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Evangelism and Contextualization
184 Plays1 year ago
In this episode, titled "Contextualization and Evangelism," Rebecca and Bud discuss the concept of contextualization in sharing the gospel across different cultural and religious contexts. They focus on how to effectively communicate the unchanging message of the gospel while adapting it to the worldview and beliefs of the people they are engaging with.
Bud starts by explaining contextualization and its importance in mission work. He describes it as adapting the gospel to relate to people's cultural, religious, and linguistic backgrounds, making it accessible and understandable without compromising its core message. Bud highlights the tension between two extremes: those who believe the gospel needs no contextualization and those who over-contextualize to the point of obscuring its clarity.
Rebecca and Bud then share various examples of contextualization strategies for engaging with different religious backgrounds. They discuss how to use stories from the Bible, particularly those involving women, to connect with Muslim women, and they mention using common concepts like gurus and sacrificial traditions to bridge the gap with Hindus.
In terms of resources, they recommend the book "Any 3" by Mike Shipman, which provides a process for sharing the gospel in various contexts, and "Christian Barriers to Jesus," a book focused on contextualizing the gospel for Hindus and addressing misconceptions about Christianity.
They also mention "Easy Evangelism" videos available on YouTube, which offer practical insights into sharing the gospel with Hindus and Muslims using relatable approaches. They discuss a process called the "camel method" by Kevin Greeson, which uses the Quran as a bridge to share the Gospel with Muslims.
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Transcript
Welcome to Season 2
00:00:04
Speaker
Welcome, welcome to Let's Talk Diaspora. We are on season two, and we have been talking about the uncomfortable middle.
What is Contextualization?
00:00:16
Speaker
And I think today's session or episode, we're going to be talking about a big word, bud. And I might need your help in making sure I pronounce it correctly. And you might need to give me a definition. I think the word is contextualization.
00:00:33
Speaker
But yeah, can you help me there? Yeah, contextualization. Primarily, what we're gonna be talking about is contextualization and evangelism. So if you've been listening, season two is about this uncomfortable middle living in the tension of these two extremes. And I think contextualization has become a lightning rod word.
00:00:53
Speaker
in mission circles. And if this word is new to you, I'll do my best to just give a brief
Cultural Mindsets in the Gospel
00:01:00
Speaker
definition. But it's the idea of saying, yes, we have the gospel that is this unchanging message, but
00:01:09
Speaker
We're wanting to communicate it across cultures and religious backgrounds and languages that aren't the same as ours. And so one just very simple example is most people in the West operate from a guilt innocence mindset. The Bible definitely presents the gospel in a guilt innocence mindset. It talks about that we have a penalty of sin and that penalty is
00:01:33
Speaker
death, like it's something we did and we get a penalty. That's kind of the idea. There's other parts of the world that are power and fear, honor and shame. Those same things are in the Gospel. So if you think all the way back to the Garden of Eden, you see all three of these. You have Adam and Eve. They sin. Yes, they did wrong. They sinned against God and they felt guilt, but they also felt shame because it said they felt shame because they were naked.
00:01:58
Speaker
So all that to say is contextualization is just trying to take the unchanging message of the gospel and relate it best to the people that are hearing it saying, yes, we want to be true to the gospel, but we understand that our way of communicating it may not actually connect with the person that's hearing it.
Contextualization vs. Syncretism
00:02:16
Speaker
Well, that's a lot to think about. I can I mean, I even start thinking about just the different religions there are and the different beliefs
00:02:28
Speaker
that there are even in within the religion. So you've talked a little bit about, you know, how we see the world, I guess, in that shame, blame, power.
00:02:40
Speaker
those types of pieces. But now I've been thinking about the religions. I know one big thing for me as I look at contextualization is to go visit a temple, a Hindu temple, and start to ask myself some of those questions of, you know, why do they do this or what is this and, you know, what's important even in my own religion and the things that I do sitting on a bench or a chair or sitting on the floor.
00:03:10
Speaker
or some of those simple things. So are some of those things also in this contextualization piece, bud?
