Unchanging

So a couple weeks ago, I was sitting outside Kerkhoff studying for my origins of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam class and this lady walks up to me and introduces herself. She asked me a couple questions like what I was studying for and what my major was. And then she pulled out this little 2x2 booklet and asked if I had ever heard about the Four Spiritual Laws. I didn't know what they were, but I sorta had an idea of where this was going. The cover of the booklet said nothing about Christianity or Jesus, so, naturally, I told her no, I did not know anything about the Four Spiritual Laws. She proceeded to read to me out of the booklet word for word, and I sat there quietly listening to her tell me a shortened version of the gospel story. I didn't have the heart to interrupt her, so I let her finish before I told her that I was already a Christian. And even though I told her this, she still went through the rest of the booklet, explaining to me the importance of accepting Jesus into your heart and all that good stuff. I sorta felt offended...as if she didn't believe me when I said I was already a follower of Jesus. Anyway, long story short, I came away from that experience feeling very...unsettled. I was sorta upset that there were people out there sharing the gospel by reading off a booklet. I was upset that Jesus, the most important part of my life, was being reduced to four main points written on some thin squares of paper. How could someone expect anyone to know the beauty of a life with Jesus in a 15 minute conversation based off some slips of paper? I think the main reason why I was so upset was because I didn't want to be associated with this type of evangelism. I didn't want others to experience someone sharing the gospel with them like this, feel pressured into it, and then assume that I was the same way because I'm a Christian.

I didn't think much more about it for a week or so, until this past Friday, when CQ and I were studying Philippians. There's this part when Paul talks about how people have been proclaiming the story of Jesus out of self-ambition and people who do it out of goodwill. But then he goes on to say, why does it matter? The fact that the gospel is being shared at all is something to rejoice over. This got us to think of an analogy. It's like the gospel of Jesus is a beautiful glass ball. Sometimes the way we talk about Jesus is good and with true intentions, and sometimes the glass ball is tainted by a dirty spec when those intentions are not pure. But the glass ball of Jesus is so huge and so beautiful that this tiny spec really doesn't change how awesome the glass ball already is. It's like the story of Jesus, his mercy and his love, are greater than any faults we have as humans when we try to tell others about it. Anything that we say or do when proclaiming Jesus that may be considered wrong has little significance when you think about the value and truth of his message. The gospel is too beautiful and too great of a thing to be tainted by something as little as our own shortcomings, and our ways of expressing Jesus's message, whether wrong or right, does not change the fact that it is true and good.