Friendly Evangelism: Opening Question

In the best traditions of Accidental Historian, this post is brought to you by Jameson Irish Whiskey and a Canadian band called Twilight Hotel. (Except that if I were Geds, I'd be drinking some sort of Scotch. Also, I'd know the band personally. But I digress...)

Over on Bruce Gerencser's blog Fallen From Grace, Grace asked an interesting question. Since she asked me directly, and since she seems to asking in good faith, I'm going to make an attempt to answer. Before I get going, let me explain that, to the best of my understanding, Grace is a well-meaning evangelist for the same sort of kind, liberal Christianity that I grew up in. Here is what she said:

It does seem that the folks who are the most vocal about their faith, and out there doing evangelical outreach are the "turn or burn," group, and unfortunately secular people really do have the impression that this represents the view of all the church, the public face of Christianity.

I think people in denominations like TEC are almost afraid to do evangelism for fear of being identified as "one of them." The other concern is not wanting to seem pushy or disrespectful, or not wanting people to feel as if we always have an agenda, as if there are simply like this project, notches on a soul winning belt or something.

Where's the balance in all this? What really are the best ways for Christians to share their faith?

Grace is right, by the way. Most of the folks who actively evangelize (as opposed to evangelizing through service, or by example) belong to the more Fundamentalist / Evangelical denominations. So trying to be an active evangelist for respectful, friendly, liberal Christianity makes her something of a statistical outlier: liberal Christians tend to evangelize closer to home, when they do it at all.

That said: What really are the best ways for Christians to share their faith? This is an excellent question, and to be honest by most measures I feel completely unqualified to answer it. For one thing, I'm not a Christian; I haven't been for over two decades. For another, I have no formal training in theology, exegesis, or apologetics - Christian or otherwise. In fact, my only real qualification is that, in my years as an unbeliever, I've been deeply annoyed by a number of would-be evangelists and apologists.

Despite these experiences - actually, because of them - I wish more Christians would ask this question. In particular, I wish more evangelically-minded Christians would ask this of unbelievers. Because one of the biggest obstacles I see is that most would-be evangelists don't really understand why unbelievers don't believe - or how that's even possible. The best of these come off as sincere but laughably naive; the worst (usually the "turn or burn" crowd) are arrogant in their misplaced certainty, pushy or even bullying in their delivery, and tend to make God look like a colossal asshole. [1]

Obviously, I don't have the time (let alone the expertise) to write an entire book on this topic. So I'm going to limit the scope of this essay these essays rather seriously: this is advice for liberal American Christians who are interested in evangelizing (or even discussing religious matters with) atheists, agnostics, apostates, and other unbelievers - without giving offense, starting arguments, or driving people away. Some of it might be helpful in other circumstances, but if so, that was purely accidental.

So that's the context for this week's set of discussions. Feel free to chime in. If you think I'm being too charitable - and bear in mind, I am not addressing the more absolutist, controlling, destructive forms of Christianity - tell me why. If you think I'm misrepresenting the position of unbelievers, tell me how. If you think I'm misrepresenting Christianity, you're probably off topic - but what the hell, tell me why anyhow.

Next: The Christian Imperative

---

[1] We could debate the relative merits of these approaches, but that's kind of missing the point.