especially the average American, the anti-demon-dismemberment message won't get you through the front door.

But the Good News about health for the sick, hope for the hopeless, comfort for the dying and those who mourn them, bread for the hungry... that's a message that carries. Do you want to know how I know? I have been all of those things! I have been sick and hopeless and mourning and hungry, and I found grace and fulfillment in Jesus the Christ. I found it by believing, yes... but it is a belief that made me want to follow. It is a belief that comes from a hope of a better tomorrow, not a fear of the alternative. And my belief and my hope are not just for myself... my belief and my hope are for the WHOLE WORLD! We can all be this happy and hopeful and free! We can let Jesus lift us up, and then we can help lift others up... that's the whole point!

So, preaching this Christian Gospel isn't just something that I can do... it now feels like something that I must do. Check one severely uncomfortable topic off the list.

A Set of Beliefs

 Ah, Facebook. You helped me make this topic so uncomfortable!

I know a good number of Christians who never have my special little problem. They find Jesus, and then their beliefs are set in stone. There is never the slightest hint of a waver - they are immovable in their set of beliefs. Uncomfortable theological questions never occur to them - there is no social conflict that they can't beat with good, old-fashioned Bible teaching.

How I wish that I was one of them.

I have to ask myself every day if I'm still a Christian. Some days, I'm pretty sure that I am. Other days, I think that we may just not have enough in common, Christianity and I. The Internet has made this immeasurably worse, because when I'm having one of those days where I'm really not sure I fit into the Christian family anymore, I do what every self-respecting member of my generation would - I post about it on Facebook. Do you understand how difficult it is for me to announce my evangelism to a group of people who have seen my constant, sometimes daily, struggles with faith? They're going to laugh at me, I think to myself. They're going to see that I'm a fake.

It turns out that there are a few guys in the Bible who had this problem. I'm thinking of Saul of Tarsus in particular. For those of you who don't know, Saul was a Jew in the time of Jesus, and if there was one thing that he loved more than roast lamb and unleavened bread, it was killing Christians. Saul was a very fervent Christian-killer, if the stories are to be believed. In his most famous moment of religious murder, he held the coats of the men who were stoning Stephen the Martyr. That's right: the act of killing a man with rocks had become so commonplace for Saul of Tarsus, that he says, "You guys go ahead, I'll sit this one out. Want me to hold your coats?"

  Then one day, Saul is walking to Damascus to kill some more Christians, and he sees a flash of blinding light... then he hears a voice, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?... I am Jesus, whom you have persecuted."

The whole story of Saul (who became Paul) is pretty long, but if you're ever interested in reading about the effects of seeing Jesus on the road to Damascus, just pick up a Bible and flip to the New Testament. He wrote most of the books between John and Revelations.

So, Paul becomes the most famous and widely-read evangelist in the entire history of Christianity. Can you imagine how embarrassing that must have been for him? If he had Facebook, it would have looked something like this.

Tuesday - Saul attended The Stoning of Stephen

Wednesday - Saul attended More Christian Killing

Thursday - Saul updated his name to "Paul"
                    Paul changed his religious beliefs to "Christian"

Moral of the story: I haven't killed any Christians. I really can't use "My friends won't approve" as a reason for not spreading the Gospel.

And, finally...

 Conversion

  At the fundamental level, conversion is the awakening of religious knowledge or understanding within a human being who had previously no belief in or concern with religious or spiritual matters.

Conversion has always seemed a forceful act to me, when done at the behest of an evangelist. But, I think that may have something to do with the forceful nature of Southern Baptist preaching.

This is where it gets real for me, because I have experienced a conversion within the last year. It's weird to think of it as thus, because I have spent almost my entire life in one church or another. I have been baptized no less than five times. I have prayed the "sinner's prayer" more times than I can count. I have had legitimate spiritual experiences at various points in my life, times when it felt like the Hand of God was reaching towards me... but I never really touched it. It was all paint on the walls, shingles on the roof, on a house that was built on a cracked and rotting foundation. My religion was a Christianity of smoke and mirrors, of memorizing Scripture but not reading too closely, of singing songs but never really entering worship. A hundred "altar calls", but not one legitimate moment of meeting God in a place where I was willing and ready to be changed.

My faux-religion met its match in the desert of Iraq: not once, but twice. It fell to pieces when confronted with real human suffering, with death, with squalor and destitution. It left splinters in my soul, where they festered and twisted and turned into a hatred of God and religion and anyone who practiced it. I was a professional Judge of Christians. I never killed any, but I wouldn't have been sad if someone else did it for me.

The 5th of June, in the year of our Lord 2012, was the last day of an old life. I chose to end it. I had made the plan, made the decision. Left no note, because I hoped that it would be judged an accident. No explanations or apologies necessary, just... an end. I wanted to do it. I willed myself to do it. But there was Someone else inside of me, Someone who was pushing hard against my desire to die with a powerful will to live anew.

Someone died that day. I recognized that before I lay my head down to sleep in a psychiatric hospital that night. Someone died, and for a while there was no one there to take the old person's place. But then, at an altar not unlike all the altars before, I knelt down and I knew Jesus for the first time. My life changed. Instead of an empty shell, I was a new, vibrant, happy person. Still some rough moments, to be sure, but there was suddenly a purpose for being me. God had converted that old basement into a throne room.

I have experienced conversion, and I know it to be a nearly indescribable experience. There is no force applied, just a gentle calling to something better. I want the whole world to share in this experience. So, I must be an evangelist.

Closing Thoughts

It's late now, Brothers and Sisters and All Those In Between. I started this project at a few minutes before 10 p.m., and it is now a few minutes before 1 a.m. I will remind you that I didn't want to do this, but I have now written far more words than I meant to. It turns out that there is something about the man Jesus, something about the Risen Son of God, that will keep us talking long after we've run out of things of our own to say. There is something about meeting the Savior at the end of your rope, at the bottom of your personal pit, that will make the time spent talking and writing about Him seem to fly by.

There is something about Him that will turn everyone who meets Him into an evangelist, no matter how unlikely.

My love to you all, wherever you are,

Michael Woywood
Saved by Grace
Following in Faith