Stories which help spread the Good News
 Regular Network Norwich and Norfolk columnist James Knight looks at how our stories and testimonies communicate about Jesus in the first of a new series. Part One - The Power of Being Dependent.
We are told by Christ that we are the light of the world, that each and every one of us is here to make a difference, and that is the huge and very significant message that I want to share with you over these next eleven weeks as we reach out further than ever before on this site with the newly expanded Network Norwich and Norfolk website.
Although the common theme is ‘Spreading The Good News’, each article will stand alone with an important message contained within it, as well as some helpful debating tips and much practical advice on how we as Christians can grow as we help others to grow.
To begin this message, I would like to share with you something I once read in one of the Newfrontiers journals:
In the sweltering summer of 1934 in Charlottesville, North Carolina, an evangelist, Dr Mordecai Ham was speaking every night in a tin hut with a sawdust carpet. For a month, some local Christians kept inviting a sixteen-year-old to the meetings. But he resisted, wanting nothing to do with ‘such nonsense’. Albert McMakin built up a relationship with the teenager as they worked together on his dad’s farm. ‘Why don’t you come out and hear our fightin’ preacher?’ Albert asked, throwing in the incentive that, if the teenager agreed to come, he could drive the McMakin truck to the meeting. This swung it. The teenager drove the truck to the meeting, sat at the back, and was totally captivated by the preacher’s message. After attending the meeting for a month, he finally responded to the appeal, the very last of 400 people who had come to the front that night to give their lives to Jesus. That teenager is now 89, but over the last sixty years he’s probably led more people to Christ than anyone who has ever lived. His is name is Dr Billy Graham. Few people on earth will have heard of Albert McMakin, but in Heaven Albert will see millions of people who found Christ through Billy Graham and will reflect forever on the value of the time he spent with his friend.
It is highly probable that none of us will ever have as great an influence as Billy Graham has had on the masses. But as we can see from the above passage, we never know just what influences we are having and in which areas we are having them. How many Albert McMakins do we have among us? We have been called to make a difference, to have an impact on the world; and all of us, every living soul who knows Christ, is capable of making a big difference in the small pocket of the world in which they reside.
In St Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians he praises them for becoming a model to all believers in Macedonia and Archaia (the small pockets in their world). He says that they became ‘imitators of us and of the Lord’, they were greatly influenced by the attitude and enthusiasm of St Paul and saw that his method of teaching was the best way to spread the good news.
There are several ways to spread the good news (which we shall look at in greater detail throughout this series), but in my experiences, the most effective way - the method that resonates most with the listeners - is stories and testimonies. I believe stories and testimonies are the things which open people’s eyes and touch people’s hearts more than any other method of communication (particularly if the storytellers are full of grace, patience and kindness). This is, of course, precisely the reason that Jesus used so many stories to demonstrate the personality of God’s grace and it is not too difficult to see why His words are the most powerful words spoken by any man ever.
But it is important to remember that evangelism is a process that takes time, it requires patience and perseverance. The analogies that Christ used to convey the message (fishing, farming, financial, agricultural, houses, kingdoms, searching for things), all involved a gradual process which would take time before reaching fruition. No Christian should be too disheartened or disconsolate if it seems that the message is not getting through; whatever you are doing, you can be sure that you are making a difference somewhere, however intangible it may seem. So often the differences we make are not noticed by ourselves; we are very often the first or second link on a sequential chain, doing good preparation work that others can use to make progress further along in someone’s life. Growth is, by definition, a process, it is not instantaneous, and therefore patience is one of the key virtues in evangelism.
We should all remember that the best way to have an impact in people’s lives is to broach the subject from the point of reference of our interlocutor; that is, we should start from where they are not from where we are. The Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard had some very wise words to say on the subject of understanding and helping others:
If one is truly to succeed in leading a person to a specific place,
one must first and foremost take care to find him where he is and begin there.
This is the secret in the entire art of helping.
Anyone who cannot do this is himself under a delusion if he thinks he is able to help someone else.
In order truly to help someone else, I must understand more than he,
but certainly first and foremost understand what he understands.
If I do not do that, then my greater understanding does not help him at all.
As Christians it is no use beginning where we are, we must begin where our prospective Christian is and employ the necessary levels of empathy and understanding that will show we are prepared to meet a person in direct relation to his or her needs. However good the news or glorious the message, it will not resonate if it bears no relation to the person’s needs at the time of hearing.
