Theocentric Evangelism: Discovering God's Prior Work in Bringing People to Himself — Part 1

I. DISCOVERIES IN MINISTRY

About three years ago, a lecturer invited me to share the Gospel with about a dozen research scholars from East Asia. I tried using apologetics—humanity’s search for origins, science (what little I knew about it) and the Bible, the historicity of Jesus, and the trustworthiness of the Bible. I closed with key passages from John’s Gospel. After each session there was a question-and-answer session. I felt the men were genuinely seeking. What was the result of those ten weekly sessions? Zero. Zilch. Nothing. But it prompted me to think that I was missing something. Somehow we were not connecting.

Months later the same lecturer introduced a co-laborer and me to a few other students. This time, we met them individually. Our modus operandi was to introduce them to the knowledge of God using a modified version of the Knowing God series (originally developed by Warren and Ruth Myers). Then depending on their readiness, we might cover major portions of one of the gospels or use the Navpress study series Studies in Christian Living.

The result? During eighteen months our little network saw more than forty decisions for Christ. We were all amazed at such fruitfulness. At one stage, people received Christ every week. What was the secret?

Initially, I thought the key was the “right method,” along with prayer and a lot of faith. These definitely were important. But we came to believe we stumbled upon it was something else that explained the fruitfulness. As we related to each person, we tried to learn their backgrounds to understand them better. We were unprepared for what we heard. It took months before we could understand the import of their stories and discern patterns. What follows are some samplings we collected over the period:

Case #1. JH had never heard of the Gospel before but whenever she faced a crisis such as a major exam, she prayed to God. She told us that she had always had a sense that God existed. So when she heard the Gospel she immediately recognised God as the one to whom she had prayed.  We were amazed that God would reach down to comfort the fears of a child.

Case #2. SM was a “nibbler” who seemed to take in Bible truths a bit at a time. He wanted to stop but agreed to meet one last time. The following week, he was transformed when, during his study preparation, he came across Hosea 11:3-4. God’s loving patience, even for people like him who ignored their Creator, genuinely touched SM.

When we gingerly talked about eternal judgment, he responded positively, saying that he knew hell existed. Puzzled, my colleague and I asked how he concluded that when he had never read the Bible before. In high school, he studied European literature including Dante’s “Inferno” a canticle about hell, which deeply impressed him. Our friend rather gladly put his faith in Christ. Even without any contact with the Bible or the gospel, God had sown seeds of biblical truth in this man. It is truly amazing how some parts of Biblical truth can seep into another culture through literature.

It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms; but they did not realise it was I who healed them.

— Hosea 11:3-4
 

Case #3. As an undergraduate, an English teacher from America had given WC a Bible. He had just come to Singapore when he dreamt that a glorious being appeared to him. He awoke and pondered over life’s meaning. When asked who he thought that glorious person was, he replied “Jesus.” We appealed to him several times to accept Christ but he wasn’t ready.

Case #4. KJ was very bright but as a child, he idled his time away. One day, a voice told him, “Wake up and don’t waste away your life.” He studied hard and did well academically. Unfortunately, soon after entering college, his father, a farmer, died. Penniless, he faced the prospect of giving up his education when oddly, he received a letter promising financial help from a benefactor he never knew. Thus he completed college with marks high enough to secure a highly competitive scholarship to do research in Singapore.

His wife later came to Singapore to seek work. Beyond their wildest dreams and against major obstacles (like limited English) she got a job in a prestigious cancer research institute in her very first interview. Coincidentally, the person who interviewed her had even studied at their alma mater. KJ was intrigued by such providence and design in his life but has yet to conclude that it was the hand of God.

From such conversations, we saw a pattern: Somewhere, somehow, in their lives in East Asia, God was at work preparing them for this opportune time when they could hear the gospel and come to faith. Even in cases where they did not have any “spiritual” or supernatural experiences, they could identify significant moments such as fearing death at a certain time or wondering what was beyond this world, which opened their eyes to eternal realities. When I searched the Scriptures to find biblical precedents, I came to a new understanding of the primary work that God the Father is doing in all our lives in drawing us to Him.

II. JESUS’ TEACHING ON THE FATHER’S PRIOR WORK

John 6 is a pivotal point in the ministry of Jesus. When He revealed Himself as the Bread of Life, many of His disciples could not accept His teaching and left. To those who desired the bread of life, he taught that the Father drew them through three different processes.

1. The Father gives people.

“All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.”

— John 6:37
 

Jesus acknowledged that the Father gives. In other words, anyone who ever comes to Christ is a gift from the Father to Jesus. God forbid that we would ever think that the fruit of evangelism is “ours.” Of course when asked, we would all be theologically correct and affirm that God is the one truly at work. But deep down, we feel a primary influence in someone’s salvation. The fruits of evangelism are not trophies nor ours to give to Jesus. It is a common habit to give credit to human instruments. Jesus commented in John 6:32 that it was not Moses who gave them manna but the Father.

2. The Father draws people
 

“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.”

— John 6:44

Jesus knew that it was the Father who was actively drawing people, even teaching them (6:45), and when they listened to the Father speaking, they would come to Jesus.

“Draw” is an interesting word. In Greek it is helkuo, meaning to “draw in”, or to “drag along”, as in pulling in a net. The meaning includes the idea of force being used as in Acts 16:19. It was very difficult for the apostle Paul to kick against the thorns when Jesus appeared to him. Leon Morris (1991) in his commentary on the gospel of John notes that not one New Testament example of helkuo includes an instance of successful resistance. The Septuagint uses helkuo when translating Jeremiah 31:3 from the Hebrew. The meaning of helkuo might also include an inner compulsion from God. Vines says that the metaphorical use of helkuo signifies drawing by inward power and divine impulse (Vine, W.E. 1940)

When the owners of the slave girl realised that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to face the authorities.

