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Evangelism in the Early Church—and Why It Matters Today · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to Reformed Thinking, the deep dive into critical
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subjects that shape our understanding of the world.
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Today we're taking a look at a really engaging subject,
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evangelism. Not just, you know, how it's
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done today, but how it's been understood and sometimes frankly
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misunderstood across history. That's right.
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And we're drawing from, well, a rich stack of sources, articles,
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research, detailed notes, really trying to uncover what biblical
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evangelism actually involves and also how human nature truly
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stands before God. And maybe touch on some of those
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historical currents that have tried to pull the church off
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course and sharing the good news.
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OK, so our mission for this deep dive for you listening is to
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equip you with a clearer picture of evangelism's biblical
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principles. We want to help you grasp the
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mindset, the actual condition of the unsaved individual, and
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recognize the various isms, these opposing worldviews that
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have challenged the true message over the centuries.
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We hope you'll gain a clearer perception of what it means to
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faithfully proclaim the good news today.
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So let's start at the beginning. Let's ground ourselves in the
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earliest days of Christianity. When I think about evangelism
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today, I often picture organized campaigns, maybe specific
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outreach events. But the sources you pulled
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together suggest something quite different back then, almost like
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a quiet revolution woven into daily life in the early church.
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Is that right? What did evangelism truly look
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like in the book of Acts? What were the principles guiding
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those first believers? Yeah, that's a great place to
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start, because you're right, the sources show early Christian
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evangelism was fundamentally distinct from a lot of modern
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approaches. It was genuinely a way of life,
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much more than some kind of structured program.
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A way of life? How so?
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Well, imagine this. It wasn't confined to a specific
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time slot for gatherings, nor did they have, you know, a rigid
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script. Like, if they say A, then you
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have to say B. Instead, it was integrated
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pretty seamlessly into their daily existence.
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Believers just naturally shared their faith in everyday
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conversations right within the fabric of their ordinary lives.
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Not just specialists or pastors. No, not at all.
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The main agents in Christianity's, well, it's rapid
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expansion weren't only the apostles, though they were key,
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of course. It was ordinary men and women,
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people carrying on their livelihoods as tent makers,
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fishermen, merchants, whatever it was, and simply Speaking of
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their faith naturally to those they encountered.
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And we find countless interactions like that in Acts
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that just don't fit into formal categories like a public sermon.
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Think about conversations happening by a well or maybe in
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a bustling marketplace or even just in someone's home.
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And this really underscores A crucial point for us today.
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Our own walk with God in daily life and our readiness to seize
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the opportunities the Lord presents, those are central to
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evangelism. It's about being observant,
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being responsive. So it wasn't just for a select
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few then, but more a natural outflow of every believer's
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life. That ties into what people
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sometimes call the Life and Lips principle, doesn't it?
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The idea that Christianity was both lived out authentically and
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also verbally proclaimed. Absolutely.
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The sources are very clear on this.
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Effective evangelism really calls for believers, well first,
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to be a faithful testimony, living above reproach in their
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conduct, but also just as vital, clearly communicating the Gospel
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with words. Both parts matter.
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Yeah, if there's a failure in either aspect, the gospel simply
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cannot be adequately conveyed. Think about it.
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You could live incredibly upright life, be the most really
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sound person anyone knows, but if you never open your mouth to
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share the truth of Christ, how will anyone actually hear the
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good news? And you know, conversely, words,
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even perfect theological statements, can ring pretty
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hollow without a life that backs them up.
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Both are indispensable. That leads to another powerful
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principle. We see in Acts the idea of
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obeying God rather than men. Peter and the apostles really
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modeled this for us, didn't they?
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Setting a pattern by prioritizing obedience to God
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over human commands even when they faced arrest for public
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preaching. That's that's not a small thing.
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No, it's definitely not. And it raises A fascinating
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question for us in the modern age, doesn't it?
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This principle applies directly to situations where human laws,
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or maybe just societal expectations, flat out
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contradict God's command to proclaim the Gospel.
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Like when they were told explicitly not to preach.
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Exactly. Think about Peter and the
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Apostles. The authorities told them point
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blank, do not preach in the name of Jesus.
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Yet they continued, and significantly, they accepted the
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consequences. That meant physical persecution,
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imprisonment. But they did it without
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resorting to deception or, you know, lying.
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That's key. Guy doesn't command lying.
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No, God does not command lying for evangelistic purposes.
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If laws forbid sharing the gospel, the biblical response
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seems to be accepting the consequences, like going to jail
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if necessary, not trying to disguise one's true mission, or
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using deceit. So how does that play out today?
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Maybe in restricted context? Well, you see this principle at
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play. Imagine someone goes to a
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restricted nation, maybe officially, to teach English.
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The principle is faithfully teach English, genuinely build
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relationships through that work, and then through those genuine
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relationships when the Lord opens the door.
