Saturday, September 1, 2007

The Evangelist

What you would call a person who...

-Befriends his neighbor.
-Ask for help from his neighbor.
-Helps his neighbor.
-Knows his neighbor and his family by their names.
-Speaks to his neighbor about his faith.
-Invites their whole family over for dinner.
-Shares in the joys (the birth of a child) and the woes (death of a family member) of his neighbor.
-Invites them tactfully to go to "church" with him to celebrate religious holidays.
-Makes sure he provides opportunities for his neighbor to see the real side of his faith by providing him with books, magazines and invitations to informational meetings.
-Greets his neighbor and his family regularly when getting the mail.
-Brings food over to his neighbor for no apparent reason (good stuff too, like cherry pie)

...and is an all around genuinely nice person who cares?

This infusion of everyday life and the commitment to sharing ones faith with those around him may get someone like this labeled as a practitioner of "Lifestyle Evangelism." An such a label would be correct.

The interesting thing about this true scenario is the "evangelist" is a Muslim and I am his "neighbor."

I think there is a lesson to learn here!

2 comments:

Aaron Stewart said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Aaron Stewart said...

It is sad that within the Evangelical tradition being "Christian" almost seems to be synonymous with cutting all ties between you and anything that doesn't have a Jesus sticker on it. This includes other people.