Distractions to Evangelism

It is amazing how quickly time can be lost via social media. One minute you are taking a quick break from work to check out a funny meme that was sent to you, the next you are watching a video of a cat juggling chainsaws while riding a unicycle; then several hours later you are viewing a film on the history of self-inflating mattresses. Before you know it, you have wasted a whole day due to distractions.

Granted, the above analogy may be a statement of extremes (although I do now wonder about the history of self-inflating mattresses), but the truth it seeks to convey is relevant – distractions are everywhere.

It is very easy for us to be side-tracked into areas that aren’t important, and as a result our focus and productivity is greatly diminished. This is true in our daily working lives, but it is also true when it comes to evangelism. When it comes to reaching out to the lost, we need to make sure that we do not get distracted by secondary issues, rather we need to keep the main thing - the main thing.

I remember several years ago being contacted by a man who asked if the ministry I served sold tracts that detailed the end times, and particularly focused on the rapture. He then went on to say that the most important message people could hear in our society is the details of how the rapture will occur. I tried to gently explain to this man that the gospel should be our main emphasis, not one particular end times interpretation, but he wasn’t interested. He had fallen for a distraction and as a result the gospel was now being lost.

There are many good and right things for us to study and research, but we must remember that when it comes to evangelism we need to keep our message on target, we must keep to the simple gospel.

Now, please hear me carefully, I am not saying other subjects and topics are unimportant; I am not advocating a form of “evangelism-onlyism”, but what I am saying is that as gospel people we should be seeking to proclaim the message which Scripture declares as being “of first importance” (1 Corinthians 15:3).

There are many different subjects I enjoy studying, but sadly sometimes those other issues can become very distracting to me, and when I get bogged down in them, I find that my evangelistic fervour is lessened. For instance, I find the whole question of textual criticism and the issue of which Bible translation is best, to be a fascinating subject. However, oftentimes when I delve too much into that subject, I find that my outreach emphasis almost becomes paralysed as I wrestle over which Bible version I should be using in witnessing, or even in my own personal reading times.

Another area of study I enjoy is history, but unlike the paralysis which comes from textual criticism, this one often leaves me distracted in the sense that I want to spend more time reading and studying this topic, to the point where I would rather do that than go out to share the gospel. Studying in the comfort of my study with a subject I love is much easier than going out to engage in the difficult task of evangelism.

There are many areas that distract us from sharing the gospel, so we need to be alert to these dangers. Some distractions even come from tools which are designed to help us better share the gospel. I remember several years ago working with a godly brother who became very passionate about apologetics. Knowing how to defend the faith and to give answers is biblical (1 Peter 3:15), but what happened was that this brother became so consumed with apologetics that he ended up not proclaiming the gospel. One night we had an open-air outreach where this brother stood up to preach. Soon after his message commenced crowds of people began to gather to heckle and ask questions - which is good, and desperately needed in open-air preaching. For the next hour my mate would answer questions and pull down the arguments that the unbelievers put up against the gospel. The crowd was silenced in the face of his withering apologetic assault, but as I listened, I was grieved. In that one hour of preaching, my friend had become so distracted with apologetics that he forgot to share the gospel. It was a wasted hour as no evangelism had taken place.

I trust if you are reading this article that you are interested in sharing the gospel, and you genuinely want to see people come to know Christ; since this is the case let me encourage you to avoid distractions at all cost. Stick to the simple message of the gospel - proclaim Jesus. Whenever you get drawn into apologetics or other subjects, make sure you engage those topics with an eye on the cross – always bring it back to the gospel.

In Romans 1:16, the Apostle Paul said, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek.”  Notice it isn’t apologetics, textual criticism, eschatology, history, healings, prophecy, politics, vaccinations, conspiracies etc. that is the power of God for salvation, it is only the gospel! Avoid distractions, and simply proclaim Christ.

If you want to see people saved, then we need to refocus our attention on the gospel alone. The enemy would be very happy for us to preach anything else other than the gospel; he doesn’t mind if you are correct elsewhere, what he wants is to silence is the gospel (Mark 4:15).

Avoid distractions in evangelism, instead keep making much of Jesus.