Laying down the foundations
It is true that we live in quite a godless country, but all my experiences tell me that people are searching for answers if only they can be introduced to some interesting debates or fresh ideas. The eternal question continues to elude many people, to the point where they get quite offended that Christians have arrogated to themselves the role of arbitrators for the whole truth of religious belief systems. But we should, of course, expect the truth to shock at first, perhaps even sting a little, for its claims of being the true path have to, by definition, involve a dismissal of other spurious religions, and indeed, anything that shows itself to be false or contrary to reason. The modern mind has a very ‘democratic’ way of thinking; therefore Christians must be mindful of this when proclaiming Christianity to be the truth.
We must continue to be humble in our behaviour, and at the same time remember that we do not always impact on people by winning intellectual debates or arguments. The strength of our case might lead to an intellectual submission from our companion, but the strength of our humility is what will ultimately have the biggest effect in the debate.
 It is worth considering what type of impression you wish to make on those with whom you are speaking. Many will claim to be alarmed at such a conversational prospect, but that is no bad thing, for we are trying to stir in them a sense of alarm. If the love and grace of Christ is not enough to stir alarm then either the good news is not being understood properly or it is not being preached properly. Christ’s punishment has brought peace to all of us (Isaiah 53); that is, God Himself took the punishment for our sins, He was reconciling the sinful world to Himself in Christ. Those who need to be won over intellectually are outnumbered by those who need to be won over by humble persuasion. We must try to reach them in a way that Christ Himself would have tried to reach those around Him. The power of gentle persuasion, particularly from those whose Spirit of Christ is a visible part of their character, is a very powerful thing.
I have been debating with atheists and agnostics for many years now, and I have known some of them to conclude that they believe Christianity to be true, yet establishment of this truth has not affected their lives very much at all. The feeling can be summarised thus: ‘I believe Christianity is true and I know that one day I will have to make some sort of commitment to know God, but right now it is not the time; it is not, at present, a big priority in my life’. I remember that feeling well myself, for in the months leading up to my becoming a Christian, self-honesty would tell me that deep down in my latent desires lies the true need for change but that making the big final step was a harder reality to face. Whenever there was a conflict between my desires and that which Christ desired for me, I would always explore the reason why. For whatever my pride said, I knew that if there was a conflict the error was, of course, on my part, not His. I suppose it is a bit like admissions in facing up to alcoholism or drug addiction - that is, all addictions or compulsive problems that are easily observed in people are not largely about the things themselves, they are about admitting the problem exists and then facing up to the bigger picture that surrounds the problem. In all of this the cardinal point is that if we are honest with ourselves about true situations we will see the real needs, and getting people to face up to these needs opens many new doorways, vistas and horizons for them.
Introducing people to a better reality
It is true that we as a species have become much more knowledgeable than at any point in history, but I also think it is true that in some quarters with this profusion of knowledge we have lost a little wisdom. One key aspect for so many is this; we know so much about the tumult of life, about the flux of busyness, but we do not really know about solitude anymore. In living this hectic life of tumult, have we lost a part of what real life is? As Milton once said, ‘What if earth be but a shadow of Heaven?’. All of us know what a shadow is, it is not the real thing, it is a dark shape of the real thing which happens to be standing between light and the surface. If earth really is a mere shadow of Heaven, then Heaven is of course the real thing, the real goal of creation, the real purpose of all of living.
But it is shocking, quite startling, to observe in this modern age, just how many people are living for the shadow and not the real thing. Plato’s famous cave theory tells of folk incarcerated by visions of shadows on the wall of the cave - never seeing the real things of which the shadows are mere surface shapes. In this day and age, Christians resemble those who told the people in the cave that there was more to life than shadows, that while they are missing the wisdom that Christ can give them, they are only absorbing vague reflections of reality. This is another important first step in spreading the good news, to introduce people to a reality that is much more enriching than the one they presently experience without Christ.
It does not always naturally follow straight away that once you introduce people to this new enrichment that they automatically realise their dependence on Christ, but it is at least true that everyone knows what it is like to be dependent upon people, for almost everything that we do depends upon someone else somewhere. Spreading the good news involves helping people to see their dependence upon God. In showing them this, we will help them come to realise that God has always been glad of our awareness of ‘dependence’ because it is in our interests to be dependent, so we might one day search for Him, on whom we really are dependent. Jesus pointed out that in the initial stages of enrichment it is very important that we know about dependence, and just as children are dependent on parents, we must be dependent on God for a full enrichment:
"I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 18:3-4
Next week we will look at faith, and how to prepare for discussions and debates.
The views carried here are those of the author, not of Network Norwich and Norfolk, and are intended to stimulate constructive debate between website users. We welcome your thoughts and comments, posted below, upon the ideas expressed here. You can also contact the author direct at james.knight@norfolk.gov.uk
James is a Norwich local government officer, author and Proclaimers church member in Norwich. You can access his current collections of columns here
Meanwhile, if you want to find out more about Christianity, visit: www.rejesus.co.uk |
