Evangelism Gone Wrong, Part 1: Mistakes Were Made
Those unbelievers out there can be so darn difficult.
They don’t understand the Gospel message—or don’t care; they’ll try to get the 
evangelist off his game by ridicule, loud shouts of disapproval or verbal abuse; they’ll mock you and the God who made them, sometimes even blaspheming his name. And it’s possible they may even try to get you to stop preaching that message of eternal life by using force.
What’s a Christian to do? We’re called to be gracious, gentle, respectful, loving, kind, helpful and prayerful, especially to our enemies. But what happens when things go wrong—desperately wrong—and the witness for Christ is totally blown? And what about those other guys; you know, those who call themselves brothers but don’t represent Christ at all in action and attitude when witnessing about him? What should you do? What about Gospel tracts that don’t tell the full story of the Gospel, are imbalanced, giving a skewed picture of the Savior?
This is the first part of a series that will offer some perspective when evangelism goes wrong. I’ll be sharing a few missteps on my part in a moment, but first let’s read about what happened to Ray Comfort long ago:
He tells the story about a woman who was heckling him so badly, using filthy language and caustic comments, that he blew it. She asked him a question that went something like this: “I’m a lady, but I don’t agree at all with you about what you are saying about women.”
Ray flippantly responded with, “You may be a woman, Ma’am, but you certainly are no lady…”
He then explained how the “lady” proceeded to beat him up.
Evangelism Gone Wrong? Part 2: Get Back on the Horse
So you blow it as an evangelist. You mess it up. Should you quit and head back to the pew never to stick your neck out again? Of course not. Quitting is never an option. (Click here to read my BIG mistake in part 1.)
My friend Steve Pivovaroff wanted to hang it up a few weeks ago when he (at my urging) preached to an unwitting high school band waiting to march in the Golden Dragon Parade in Los Angeles’ Chinatown. Here’s how it went down:
Right in the middle of a wonderful presentation of the Law and Gospel, two older women took issue and shouted at him to stop though he was doing nothing wrong and had every right to be there. Being an apt pupil, Steve heeded my earlier advice to always continue with the message no matter who tries to interrupt you, unless of course, the interrupter has a gun.
Fortunately for Steve, these women had no guns.
Since they couldn’t stand being ignored by the big man they resorted to drastic measures. One
woman took matters into her own hands and did something that shocked even me!Read More