Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Get In Touch!!!

I don't know if you have or realize this pattern but I certainly do. The pattern goes like this - it is almost Good Friday, Easter or Christmas time and you picked up your phone to give your non-believing friend an sms or a call. "Hi, how are you? Would you like to come to my church this Sunday......" The reason: It is an evangelistic service and you would like to get your friends to come down and hear the gospel and prayerfully they respond.

While there is nothing wrong with inviting your friends, have you notice that you only sms or call them because it is an evangelistic event? On other normal days, you hardly sms or call them. So what am I trying to say? I am trying to say that we must make an effort to build up our friendship with non-believing friends. We should not only remember them when an evangelistic event draws near but treat them as we should have treated our cell group members. An occasional call, sms and meet-up IS necessary to keep in touch and to be an effective witness for Christ.

Everyone wants friends that genuinely cherish friendships. This sincerity is shown by your effort in maintaining contact and being real to them. Popping by last minute to invite friends you have not met for some time is akin to calling up your long-time friends with the intention of selling them insurance policies. I am not saying that we should not invite friends we have not met for a long time but ideally, we should have make an effort to keep in touch with them much earlier even before any evangelistic events. Because logically speaking, if my friend(who have not kept in touch with me for a long time) were to suddenly call me up and invite me to church, I would imagine him to be similar to some dude trying to sell me MLM products.

I hope you're getting what I mean. While shortcuts are possible, it can easily back-fire and put your friends off. I realized this recently and I am making an effort to meet my non-believer friends for dinner or other activities. They are not just worth inviting for evangelistic events, but worth spending my time with. Jesus died for them so that they can be saved, will you not spend some time with them to make Jesus's death worthwhile? Let's not be caught up in our own little 'christian world' where we spend 365 days with christians only.

Get out and get in touch today!!!

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