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Share the gospel with honesty and integrity, even if it means
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facing opposition or hardship. The cost of following Christ,
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Well, that's always been part of a faithful witness, hasn't it?
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Yeah, it seems so. OK, so if we connect this back
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to the overall aim, the goal of this early evangelism wasn't
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just getting people to comply outwardly or make some simple,
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maybe fleeting decision, was it? The sources indicate the
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ultimate aim was much deeper for God's Spirit to regenerate
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people to bring them to spiritual life.
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That's spot on. The aim was for people to
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genuinely turn from sin and embrace the gospel in a saving
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way. Not just, you know, make a
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mental nod or a quick choice. And this really stands in stark
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contrast to some later approaches that came to focus on
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individual simply making a decision for Christ.
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The early church viewed the effectiveness of evangelism as
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entirely contingent on God's might honoring the faithful
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proclamation of the gospel. It was always understood as
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God's work fundamentally, not just human persuasion.
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The content of that message, the core of it, was consistent,
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wasn't it? Even if maybe the starting point
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adapted depending on the audience, it always included the
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crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, a clear call to
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repentance, and the offer of forgiveness of sins.
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Indeed, the overall structure often followed a kind of
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pattern. First, establish a shared
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history. This was especially true for
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Jewish audiences familiar with the Old Testament.
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Second, bring a sense of guilt for sin before a holy God.
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Third, present the hope found uniquely in Christ, and finally,
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often issuing a warning about the consequences of rejecting
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that hope. History, Guilt, Hope, Warning.
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Yeah, that consistent content really highlights the timeless
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core gospel truths, regardless of who they were talking to.
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But like you said, the starting point often adapted.
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They're quite flexible in their methodologies.
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OK, let's unpack that adaptability.
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How do they tailor their method? You mentioned Jewish audiences.
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They often use temple and synagogue preaching.
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Precisely. The apostles consistently
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preached in the temple in Jerusalem.
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I mean, that gave him access to large Jewish gatherings, right?
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And Paul, We see him regularly visiting synagogues all across
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the Roman Empire. This was actually a pretty smart
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move. Why is that?
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Well, it was customary in synagogues to allow visiting
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rabbis or Pharisees to address the congregation after the
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readings. So Paul could often get a
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hearing, and their message typically would begin with Old
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Testament history. They'd summarize key events,
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maybe from Abraham all the way to King David.
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OK, building common ground. Exactly.
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And then they'd skillfully bridge that narrative to Jesus
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as the promised Messiah, the promised Savior.
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They talk about his death, his resurrection, and the
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forgiveness of sins he offers through faith in him.
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And then they'd conclude with a direct challenge to believe.
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Paul's sermon in Acts 13 is a really clear, detailed example
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of this approach. OK, what about when they were in
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more restrictive situations, like jail preaching?
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That sounds almost counterintuitive.
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Evangelizing from a jail cell. It's certainly a unique method
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we see in Acts. It involved proclaiming the
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gospel while literally in prison, turning a place of
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confinement into, well, a platform for Christ.
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The accounts in Acts 4, Acts 5, Stephen and Acts 7.
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They offer examples. What was the focus there?
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The content often focus heavily on Christ alone as the only
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means of salvation, on God being the one who saves, not human
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effort or systems, and often on God's sovereign hand, even over
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the horrific event of the crucifixion itself.
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Stephen's speech in Acts 7 is just a powerful instance of
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this, though it's worth noting his speech lacks the
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resurrection because he was martyred.
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He was killed before he could get to that point in his
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message. And then you have the story of
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Paul and Silas in the Philippian jail.
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The earthquake, the jailer asking what must I do to be
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saved? His whole household comes to
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faith. It's a compelling example of God
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using what seemed like a total obstacle for his purposes.
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Definitely, and we know the early church met extensively in
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harm, so that must have naturally led to house to house
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preaching too. Oh, absolutely.
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For well, well over 150 years, the early church didn't really
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have distinct church buildings as we think of them.
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They met primarily in homes, and this created an inherent
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evangelistic dynamic right within neighborhoods and
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communities. Well, neighbors would observe
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the believers gathering, see their lives, hear their singing
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perhaps, and the gospel could be shared in a much more intimate,
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relational setting. Paul, for instance, mentions
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teaching and preaching from house to house in Ephesus.
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So what's the take away for us today?
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Well, the guiding principle isn't necessarily that we must
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only meet in homes, but it's about keeping a presence in the
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community beyond just formal Sunday gatherings.
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This could look like home Bible studies, consistent neighborly
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interactions, maybe even door to door efforts in some contexts.
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It's about active engagement where people actually live
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rather than solely expecting non believers to come find us inside
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a church building. Got it.