00:03:18
Speaker
Yeah, thinking about expression. So you mentioned Hindus, and we're not suggesting you have a church of Hindus that have these gods set up. And it's like, no, but we still worship Jesus. That would be called syncretism, where you're blending things. Contextualization isn't always syncretism, but I think it's very, very important to understand
00:03:42
Speaker
what they're already doing, what they're already thinking, how they're already expressing worship. And we just want to direct that misguided worship to the worship of the one true God. The form may look something that's very, very foreign to us in a Western, you know, Christedom type setting of, yeah, their worship may not be on pews, it may be on the floor. They may have candles and incense and you're like, oh, bud, incense, that's wrong.
00:04:11
Speaker
Well, it's not necessarily wrong if you have a reason behind it that's biblical. So that is like the tension, the overwhelming complexity of contextualization is there are multiple layers of understanding. What does church look like? What does discipleship look like? What language do I use? Do I use, for example, is it okay for me to use Muslim religious terms whenever I'm talking about the gospel?
00:04:36
Speaker
That's kind of a hot topic. All of those things come in. But I think maybe if I could just give a starting point to start thinking about worldview of people that you are engaging. And hopefully, once you start to see the complexity of this, you'll understand why we're sort of an advocate of having a focus people group or focus segment.
Biblical Contextualization Examples
00:05:01
Speaker
Because if you're trying to engage multiple religions, multiple language groups,
00:05:06
Speaker
you're honestly not going to do a very good job with effective contextualization.
00:05:13
Speaker
we see that Jesus contextualized the gospel because He took on flesh. I think we see Paul contextualizing the gospel of how He proclaimed it to other people. I think we look at mission's history and we see that people use contextualization and saw the gospel multiply. So if you think contextualization is bad, just stick with us. We want to walk in this uncomfortable middle.
Universal Questions Across Cultures
00:05:34
Speaker
But four questions to get you started on thinking through worldview.
00:05:38
Speaker
What I want to propose is every single culture, religion, and worldview answers these four questions, and it's a good place to start. Ask, where did it all begin? Every single culture has this idea of where did it begin. If it's a Judeo-Christian, Abrahamic faith, Jewish people, Muslims, Christians, they're gonna have a similar starting point of how it began. Hindus and Buddhists and Sikhs are just gonna have a different view.
00:06:09
Speaker
The second question is, what went wrong? Why is the world the way it is? The third question is, is there any hope? And the fourth question is, how is it going to end? I think that's a great place, Rebecca, for people to begin really what you're doing when you're asking those questions, you're doing research, but that can help better inform you in how to contextualize the gospel.
00:06:36
Speaker
So say those four one more time. So where did it all begin? Yep. Where did it begin? One, two, what went wrong? So from a Christian worldview, we're talking about sin, but other cultures are going to look at it differently. Third, is there any hope?
00:06:51
Speaker
Every world religion has some sort of hope, like, um, you know, for, for Hindus, they're, they're wanting to break the cycle of samsara of reincarnation. Like that is the hope. Then the fourth question is how is it going to end? What, what's at the end? Which I think this all goes back to that research thing that you keep coming up with. These questions sound very similar to.
00:07:16
Speaker
that research piece that we need to kind of go in and look at each place, each person we're going to share with, and we need to start learning these questions, asking these questions, learning the answers to these questions, I guess, in their context.
Avoiding Inaction in Contextualization
00:07:32
Speaker
Yeah. I'm obviously an advocate for research. I say that often, don't I, Rebecca? You do.
00:07:38
Speaker
But I think it's important in the conversation of contextualization when we're talking specifically about evangelism. I think another important thing that we we research and research is maybe a strong word, but just learning what's been what's been used historically among a segment of people.
00:07:57
Speaker
And what has been its response, right? So just what is the best practice? What's not work? Just learning from people that's gone before us and understanding that something that's been tried, it wasn't necessarily evil or wrong. It could be that we learned something about the culture that we make just a little tweak.
00:08:16
Speaker
And then it begins to really connect with people at a heart level so they can truly understand the gospel because my fear is it's not it's there's multiple fears not the right word. The concern first is people aren't hearing the gospel. The second, you know, concern is people are hearing the gospel in a foreign way.
00:08:35
Speaker
which means they're not really hearing it at the heart level. So when we talk about evangelism, it's really those two kinds of concerns. We need to know that people are hearing the gospel, but the second is they need to hear it in a way that connects with their heart.
00:08:50
Speaker
Well, it reminds me too, is I remember as people came over to visit us when we were overseas and preparing them, we would always give these, these are things you need to be careful not to do. And these are things that you need, you know, it's okay.
