Welcome to the 2016 Puerto Rican Fest Outreach! This event is aimed at reaching the people of Humboldt Park with the life-changing Gospel of Jesus Christ! Further, our heart is to equip the church for the work of evangelism so that they may continue to share the Gospel in season and out of season. We pray that the lasting fruit of this ministry will be that multitudes of lost people will hear the Gospel and be saved as multitudes of Jesus’ disciples are sent out to preach to them. The result will be revival in the church and revolution in the culture.
Chicago for Jesus believes that public evangelism is mandated in Scripture. It is key to the Great Commission that unbelievers hear the Good News about Jesus Christ though the mouths of his disciples. Moreover, public preaching is the very pattern provided for us by Jesus and his apostles. Sadly, many Christians are ignorant of their to duty to evangelize, and many churches do not practice it faithfully as they do other ministries, such as bible studies and prayer meetings. These things are wonderful, but whatever else a church may do, it is failing to totally obey Jesus’ commission if it neglects evangelism.
The blame for this lack in the church goes up to the leadership. Students learn from their teachers, sheep follow in the way of their shepherds, and the people of God reflect their pastors. This leads us to ask: are they being taught to preach and are they being led into the harvest fields? Nowadays, pastors may give vague exhortations from the pulpit to be witnesses for Christ. They may agree in theory that evangelism is right and true. They may have a genuine desire to see lost people come to know Jesus. They may concoct methods of attracting lost people to the church to hear the Gospel. But for whatever reasons, pastors have found it too difficult to model and teach evangelism to their people, and have given up on it. Giveaways and Easter plays have become a more viable option for involving the church in the Great Commission, but is that what Jesus commanded us to do? It seems like churches are willing do anything to win the lost except public evangelism!
We should be reminded that every disciple, every congregation and every Christian leader is called to preach to the lost. For as Paul wrote to a young pastor named Timothy:
2 Timothy 4:1-5, In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage –with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.
Therefore, today’s message will focus on the basics to give everyone a firm foundation for what it means to evangelize. Remember grade school? Many times we were taught to learn stories and concepts by asking key questions – What? Who? When? Where? And Why? In the same way, let us ask God in His Word the following:
What is Evangelism?
Who should be evangelizing? And who should we evangelize to?
When and where should we evangelize?
And, perhaps most importantly, why should we evangelize?
(1) WHAT?
What is Evangelism? Preaching the message about Jesus Christ (that is, the Gospel) to unbelievers so they may believe in Him and be saved.
Romans 1:16, I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
John 3:16, For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
(2) WHO?
Who Should Evangelize? Every true disciple of Jesus Christ!
Who Should They Evangelize To? Everyone who is not a true disciple of Jesus Christ!
Matthew 28:18-20, Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Mark 16:15-16, He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.”
Simply put, evangelism is a ministry of the church directed toward those outside of it– it aims to make disciples of Christ out of those who currently do not know him. That includes people of other religions, atheists and agnostics, and professing Christians who do not display a born again life. That includes your family, friends, neighbors, classmates and coworkers – every one of them needs to hear this Good News and if not from you, then who?
(3) WHEN AND (4) WHERE?
When Should We Evangelize? Many believe the myth that Christians should keep their faith to themselves and only preach in churches, but the Bible does not place any limitations on when and where one should preach the Gospel. In one parable, Jesus taught us to preach the Gospel on “street corners,” and in the “streets and alleys” (Mt. 22:9; Lk. 14:21). Further, Jesus himself was known to spend more than half of his time ministering in public places to complete strangers! The Bible shows how he actively went out seeking sinful people, such as the woman at the well (John 4:1-26) and Zaccheus the tax collector (Lk. 19:1-10). In point to fact, Jesus was far more interested in ministering to irreligious people outside of religious settings (such as synagogues and the Temple), than to religious people in religious settings, where they often misunderstood and rejected him (Lk. 4:14-30). For this reason, he said, “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Lk. 5:32) and “the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost” (Lk. 19:10).
Where Should We Evangelize? That is why today we are going to Humboldt Park, because we know there will be many lost people there– people with all kinds of sinful lifestyles, opposing beliefs and painful backgrounds. Jesus was not afraid of people like that, nor should we be! And after today, we will continue to evangelize regularly with our churches and in our daily lives, following the example of our Lord. In summary: evangelism can and should be practiced wherever people are and whenever the opportunity presents itself!
(5) WHY?
Why Should We Evangelize? Here are a few of the main reasons:
(a) Evangelism is a Command: We have already covered this point, but let’s make it plain that for churches and individual believers to neglect evangelism is to be disobedient to the Lord’s commands! We should be just as zealous to evangelize as we are to read our Bibles, pray regularly, and attend church services.
(b) We Must Follow Jesus’ Example: Again this is a point we have begun to cover, but to drive it home – to not evangelize is not Christ-like. For anyone to be rightly called a “Christian” (min-Christ) or Christ’s disciple, they must do as he did and preach the Gospel.
(c) Hell is Real: Hell is a place of infinite suffering reserved for “the devil and his angels” and anyone who chooses to rebel against an infinitely worthy God. The problem is that all have sinned and gone astray from God, earning this terrible judgment. The solution God has provided is the giving of his Son as a sacrifice for all sins. We must now believe in his Son to be saved – there is no other way to have forgiveness of sins and peace with God. We must share the Gospel because it provides the only hope for our lost family and friends, and the many millions in Chicago who will otherwise perish for their sins.
John 3:17-18, 36, For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him.
(d) Evangelism is Part of a Blessed and Balanced Life: Even though it has come as a sacrifice and has often brought me out my comfort zone, I have never regretted sharing the Gospel with others – it always brought refreshing to my soul and given my life a sense of eternal purpose. It is only the times I neglected to share the Gospel or otherwise refused to give myself to serving God that I regretted. Today many Christians are lazy when it comes to the Lord’s work and lack eternal purpose, and yet wonder why they find the Christian life so unsatisfying. We were saved that we may be sent into the harvest, and given a mission to co-labor with Jesus in reaching the lost. We will not find total satisfaction in Christ until we are totally obedient to this aspect of discipleship.
Proverbs 11:25b, …He who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.
Mark 8:35, For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it.
(e) Evangelism is God’s Plan to Change the World: Jesus left his disciples with a plan to positively impact the world and spread the God’s Kingdom through means of evangelism and discipleship. And though modern technology has afforded us many alternate ways of reaching people and affecting the culture, there is no substitute for personal evangelism – Jesus’ ways are still the best.
If we are tired of seeing “hell on earth,” then we must take it upon ourselves to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to earth! We want to see the world filled with born again disciples of Jesus Christ who love God and love their neighbors and themselves! And this will be accomplished when the Church, with disciples great and small, goes and publicly proclaims the life-changing Gospel to the multitudes!
Matthew 28:18-20, Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
