Skip and I were just about to pass through the doors of Bronco Mall at Western Michigan University. That’s when we noticed a young man in a leg cast leaning against the brick wall, inhaling on a cigarette. “What happened?” I asked.

“I got hit by a car while driving a moped.”

“Wow, and you came out alive?—Well, I guess that’s obvious.”

“And I wasn’t even wearing a helmet.”

“What’s your name?”

“Mark,” he replied.

“Mark, may I ask you a personal question?”

“Ask me anything you want.”

“Let’s say that car sent you flying and you smacked your head on the pavement and woke up dead. Suddenly you realize that you’re standing before God and He says, ‘Mark, for what reason should I let you into heaven?’ How would you respond?”

Mark gave his answer and it wasn’t Jesus. Many words and ten convicting minutes later, Mark cried out to God for salvation and placed his faith in Jesus Christ. A week later I stood at Mark’s bedside reading Scripture as the doctor prepared to replace Mark’s kneecap. A week after that, Mark and I were on the phone planning a coffee meet.

Mark is one of over six billion people in this world. Six billion people made in the image of God, plagued with the curse of sin. Did you know that if you led ONE person to Christ this year, and next year if you each led ONE person to Christ, and this process continued each year, in thirty-four years the entire world would know Christ? The power of one is formidable.

Are You in the 5%?

“Only two percent of all Christians share their faith on a regular basis,” said Bill Bright.¹ That was over thirty years ago. A decade later, D. James Kennedy observed that approximately 95% of all believers have never led anyone to Christ.² Ouch.

But now we get close to home. In 2006, church growth expert, Thomas S. Rainer, stated that “Five percent of Christians engage in personal evangelism on a consistent basis.”³ Five percent? That means that for every 100 believers, only five of them are living the joy of obedience to Christ’s Great Commission!

Perhaps you’re in that 95%. Perhaps you once heard a message on evangelism that kept you up all night as the picture of thousands of hell-bound people you’ve passed by in your lifetime without saying peep about the gospel broke you to tears. So you decided to start by sharing with your coworker, but it came out like a brick on a glass table and you thought you’d die of embarrassment. And then convenience slowly trumped conviction until you were back where you started.

But today I have good news ! Evangelism can become a way of life for you. Christ did not give His church a commission she could not follow. Whether you be bashful or extrovert, seasoned veteran of the faith or two-day-old believer, like many before you, you too can learn how to share your faith with confidence, clarity and conviction. And that begins with two steps...

Jesus is Supreme

Step #1: Bow to the supremacy of Jesus. He created you, He saved you, and now He calls you to take up your cross and follow His example (Matt 16:24). If you love Him, you will obey Him (John 14:21). The statistics mentioned above are shouting evidence that many believers have taken the Great Commission as the Great Suggestion. But Christ was not taking a vote when He said, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation” (Mark 16:15).

When a believer turns down opportunities to share His faith, He has a problem with Christ’s lordship. No matter how many excuses he may pound into his conscience, he cannot escape the plain fact that He is not surrendering his whole life to the authority of Jesus.

Some have tried to excuse themselves from Jesus’ command by protesting, “Jesus gave the Great Commission to His eleven disciples, not to us!” But the excuse is limper than a wet fish handshake for two reasons. First, the objection wrecks itself on Christ’s words in Matthew 28. Christ did not only command His disciples to make more disciples but to teach their new disciples to “observe all that I commanded you” (Matt 28:19-20). Part of “all that I commanded you” was Christ’s command to evangelize, which means every disciple of Jesus is commanded to share the gospel. 

Second, if evangelism was only the responsibility of Christian leaders, then Paul wasted first century ink when he commanded church leaders to equip their people in evangelism: “And He gave some as…evangelists…for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ” (Eph 4:11-12). Equip means to train and make someone adequate to accomplish a task. God gifted some leaders with an extraordinary ability to evangelize so they would train regular Christians to share their faith too. Evangelism is not the elite gift of the spiritual Navy Seals but the responsibility and privilege of every believer.
 
