Next Step Evangelism

Bryan Collier

He hung around after the service to ask me an important question. Jack wanted to know if he would be “welcomed here.” I answered that I hoped he already had been since we were through with the service. But he pressed on to tell me about how he was a misfit. He fit the part: disheveled, clothes worn thin, thinning hair, in need of a bath and walking with a severe limp, feeling as much a relational misfit because by his own admission Jack was homosexual. He was moving from a town, to our town because there was no place for his “kind” and he began looking for a church where he could attend because he had promised his daughter he would attend church if they would just relocate.

What was as unusual as Jack’s story was the way he found our church – he and his daughter went to the local library to search online for a church where “misfits fit.” After hours online Jack didn’t feel like there were any churches that looked promising, so, after telling his story to the reference librarian he quizzed her if she knew a church where they would be welcomed. Her response is one of the most prized compliments our church has ever received. She said, “You need to go to The Orchard. They take anybody.”

What made this statement even more complimentary, is that the reference librarian attended a different church!

At The Orchard we understand that it takes an incredible amount of patience with people who are coming to faith. While we will never tell people that a lifestyle of life-taking habits are acceptable, we will walk with them in patience as God coaxes them toward his life-giving way.

Several times a year, a new family to The Orchard will make an appointment to talk to me about membership. By now, after several of these appointments, I am well prepared for the conversation that is about to happen.

Generally the couple will come in, sit down and begin with compliments about our church. “We really love the music.” Or “We really enjoy the sermon” or some other encouragement. Eventually they get around to saying, “We really love The Orchard; we just can’t join. See, we live next door to some people who say this is their church home. In fact they invited us. But do you know what they do during the week? If that is the kind of church this is then we can’t join.”

My response usually shocks them. “I do know what they are doing during the week. I know it seems inconsistent for someone who goes to church and calls The Orchard their church home. But you should have seen them last year!”

My point is that we cannot expect people who are not Christians to act like Christians until they are. And, furthermore, we cannot expect new Christians to act like mature Christians when they aren’t. They don’t know they shouldn’t act a certain way, go certain places, or do certain things until someone tells them and the Holy Spirit convicts them!

One of the problems Christians have in reaching people who do not have a personal relationship with Jesus is that after having been a Christian for a while they don’t know anyone who is not a Christian. They spend most of their time with Christians and sooner or later Christian behavior becomes the expected norm so much so that they cannot tolerate anyone who does not act like or sometimes even think like a Christian.

The problem is no less prominent in churches. Too often our churches expect that people who come to church will behave themselves both inside and outside the church. The church needs to be reminded that we cannot expect people to act like Christians until they are and then only as the church takes the responsibility to teach them everything Jesus commanded (Matthew 28:20).

It is easy to understand why Jesus had to emphasize that he came for the sick, because religious leaders forget that truth in light of their preference for the whitewashed. Therefore, those who do attend church feel the need to pretend and those who cannot pretend simply do not attend! Churches must communicate loudly and clearly, “you don’t have to have it all together to attend here.” And then they have to communicate Christ’s promise that with the Spirit’s guidance, we will figure it out together.

This means that we may spend more time reading the felony arrests than the obituaries. We may spend late nights picking up parishioners from bars or visiting them in jail. But the church that communicates “we take anybody” through relationship and through the constant affirmation that “there is a place for you here” will find that they have a ministry in the nature and character of Christ.