Evangelism - Really!

My wife and I spent this morning working at our region's Food Bank, along with several folks from our church, folks from another church, and youth doing community service. In three hours we packages nearly a thousand food boxes, assembly line style. These boxes will be distributed to persons in need throughout the extreme southeast section of our state. That sounds good, on the surface. The truth is that, even with this important outreach, the majority of people who will seek this aid will be turned away, because there won't be enough. As the food and fuel crisis intensifies locally, and worldwide, the numbers are rising.

As we seek to introduce a struggling and disoriented world to a real Jesus, I've invited us to pray for the resources, commitment, and decisions necessary to raise disciples for Jesus. If we make prayer central in our outreach, if we make it the very fuel for our central task as the Body of Christ, it won't be only a matter of what happens when we're on our knees or when our hands are folded piously. Real prayer will reshape our heart, so that we see others as they are seen by the heart of God. Our lives will morph, as sacrifice and service become more the norm for how we live. Evangelism will be way more than getting people into heaven or into worship services. Evangelism will become economic, social, and political. The Spirit of God will cause us to look at the ever widening gap in our world between the few who have much and the many who are barely surviving, and it will cause us to say, "Enough! This is not the in breaking Kingdom of our God."

Again, quoting Richard J. Foster, "We must boldly teach the essential connections between the inner and outer aspects of simplicity. We can no longer allow people to engage in pious exercises that are divorced from the hard social realities of life. Nor can we tolerate a radical social witness that is devoid of inward spiritual vitality. Our preaching and teaching needs to hold these elements in unity." (from Freedom of Simplicity.)

Are we ready for an evangelism like this; a disciple-making posture that doesn't allow us to escape life as it is, but empowers us to wade into life as it is, fueled by a transforming Jesus? We're in rapids again. Let's so who makes it to the next bend.