Fear is what used to overwhelm me when it came to sharing my faith with friends.
It wasn’t always that way.
How I started in Personal Evangelism
When I first became a Christian, I naturally shared my faith.
I was discovering all sorts of things about the Bible, and willingly sharing my learnings with people around me.
I’d read something in my quiet time, and then find someone to share it with during the day.
I’d read a Christian book and would share insights with my friends at school.
I’d hear a great sermon or have a tremendous experience of God in worship, and I would share that with my friends at work.
I’d experience a healing or some other spiritual gift and then I’d tell that story to another person.
It was pretty normal for me to talk about the work of God in my life.
How I became fearful of Personal Evangelism
In the quest to get better at personal evangelism, I began to read books on evangelism.
These books focused on conversational techniques and properly memorized presentations.
These books presented well reasoned apologetics and philosophical defenses on the existence of God.
These books focused on theology of how God comes to us with such an offer of irresistible grace that we respond, or sometimes on human psychology on how to lead people in a conversation.
These books focused on God’s sovereignty that evangelism is not needed (He will call whom he will call) or they focused on our human responsibility and guilt if we don’t at least try.
I read apologetic encyclopedias that I couldn’t memorize. I read philosophical arguments I couldn’t understand. I read material that felt manipulative and pushy. I read some material that was very good.
The more I read, the more inadequate I felt in sharing my faith.
I became convinced that I was doing personal evangelism all wrong and that I’d never get it right.
When I encountered Dunamis teaching on Evangelism
When I first encountered the Dunamis Project teaching on personal evangelism that is now in our Dunamis Project on Listening Evangelism, I felt like I discovered a refreshing new approach that I had never seen before.
It emphasizes
- God’s vision for evangelism,
- Developing a passion for personal evangelism.
- Listening to the Holy Spirit for guidance on who to talk with.
- Discovering when a person is ready to talk with you.
Dunamis 6 helped me develop practical evangelism skills in cooperation with the Holy Spirit.
How Dunamis helped me share my faith
Recently, I walked with my friend. That is one way I now practice evangelism in the course of my life.
One of the discussion items that came up was the current topic of my small group – how do we live out our faith in the “fear of the Lord?” After all, Proverbs 1:7 says
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.
That opened up nearly an hour long two way conversation that dwelt in themes like:
- How to develop a relationship with God
- What about the people who’ve never heard the gospel?
- “All religions are true” and why that doesn’t make any sense.
- How sin affects each person no matter how good they think they are.
- How Jesus reconciled us to God so that we might have a relationship with Him.
- How many good works does one have to do to secure the blessing of God and earn a spot in heaven.
His spiritual curiosity was fascinating. I enjoyed the “a-ha” moments he found as we talked about the biblical truths and clarified some of his misconceptions.
The Dunamis Course on Listening Evangelism prepared me to see his spiritual curiosity, and recognize how the Holy Spirit is highlighting this conversation to me.
Evangelism felt natural – planting seeds and helping this man on his journey to faith.
As he started visiting my church after several personal invitations, I’m seeing forward progress in his journey to faith.
How to take this Dunamis Project on Personal Evangelism if you can’t wait
The Listening Evangelism Dunamis Project helps you find a natural and fearless way to more faith-sharing conversations in the ordinary course of life.
Option 1: Join a Dunamis Project
Option 1 is to get involved in Dunamis community near you that is currently doing a Dunamis Project. Eventually, you will get to the Dunamis Project on Evangelism
Option 2: Online Video Course
Option 2 is a 10 session self study course that PRMI has produced.
The Dunamis Video Course on Listening Evangelism is available for you start at any time.
It is offered on an offering basis – we ask that as you take the course, you pray about how to give an offering to advance this teaching of the Dunamis Project into more places.
You will need to create an account here at PRMI if you do not have one already.
Please help us! In 2019 we are using a new log-in system. There are still some bugs in the system so, if it doesn’t work for you then please file a Bug Report so we can get it fixed. (There’s a Bug Report form at the bottom of this page.)
Option 3: Host an Ignite Weekend on Evangelism
You can invite a PRMI team for an Ignite Weekend focused on Evangelism.
The teaching starts on Friday night and goes through on Saturday.
