God has always placed special emphasis on evangelism when talking about the church. In Luke 5:30, Jesus said, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance."
That doesn't mean that God doesn't care about existing church members, but God's plan for the body of Christ was always to expand and grow. Just as God called man and the beasts of the field to "be fruitful and multiply," the call is no different for the members of the universal church.
However, today the unchurched and the seekers do not find the church to be evangelistic in nature. Many churches have made it almost impossible for those who are seeking to enter into church community. As a result, evangelism has become harder than it was less than a decade ago. Here are four major issues that unchurched seekers have with many church communities.
Lack of compassion
Matthew 9:36 describes one encounter Jesus has with a crowd of lost people: "When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd."
Some churches today don't look at crowds the same way Jesus did. Many believers see dirty people who are far from God and may compromise their own holiness, rather than hungry people who need to be fed with the bread of life.
Discriminatory treatment
In too many churches, first-timers and new members can be the least important members of the church because it's far more comfortable to speak to the people we already know. Do we still value that one lost sheep over the 99 safe and saved ones, and what's more, are we prepared to move off our comfortable seats to go and find them?
When churches make evangelism and engaging lost cultures a priority, it places heavy emphasis on getting everyone involved in welcoming those who seek salvation and redemption with God. There are no caste systems in Christianity.
Legalistic mindsets
It doesn't take long for many seekers to feel the legalistic vibe of a church. Even before they enter churches, social media and other forms of multimedia have already trained minds to stereotype churches as legalistic and rule-driven.
God's original intent for the church was to exist and thrive in the context of loving relationship, which would then later lead to trust and edification -- including rebuke and correction. There's a time and a place for everything, let's just make sure we don't get them mixed up.
Complicated messages
The gospel is not a complicated message. It's not always an easy one to deliver or an easy one to digest, but it's not complicated - and our way of communicating it shouldn't be either. The message we share with the lost is not good advice, but good news. We do not bring to people a message about what they should do, but about what God has done for all mankind. Let's make sure newcomers are walking away from our services with the right message.