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Open air preaching was also a method you mentioned, especially
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for gentile audiences preaching in public spaces like
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marketplaces. That seems like a pretty bold
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approach. It was bold, and Paul especially
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recognized that Gentiles wouldn't have the same Old
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Testament background as Jewish audiences.
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You couldn't just start with Abraham, so he would often start
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with creation, referencing what people inherently knew or could
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know about God just from observing the world around them
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and what they knew in their conscience.
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Like in Athens. Exactly Acts 17 when he
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addressed the Areopagus in Athens.
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He started with their altar to the unknown God and talked about
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the God who made the world and everything in it.
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From there, he could then move to Christ's death for sins and
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the crucial fact of the resurrection.
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Now, this requires A balanced approach, right?
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Faithful open air preaching generally aims to attract a
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listening crowd. Engage people thoughtfully, like
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you see with someone like Ray Comfort today, as opposed to
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just shouting indiscriminately into the air.
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The goal is engagement, not just making noise.
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Makes sense. And you said the most frequent
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form of evangelism in Acts, according to the sources, was
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actually conversational evangelism.
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This seems to tie everything together, doesn't.
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It it really does. This happened through
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spontaneous everyday interactions.
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And let me just reiterate this point, because it's central The
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chief agents in Christianity's rapid expansion were not those
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who made evangelism their sole profession.
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It was ordinary men and women just carrying on their normal
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livelihoods and Speaking of their faith naturally as
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opportunities arose. Like Philip and the Ethiopian
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eunuch. Perfect example right there on
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the road. Or Ananias's really unexpected
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interaction with Saul after his conversion.
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Or Paul and Silas again, this time with the Philippian jailer.
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That started with a conversation prompted by crisis.
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And these conversations were often quite direct, including
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clear calls to repentance and faith.
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It really underscores that evangelism is meant to be woven
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into the fabric of life, not just a specialized program we
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turn on and off. That's a powerful picture of
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early evangelism. OK, let's pivot slightly now to
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another crucial area. Because before we can faithfully
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share the gospel, we really have to grasp who we are sharing it
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with. What does a biblical view of
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human nature, biblical anthropology, tell us about the
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unsaved person? This understanding seems
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absolutely vital. Oh, it's critical.
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It's crucial for pinpointing, you could say, the entry point
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for the gospel message, because the sources are quite clear on
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this. There is simply no neutrality in
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humanity's relationship with God.
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Everyone stands somewhere in relation to him.
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And what's particularly insightful here, maybe even
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jarring, is the stark contrast between how the average person
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tends to view themselves and what the Bible actually reveals
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about their state apart from Christ.
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How does the average person typically see themselves?
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Well, the common self perception is often that they are basically
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morally good. Deep down.
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They genuinely believe they'll probably go to heaven because,
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well, in their own estimation they are a good person.
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Maybe not perfect, but fundamentally good and their
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wrongdoings. They're typically categorized as
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maybe misjudgments or bad choices, perhaps mistakes, but
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usually not sin in the deep biblical sense of rebellion
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against God. If they do admit something was
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wrong, it's frequently framed as a one off admission, an isolated
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incident. It's generally not an
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acknowledgement of an inherent, pervasive sinful nature.
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It's more like, yeah, I messed up there, not I am fundamentally
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flawed and at odds with God. So they don't see themselves as
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inherently sinful, but is generally OK, just with
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occasional slips. And they sort of see themselves
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as the ultimate judge of right and wrong, too.
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Precisely. They often consider themselves
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the final authority on matters of morality and judgement.
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They're not typically appealing to some external divine
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authority or standard. The reason something is bad or
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good is ultimately because they decided it was bad or good based
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on their own feelings or reasoning or maybe societal
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consensus. This perspective is completely
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devoid of the idea of absolute truth or a final objective
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authority beyond the self. Yeah, that's a huge hurdle.
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It really is. It becomes a significant point
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of interaction and often contention when you try to share
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the gospel. It's like trying to explain the
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rules of a game to someone who insists they are the only
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legitimate rule maker. That's such a sharp contrast to
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the biblical reality of the unsafe person.
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The sources you pulled are quite blunt.
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People are described as depraved.
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Indeed, the Bible uses strong language.
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It describes people apart from Christ as depraved, meaning
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their entire being, their mind, their will, their emotions is
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affected and corrupted by sin. They are described as dead in
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their sins and trespasses, not just sick, but spiritually dead,
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dead, desperately wicked minds blinded by sin.
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Conscience is defiled or even seared, meaning unresponsive to
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guilt. So the gospel isn't about
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helping someone who is merely spiritually unwell.
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It's about bringing life for the dead.
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That's a radical difference. And they're also culpable,
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responsible. Absolutely they are without
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excuse. That's Romans one again.
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Because their rebellion against God isn't out of ignorance.
