Evangelism in a Changing Culture

A few months ago I had the privilege of speaking at the Japan Evangelical Alliance Congress on Evangelism. The gathering had an atmosphere of vitality with some 2000 people attending. The music ranged from contemporary Christian to opera and included a vast choir, which concluded one of the services magnificently by singing Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus.” The messages were powerful. Sitting in those sessions, one might conclude that Christianity is thriving in Japan. Yet the population of Japan is only 0.7 percent Christian. The current population of Japan is 127 million.

Challenge of Racism

Pondering these facts, I began to recall the challenge made by General MacArthur at the end of World War II. He boldly stated via radio that if North America would send 100 missionaries immediately to Japan it would become a Christian nation. The sad news is that North America did not respond.

Today we ask the question, “Why?” There are several reasons, one being our desire to recover our own lives as we had known them before the war. Perhaps the most destructive, un-Christlike and yet subtle reason we did not respond was racism. We North Americans were taught to hate the Japanese. Many stereotypical slurs were used in public to impose this fear on us and on our children. I well remember friends of Japanese heritage who were coached by their parents never to reveal this information. In fact, they were encouraged to lie and claim another heritage. Christians had become part of the war culture, which taught us to hate the enemy, making it difficult to see this population through the eyes of Jesus.

Throughout my visit to Japan, I kept thinking about what might have been. What would Japan and eastern Asia be like today if the gospel in its entirety had been proclaimed? One can only imagine.

Challenge of Relationships

Today enormous opportunities lie before us. The fact that there are 100 million unchurched people in North America is alarming. This number does not include the de-churched or those who attend church only occasionally. The immigrant population is growing rapidly, and soon non-white peoples will comprise the majority. Both of these facts challenge us to move out of our comfort zones with the gospel.

Reaching the unchurched today calls for building relationships as opposed to offering only impersonal prayers. Evangelism in the era of the 1970s focused on getting people to answer a few questions, have them repeat a prayer, and send them on their way. I recall hearing people boast about how many people they had won to the Lord between salad and dessert in the local cafeteria. We seemed more concerned with keeping track of our wins than with making authentic followers of Christ and building relationships with them. We are now reaping the results of those methods as we hear many people say, “I tried Christianity 30 years ago, and it didn’t do anything for me.” When following Jesus is presented as an individualistic pursuit it will never satisfy.

Challenge of Community

Jesus calls us to a community, as was modeled by the early church. Rodney Stark, in his book The Rise of Christianity, asks how a group of some few thousand Christians in the year A.D. 40 could have grown in number to some 34 million by the year 350, comprising about 56 percent of the population. He calculates a growth rate for the early church of 40 percent per decade. In answering this question, Stark observes that conversion occurred within relational networks as well as through the church’s care and concern for their neighbors. This was noted particularly during times of disease and hardship, when many converts were led to Christianity.

The power of the gospel in community became evident in the year 361 a.d. when the Roman emperor Julian the Apostate tried to stamp out Christianity and revive the pagan cult. When his effort failed, he was forced to admit to a fellow pagan, “These Christians feed not only their poor but ours also.”

The power to love one’s neighbor authentically comes only from the Spirit. Therefore, reaching out to those in need in the name of Christ is no shallow gesture. The coming of the Holy Spirit catapults believers into the community and empowers them to love beyond their natural ability. On the day of Pentecost, the disciples were launched into a multicultural world. People from all over the known world were among their first converts.

Challenge of Engagement

Opportunities for engaging many ethnic groups with the gospel are before us today. The June 2009 issue of Christianity Today suggests that Christians should keep the number 133 million fixed in their minds because that is how many additional souls will be living in the United States by 2050. Most of these people will be immigrants or their children.

I challenge all Wesleyans to respond to the great opportunity to share the love of Jesus in word and deed with the millions of immigrants and people of color on our doorstep. This will require us to honestly face the issues of racism and even to repent of these sins.

Further, this will mean that church in the future may not be done in the way it has always been as various ethnic groups bring new gifts to the entire body of believers and we look more and more like Pentecost. The vision of Revelation will be reality before our eyes, “After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:9).

Let it be true that our grandchildren will not have to ask what might have been but will praise God for the reality of the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. •

Jo Anne Lyon is a General Superintendent of The Wesleyan Church, Indianapolis, Ind.