00:09:07
Speaker
But also in that I'd always be afraid because it sounded like we were telling him, you know, don't do this, don't do that, don't do this. And I was afraid they wouldn't share because of all these things, all of these don'ts. So I think we do have to also think about what's, you know, what's the worst thing that can happen? What's the best thing that can happen? And of course, trusting in the spirit as he leads in it as well.
00:09:32
Speaker
But not to say that we shouldn't think of these contextualization pieces, but I do feel like we need to be careful not to do so many be careful about this and be careful about that, that no one's out there sharing. Yeah, that's a good point. So maybe let's kind of define the two extremes and then ask the question, like, what's the worst thing that will happen? What's the best thing that will happen? Because I think that's just a very logical way to approach
Maintaining Gospel Clarity
00:10:00
Speaker
it. Maybe I'm just
00:10:01
Speaker
weird, but the two extremes of contextualization is you have people who say, the gospel is the gospel, it needs no contextualization. Meaning
00:10:18
Speaker
As long as it's in a language that the person can understand, there should be no consideration of their worldview. You can just say, John 3 16 for God so loved the world that he gave his only son. And then that's, that's, that's it. There's no contextualization. I could push against that a little bit. I think with a biblical basis, that's not the point of pushing against that, but saying that, that is, that's one of the ditches. I would say that people fall into is no contextualization. The other extreme.
00:10:48
Speaker
is over contextualization to the point that the gospel becomes unclear. So I think the key word in that is, Rebecca, is gospel clarity. In each of those ditches, there's not gospel clarity. It's somewhere in the middle where you have gospel clarity. And when you say gospel clarity, what is it that you're meaning, Ben?
00:11:16
Speaker
Yeah, gospel clarity. So if we think of what Paul writing to the Corinthians said, he said, I passed on to you, my paraphrase, I passed on to you of what was utmost importance, that according to the scriptures, Jesus lived, he died, he was buried, he rose again. So like I would say that is the core of the gospel, but the gospel is also understanding our sinfulness, understanding the nature of God. And so if a person has a
00:11:43
Speaker
a wrong understanding of God, I have to begin at a way that helps understand that. Because if they don't have a right understanding of who God is, how can they understand they've sinned against a God? Or if they don't have a concept of sin, so a person's starting point is different.
00:12:01
Speaker
I can say those words that Jesus lived, died, and rose again, but if there's not the historical view of who God is or what sin is, that is not clear. Does that make sense? Like gospel clarity, the narrow point of the focus is that truth, but we have to be clear in helping people grasp those truths, which means I might have to talk about something else to get them to that point. Which I understand completely because I know
00:12:30
Speaker
My first inclination in going in to share the gospel with someone from the very first time, I want them to understand that Jesus is God. But I learned very quickly that in some context, if I go in with that, I lose whoever I'm sharing with automatically by sharing that Jesus is God himself.
00:12:53
Speaker
So that is just kind of one example of you've got to kind of find some other direction, some other avenues to go in still sharing the truths, but maybe not that truth at the very beginning.
Bridging the Gospel with Hindu and Muslim Contexts
00:13:06
Speaker
So, yeah, I understand completely bad. Yeah, that's that's a great, a great point. So like for our Hindu friends saying Jesus is God is not a big deal because they're like, oh, great, another God, they're happy. You know, Jesus is God. I've heard of this Jesus. He's cool.
00:13:23
Speaker
And that's not a hurdle, right? But the hurdle is they don't have a good understanding of the one true God. And so it's like you have to start with like almost a creation narrative. But for our Muslim friends, saying Jesus is God is like, not that that's untrue, it's not that we hide that, but we have to help them understand how Jesus could be God.
00:13:49
Speaker
and still have this truth that they believe that there is only one God. And so there's just this process of unpacking. And then another, I think, hot topic and discussions where you see polarization, we're talking about Muslims, is using the Quran in conversations with Muslims.
00:14:12
Speaker
or with Hindus using the idea of some of their religious and cultural expressions of, for example, using a coconut to share the gospel. They typically use coconuts and some of their worship. But if I'm using a coconut to share the gospel, is that too much? If I'm talking about a religious leader, a guru,
00:14:35
Speaker
And I say, well, I follow a guru as well, but I talk about Jesus. Is that too much? So these are some of the hot topics, Rebecca, you.
