David Orendorff · John 1:35-42

Once upon a time Christians had a wonderful, magical word. They would whisper it to each, and tell each other to tell others. Its very sound would conjure up images of peace, joy, love, healing and the very presence of God in the flesh. But over the centuries it became soiled and now many Christians are ashamed of the word and Christians and non-Christians alike use it to mock and accuse. It has become so soiled that in some countries it is illegal for Christians to practice the word. This once upon a time wonderful word has come to mean “cramming religion and selective ethics down someone’s throat.”

The word is evangelism. Literally translated from the Greek, evangelism means “telling the good news.” Obviously the word “evangelist” comes from the same root and means “one who tells the good news.” And to be evangelical means “having good news to share.”

Whatever its noble origin, today when we think of evangelism, evangelists and evangelical we think of folks who are pushy, rude fanatics, often self righteous and even con artists of religion. Most of us would apologize for or deny being evangelicals.

But in spite of this I think of myself as an evangelical, someone with good news to share. And I wish there were a way of returning to the old times when evangelism was synonymous with offering water to the thirsty and bread to the hungry.

You remember the story of Jesus at the well where he meets a woman drawing water. And though she has water for her body, it is her soul that is desperately thirsty. She has been through 5 husbands looking for someone that will quench her desperate thirst. And now she is with a man that is not her husband and still she thirsts.

Evangelism, the good news, for this woman dying in a relational drought, is that with God there is water for her that will ease her thirst and soften her suffering; that with Jesus there can be deep joy.

John the Baptist in his association with Jesus comes to believe that Jesus is the “Lamb of God.” For John and the folks of his time and place the Lamb of God could mean several things. I think that in this scripture John is telling us that Jesus is the lamb that is blessed and eaten for the feast of the Passover or Seder meal. This lamb is to remind the Hebrew people that God fed them on their forty year exodus in the wilderness with Moses to freedom and a promised land. It is to remind them that God has always fed them when they were hungry while traveling life. Jesus, as the Lamb of God, is food for the
hungry, he is the good news of wandering and wilderness bound lives.

Seeing Jesus and knowing he feeds the soulfully hungry, John says to his disciples, “Here is the Lamb of God.” That is to say. “Here is the one who will feed you in your deepest hunger, the one who by generosity and grace will heal the broken and sinful places in you. Here is God’s gift of peace to your soul and the soul of the world.”

John the Baptist is in that moment John the Evangelist for he is sharing the good news as he knows it with those who hunger and thirst.

So Andrew and another unnamed disciple of John follow Jesus and even end up going home with him to spend the day. Andrew is convinced that indeed this Jesus is the Lamb of God and goes to tell his brother Simon that he has found the Messiah, the anointed one who will set them free of their hunger and thirst.

In that moment of telling Andrew was an evangelist, telling the good news as he knew it to his brother Simon, now known to us as Peter. So John tells Andrew who tells Peter who tells hundreds who repeat the good news down the generations until we are told that in Jesus we might find the water and food which satiates our hunger and quenches our thirst. If there were no evangelists the good news would die for lack of telling and we would not know what we know.

Today’s world is full of hungry and thirsty people. Some, in their desperation become criminals and terrorists, lonely and depressed, ill, suicidal and dying. They live in refugee camps, prisons and bars. Many of our neighbors are hurting in their souls. Who will tell them of the water which ends their thirst? Who will tell them of the lamb that will feed their hunger? Who will tell them of Jesus? Who will tell them of the love of God, hold their hands and their hearts, be patient with their sins and mistakes, offer correction and encouragement? Who will be the evangelists for today?

Don’t run at the idea, but aren’t we the ones with good news to share? I know how this scares folks, but if we know a good plumber, won’t we tell? And if we know of a good doctor, won’t we tell? If we know of a good buy, won’t we tell? As much as the world needs plumbers, doctors, and good buys, it needs a loving savior.

Should you accept this mission and answer God with “Here I am Lord” I offer you these guidelines from today’s scripture.

1. The first thing an evangelist needs is good news. John, Andrew and Peter each told of the good news they had seen and heard. They told of their first hand experiences of grace alive. Discover what is the good news of your life with God and then you have something worth sharing. Our experiences can be in what we have learned or the people we have known. Most often our greatest experiences of God’s love have been in our times of fear and wounding, the places of our greatest thirst and our deepest hunger. There God has met us, been loving to us, and given us peace. This is our good news.
2. Secondly, John and Andrew the good news to their own sphere of influence, the hungry and thirsty known to them. Sure, there are folks like Peter and Billy Graham who are called to draw crowds and reach millions. But most of us are called to feed nearby souls one at a time. God has placed in our lives people who yearn for some good news. They might be family members, friends, co-workers, or fellow members of community and service organizations. They might be somebody in church with us as Andrew was a member of John’s church. It is a curious fact of the spiritual life that as we learn to be aware and appreciate God in our lives we become more sensitive to the needs of the lives around us. Jesus once said that he came not for the healthy but for the ill. There are those who neither want nor need our good news and we waste their time and ours in sharing. However, there are times when it will become clear by conversation or deed that we are with someone thirsty for the water that only God can give. Then we are asked to share what we know.
3. Finally, in a surprising reversal of common wisdom, we discover that our souls are watered and fed at even deeper and more pleasurable levels when we water and feed others. There are several among us who have now taken the Amazing Grace class twice. I have observed that a change often happens between the first class and the second. The first class is for the individual that they might learn more of God’s good and gracious news. The second time though, consciously or unconsciously, the class becomes more about the neighbor who is a first timer. In the second taking folks are often as intent on helping others “get it” as they are concerned about themselves getting more of it. And I dare say the greater joy comes in “helping others.”

Thus there are three guidelines to being an evangelist:

1. Discover and deepen what you know by your experience of the good news of God’s love (worship, study, service).
2. Tell the good news you know to the thirsty and hungry ones God places in your life.
3. And do it because it is good for you.

All the dirty word evangelism really means is “sharing good news.” And being an evangelist is no more than sharing the good news of as we know it with the thirsty and hungry about us. The dirty word and its derivatives mean nothing more than this and yet this means water and food for a dying neighbor and world.

At Bear Creek we have a few planned ways in which we share the good news beyond our regular worship, study and service as disciples of Jesus.

1. We place names of thirsty and hungry people we know in the box on the altar and we pray for them weekly.
2. Thanks to your offering and the matching grants some of you sign up for at your work place we are sharing good news with our neighbors in the areas of some of their greatest needs; parenting and financial skills, emergency preparedness and Samaritan counseling.
3. This last Christmas we invited our neighbors from the Love and Logic class to join us for the Advent Festival and for the Unrehearsed Christmas pageant and some of them did. This coming Holy Week we will invite our hungery family, friends and neighbors to join us in the Seder Meal of God’s redemption, and in the Last Supper drama and tableau to see and hear for themselves the good news of Jesus our Christ. And some will come.

But the most significant and important evangelism happens we individually and as small groups in ways often unplanned and spontaneous share with those in need the good news we know. It is how by acts of compassion and words of hope we share good news with the hungry of our homes, work places, and shopping malls, letting our world know that there is water and food for body and for soul. You may not mean to do it, but you have been whispering (and sometimes shouting) that dirty word evangelism in your life and others are hearing you and the good news survives for yet one more generation; thanks be to God you are evangelists.

Shalom and Amen.