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It's described as a deliberate and willful suppression of the
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truth they actually know. Their goal, often subconsciously
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maybe, is to silence their conscience precisely because
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they are in sinful rebellion against the God who placed that
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conscience within them. So they are fundamentally
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opposed. Yes, the non Christian is
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fundamentally opposed to what you are saying when you share
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the gospel precisely because they are opposed to God himself.
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It isn't just a simple disagreement over ideas.
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The Bible portrays it as an active.
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Good. The Bible's assessment is, well,
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far more severe. But here's a question.
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Does the unsaved person inherently know anything about
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God, even in the state of rebellion?
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It seems like if they're so opposed, maybe they wouldn't
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know anything at all. That's an excellent question,
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and the answer which might surprise some is a definite yes.
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According to Scripture, they know at least two key things,
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even if they suppress that knowledge.
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First, God's person, his basic attributes, are revealed in
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creation. Romans 1 verses 18 to 20 is
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incredibly explicit on this. What?
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Does it say they know? It says that God's invisible
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attributes, things like his eternal power and divine nature,
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have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world
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in the things that have been made.
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So every non Christian knows at some level about God's
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omniscience. He must be incredibly
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intelligent, His omnipresence involved everywhere, His
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Holiness, His eternal might, His divine nature, simply from
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observing the universe. Just from looking around.
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Yeah, they can deduce that a creator exists who is infinitely
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mighty and intelligent just by standing on this planet and
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observing its complexity or looking up at the vastness of
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the cosmos. It shouts design, purpose,
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power. They also recognize
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instinctively that God maintains the world.
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They see consistent natural phenomena, the sun's reliable
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movement, the predictable cycle of seasons, God's provision, as
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Acts puts it, of rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons
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satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.
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Paul argues that God has not left himself without witness in
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any society, no matter how remote or seemingly unreached.
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This inherent, undeniable knowledge, even though it's
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often suppressed, is precisely what makes them culpable without
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excuse. They aren't truly ignorant, the
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Bible says. They're an act of defiance of
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what they know deep down. Wow.
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So creation speaks. And beyond creation, you said,
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there's a second thing they know, an internal witness.
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Yes. Second, God's law is revealed in
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their conscience. Romans 2 talks about this.
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Non believers have God's moral law written on their hearts,
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possessing an instinctive built in sense of right and wrong that
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activates their guilt when they violate.
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It even without the Bible. Even without the Bible, they
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know fundamentally what sin is. We see this even before the
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Mosaic Law was given at Sinai. Cain obviously knew murder was
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wrong. Why else would he try to hide
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his brother's body and lie about it?
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Joseph knew adultery was wrong when Potiphar's wife tempted him
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in Egypt, calling it a great wickedness and a sin against
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God. Even societies without direct
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access to Scripture often have remarkably similar moral codes,
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prohibiting things like theft, murder, lying, dishonouring
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parents. It points to a universal moral
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standard. But they suppress it.
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Yes, that's the critical part. They know this internal law, but
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they choose to suppress and deny this truth, especially when it
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comes to applying it rigorously to themselves.
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A big part of their life's goal, spiritually speaking, is often
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to silence that very conscience. Because they are in sinful
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rebellion against the gods who put it there.
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They don't want to admit there's an external moral standard they
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fall short of, or a holy God to whom they are ultimately
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accountable. So evangelism isn't just about
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giving new information. Right.
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It's often more about breaking through layers of self
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deception, willful blindness, and that active suppression of
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the truth they already know through creation and conscience.
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It's asking God to overcome that resistance.
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That understanding really does reshape how you'd approach
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evangelism, doesn't it? Realizing the depth of the
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spiritual opposition involved. OK, now let's look at history.
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History shows us that this core message of the gospel has
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constantly faced challenges, hasn't it?
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What are these isms, as you call them, that have developed either
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in opposition to or maybe as distorted responses to
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Christianity? How do they twist the truth?
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Yeah. And if we connect this to the
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broader flow of history, it's important to see that these
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world views, these isms, they don't just sort of appear and
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then vanish completely. Their remnants, their underlying
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ideas often continue to hinder faithful evangelism today.
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That makes it really vital to be able to discern their lingering
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effects. The first major one we see
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emerging historically really dominating the Middle Ages, say
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from the three hundreds AD right up until the Reformation in the
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1500s, was sacramentalism. Sacramentalism.
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OK, that sounds like it may be erected.
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Barriers between people and God. Is that the idea?
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That's a really good way to describe it.
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The core idea was that it introduced what amounted to a
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well, frankly, A heretical system where individuals had to
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perform specific procedures, the sacraments, as defined and
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controlled by the institutional church, in order to gain access
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to God's grace. So adding steps.
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Exactly. It effectively inserted a human
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devised barrier, or maybe a series of hoops between the
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individual soul and God himself. It wasn't necessarily a denial
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of the Gospel's truth outright in every case, but it was a
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crucial addition of human invented steps that were
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presented as necessary for salvation or for receiving
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grace. And the effect was it connected
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people much more strongly to a system and its institutions
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rather than directly to Christ himself through simple faith.
