5. Church leaders are not leading the way.
Most church leaders I have encountered are not actively leading the way for evangelism in their faith communities.
They may pull off an outreach every now and again. They may bring in some professionals to exercise their gift of evangelism in their church services once or twice a year.
But most are not actively leading in evangelism on a personal or public level. Ask your pastor, youth leader or even outreach pastor to tell you the people they are currently engaged in an evangelistic conversation with, and you may be surprised…and disappointed.
As the old statement goes, “When there is a mist in the pulpit, there’s a fog in the pew.” This is true of both bad exegesis and non-existent evangelism.
If the spiritual teachers in the church aren’t sharing their faith personally, then why would we be shocked if their students are failing at Evangelism 101. As Jesus said in Matthew 10:24, “No student is above his teacher.”
6. We have forgotten how to pray.
For years I relegated intercessory prayer to little old ladies and crazy people. Why?
Because the intercessors I knew were older than 80 years old or seemed like they needed Ritalin. But God slapped my hand and shut my mouth when he brought me to my knees four years ago.
The Great Recession taught me how to pray.
At first it was for financial provision for our ministry, which had been hit hard by a loss of major donors after the stock market crashed. But then, as God provided financially, He turned my prayers toward the Mecca of ministry. I started interceding, not just on behalf of Dare 2 Share (the ministry I lead), but on behalf of my unreached neighbors and friends.
When church services spend more time in announcements than intercessory prayer, then you know something is broken. If we want to reach every person in this nation with the good news of Jesus, we need God to act on our behalf. We need Him to soften harden hearts and open closed doors. We need to pray like we mean it.
7. Churches don’t mobilize their young people to share the Gospel.
The vast majority of those who come to Christ do so by the age of 18. So why aren’t more churches inspiring, equipping and unleashing their young people to engage evangelistically with their peers?
If I were selling a certain product, and I knew a certain demographic was most likely to buy my product, then I would use the majority of my marketing dollars to get in front of that particular demographic. This is only common sense.
While we, as Christians, aren’t selling anything (we’re actually giving it away!), we know the demographic most likely to believe our message is young people. But, instead of focusing on training and unleashing Christian teenagers (who are searching for a cause) to reach non-Christian teenagers (who are more open to the Gospel), we spend the vast majority of our money on buildings, budgets and Bible studies to minister to adults. This doesn’t make common or kingdom sense.
At Dare 2 Share we equip teenagers to share the good news. We do it through large-scale training events, cutting-edge resources and powerful evangelistic tools. If you’ve never checked us out, check us out. Join us in our quest to reach every teenager for Christ through a teenager they know. Pray for us. Support us. Join us.
It’s time we drop our lame excuses and reach this nation for Jesus Christ. Who’s with me?
