What if congregations and individual Christians are not evangelistic? What if we do not put forth our best effort to teach the gospel to lost people? The consequences will be disheartening and deadly.
What will happen if we do not practice evangelism? Untaught people will remain untaught. Unbelievers will remain unbelievers. The lost will remain lost. Do these truths make us smile or sad?
If we fail to evangelize, we are disregarding our Commander’s charge to declare His gospel to all people (Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15). If we fail to obey His commands, including the one to teach the lost, what does that say about us?
If we do not practice evangelism, we are not imitating the Christ or the first-century disciples. In His efforts to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10), out of compassion for lost sheep, Jesus taught and taught and taught (Matthew 9:35,36). And His followers? After Jesus returned to heaven, the early disciples taught privately, publicly, daily, and all over the place! (Acts 5:42; 8:4). If we want to restore New Testament Christianity, evangelism cannot be omitted.
There were conversions on Pentecost. When? After the word was taught (Acts 2:41). The number of church members in Jerusalem increased to about five thousand. When? After the word was taught (Acts 4:4). The number of disciples multiplied. When? After the word was proclaimed (Acts 5:42- 6:1). The Bible even says the number of disciples “multiplied greatly.” When? After the seed was sown (Acts 6:7).
What pattern did you observe in the above-noted cases of conversions? In every case, before there was a harvest of souls, there first was a season of sowing. Teaching the word to lost people is no guarantee that they will accept it, but where there is no teaching of truth there will be no believers, and without faith, there will be no saved souls (Romans 10:14-17).
Practically speaking, if we do not evangelize, our numbers will dwindle. Producing babies can only sustain a congregation’s numbers/attendance for a limited period of time. Christians producing children is not the key to numerical growth: evangelism is!
The bottom line is, if a congregation does not evangelize, it will dwindle in number . . . then it will die. It will cease to exist. The world will look on in amazement, the devil will laugh, and God will weep.
Let us be clear. Our motive in teaching the gospel to lost people is not to keep the doors of a church building open. What moves us to open our mouths and teach the gospel is our love for God and lost souls!
— Roger D. Campbell
