Street Preaching
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on June 7, 2014 at 10:44 am
A Facebook friend, a person I admire outside of the digital life as well, posted something about the street preachers in our town. I gave my two cents. I hope she takes it in the loving way I intended it.
Here is my response:
This is probably my church, and street preaching is one of about fifteen ways we evangelize. It works for some, and not for others. I personally focus on other methods because I’m good at what appeals to me, but I have seen a lot of souls saved from this method. I prefer talking one on one, but I will not disparage something that I know brings some to the saving knowledge of Christ Jesus.
As for whether or not Jesus likes street preaching, well, He did it. He taught and encouraged His disciples to do it. Every prophet of God in the Old Testament days did it, too. They preached that God is love, but they also preached that God is just, righteous, and holy. And the majority of the people on the street didn’t like it, either. Ask John the Baptist, Paul of Tarsus, and every disciple save Judas Iscariot and John the Beloved. They were offensive to the masses, and they were killed for it, just like their Lord, the Rock of Offense. The Scandalon.
Many ask, “Why don’t you…” and then they list off what works for them (if they evangelize at all. Otherwise, they just list things that get the gospel out of their faces.) Well, we do that too. Feed people? Check. Sing at nursing homes? Check. Child Evangelism Fellowship? Check. Knock on doors? Check. Sing in public? Check. Hand out tracts? Check. Clothe the homeless? Check. Prison ministry? Check. Free Bible college? Check. Free books? Check. Support missionaries? Check. Become missionaries? Check. Send recorded sermons worldwide for free? Check.
I am an accountant. I see the financials of a score or more ministries constantly. I believe that there is no church anywhere in the country that spends a greater percentage of its revenue on evangelism than this church. I have been to no other church anywhere in which there is more dedication to the furtherance of the gospel. A lot of us spend as much time evangelizing as we do working a full-time job. I personally am a slacker with no excuse, but fully half of our church takes evangelism VERY seriously.
As for the argument that street preaching drives people from Christ, I don’t buy it. Yelling a Bible verse or Biblical principles might be loud, but so are thousands of other things. I think most who are offended would be offended by the word no matter how it is delivered.
If the Bible teaches us that X is unholy, and the television and pop culture teaches us that X is fun, good, harmless and wonderful, and we happen to indulge in X, and it brings us pleasure, when a man comes along and screams out that the Bible says X is wrong, what is to blame for driving us away from God?
I have attended church with these street preachers for sixteen years. I have seen no hate. Hate has become such a buzzword in the past decade that even the saved have been sucked into misusing it. What passes for hate, even among the saved, is quite often simply an offense to the excuses we make for ourselves or our loved ones. Unfortunately, God is opposed to a lot of what human nature says is harmless fun. We are fallen creatures in need of the absolute authority of God’s word, whether it makes us comfortable or not. We don’t even know how wretched we are apart from God.
I have learned over the years to be less offended by the guy pointing out sin, and more offended at myself for breaking God’s heart time and time again through my own endless cycle of sin. Yeah, it’s humiliating, but He’s my creator, and although I’m bought with His blood and as clean in his eyes as I can be, I’m still stuck in this flesh, and that’s more offensive to me than any man screaming on a street corner.
Yes, there are those younger, less life-experienced members of my church who are what I think of as zealous in the wrong direction at times. They major in the minors, so to speak. But they are not at home watching Breaking Bad. They are not in a bar getting drunk, and they are not hooking up at the night club. They are preaching. They are redeeming the time in an evil day while most of us are sitting on our butts indulging in at best, the benign things that waste our time, and at worst, entertainment and lifestyle choices that are offensive to our Lord.
God promises us that His word will not return void. I challenge anyone to take an hour to sit and listen and try to calculate the percentage of what comes out of the mouths of these street preachers which is pure scripture. In my own personal quest during this latest downtown uprising, I did just that. My estimate is at 90%. 90% pure Bible verse, not something that could be called opinion, interpretation, etc. God’s word DOES NOT return void. How dare any of us judge the street preacher (and, quite ironically, find him judgmental) when we won’t take a good hard look at what we’re doing while he’s out there in the rain, sun, wind, in the night after working for ten hours, being faithful to God’s command to go into all the world and make disciples of all men?
