QUALIFIED EVANGELISTS

In the days before email, Western Union telegrams were the most effective way to convey an urgent message.  The messenger’s sole obligation was to carry the message to the person to whom it was addressed.  He may not enjoy doing it, especially if the message contained bad news, but he was faithful to deliver it.  He dared not stop along the way, open the envelope and change the wording.  His duty was to deliver the message.  This is the duty of the evangelist.  God has given His Word and the evangelist is to be faithful in their duty to deliver the message.

Like the Gospel of John, the first letter of John has a strong eyewitness characteristic to it.  The Apostle shares with his readers “what they have heard, seen, looked upon, and touched, what was from the beginning, the Word of life made visible.” (1 Jn 1:1-2)

John goes to greater lengths than perhaps any of the other Gospel writers to convince readers through word and deed that Jesus is the One, and his promises are beyond all telling.  He emphatically wants us to know and believe Jesus was truly divine, was truly God made incarnate (human/in-the-flesh), a God who in person walked among us, taught us everything important, what true love is, and then completed the greatest sacrifice ever made on behalf of the human family.

It was love that through John developed by his first hand experiences with Jesus.  His calling from his fishing nets, time traveling with and teachings of Jesus.  John saw him die and he looked into the empty tomb.  This is what drove John to evangelize so tirelessly.

I can hear some of us now speaking in our hearts, “I’m no John” or “I’m not qualified to be and evangelist.”  Here’s the qualifications of the first evangelists found in Luke 2:15-20.  Unreliable.  Untrustworthy.  Uneducated.  Ceremonially Unclean.  The shepherds at the time of Jesus did not have a good reputation. Their status did not even allow them to testify in the court of law.  Yet as Jesus lay in a dirty manger, cared for by a teenage mother and an overwhelmed and probably slightly internally conflicted father, it was the shepherds whom God chose to minister to the child and family, then spread what was probably the most important news in history up to that point.

This type of evangelism is just as important today.  As baptized Christians it is our duty to evangelize.  Today, take some time to contemplate what you’ve seen and heard to spur your belief in and love for Jesus, the Incarnate Word?  It’s this faith in and love of Jesus that makes us qualified evangelists.