Evangelism

As I blogged yesterday, it has been a great week of teaching! "Evangelism" usually brings to mind people going door to door or standing on corners with loud speakers speaking the name of Jesus or trying to scare people out of hell, into heaven. We were challenged to be a people of captivated worshippers of God - a lifestyle of living in His love and bringing that love to others through our lives. God created each of us to be in relationship with Him - exactly the reason that He also gave us free will and the choice to accept or reject Him. A relationship is not a relationship unless you are able to decide to love or to walk away. It's never about 1 person - it requires 2.

When God knit us together in our mother's womb (Psalm 139), He breathed His dream into each of us - to be in relationship with Him. And no matter how great our dreams are for our lives, our dreams fall at least a trillion times short of His dreams for our lives. What would happen if we let OURSELVES out of the box we've confined ourselves to, in order to discover the true purpose for our existence?

I've spent so much time trying to figure out God's plan for my life, which is important. But in the process, I've forgotten that He has plans for EVERYONE. It hit me like a 2x4 right between the eyes this week: even people that live in utter and complete poverty, people that live in million dollar mansions and all of us in between, God has a specific path for all. It's hard for me to comprehend that God has a plan in poverty, but He created each soul on the planet and desires an intimate relationship with each of us.

Sounds like we got far from the idea of evangelism, but really, if we don't start here, then we haven't started at all. We cannot live OUT love, unless we live IN love (that's Christ's love). And we start to live in love when we have a face to face encounter with the cross. And it's a process - whoever came up with the idea that we should be able to figure out all things at specific points in our lives was crazy. It's a journey, and I'm so thankful to be here right now. But I'm even more thankful for everything and everyone that has got me to this point. Every day I feel more and more blessed and, I'm guessing that as I travel and encounter poverty and the destitute, I will feel that more and more!