Mass Mailing the Gospel?

The gospel is not mainly a 'good idea' and anytime we claim we can reduce it down to a pamphlet we end up...well, reducing it. But the gospel that Jesus lived, and then died for, is irreducible in that sense. It must be lived out in community. By claiming the gospel can be mass mailed we are weakening the power of the gospel in our time. I don't want to be a part of that.

The fact remains that Jesus calls us to get up off the couch and lay down our lives for people. If the gospel could be mass mailed, don't you think God would have avoided risking his "one and only Son"? The nature of the truth of God's good news required Jesus to be incarnate among us. Why would it be any different now?

In case you missed it, I posted an article with this title on the Spectrum Blog last week. The statement above is part of a comment I added today after quite a few commenters misunderstood my point.

Here's the piece in its entirety, but I'd encourage you to also join the conversation over at Spectrum.

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This morning I received an email from Remnant Publications. I don't usually pay attention to these emails but this one really caught my eye. The subject line reads, "Evangelilsm [sic] by Mass Mailing." My first thought was, "This is a joke...an eye-grabbing headline to force me to look deeper only to discover the author of the email reminding us that, of course, we cannot do evangelism by mass mailing."

It did grab my eye, but when I looked deeper it quickly became clear the author is not jesting. The headline inside the email reads, "Hit the streets with soul-saving literature without leaving the comfort of your own home!" (See the email here)

They're being serious! I wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. This is the kind of thing that keeps The Onion in business. I would have written a headline like this as a satire, but Remnant Publications isn't joking.

The reason I think this is worth pointing out is not to ridicule the nice people at Remnant Publications, but to highlight that this is precisely what is wrong with our theology and practice of evangelism today.

There is nothing about bearing witness to the good news of God's present and coming kingdom (AKA evangelism) that can be done through the mail or from the comfort of your home. Jesus said, "Take up your cross and follow me!" Follow me! When people who were more interested in comfort than discipleship wanted to follow Jesus, he replied with all the tact of a drill sergeant, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head" (Matt 8:20). This is nearly the exact opposite of "the comfort of your own home." As a friend of my said, "Finally someone is answering Jesus' call to take up our sofa and microwavable popcorn and follow him."

Unfortunately, when people question this kind of so-called evangelistic tactic, they are branded as anti-evangelism. But in truth, the kind of evangelism advocated in this email from Remnant Publications is anti-evangelism. It often does more harm than good and reinforces in people's minds that the gospel is an abstract idea that can be communicated absent relationships. But this is not the gospel. Or, at best, it is a kind of gnostic gospel which teaches a special knowledge that will save you. The gospel Jesus taught and died for was an embodied gospel. The gospel of Jesus took shape in real relationships and in rich social contexts without which his life and teachings make little sense.

The challenge facing the church today is whether we will eschew all short cuts and tactics which proclaim that we can mass mail the gospel from the comfort of our own homes; that the gospel is like drive-thru fast food. There is no way the world will hear and believe as good news that Jesus Christ is Lord over all the earth until his followers get up off the couch, put down their mobile phones and start sharing their lives with people in the their communities.

Let's do evangelism the hard way! Who's with me?

Comments

[Glenn]

I'd normally be inclined to agree with you, but I think I understand the motivation of this. Most people are petrified by the idea of witnessing directly about what they believe, particularly to those, ironically, they may know the best. Consequently, when the subject of evangelism is raised, these foks may really be intimidated, fearing they don't have the necessary skills or that their own faith is deficient, etc. I speak here in particular about those of us of the Type B, Introverted personality type.

For these believers, this type of outreach could really be empowering and for some it might even prove a needed spark to get them to at least start thinking about reaching others and may encourage them to reach out in other ways.

For the recipient, again let's say someone who is of a more introverted personality type, a pamphlet or book can be a great way, perhaps the best way, of breaking the ice for them. To the extent the material speaks to them, they are likely to then be inspired to seek out a community of faith to which he or she can unite and which holds to the material the recipient has just dicovered and may be quite excited about.

Having said this, if all this does is continue the present church culture fixated on belief formulas, and a fear of and withdrawal from the world (and I suspect this is where you are coming from), and if in particular this form of evangelism is predominant, then the question of whether the church is really fulfilling its mission comes into question. Or at least the question should be raised as I think you're doing.

I also think it's important to address the reluctance of believers to evangelize more generally. It may reflect an issue of personality type, or a more generalized fear or depression, or an unrecognized alienation from the substance of one's faith. While all three of these pertained to me, I only became aware of the latter issue as I began separating from the SDA church.