Header image credit: me // Featured image credit: Helena Lopes (freely available via Unsplash)

While on a lovely walk this afternoon with some friends around a local lake, we were rather rudely interrupted by a lady’s asking us if we were signed up for a rally.

The curtness of my immediate, “No” in response caught even me by surprise, and I’ll admit that it was perhaps too brusque. However, as I continued to ponder over this brief exchange throughout the day, I began to feel more convinced that my response corresponded appropriately to the disruptiveness of her interruption. And I began to realize why it was so off-putting.

First, after a week in which I got countless spam/scam calls and in which at least one canvasser came to the door at home (there were two recently, but maybe not both this past week—clearly it all blurs together), I couldn’t help but think, “My goodness, I can’t even go on a walk in peace! Is nowhere safe from people’s endless solicitations?”

Secondly, I came to realize how poor her witness was for her cause: no introduction, no “Hello, how are you today?”, no pleasantries, not even any small talk about the weather (which, as Minnesotans, we love to do; and the blustery weather was easy fodder for such small talk). She just jumped right into her evangelism.

Yes, evangelism. No, she wasn’t evangelizing the Gospel, but she was evangelizing her beliefs and causes. And in a very unwinsome way. While I already wasn’t planning on going to the rally, now I really don’t want to go lest I meet more people like her who are really pushy and disruptively in-your-face with their beliefs.

And I get the irony here: Christians are known for being similarly pushy and in-your-face with their beliefs and for having a similarly blunt, no-leadup-up-given, right-to-the-point evangelism. No wonder we have a bad rap as Bible thumpers. And warrentedly so. Because winsome witness requires relationship.

This is part of why I’m not as bold in sharing my faith as I feel I should be and as Scripture commands. (The other part is fear about how others will respond, which I know isn’t a valid excuse. It’s also not the topic of this post, so back to winsome witness.) People aren’t very inclined to buy into beliefs just because they’re told about them. People buy into beliefs when they see the value in them—specifically, when they see the value that comes from authentically living them out.

This is why Jesus taught His disciples the importance of love: “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). And John clearly got the message, because he later writes, “Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:18).

That’s how you win hearts: love in deed and truth. People seeing you live out what you believe for the good of those around you. And that takes relationship, which takes time. And that might be the years spent with a family member or friend as they see you live out your faith in daily life—seeing how it gives you joy, how it helps sustain you through trials, how it helps you center your life, how it gives you purpose. It might be the few short hours you spend at a soup kitchen providing hot meals to those in need. Or, yes, it could be in the brief conversation with a stranger. But not if that brief conversation starts right with the evangelism, because then where’s the relationship? Begin with introductions. Build at least some rapport. Let them see you as a real person so that they can the reality of your faith.

So let’s be winsome, y’all. Let us love in deed and in truth!

Yours truly,
D. R. Meriwether, Ph.D.
Renaissance Man and Abundant Life Liver