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And the effects of this system, they were pretty far reaching,
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weren't they, Influencing practices like asceticism and
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monasticism? Oh absolutely.
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Sacramentalism definitely gave rise to, or at least strongly
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encouraged asceticism. This stressed extreme self
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denial, things like mandatory celibacy for clergy, vows of
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poverty as somehow a higher, more direct path to God's grace.
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And this subtly altered the evangelistic hall itself.
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It started to suggest that to truly experience God's grace or
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to be really serious about faith, one needed to undertake
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additional acts beyond simple repentance and faith, like
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selling all your possessions and maybe moving off to a commune or
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monastery. And monasticism itself had a big
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impact. A.
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Huge impact, and often a devastating one on local
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churches. Monasticism was a natural
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progression from that ascetic ideal, but it effectively
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siphoned off many of the most devout and potentially gifted
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individuals, including potential elders, pastors, leaders, away
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from the local congregations and into isolated communes.
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This often left the local churches spiritually weakened,
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almost like congregations filled with widows and orphans.
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Metaphorically speaking, you had families whose main spiritual
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leaders or even providers had liquidated everything and
21:55
abandoned them for the supposedly higher life of the
21:57
monastery. It created a real spiritual
22:00
vacuum in many places. Wow.
22:02
And it also led to the concept of baptismal regeneration,
22:04
didn't it? The idea that baptism itself
22:07
saves or regenerates. Yes, it did.
22:09
This teaching held that infant baptism itself actually
22:12
regenerated the individual, making them spiritually alive
22:15
and part of the covenant community without any need for
22:17
personal faith or a genuine conscious relationship with
22:20
Christ later on. Which then leads to problems
22:22
when church and state mix. Precisely this flowed quite
22:26
naturally into the institutionalization of the
22:28
church and the whole state church concept.
22:31
When Christianity became the official religion of the Roman
22:34
Empire under Constantine back in the 4th century, baptism
22:37
gradually became not just a religious right, but almost a
22:40
requirement for citizenship. It was the way you formally
22:43
entered society. And this, as the source material
22:46
puts it, slays evangelism because people started
22:49
considering themselves Christians simply by birth or
22:52
nationality, not because of any personal belief, repentance, or
22:55
conversion experience. They.
22:56
Were born into it. Right.
22:58
And figures like Pope Leo the First back in the four hundreds
23:00
really solidified the role of the Bishop or pastor as a civic
23:03
leader, intrinsically linking the church hierarchy with
23:06
government power. This created a situation where
23:09
the lines were incredibly blurred and true personal
23:12
evangelism was deeply hindered for centuries.
23:14
This whole elaborate Sacramento system was really the main
23:18
opponent that authentic biblical evangelism faced right up until
23:21
the Reformation. OK, so after sacramentalism, as
23:25
we move out of the Middle Ages and into the, say, 15 hundreds
23:28
to the 1800s, we see the rise of rationalism.
23:31
How did this different worldview affect evangelism?
23:35
Rationalism brought a whole new challenge.
23:38
Its core idea was essentially that one should only believe
23:40
what could be arrived at through human reason alone.
23:43
It tended to exclude or marginalized anything
23:46
supernatural, miracles, revelation, regeneration from
23:50
the realm of what could be considered true or knowable.
23:53
So reason above faith. In practice, yes, and its impact
23:56
was pretty significant. It LED towards a sharper church
23:59
state distinction, which wasn't entirely bad, but it also often
24:03
had the effect of dividing life into separate spheres.
24:05
The religious and the secular. Christianity could get isolated,
24:08
pushed into the corner of purely religious matters, effectively
24:11
divorcing it from public life, from science, from philosophy.
24:15
But there was pushback. Oh, strong pushback from key
24:17
figures. Think of the Reformers like
24:19
Luther and Calvin, and later figures like Jonathan Edwards in
24:23
America or George Whitefield during the Great Awakening.
24:26
They vehemently oppose this shrinking of faith.
24:29
They thought for a return of the supernatural idea of
24:31
regeneration right back into the heart of the church's message.
24:35
They strongly asserted the necessity of being born again, a
24:38
divine act, not just a rational conclusion, to genuinely receive
24:41
the gospel. They were countering
24:43
rationalism's tendency to, well, secularize everything by arguing
24:47
forcefully for God's active intervention in the world and,
24:50
crucially, in individual hearts. Yet despite their powerful
24:54
efforts, rationalism began to morph or give way to another
24:57
challenge as we move into the 19th century orthodoxism.
25:00
Orthodoxism OK from the 1800s to the 1900s, what were its
25:04
distinct challenges for evangelism?
25:06
It was different again with orthodoxism.
