Quote
Paul_S said:
That said, I restate my concern over his framing of the issue primarily in light of the practice of "famous Calvinists", including, according to the issue in the blog article, those with wide media access, particularly on the Internet, and reiterate that using that measure of comparison of evangelistic activity is itself a peculiarly modern, American concept of evangelism, predominant among but not unique to Arminians, in which the best evangelism requires the widest exposure of the most well-known personalities, rather than each in his own calling, primarily in the context of the local church.
I think that a systemic misinterpretation and thus misuse of Matt 28:19, 20 over several decades has been the biblical foundation for this modern idea of "evangelism"; i.e., the mass onslaught of "soul winners", totally untrained yet zealous to speak and/or gargantuan "crusades" that attract 10's of thousands to football stadiums where they are entertained and then given the "Four Spiritual Laws" or something similar.

In actuality, that passage does NOT say, "GO and make disciples... etc." but rather it says, "AS YOU ARE GOING make disciples... etc." The word for "go" in the Greek is an aorist participle. <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> Thus the Lord's emphasis wasn't telling His disciples to go but as they were going about they were to make disciples and teach the Word to those whom they met. Yes, there is a place for missionaries, both foreign and local who are to evangelize, make disciples and teach them all things; the whole counsel of God (Acts 20:27). And on a lesser scale, all who profess Christ are to do likewise as the Lord provides the opportunity, i.e., as they go about in their daily lives, they are to speak of Christ at opportune times. This is in stark contrast to the typical hyper-zealous soul-winner who indiscriminately stuffs a tract in people's hands and blurts out, "God loves you!" to everyone who even comes near. I am of the notion that the bulk of evangelism done by "non-professional evangelists" should be personal; i.e., expressing your genuine personal concern for an individual as a human being rather than going out and trolling for "victims" and seeing people as potential "trophies".

That's my [Linked Image]

[Linked Image]

simul iustus et peccator

[Linked Image]