What is the greatest way to bring Joy to the nations ...?
by Pastor Glenn Leatherman

 The fuel and goal of all evangelism is true heartfelt worship that celebrates and enjoys God. The Evangelism that flows from God-centered worship are the bookends (so to speak) of Disciplemaking that obeys the Great Commission (Matt. 28:18-20)

 I believe in evangelism and missions because I believe its necessity is taught in the Bible. People have broken God's law and are in need a savior to save them from the wrath of God. The Bible declares that “there is one God, and [only] one mediator also between God and men, the man Jesus Christ.” (1 Timothy 2:5). This is why we must be involved personally, prayerfully, and financially in the cause of Evangelism and International Missions in order to bring joy to the nations. The following are some biblical principles as it relates to my plan of evangelism to bring joy to the nations.

A Basic Principle of Interpretation – The Absolute Inspiration of the Scriptures

We must come to understand and start with the principle concerning the Bible. In Baptist Confessions the first statement of faith is always the Bible because without a proper view of Scripture, Biblical Interpretation is impossible. This is also where dialogue usually gets side track because people have different views of the authority and inspiration of Scripture.

So you may be asking: “What is the Christian doctrine on the Scriptures?” In a sentence the Christian doctrine of the Bible is:

 …the verbal, plenary, inspiration of the infallible, inerrant Bible which is the written Word of God.

Evangelism and outreach activities are the necessary training medium for disciples.  Without intentional indigenous group evangelism, spiritual depth for spiritual depth's sake is as much a heresy as self-denial that does not include taking up one's cross.   The following are some principles that will help us to understand the principles that underlie a healthy disciplemaking church.

Participation is more important than Activity
The struggle I have with most churches is that they get people busy, but do not develop disciples or for that matter do evangelism. The Bible says, in Philippians 1:5, we need should participate in the gospel ministry not just be busy.  In 99% of churches, we go from one event to another to another event without knowing how any of them are tied together and actually competing against ourselves for people to serve and resources.  The great problem is that when the event is over evangelism and outreach stops as well.

Belonging is more important than Events
Events for event sakes don't work.  I think you can see this in the results of many crusades even thought they try to tie the people to churches.  The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association says that only about 0.4% of the people making professions at their crusades can be found in churches 2 years later.  A survey done in 2000, also reveled that no county in North American has seen a net increase in the number of Born-again believers in Jesus, even while our population has grown.  What does this say about how we do evangelism?  This is why event evangelism doesn't work unless it is tied to other intentional indigenous groups  or Communities within the church to give a person a place to belong.  The church is God's only vehicle or organism for evangelism, not the parachurch!  My desire is to see the church stand up and be responsible for what we have been commanded to do.  Participation in the Gospel ministry requires everyone to sacrifice in the present for something of much greater value. 

When we disciple we should not apologize for the beliefs that we hold to and have.  The necessity of a theology is given fact of any student and teacher relationship.  If we don’t want to teach theology to our disciples then we are actually dispensing with Christianity and Christian Discipleship.  While it is great to champion the basics. We need to see the basics in relationship to the web of our total beliefs.  This means that you must teach that Scripture is your final authority and you must show this from the scriptures and not some other source of knowledge.  I have learned the knowledge is not just a justified true belief or

Knowledge ≠ belief x truth x justification. 

It is something more.

I would fit the fear of God and Scripture into this equation.  The Bible alone is the source from which Christians are called to draw their epistemology (and everyone else for that matter). Scripture is adequate for every good work, including defending the faith (2 Tim. 3:16-17). In Christ are all the treasures of wisdom stored (Col. 2:3). The Christian is called to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Cor. 10:3-5). The only biblically acceptable apologetic is therefore one which is drawn from the Bible and acknowledges the epistemic lordship of Christ. Any position other than this is merely knowledge falsely so called (1 Tim. 6:20). 

When a disciplemaker starts to disciple and encourage their disciples to confront and witness, do not teach them that common sense is the starting point for defending the faith, but knowing the Scriptures.  If you and/or your disciple start with something else in witnessing, then what you start with, and not Scripture becomes the ultimate authority.  It becomes surer than the sure word of God.  But Scripture teaches us that Scripture itself is to be our final authority (2 Pet. 1:19, 21; 2 Tim. 3:16, 17; 1 John 5:9; 1 Thess. 2:13).  If Scripture is the final authority, and if one proves the authority of Scripture on the basis of something else other than Scripture, then one proves that Scripture is not the final authority. In other words, to prove the authority of Scripture on something other than Scripture is to disprove Scripture.. 

Christian Disciplemakers are morally and logically compelled to defend the faith with an epistemological outlook (understanding how they know what they know) that accords with the faith. Not only is it wrong to defend the faith with an autonomous (man-centered, humanistic) epistemology – Christianity must be understood on its own terms – but, in the nature of the case, blending Christian theology with non-Christian epistemology always serves to undermine the Christian’s ability to defend the faith. As Christians we need to be much more epistemologically self-conscious.