25:09
The core idea was that Christianity became primarily an
25:11
issue of tradition and genealogy.
25:14
Being a Christian was less about personal conviction and more
25:17
about your family background. You know, I'm a Christian
25:19
because my parents were Christians, where I belong to
25:22
this denomination because that's what my family has always been.
25:25
Truth became largely defined as simply what was taught and
25:29
handed down through a particular denominational lineage.
25:32
So loyalty to the group. Yeah, loyalty to the
25:34
institution, to the tradition. And this meant evangelism subtly
25:38
shifted its focus again. Instead of calling people
25:41
primarily to a fresh, personal encounter with the gospel
25:44
itself, repentance, faith, new birth, it often became more
25:47
about calling them to a church, join our denomination, adopt our
25:50
traditions. And this naturally fostered
25:53
intense denominational competition and rivalry.
25:56
The focus could become more about allegiance to a human
25:58
institution than about personal repentance and saving faith in
26:02
Christ alone. And this, interestingly set the
26:04
stage for a dramatic counter movement.
26:06
Yes, Charles Finney and what's known as decisionism.
26:11
This sounds like a really major turning point in how evangelism
26:14
started to be approached, particularly in America.
26:16
Oh, it was huge. Charles Finney emerged in the
26:18
early 1800s, and his approach was in many ways a direct
26:22
reaction against that staid, tradition bound orthodoxism.
26:25
He heavily stressed the individual's choice to receive
26:28
Christ, and he often presented this choice as something almost
26:31
independent of any systemic truth, traditional church
26:34
structure, or even, some would argue, the sovereign work of
26:38
God. How did he view sin?
26:40
Well, a central and quite controversial tenet of his
26:43
teaching was that people were sinful primarily by choice, not
26:46
by nature. Meaning, what ultimately sends
26:48
people to hell isn't an inherent sinful state inherited from
26:51
Adam, but rather the absence of making a correct choice for
26:54
Christ fundamentally shifted the goal of evangelism from
26:57
regeneration to a. Decision.
26:59
Exactly. The objective changed from
27:02
seeking regeneration, which the Bible describes as being born
27:05
again, a supernatural act initiated by God's divine will,
27:09
to primarily causing people to choose differently or simply
27:13
make a decision for Christ. It frames salvation much more as
27:16
an act of the human will rather than an act of the divine will,
27:20
and Finney also introduced. New ways of measuring success in
27:23
evangelism, didn't he? It seems like he was the first
27:25
to really try and quantify the results.
27:27
Yeah, that's a really. Noteworthy aspect of his legacy,
27:31
Finney was in a very real sense, the world's first evangelist to
27:34
count decisions. This introduced a whole new
27:37
concept, what the sources call evangelistic pragmatism.
27:41
Success started to be measured not by biblical criteria like
27:44
genuine conversion leading to baptism and integration into a
27:47
local church, as we see consistently in Acts, but by the
27:49
sheer number of hands raised or inquiry cards filled out at a
27:52
meeting. Numbers became the measure.
27:54
Numbers became the primary. Measure, and this also gave rise
27:58
to the whole idea of rededication, the notion that
28:01
you could simply re choose Christ if you felt you'd
28:04
strayed, rather than seeing repentance as an ongoing aspect
28:07
of the Christian life rooted in an initial definitive
28:10
conversion. Success therefore became
28:13
determined by what produces decisions.
28:15
Methods started being adopted based on their perceived
28:18
effectiveness in generating these decisions, sometimes
28:20
irrespective of whether they were strictly faithful to
28:23
biblical patterns of gospel preaching and reliant on God for
28:26
the actual work of salvation and his influence even affected.
28:29
The language we use in evangelism, didn't it, shaping
28:31
phrases we still hear all the time today?
28:33
It certainly did. His approach fostered a lot of
28:36
non biblical or at least extra biblical vocabulary that became
28:39
widespread. Phrases like make a decision for
28:42
Christ or ask Jesus into your heart.
28:45
Now the intention behind these phrases might be good, but the
28:48
vocabulary itself often reflects that underlying numbers oriented
28:52
decision focused motivation rather than emphasizing the
28:55
deeper biblical concepts like repentance from sin,
28:58
regeneration by the Spirit, new birth, public baptism, and
29:01
commitment to church membership. So there can be a disconnect.
29:04
There can be for instance you. Look at modern mass crusades,
29:07
which often borrow heavily from Finney's model.
29:10
While the gospel messages themselves might be quite clear
29:13
and biblical, the practice of counting decision cards often
29:16
doesn't reliably correlate to real converts in the biblical
29:19
sense. Follow up studies have often
29:22
shown that a large percentage of those who fill out cards don't
29:24
actually follow through with baptism or become meaningfully
29:27
involved in a local church. This suggests the potential
29:30
disconnect from genuine, lasting transformation.
