In the middle of a blog post about the effectiveness of using movies (such as The Passion of the Christ, Narnia, and The Da Vinci Code) for evangelism, Dan Kimball made this statement:
I sort of find it kind of sad that the church has to get so excited about films to do evangelism, rather than being excited about the ongoing relationships we have with those outside the faith for evangelism. It feels weird that I would invite someone to a movie to explain what I believe in rather than letting my life and what I can be talking them about personally would be.
Although Dan’s article is not directly related to the sorts of things I usually talk about on this site, I do feel his post is worth reading in its entirety, so I’d encourage you to head on over to his blog.
I’d like to comment, though, on the portion I have quoted above. Dan’s right - personal relationships with unbelievers are the key to effective outreach. I’ve said it before — a demonstration of authentic Christian community is the foundation of all effective outreach (cf. John 17:21-23).
But where does that demonstration of Christian community begin? In one-on-one personal relationships with unbelievers. As we befriend unbelievers (primarily for the sake of simply being their friends, although we certainly hope that they will come to know Christ), they will begin to see what life with Jesus is all about in the interactions between us and our believing friends. They will be exposed to authentic Christian community.
The problem many believers have (and which I had for several years after being converted to Christ and still have, albeit not to the same extent) is that we don’t have personal relationships with unbelievers. We’re often too busy with internally-focused ministries of the church to actually befriend people outside the church. Astounding in light of Jesus’ call to take the good news to those around us, but still true.
Bringing this discussion back to digital outreach, my question is this: “How can we use digital evangelism approaches (websites, blogs, digital tracts, screen savers, wallpaper, etc., etc.) to be the catalyst for personal, one-on-one relationships?”
I believe that the internet provides today's church with a historic opportunity .... to tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love in ways which could only have been imagined in times past. The objective of this website is to explore the various ways in which today's technology can be used to spread the gospel around the world.
