Empathetic evangelism

"Empathetic evangelism"

Empathetic Evangelism

A Sermon Preached on Palm Sunday, March 24, 2002
Hanover Street Presbyterian Church, Wilmington, Delaware

by the Rev. Thomas C. Davis, III, Ph.D.

Text:

Isaiah 50: 4

"The Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain him that is weary. Morning by morning he wakens, he wakens my ear to hear as those who are taught."

We welcome this morning several new members to Hanover Street Presbyterian Church. Together we spent six weeks studying the history of Christianity, so that we might understand not just the Presbyterian part of that family of faith, but also other major branches. On the seventh morning we reviewed the duties of every member of the church: attending worship, and supporting the mission of the church through the giving of time, God-given talents, and money. As I was reading the scripture passages for this Sunday, I realized that we did not talk about another duty of Christians, sharing our faith with others, or, "evangelism," to invoke a Biblical word. "Evangel" means "good news" in Greek. Evangelism is sharing the good news about Jesus with people who don't know about him, or who haven't experienced his presence.

At the end of Matthew's gospel Jesus speaks the "Great Commission," a commandment incumbent on all Christians: "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you." Some modern scholars doubt that Jesus himself gave this Great Commission. Rather, they say, those words came from the church. But, whether Jesus uttered the Great Commission or not, the question still remains: Do we regard the story of Jesus as good news, vitally important good news, life saving good news? And if the answer to that question is yes, then shouldn't we share it? Wouldn't we be depriving others of something very precious by not sharing it?

Some Christians are put off by the word "evangelism," and understandably so. For we find the demagoguery of T.V. evangelists downright disgusting - their slick, manipulating ways, their shallow and rigid thinking, and very often, their utter lack of moral integrity. It's not just such oily self-promoters as these that bother us, though. We are also put off by humble, truly kind and earnest people who come knocking on our doors, intent, they say, upon having a conversation. We soon discover, however, that they are programmed to dispense answers to questions we have not asked. It's impossible to converse with someone who has all the questions, let alone all the answers. And so, we nicely turn them away. If this is evangelism, we want nothing to do with it.

Over at the Interfaith Resource Center on Union Street a small book caught my eye, entitled The Celtic Way of Evangelism: How Christianity Can Reach the West Again. Hmmmm, that's intriguing, I thought. What was the "Celtic way of evangelism"? I found out that Saint Patrick, that Welshman who founded more than 1000 churches all over Ireland, modeled Celtic evangelism. Before Patrick, the Roman Catholic church hadn't been very successful in spreading the gospel in Ireland. Missionaries would come in and try to scare the populace with tales of fire and brimstone. They would live apart, in monasteries with walls, and they would speak to the pagan Irish in a holier-than-thou way. They rarely strove to get to know the people they wanted to win over. So, it wasn't surprising that they made few converts. But then, along came Patrick, who had lived amongst the Irish as a boy, when pirates had kidnapped him and sold him away as a slave to shepherds. During those years Patrick had come to know the Irish, and had come to feel a deep compassion for them. That's why, many years after his escape from Ireland, he begged his bishop to send him back there as a missionary. Patrick loved the pagan Irish. Truly loved them. I don't know whether he engraved our Hebrew text for this morning on the wall of his study, but he sure acted as if he did, that text which says:

"The Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain him that is weary. Morning by morning he wakens, he wakens my ear to hear as those who are taught."

Empathetic evangelism, that's what Patrick modeled. Before he spoke anything he listened to the Irish, listened with the ear of the people he was trying to teach. And he did not live apart from them. When Patrick established a monastery, it was not separate from the village. Instead, his monks lived among the people. In effect, the whole village became a monastery. Patrick did not approach the people with a list of questions he thought they would want answered. Instead, he listened to the questions that arose from their own experience, not his. Patrick befriended them. He affirmed all that was good in them. Only then was he ready to speak, as the scripture says, with the tongue of one who is taught.

This day, Palm Sunday, is a day of triumphal pomp. On this day we sing: Ride on King Jesus! Ride on in majesty! But (as I've preached before), there is irony in all such language. Irony, because the last message that Jesus mimed to his adoring public was not intended to invite adulation. He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, parodying the pompous self-promoters who for centuries had tried to win people's loyalty by shows of wealth and power. Jesus deliberately rode not on a mighty steed, but on a donkey. His Palm Sunday mime was not a gimmick for self-promotion, but rather, a symbol of self-effacement. Jesus was already emptying himself. But the crowds didn't get it.

In our efforts to share the good news of Jesus, what would it mean for us to remember that he never was a self-promoter, and in fact, discouraged people who wanted to make him their champion, their messianic rescuer? How ought we to do evangelism if we recall that, like Patrick, Jesus befriended the people he deeply cared for, befriended them before teaching them? What would it mean for us to recall that when Jesus healed people he never said "I have healed you," but rather, "your faith has made you whole"? When we do evangelism, what would it mean for us to remember that Jesus held up for moral example a Samaritan, a person who was not only outside his own religious and ethnic group, but indeed, belonged to a group in tension with his own? When we share the good news about such a strange messiah, haven't we missed something if we presume to have all the important life questions, let alone all the answers? Haven't we missed something essential about Jesus if, when we tell people about him, we presume to bring God to them, rather than recognizing, as Jesus did, that God has already been working in strange and mysterious ways, even through Samaritans?

People of Hanover Street Presbyterian church, let us not shy away from evangelism. If we are convinced that the story of Jesus is vitally important to all people, then let us share it. But, let us share it in ways that are in keeping with who Jesus was. Let us pray that God would give us the ear of those who are taught. Let us empathize with those we would "win for Christ." That way, perhaps we shall discover, as Paul did in the market place in Athens, that God has already been touching seekers outside our circle of faith. Then we just might enjoy a lively conversation which could, by the Spirit's help, bring us all into the Light.