I enjoyed reading David White’s article in the June issue of NZ Baptist. It was clear, concise and gave me some very good ideas – if I wanted to make a friend.

My question is… is this the right question for the article? Is this an article on evangelism or how to make a friend? It could be argued that, yes, it is about evangelism. How we engage and make connections with people is an important part.

The Christian sub-culture he mentions is enough to drive most people to furthest most parts of the planet and, as far as cultivating relational skills, we are at times surely lacking.

But it’s not the total sum of evangelism.

Evangelism is faithfully proclaiming the facts of the gospel of Jesus Christ. That is not to say that building friendships is not important, because it is. It’s only a problem when we name it as evangelism.

Is there enough confidence in the gospel to say that to evangelise is to declare the facts about Jesus or do we hesitate because we just want to be accepted by others even with all our idiosyncrasies, perhaps? Are we uncomfortable with the position we find ourselves in (being downstream culturally) and so our greatest desire becomes being valued by society rather than claiming Christ as Saviour?

I like having friends and enjoy making new friends and this article is helpful for that. But as an article on evangelism, well, I’m not so sure. Evangelism is evangelism, making friends is making friends. By calling it by its proper name we don’t delude ourselves into thinking we are doing something when in reality… maybe we are not.

– Allen Hince, Feilding