Evangelisim

Interestingly we got a bit of Christian spam in our letterbox the other day, it looked like the whole neighbourhood got one.
I cringed as I read it. Repent Repent blah blah blah, Sodom homosexuals hell etc etc. As a Christian I couldn't help but feel ill and embarrassed. The sad thing there was not an address, phone number any contact from who dropped it off. Perplexing really, to embarrassed maybe?! There are four churches on the island a Pentecostal, Baptist, Uniting and Anglican. I don't think this would have been sanctioned by any of them.

I think there is a place for the mail drop off, but it has to be sensitive. An invitation that is welcoming, warm.
The sort of stuff I read just irritates people. If the aim is to draw people to Jesus, it does the opposite pushes them away.

A new apologitic

 

Brian Mclaren wrote a chapter on apologetics in a book which he co-wrote with Tony Campolo, Adventures in missing the point.
What stuck me in this chapter was much of my approach to evangelism and apologetics is already based on Mclarens points. These are::

:: Evolution already been a creation of God's
::"The bible less like evidence in a court case and more like works of art in an art gallery" A pointer to God.
:: Throwing the question's back to the questioner. Eg How would you explain good and evil without God?
:: Look for emboided truth instead of absolute truth, eg how Jesus demonstrated God's mercy.
::Instead of people coming to faith in a linear way, people will move along in a more unpredictable path. Mclaren calls in a spiral. I think the idea of a labyrinth is a better illustration. But his point is the same.