That’s Not How You Reach People
That’s Not How You Reach People
If you are an open-air preacher or street evangelist and you’ve been witnessing for any length of time, then you know “professing Christians” (also known as false converts) are some of the most discouraging people you encounter on the streets. Professing Atheists, God-haters and mockers you can handle. You expect them. In fact, nothing draws a bigger crowd than a good mocker when you are having a good exchange or interaction with them. But professing Christians are the absolute worst. They can discourage you and they do so much more harm than good. But I’m here to encourage you; don’t let them get you down. They tell you things like “That’s not how you reach people” or “You are pushing people further away from God” and other such comments. They also typically run around telling others “Don’t listen to him.”
Actually, the line pushing people further away from God is my favorite put down. How can you push someone further away from God? What does it take to die in your sins and go to Hell? Absolutely nothing. Just keep trucking down the path you are on. If you are alive and breathing, you have sinned. All of us have sinned in our thoughts, words and actions. Every single one of us, for all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory (Romans 3:23). Unrepentant sinners are already Hell-bound. There is absolutely nothing that we can do to make an unrepentant sinner more lost than they already are.
Don’t Let Professing Christians Discourage You
But if you are like me, even though you know that we shouldn’t let professing Christians discourage us, it’s hard not to do. Every single time I’ve gone home after witnessing thinking about the professing Christian’s criticism and prayed about it, God has convicted me to keep preaching! Every single time. Why do we open-air preach (or do street evangelism)? Because the Old Testament prophets were street preachers. John the Baptist was an open-air preacher. The apostle Paul was one too. Even, Jesus preached out in the open and did so many times. More importantly, Jesus told us to go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature (Mark 16:15).
So keep your chin up, keep sharing the glorious Gospel and next time you run into a discouraging professing Christian, please remember that they are just as lost as the most hardened and hard-hearted Atheist. They need the Gospel just as much as any other lost person. Also remember that when they erroneously try to compare your open-air preaching to praying on a street corner to be seen by men that Jesus said, “What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops” (Matthew 10:27). As the apostle Paul said, “To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some” (1 Corinthians 9:22). Don’t let professing Christians discourage you in the least bit. Keep proclaiming our Lord and Savior out on the streets, highways and byways. Keep witnessing!
