Friendship and evangelism go together in a most wonderful way. To call someone “friend” is a beautiful epitaph and to call someone friend for all eternity is the sweetest of relationships.
Unfortunately both friendship and evangelism have fallen on hard times. We are overwhelmed with relationships and bombarded with demands. The frantic pace of life often prevents us from becoming close to anyone and nurturing friendships with the most precious of commodities, time. One of the great surprises of recent times involves online social networking. It has become far too easy to confuse knowing about someone with knowing someone!
To the ancients, friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves — the crown of life and the school of virtue. Moderns by comparison, ignore it. Why? Could it be that too few truly experience it?
Friendship arises out of companionship, but it blossoms when they discover something in common. It may be an insight or an interest that, until that moment, they believed was their special treasure. Hence, the picture of lovers is “face to face” but the image of friends is shoulder to shoulder.
Likewise, evangelism has often been cheapened into just another program. We often relate evangelism with sales, and the joy of sharing the good news becomes crass commercialism. We learn a “technique” or rely on “professionals” without ever realizing we are sharing a relationship with a friend.
Evangelism begins as we discover God for ourselves. It spills over as we introduce others to our eternal Friend. At its heart, evangelism is learning to love our friends in a way that even death cannot separate. The news we’re going to share is so good there is even a special name for it: Gospel.
When Cornelius was told Peter was coming to his house with the Gospel, he was so excited he invited all of his friends and all of his family to be there. Will you do the same?