Method or Madness?

Here you go, Captain Caveman!

Ecclesia and I have been talking a lot about methods people have for sharing the Gospel, so naturally I decided to throw some thoughts out there and see what other's take on it is.

There has been an ongoing debate recently about our responsibility in sharing the Gospel with others and what is the best way to do that? I think my conclusion is - there is no best way. I remember hearing an interview with Sara Groves one day on WRBS - she apparently had really struggled with the whole "working mom" issue. If I remember the circumstance correctly, she had been guilt ridden by the fact that she was the primary bread winner in the family, and how this didn't seem to jive with all she had been taught about what a "good, respectful, submissive" wife is. After much battling in prayer over the issue and her trying to force herself to do things the "right way" all the while feeling like she was trying to force a square peg into a round hole, she was given this revelation: God gives us a fence or framework within to work - in this case it was "respect your husband". Then He allows us creative reign within that fence with which to work. So her family situation is not going to look like mine, or yours. I feel the very same way about evangelism. God has given us the scriptures as a fence or a framework within to work, and then allows us to be creative within that fence to share the Gospel. What I need to find out is what is God calling ME to. I tried for years to be a "good fundamentalist Christian" and use the methods well-known to all of us and it felt forced, unnatural, and really unfruitful and I began feeling like a failure. I am coming to the conclusion that I failed because I relied on the method, not the Holy Spirit.

I was reading in John 15:13-17 "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you. This I command you, that you love one another." It seems to me that Christ is calling us to two things here: love and obedience. We cannot do either of these things without abiding in the Vine - which is what the beginning of John 15 explains. Jesus calls us to make disciples, not clones. We are a wonderfully diverse creation - I think that we all agree that not one person is like another. This is amazing to me -- so why do we insist on boxing people, and ultimately God into one way of doing things?

God is calling me to be alone, still and quiet. This is not an easy task for an extravert. But it is only in my aloneness that I can allow the Holy Spirit to focus my attention in the right area. It is only in my aloneness that I can hear what God is calling me to, because I cannot obey if I don't know what He is teling me. I have to stop listening to other's convictions and start allowing Jesus to lead me through the Holy Spirit. Iron sharpens iron and I am grateful for all the wonderful people that God has placed in my life -- this "great cloud of witnesses" -- but I am not called to follow people, I am called to follow Christ.