Evangelism is loving people

Evangelism is about loving people

I believe 2016 is a year when we will see an even greater increase of Gods Kingdom breaking out around us. I believe God is raising up an army of ordinary people like you and me who know their identity and who will naturally move in the supernatural in supermarkets, on buses and trains and in the everyday places of life. This our mandate to bring the love of the Father and see his kingdom come to those who don't yet know him.

People need not just to hear of God's love for them but to experience it. My experience on the streets of Bedford where I live and elsewhere is that people are disillusioned with religion but are very concerned about the cruelty and injustice in the world. Many think God doesn't care and have closed their hearts to him either through what they see around them or through personal loss and disappointment.

God is giving us a wide door of opportunity to show people He does care. He is kind and merciful, full of compassion and he has not come to judge or condemn but to forgive and show love and mercy.

I can't convince someone to believe and it's not about about winning an argument but loving the person in front of me whatever that looks like in the moment I have been given. 

Sometimes it may be helping them practically, listening to them selflessly, buying them a coffee or a meal or praying for them. I want to share a story of a lady I stopped in the street today

I asked her the question 'If God could do a miracle in your life what would you ask him to do?' At first she was guarded. As I suggested that perhaps there were dreams or desires she had for things to change she began to well up. She was embarrassed and said "I've had the worst year possible and I don't think even God could help me" She began to cry and said "I think I need to walk on". I begged her not to walk on and that God really cared about the year she had had and he cared about her. She then began to tell me about it. How she was a single mum who had nearly lost her legs through diabetes and she had also lost her mum recently who had died from mouth cancer and clearly suffered so much. She also told me of a time when she had felt so ill she had cried out to God to help her and to put her in hospital and she woke up and found herself in a bed in hospital. I knew God was reaching out to her and I asked if I could pray for her. She let me and said I think I was meant to meet you today. Twice she commented on the kindness I was showing her. It was amazing watching the power and presence of Gods love break in to her life. At the end I said to her this may be a bit presumptuous to ask you but would you like to meet again for a coffee and she replied I would love that. We hugged each other and exchanged phone numbers.

This is just one of many stories from today when a group of us spent a couple of hours talking to people on the street. We saw someone come to Jesus, someone's shoulder instantly healed, we got to prophesy and bring hope and hopefully help shift people's perspective about who Jesus really is.

I came away feeling alive knowing this is what I was made for and I was reminded again of Isaiah 61

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners

I encourage you to look for opportunities every day wherever you are to love people and see what God will do through you.