00:14:45
Speaker
You lived in South Asia where there's a lot of Hindus, there's a lot of Muslims. What did you find as a bridge? Sometimes we call it a bridge, right? What does a bridge do? It gets you from point A to point B, but you don't live on a bridge. Homeless people live under bridges. We don't want to be homeless people. We just want to get over the bridge. But Rebecca, what are some examples of maybe your favorite bridge that's contextual?
00:15:09
Speaker
Well, I mean, I found using stories that related to them. Scripts like Bible stories that related to them and maybe even starting with the story they may already be familiar with. That was easier in the Muslim context than the Hindu context, but still using those stories and sharing those stories.
00:15:32
Speaker
And I found the woman at the well was a great story for me to share or the bleeding woman. And then being able to bridge using my own story with those stories was a great bridge for me. Yeah. So what, what I heard, I just want to, I think everyone got this, but you being a woman,
00:15:54
Speaker
primarily talking to women you were using Jesus stories that involved women like the woman at the well who who most commentators would say this woman was probably of She could be a prostitute. She wasn't well known in the right ways and oftentimes in Muslim culture women are degraded if they do anything wrong They also to take on that reputation, but they say oh Jesus is for this type of woman the bleeding woman there are gonna be women who are
00:16:24
Speaker
who are experiencing things and need healing and say, well, Jesus healed. And that is a common Muslim that's in the Quran. And you can say, well, Jesus still heals today. Can we pray for you? Is that kind of how that plays out? For sure.
00:16:41
Speaker
And I mean, and that's what I found in the contextualization in South Asia was I was sharing with women and not usually with men either. So that's, you know, the sharing those stories with the women, um, or a better way than me going and sharing with a man in that culture as well.
00:17:01
Speaker
So maybe I'll give an example for a Muslim man. So my favorite way that I communicate the gospel with Muslims specifically is similar. I'm using stories that they are familiar with, but they are in the Bible.
00:17:18
Speaker
You know, Muslims every year have this festival called Eid al-Adha, where they're sacrificing an animal in remembrance of the sacrifice of Abraham. They would call him Ibrahim.
00:17:33
Speaker
So what I do is I talk about, and especially in South Asia, they use this language as a korbani, or korban is just the word for sacrifice. So I tell korban stories, starting with Adam and Eve in the garden that God did the first sacrifice, moving on to Abraham, which they know. And as I'm telling the story, I'm engaging them because they know the story. I'll ask questions. So who was it? What did he do? And they're telling the story with me,
00:18:02
Speaker
But it's contextualized, even though I'm just telling the Bible stories, contextualized because I know that's what they know and that's where they're at. I think contextualization could sometimes be defined of starting to share the gospel where they're at in a way that they understand. Then so I'm going through Abraham and then Moses, and then John the Baptist is in the Quran. In Arabic, his name is Yahya.
00:18:25
Speaker
And this is how it points to Jesus. We said, not just I point to Jesus, but Yahya points at Jesus and says, behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.
00:18:36
Speaker
And then you just wrap all of that up and say, Jesus is the sacrifice that took on shame to cover our shame. Jesus was the sacrifice that died as a substitute, uh, so that we don't have to die that he, he died. He, he was the sacrifice that shed his blood. Like Moses put the blood on the doorpost. The angel of death will pass over us because the blood has saving power. And so we don't hide from the fact of clearly communicating the life, death and burial and resurrection of Jesus.
00:19:03
Speaker
but communicating in a way that someone can say, okay, I'm following this grand narrative of the scripture.
Addressing Sin and Goodness in Different Religions
00:19:10
Speaker
And I think another thing that I hear you saying, and I feel the same with sharing with clarity, is really getting to that point of understanding sin or our lostness. We all have to get to that in the story. Sometimes we can talk about how God has provided all of these great things for us and that we can have all these great things. But the ultimate thing that he's provided for us is taking away our shame, our lostness, our sin.
00:19:40
Speaker
Those things that we're all in every religion, we're all working every religion works towards that relationship with God or works towards being able to be like God or God themselves and figuring out what is it that's keeping you from that and talking about that brokenness or that piece that we're all missing.