— Acts 16:19

The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with an everlasting kindness.”

— Jeremiah 31:3

The Father uses many to draw people into the kingdom. It might be by the drawing power of the cross (in John 12:32—which uses the word helkuo). The Father could open the seeker’s heart as he did Lydia’s (Acts 16:14). Or again believers could be salt and light. God may use any means at His disposal to draw people to Him. He has used the life of our lecturer friend to draw many through her excellent teaching skills, selfless serving in students’ lives and the opportunities she opens by assigning students to write their views of life, purpose and other topics that help her discern truth-seekers.

“But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.”

— John 12:32

My wife, Dolly, and I were regularly studying the Bible with four new believers in the university cafeteria. One week, a girl, WW just showed up. At the end of the session, WW prayed to receive Christ into her life. We assumed that a girl she knew who attended the group had invited her, but WW admitted she had been observing us for weeks and was drawn by the group’s laughter, animated discussions, munching homemade cookies, and the fun that all were having. When WW learned it was a Bible discussion she invited herself. Something about Christian fellowship attracted her.

3. The Father enables men.

Jesus went on to say, "This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him."

— John 6:65
 

It would seem that all kinds of obstacles hinder a person from coming to faith. Yet the Father enables people to overcome these obstacles. Jews and Greeks each had their peculiar stumbling blocks (1 Cor 1:22-24). Unless the Father enables faith, the stumbling blocks will not become building blocks for faith.
 

Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Greeks, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

— 1 Corinthians 1:22-24

The word “enable” is translated from the Greek didomi. It is related to the root meaning of “to give.” The Zondervan NIV Exhaustive Concordance states that didomi can have many different specific meanings depending on the context, including “to give,” “to grant,” “to make,” and “to enable,” among possible meanings. In the context of John 6, the “enabling” could well be related to “equipping” people with faith to believe.

C.S. Lewis was a rationalist whose stumbling block was philosophy and reason. Yet that same superior mind and logic came to accept the possibility of the supernatural and, along with the influence of JRR Tolkien’s use of mythology came to embrace the historicity of Christ. When he became a Christian, he said of himself, “I give up. I admit that God is God.” (Wellman 1997, 100). Writing to a friend, he describes himself as “the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England.”(100) God had obviously enabled or equipped C.S. Lewis to come to the point of faith.


III. “He Has Not Left Himself Without Testimony” (Acts 14:17-18)

“…Yet he has not left himself without testimony: He has shown kindness by giving you rain from heaven and crops in their seasons; he provides you with plenty of food and fills your hearts with joy.” Even with these words, they had difficulty keeping the crowd from sacrificing them.

— Acts 14:17-18
 

These truths indicate that God has always been working far ahead of the one who seeks to evangelize someone or some group. Such might be like Abraham trying to evangelize Melchizedek, not realizing that the latter had a prior revelation from God!

In Acts, we recall cases of the prepared heart such as Lydia, Cornelius, the Ethiopian eunuch, and the Athenians who worshipped the unknown god. Instead of taking these as the norm, and believing in God’s prior work in people, we tend to treat them as exceptions.

In Job 33:14-30, Elihu, who had more wisdom than the three comforters of Job, seemed to have figured some things out well ahead of us. He lists ways that God speaks to people through dreams, visions, words of warning, pain and suffering and angelic mediators. He uses all these means “to turn back his soul from the pit” (v.30).

My perspectives on how God communicates with man have radically changed. Previously, I thought that God communicates with man only through His written Word. I now believe that God speaks to man in many ways. The change in perspective would have occurred earlier had I been more discerning about my father-in-law. We had tried many times to witness to my wife’s parents. My father-in-law, a dedicated idol-worshipper always seemed open but each time he said, “I can’t believe”.

To let us know that he was not avoiding the issue or being stubborn, he shared how he had even seen a vision of Jesus in a dream: a glorious being, who in his mind was Jesus, had shown him two doors or gateways, one black and the other golden. Jesus pointed out the golden gate and asked him to enter that gate.

Since then, he was convinced Jesus was true. That event could have been a wonderful bridge to lead him to Jesus yet something hindered him from believing. Years later, God’s direct intervention in the family converted him in a manner beyond the scope of this article. I tell this story to show that God was already speaking to him, which we didn’t know until he told us.

Thus decades ago, I encountered ways that God speaks to some people but had been unable to accept it into my worldview until now. When you next witness to your friends or relatives, try asking them to talk about their spiritual experiences. Don’t be surprised by their responses.

Whether it is dreams, crises faced, blessings received, Christian friends, problems encountered, reading the Bible, visitations by angels or some other manner, God used these ways to speak to people, preparing them to acknowledge Jesus as Saviour. When we meet them, they may be more aware of God than we realise.


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QUESTIONS FOR FURTHER EXPLORATION

1. In your own journey towards faith in Christ, have there been any crises, special incidents or events that God may have used early on to bring you towards Christ?

2. Are there similar processes among those that you know have become believers, e.g. among family members, relatives, friends or people in your ministry?

3. Are there possible examples of God’s prior work in the encounters that Jesus had with individuals?

 

References

[1] Morris, Leon. 1991. The Gospel According to John. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans

[2] Vine, W.E. 1940. Complete Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words. Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H Revell.

[3] Wellman, Sam, 1997. C.S. Lewis. Ohio: Barbour Publishing.


This article was first published as “Theocentric Evangelism: Discovering God’s Prior Work in Bringing People to Himself” in The Evangelical Missions Quarterly Jan 2005 Vol 41, No 1 . Written by Wong Kim Tok



Stay tuned for Part 2!