A Call to Evangelize the Truth

We are vessels of the living truth of Jesus Christ, called to witness to the goodness of God to everyone we encounter.

Aug 12, 2024

Because of many Bible verses and exhortations from Jesus, the Christian faith has traditionally prioritized evangelism of the faith, and rightfully so. While different denominations enact evangelism differently—some prioritizing global missions, others teaching seminary-level courses, and others emphasizing small group fellowship—evangelism is at the root of our core doctrinal belief system.

Most of the topics or questions of the faith I approach pertain to online conversations with Christians from all over the spectrum of belief—conservative traditionalists, Catholics, progressives, deconstructionists who have or haven’t reconstructed their faith, etc. Many people who grew up in an Evangelical church and have or are walking through deconstruction tend to ask what the point of evangelism is.

Is having someone say a prayer to “accept Jesus into their heart” really the goal of our Christian walk? Is that more powerful than feeding a meal to a starving homeless person down the street? Is that more important than changing policies to ensure everyone can access life-saving healthcare?

These are valid questions and ones that deserve attention. When Jesus claimed that the great commission of believers is to “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything [Jesus] commanded [them],”1 the question people are asking is what is it that truly “makes a disciple.”

Books and books abound on the making of disciples, so we won’t sit there for long, but instead look at other ways Jesus calls us to bear fruit and make disciples: to witness or testify.

When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, namely, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, He will testify about Me, and you are testifying as well, because you have been with Me from the beginning.
John 15:26-27 (NASB)

The Word: Bear Witness
G3140 | martyreō

This word is used 79 times in the King James Version and translated as bear witness, testify, bear record, witness, and give testimony.2

to have a good witness
testify strongly
report, give testimony

Jesus exclaims multiple times in the gospel of John that He came to bear witness to the Father. Here in John 15:26, He explains that the Holy Spirit will live with us and bear witness to the truth of Jesus and the way to salvation and in turn, the disciples will testify to the truth as well. This is some pretty solid top-down leadership at play here!

In John’s epistles, he elaborates on this concept of us being witnesses to the gospel truth.

If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning his Son. Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has borne concerning his Son.
1 John 5:9-10 (NASB)

The word for “testimony” in these verses is a slightly different root word though very similar in meaning.

The Word: Testimony
G3141 | martyria

This word is used only 37 times in the KJV and translated as witness, testimony, record, and report.3

to testify to the truth of something, specifically used about the truth of Jesus’ gospel and mission

Where martyreō seems to declare bearing witness to anyone or anything truthfully, martyria implies a specific witness to the truth of the gospel.

Jesus’ embodied life bore witness to the truth of God, and the Spirit lives within our embodied lives so that we can bear witness to the truth of God incarnate and the saving grace of our Savior.

So we have the foundation of what it means to be a Christian witness here: we are created and called to bear witness and testify to the goodness of God and the truth of our need for a savior and how Jesus saved our souls, but do we prioritize testifying through means of turning people to give their lives to Christ or through means of caring for people the way Jesus called us to?

We’ve talked in-depth about the concept of belief, truth, and bearing fruit that exhibits your faith, so I won’t continue to drone on about that. I don’t think showing the love of Christ through compassionate actions is at odds with telling people the love of a savior that they need to live an abundant life. Unfortunately, many people do.

When we consider our call to bear witness to the truth of the gospel, John answers this conundrum for us.

And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.
1 John 5:11-12 (NASB)

The testimony IS Jesus. Jesus is the truth we are to tell people about. That includes how He treated people and modeled a lived-out faith in God, but John says explicitly here that the testimony is eternal life available to all through the life of the Son. In other words, the testimony we prioritize is that Jesus saves, so yes, evangelizing about why we need a savior and who our Savior is, should be the priority of the church.

The endeavor of evangelizing the gospel is honored by God, but we also must reasonably accept that the WAY we testify should involve loving our neighbor as ourselves.

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We often consider the idea of testimony to just be someone’s personal story of their encounter with Jesus, and that is powerful. After all, Scripture holds multiple personal testimonies like this and that's how we collectively trust the truth of the Bible. But what if we’re missing out on alternative ways to bear witness to the truth of Jesus Christ’s saving grace?

I love stories and seeing the tears of joy in someone’s eyes because of how God stepped into their mess and pulled them out of the muck is inspiring and miraculous. I celebrate that! But I have lingering questions about the general reality of God, Jesus, faith, and the world God made that often personal stories don’t answer.

Our world, our God, and our existence are not simple matters. Some come by faith almost naturally—it’s a gift of the Spirit—while others find faith through deep study and community.

Questions about who God is, why the earth exists as it does, how redemption is possible, and the like should be welcomed because it respects the vast glory of God which can’t be so easily explained by our limited human perspective.

My point is to say that stories are beautiful and people can resonate with personal testimonies to see how they need the grace of God in their lives. But other times, people need more than stories. They need to understand as much as they can about how God moves, lives, and engages with the world.

Maybe testifying to the truth of the gospel is not always about how Jesus grabbed a hold of your heart personally, but also how you see and engage with God’s presence in the world daily. Maybe studying theology, history, sciences, and the Bible deeper can improve your ability to bear witness to the truth because it illuminates the truth in new ways that can reach people for whom a story just might not be compelling enough.

As you can tell, that tends to be the way God engages with me—through the power of words and understanding, rich biblical study, and making connections to different revelations of God throughout time. My prayer is that this way of storytelling might reach skeptics who need a bit more pragmatism when encountering the God of the universe as I do.

The beautiful truth about how we testify is we offer what we can, but God does the work of transforming the heart, and God can meet the people we encounter in any situation, through heartfelt stories or researched apologetics.