Never has there been a greater need to share Christ with the world, starting with our own neighbor—and never have believers felt more ill-equipped.
Two years ago, we returned to live in America, and I was interviewed on a national radio show which included a phone-in Q&A session. The producer said before my interview, “Becky, I know you and your husband have done evangelism ministry all over the world, and that recently you have lived and ministered in Europe. You need to know that things have changed in America. To be honest, American Christians are far more interested in living the gospel and demonstrating their witness by serving the needy and caring for their cities than they are in any verbal expression of faith. To be very honest, I think the light has gone out for that kind of evangelism. So don’t worry if no one phones in.”
What happened after my interview? All the phones lit up as people called in from across the country!
The callers’ comments were very revealing. Every caller spoke of someone they cared deeply about who was not a Christian, but they felt fearful about engaging in a spiritual discussion with them. They said they longed for their friends to come to Christ, but because they felt inadequate in talking about faith, they were praying that another Christian would do it for them. All their fears were similar: How do I raise the topic of faith naturally? What if I offend them or they reject me? What if they raise questions that I can’t answer? Nearly everyone said they wished their churches would help train them in evangelism—not in a formulaic, memorized, one-size-fits-all approach, but in the way that I had been describing in the interview.
One thing has become clear to me: never has there been a greater need to share Christ with the world, starting with our own neighbor—and never have believers felt more ill-equipped.
Fruit from burned-over ground
Without question, the landscape in the West has changed considerably since I wrote my first book on evangelism, Out of the Saltshaker, in 1979. Back then it was a fairly radical idea to call Christians to an incarnational approach to witness, to challenge them to get out of the saltshaker and into the world: that is, to encourage them not to live in a Christian bubble but to genuinely befriend unbelievers, and to share the gospel as part of a relationship rather than using a hit-and-run approach.
Now, 40 years later, I have written my second book on evangelism Stay Salt— because we need to learn again to share our faith in a confident, compassionate, compelling way in this new, post-Christian world. I remember when we were planning to move to Europe, and some well-meaning friends of ours counseled against it:
“It’s burned-over ground for the gospel, Becky.”
It wasn’t. The secularized soil of Europe proved very fertile for the gospel. The fruit was tremendous. And this book is really the result of the lessons we learned.
What we have seen in our ministry is that even as our cultural landscape becomes increasingly secular, secularism does not have the power to erase our human longings for meaning and worth. If anything, it increases them. God has placed a longing for identity, meaning, and purpose in all human hearts; so, even if people can’t quite articulate what they feel they are missing, the longing and wistfulness are there. But they will not know where to look unless Christians both live and tell the good news of what God has done for all in Christ.
As we’ve spoken to and listened to countless thousands of Christians right around the world, helping them to both understand the gospel and to share it winsomely, we’ve often heard three heartfelt reasons why they are struggling or why they choose to remain quiet. Those three reasons provide the structure for this book.
1) We Feel Inadequate
We continually hear of the deep sense of inadequacy that Christians have about sharing their faith. They wonder how God could possibly use them in this current era. This is another way of saying that they fear that God may not come through. In other words, they are struggling with pockets of unbelief. They also suspect that evangelism is a specialized call and not for people like themselves. While they don’t realize it, what they are really saying is that evangelism is up to them alone, and that is why they panic.
2) We Think We Don’t Know Enough
Another area of insecurity in Christians is feeling that they lack knowledge. They fear they do not understand the gospel well enough to explain it or defend it. They don’t know how to answer the questions that skeptics will raise. Nor do they know how to help non-Christians see the beauty and relevance of the gospel to their lives.
3) We Lack Confidence
What we hear repeatedly is “I am just not sure how to do this. I really do want to share my faith—but I don’t know where to start.” There is a lot we can learn from Jesus and the early church about the “how” of witness. I believe we can effectively share the gospel with both people who are spiritually open and those who are spiritually closed.
Are Christians ready for this new age? Can we really communicate the gospel effectively? I emphatically say “Yes!” Because though our context and culture have changed, the power of the gospel has not. The riches and the resources that God has given to all Christians are still the same. Our task is learning how to apply all that we have received from God so that we can witness to the truth about him in ways that are effective and that truly connect with people today. We do not need to get angry, shouting at our culture. We do not need to feel defeated, staying silent in our culture. We can be hopeful, as we share the message that the whole world so desperately needs to hear. To put it another way, we can still be disciple-makers. We can—we must—stay salt!
The world has changed in so many ways, and many of us no longer feel confident when it comes to evangelism, especially with the rise of hostility towards Christian points of view. Keeping quiet is becoming our default position. Yet the world has not changed in one way—it still needs Jesus.
Rebecca Manley Pippert, is the founder of Becky Pippert Ministries and author of 11 books, including Out of the Saltshaker And Into the World.
This article is adapted from her most recent book, “Stay Salt,” in which she draws on decades of conversations about Christianity around the world to call and equip ordinary Christians to share Jesus through their ordinary day-to-day conversations.
Used with permission from The Good Book Company.