00:20:02
Speaker
Yeah, that's a great point. With Hindus, Muslims have a distorted view of sin, but they have at least an idea of sin, right? Their view is distorted, oh, I didn't sin, I just did wrong. So they minimize sin, but for our Hindu friends, sometimes the idea of sin is just totally foreign.
00:20:27
Speaker
Rebecca, are there ways or bridges that you've used with Hindus or maybe even just talking about the idea of sin? I think a big part of it is we're all wanting to do and be good in some way. So for me is talking about
00:20:48
Speaker
you know, all the ways that we are trying to do good, but we never can do quite enough. I mean, I've found that I've talked to people in different religions, in different ways about that. The first one that comes to mind, of course, is that I've talked to recently a Muslim woman, you know, she's kept talking about all the good things she was trying to do. I said, but are you sure all of those good things are going to get you to heaven? And I think Hindus,
00:21:14
Speaker
As well, they tend to are trying to go and, you know, to the God as many times as they can and do the different rituals that they do to, you know, make, make sure that that God is good with them. Whatever God that might be.
00:21:32
Speaker
Yeah, with Hindus, they believe in reincarnation. And so it's the idea of how well I do in this life is going to affect what my outcome is in the next life. And if I'm a human this time,
00:21:48
Speaker
I have a lot
00:22:05
Speaker
Desiring to be a good Hindu and that that even saying that sounds weird because what does that mean? You ask a hundred Hindus and you're gonna get 75 answers but they're just they're trying they're being devout how they know is is talking about Jesus as our guru Because most Hindus that are really striving they have a guru that they follow there's kind of this list of
00:22:33
Speaker
This is what a good guru is. And you look at the list and you're like, oh, this is kind of like Jesus. Some of those things is they're not a lover of money. They don't get married, like they're celibate. They can do miracles. And so what I do just as a bridge, this doesn't work with nominal Hindus, but if someone's following a guru, say, hey, do you follow a guru? What's his name? It's interesting. Hey, I follow a guru. Can I tell you about him?
00:23:01
Speaker
And I just start telling stories about Jesus. My guru had a miraculous birth. The angels actually announced his birth. He lived a pure life. He never married. He wasn't a lover of money. He was actually homeless and had a group of followers around him that were his bhaktis, which basically just means disciples in Hindi. And he could raise people from the dead. He gave the blind people sight, all of these things. And I say, and he actually, he died.
00:23:31
Speaker
But he came back to life. Have you ever heard of a guru who could do anything like that? And they're like, no, no, I need to know about this guru. And I said, well, let me tell you, my guru actually says he knows the way to break the cycle of reincarnation so that whenever you die, you never die again, that you live eternally. And that connects. That's just the contextualization connecting to where they're at. Does the Bible say that Jesus breaks the cycle of reincarnation?
00:24:00
Speaker
No, it doesn't, but it says too that when we died with Christ, we live with Christ and that life is eternal. So in a sense, if a person thinks that way, me saying that is not a biblical truth per se, but it connects to where they're at. And that's
Challenges with Buddhist Engagement
00:24:15
Speaker
where it gets gray in contextualization. Some of you just got really uncomfortable when I said that. Rebecca, did you get uncomfortable? Of course I did. It's a very uncomfortable place to be.
00:24:29
Speaker
But that's the middle where, yes, we could just say, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Let me tell you about the four spiritual laws. But if they're a Hindu, I'm not limiting God. So please hear me say, I've seen someone who is very ill-equipped, who did not contextualize, and there was a God-prepared person who heard the gospel and responded. But I see that just as an exception oftentimes. The other thing with Hindus,
00:24:57
Speaker
in contextualization is they're seeking power, they're seeking healing, and just boldly praying in the name of Jesus for miracles. And another portion of our audience just got really uncomfortable, but that is something we see Jesus do, something he called his disciples to do. It's something that we see happening across the globe, less so in the West, but in South Asia and Africa, you're seeing Jesus still heal people.
00:25:27
Speaker
through prayer and people recognize that power and it draws them to want to know more about Jesus. But we've talked about Hindus and Muslims. I will say out of the different backgrounds, religions of folks that I've shared with, Buddhists are the ones that I have the hardest time finding that connection. You've got any good connections for sharing with a Buddhist?
00:25:56
Speaker
They are the hardest. You know, a Buddhist worldview focuses on the idea of suffering and karma. And so I don't know this is a good answer. I'm just sharing from experience because honestly, I don't know if we've got a lot figured out with with Buddhist and contextualization. I want to talk about suffering.