29:34
People might make a decision for all sorts of reasons.
29:36
Maybe they want a free Bible offered, or they want the
29:39
experience of walking onto the field where a crusade is held.
29:41
Or they get swept up in the emotion of the moment, not
29:44
necessarily out of deep conviction of sin and saving
29:47
faith. The remnants of Finney's
29:49
decision oriented and pragmatic approach to evangelism are still
29:52
incredibly widespread today, making it a really critical ISM
29:56
for us to understand and evaluate biblically OK moving
29:59
into the 20th century. Now we encounter politicism and
30:03
also liberation theology. This seems to be about
30:06
connecting the gospel message tightly with specific social or
30:09
political agendas. That's right, the core idea.
30:11
Here was that the gospel became intrinsically connected to, or
30:16
sometimes even subordinate to, a particular social agenda or
30:19
political ideology. Liberation theology, for
30:22
example, which arose primarily in Latin America but had global
30:25
influence, tended to view salvation less in terms of
30:28
individual reconciliation with God and more in terms of the
30:31
oppressed social class rising to political and economic power.
30:35
Kingdom work often got redefined primarily as wealth
30:38
redistribution to alleviate social inequalities, so the
30:41
focus shifts. From the individual soul to the
30:43
social structure, largely yes, the.
30:45
Practical impact was that evangelism could become seen
30:48
mainly as a means of achieving social transformation rather
30:52
than its primary biblical focus on individual reconciliation
30:55
with God through Christ. An underlying theological view
30:58
that often contributed to this was what's sometimes called an
31:01
optimistic amillennialism. This is a particular view of end
31:05
times that believes the Kingdom of God is primarily advanced
31:07
through human efforts and social action, cultural transformation
31:10
and political in the present age, rather than waiting for
31:13
Christ future literal return and reign.
31:16
And if you believe. That.
31:17
Well, if you believe you can. Essentially, build the Kingdom
31:20
of God on earth through political action or social
31:22
programs. Then evangelism can easily
31:24
become just another tool in the toolkit for social engineering.
31:28
It risks losing its primary God-given focus on calling
31:32
individuals to spiritual rebirth and reconciliation with their
31:36
Creator. And for a really stark, maybe
31:39
extreme historical example, you could even consider something
31:42
like Hitler's German Christian faith movement back in the
31:44
1930s, where Christian Identity was explicitly and terrifyingly
31:49
linked to joining his political party and embracing its racist
31:53
and nationalist ideology. That's politicization of the
31:56
gospel in its most horrific form.
31:58
That's chilling. OK.
31:59
Then moving forward again, from roughly the 1950s up to the
32:02
present day, we see the influence of ecumenicalism.
32:05
This sounds like it prioritizes unity, maybe sometimes at the
32:07
expense of doctrine. It often does, yes.
32:10
The core idea driving much of the modern ecumenical movement
32:13
promotes unity without doctrine, or at least unity based on a
32:16
minimal doctrinal core. It often involves a tolerance of
32:21
error on secondary or sometimes even primary issues, and can
32:25
foster a kind of disdain of theology itself as being
32:28
divisive. The prevailing belief was and
32:31
often still is something like, look, it doesn't really matter
32:33
if you're a part of this church or that church because
32:35
ultimately we're all Christians. We're all going in the same
32:37
general direction or downplaying differences.
32:40
Yes, downplaying. Or minimizing theological
32:43
differences for the sake of visible unity.
32:45
This involved a gradual lessening of the conviction that
32:48
there is a specific, robust body of universal truth that must be
32:51
believed for salvation and for healthy church life.
32:55
The impact in places like the US was quite significant.
32:58
It contributed to the gradual end of the traditional
33:01
denominations as distinct entities, as once clearly
33:04
defined denominations began to merge, cooperate loosely, or
33:07
simply minimize their doctrinal distinctives.
33:10
Detailed statements of faith were often reduced down to just
33:13
very basic essentials to allow for the broadest possible
33:16
cooperation and Billy Graham's crusades.
33:19
Fit into this Billy Graham was in many.
33:21
Ways a master at uniting incredibly diverse denominations
33:23
for his mass crusades. He did this largely by adopting
33:27
Finney's decision based approach, which could appeal
33:29
across theological lines. As a result, for many people,
33:32
evangelism became synonymous with mass crusades.
33:36
Unity for the purpose of generating decisions was the top
33:38
priority, and within that framework strong doctrinal
33:41
distinctives, if they cause division among the cooperating
33:43
churches, were often viewed as inherently anti evangelistic.
33:47
Interesting tension there. And related perhaps is this
33:51
emphasis on personal experience experientialism, which seems to
33:55
have really grown since the 1970s, maybe particularly
33:58
prominent in movements like the charismatic movement.