The early church did not know a disciple who was not also a disciple maker. Luke tells us that the believers, “were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles” (Acts 8:1). Three verses later, Luke writes, “Those who had been scattered went about preaching the word” (Acts 8:4). These new believers, uprooted from their homes and rejected by society, went about preaching the gospel wherever they went. These were common, everyday Christians with secular jobs and family responsibilities who suffered all the temptations of life that you and I face. God used these baby Christians, and if you submit your life to the authority of His Son, He can do the same for you. Bil Bright noted,

 

To be unwilling to witness for Christ with our lips is to disobey his commandment just as much as to be unwilling to witness for him by living holy lives is to disobey his command. In neither case can the disobedient Christian expect God to control and empower his life.³

 

Eleven Sinners and a World Turned Upside Down

Step #2: Trust God’s ability to use you. I used to think how wonderful it would be if every believer resigned from his secular job and became a missionary. But I was sorely wrong. Christianity would die. As much as I respect and support the work of missionaries, pastors, and itinerant evangelists, the greatest force spreading the gospel around the world is through faithful Christians rubbing shoulders with unbelievers at their workplace, in their school, and on their street. Yes, we need missionaries, pastors, and evangelists, but if ministry stops with them, so will the spread of the gospel. Until the rising of Chrysostom, the exceptional preacher of the 4th century, history does not point out a single notable preacher or evangelist. As far we know, for the first 300 years since Christ’s ascension back into heaven there was not one remarkable leader of the Christian faith, and yet during these three centuries, the church exploded from a huddle of eleven men to a world-shaking force embraced by hundreds of thousands of followers. How did the church expand without a crowd-captivating preacher? How did a band of eleven sinners saved by grace turn the world upside down? They trusted God’s ability to use them.

Crude Clay in the Hands of a Skilled Potter

I’m often baffled by God’s choice to entrust sinners like you and me with the responsibility to spread His Word and build His kingdom. Philip Yancey said, "In an awesome act of self-denial, God entrusted His reputation to ordinary people." Only one answer makes sense: God delights in using ordinary people for extraordinary causes.

If man stood in God’s place, he’d never entrust a spotless gospel into the hands of redeemed but dirty sinners. Yet that’s exactly what God did. Paul explains why in his second letter to the Corinthians, “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves” (2 Cor 4:7). The treasure is the gospel and the clay vessel is the believer. If you found a 20 million dollar diamond, where would you store it? Probably in a safe. But here God takes the priceless pearl of the gospel and stores it in pots made of clay! It’s like keeping a rare stone in a knapsack, diamonds in dirt-pots, or pearls in paper bags. What irony.

When God uses shrimps like you and me to lead sinners to glory, people can’t help but notice that it wasn’t the skill of our presentation or outreach strategy that saved the sinner, but rather the unrivaled treasures of the gospel. And this brings glory—big glory!—to God Almighty, who saves not by the competence of His messenger but the power of His message.    

God Doesn’t Need Superheroes

Sometimes we take ourselves way too seriously, as if until we acquired the eloquence of Billy Graham or the courage of Ray Comfort we’d never be able to enter the elite class of evangelists. Of course, that’s ridiculous. There is no such class. God delights in using the “foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong” (1 Cor 1:27). God doesn’t need superheroes to get His work done. He “air-dropped” you into your workplace, neighborhood, family, or school because that’s right where He wants to use you. And He will if you’ll trust Him.

Don’t feel like you need to become a professional before you open your mouth and share. If you have the Holy Spirit and know the gospel, you are more equipped than the most skilled rhetorician of all time who lacks both. A wise man once said,

Moses stuttered. David's armor didn't fit. John Mark was rejected by Paul. Timothy had ulcers. Hosea's wife was a prostitute. Amos' only training was in the school of fig-tree pruning. Jacob was a liar. David had an affair. Solomon was too rich. Jesus was too poor.

Abraham was too old. David was too young. Peter was afraid of death. Lazarus was dead. John was self-righteous. Naomi was a widow. Paul was a murderer. So was Moses. Jonah ran from God. Miriam was a gossip. Gideon and Thomas both doubted. Jeremiah was a bull frog—woops!—Jeremiah was depressed and suicidal. Elijah was burned out. John the Baptist was a loudmouth. Martha was a worry-wart. Mary was lazy. Samson had long hair. Noah got drunk.

These were the kind of men and women God chose to use, and He can do the same with you.

One hundred and twenty years ago, John H. Sammis wrote the now classic hymn, “Trust and Obey.” This simple title summarizes the entire Christian life. Obey Jesus’ command to share the gospel and trust His ability to empower you.

Endnotes

1. D. James Kennedy, Evangelism Explosion, 4th edition (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1996), 4. 
2. Thomas S. Rainer, The Complete Evangelism Guidebook, edited by Scott Dawson (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2006), 257. 
3. Bill Bright quoted by Michael Richardson, Amazing Faith: The Authorized Biography of Bill Bright. Colorado Springs: Waterbrook Press, 2000), 256.