34:00
Yes, there's often a. Connection The core idea of
34:03
experientialism is the belief that some kind of specific
34:06
experience, often something dramatic, emotional, or
34:09
supernatural, perhaps going beyond initial belief or
34:12
spiritual rebirth, is necessary to truly be in a right
34:15
relationship with God or to fully experience his grace and
34:18
power. So faith isn't enough.
34:20
You need an. Experience.
34:21
That's often the implication. Yes, the impact on evangelism is
34:24
that the call can shift. Instead of primarily calling
34:27
people to repent of their sins and place their faith entirely
34:30
in the finished work of Christ, the call might become more
34:33
focused on urging them to open themselves up to receive this
34:37
experience from God. And the danger there is that it
34:40
risks undermining the sufficiency and authority of the
34:43
gospel message itself by elevating A subjective human
34:47
experience as the ultimate validator or even the source of
34:50
a right relationship with God. I actually recall being
34:54
evangelized by someone coming from this perspective years ago,
34:57
before I truly understood the gospel myself.
34:59
The message wasn't a clear call to repent from sin and trust
35:02
Christ's death and resurrection. It was basically just kneel down
35:06
right now and pray for the Lord's blessing to come upon
35:08
your life and you'll feel it. It lacked the core content,
35:11
right? Focusing on the feeling.
35:12
Over the facts of the Gospel. OK, and finally we have this
35:15
cluster of more contemporary isms that seems especially
35:17
pervasive today. Subjectivism, mysticism,
35:20
pragmatism, syncretism and relativism.
35:23
These seem to be dominant forces from the 1980s onward.
35:25
Yeah, this cluster represents. A really widespread relativistic
35:28
idea where basically conflicting worldviews are tolerated as
35:32
equally valid or at least equally acceptable paths.
35:36
Truth becomes highly personalized, so subjectivism
35:39
posits that truth is purely internal and personal.
35:42
What's true for you isn't necessarily true for me.
35:45
Mysticism often locates spiritual authority and inner
35:48
feelings or direct personal revelations apart from
35:50
Scripture. Pragmatism we touched on with
35:53
Finney, but more broadly it just embraces whatever works as the
35:56
main criterion for truth or effectiveness, regardless of
35:59
principle. And the syncretism actively
36:01
blends different beliefs and practices together, often
36:03
without much regard for their inherent contradictions.
36:05
And these are major. Roadblocks for evangelism.
36:08
Huge obstacles today. Because broad evangelicalism
36:11
itself unfortunately still shows the lingering remnants of all
36:15
these different isms we've discussed.
36:17
Christianity, for many people, can become defined primarily by
36:20
their personal feelings. Well, I feel good about God, so
36:23
I must be OK. Or maybe by their church
36:25
affiliation, making changing churches feel almost like losing
36:28
your salvation. Because their core identity is
36:30
tied to that specific institution or tradition, Or
36:33
even increasingly, by a connection to a particular
36:37
political party or social platform, rather than by genuine
36:40
repentance from sin and saving faith in Christ alone based on
36:43
the objective truths of Scripture.
36:45
Each of these modern outlooks becomes a substantial obstacle
36:48
when you try to proclaim the pure, exclusive claims of the
36:51
gospel, because they make the very concepts of objective
36:54
truth, universal sinfulness, and a soul necessary path to God
36:57
through Christ incredibly difficult for the listener even
36:59
to conceive of, let alone accept.
37:01
Wow, we have. Certainly covered a lot of
37:04
ground today, everything from the biblical blueprint of
37:07
evangelism back in the book of Acts, all the way through these
37:11
historical opponents, these isms that has sought to redefine or
37:15
dilute it over the centuries. It's really clear how crucial it
37:18
is to understand these distinctions if we want to be
37:20
faithful. You're absolutely right
37:22
understanding. That true biblical evangelism
37:24
centers on God's revealed truth, on man's actual spiritual state
37:28
as a rebel against God dead in sin, and on God's sovereign act
37:32
of regeneration through the Holy Spirit.
37:34
Understanding that in contrast to all these human centric,
37:37
pragmatic or experience driven approaches is just critical for
37:40
faithful proclamation today. The historical struggles really
37:43
do serve as a valuable, maybe cautionary guide for us.
37:47
So as we close this. Deep dive.
37:49
Here's something for you, the listener, to consider.
37:51
If the unsaved individual is indeed, as the Bible describes,
37:55
in willful rebellion against God, actively suppressing the
37:59
truth they already know about Him through creation and
38:01
conscience, how does that understanding fundamentally
38:05
reshape your prayers for them? And maybe also, how does it
38:08
reshape your approach to actually sharing the gospel with
38:11
them this week? Yeah, that's the heart of it.
38:13
We trust this deep dive has helped you consider these
38:16
insights. Perhaps challenge some
38:17
assumptions. Until next time, keep seeking to
38:20
understand and faithfully share God's truth.