00:26:19
Speaker
Where did suffering come from? I'm asking more diagnostic questions. It's like I'm trying to learn, but I've found these questions kind of make Buddhists think. Where did suffering come from? What is the end of suffering? The other is with karma, how did karma start? Like who started karma?
00:26:38
Speaker
And that's more an ontological question than the theological question, but it makes people think. Same thing with anybody that believes in reincarnation, seeks believe in reincarnation as well. Asking the question that's really an ontological, just simple knowledge question is if you believe in reincarnation, why is the population of the world exponentially multiplying?
Learning and Practicing Evangelism
00:26:58
Speaker
Not just people, but animals because we're raising livestock, you know, in these farms, like the number of
00:27:05
Speaker
species and the number of, for lack of a better word, animals, bugs, fish, people are explanations. Where are they coming from? Because their understanding of reincarnation is when karma started, when the cycle started, everyone who existed existed. There's no initial creation. It's just recycling. And it begins to insert doubt into their minds. And then one question I ask
00:27:31
Speaker
with anyone that believes in reincarnation after I've shared the gospel with them to the best of my ability is I say, Hey, if, if you're right and I'm wrong, what do I have to lose? I'll get another shot. It's okay. If I'm right and you're wrong, there's, there's eternal implications. Wow.
00:27:55
Speaker
There's a lot of things to consider. As we're thinking about this piece, what are some good resources or maybe some best practices that we should be able to share with the audience for them to be able to start looking at some of these things themselves? What are some ideas you would give? Yeah, I think one.
00:28:14
Speaker
that I would recommend just as a general baseline is a book written by Mike Shipman called Any Three. We'll put a link in the notes. It's not about necessarily contextualization. It's just about a process to have a conversation with anyone, anytime, anywhere about the gospel. That's what any three means, like A-N-Y, anywhere, anytime, any place.
00:28:41
Speaker
And it's simply get connected, which we've talked about in a previous episode. Get connected with them. Get to God. Have a God conversation. Rebecca, you've emphasized this. Get to sin or lostness. Get to the gospel and then get to a decision. And then what you do is the contextualization. You just fit into those kind of those categories. He pulls this straight from John four. It's a great book. It has a very biblical basis. Another book that I would recommend for for Hindus.
00:29:10
Speaker
is it's a book called Christian Barriers to Jesus. And it's really a book about contextualization, the Hindu worldview, and how the gospel is not offensive necessarily to Hindus, but Christianity is. And so disconnecting and pulling kind of the cultural baggage of Christianity apart from the gospel and who Jesus is, which there's another group of our listeners who just got uncomfortable with that as well.
00:29:38
Speaker
I was about to tell you about, but is, um, I've seen some videos online there on YouTube called easy evangelism. And there's some great ways and helps, particularly on the Hindu Muslim side, um, of sharing, um, the gospel.
00:29:58
Speaker
that's a great YouTube channel. We'll put a link to that channel as well. It gives some tips on contextual language and just different ways to share the gospel, other ways to get connected, other ways to offer people a Bible from a different background of just how we do that. So that is great. A book that's
00:30:20
Speaker
somewhat controversial but it is it has been it's it's dated it's it's it's a little old but it's been practiced and well-worn process called the the camel method by Kevin Greason that that is a great resource if you're working with Muslims and you're okay with using the Quran as a bridge
00:30:38
Speaker
Another book that's new that will actually have him on the podcast, Lord willing, Fwad Masri with Crescent Project wrote a book called sharing Jesus with Muslims. It's a very practical guide of how to do that. I will say that it also references some Quranic bridging as well.
00:30:58
Speaker
So that's something that I would say you have to wrestle with yourself. So Rebecca, what advice would you give someone? Because we're not saying what level of contextualization a person should take. We're just saying this is a tension we have to live in. I think we have to contextualize, and we also have to recognize you can't go too far. So how would you recommend someone just to learn for themselves what is acceptable?
00:31:22
Speaker
Well, one is I would start praying for these different people groups, begin praying about a particular one that the Lord wants you to begin to get some training on and do some research on and start researching and reading about and getting to know that particular people group or that particular
00:31:46
Speaker
religion background, maybe at least, and then learning one of these best practices and learning how to do it and do it well and share it and then start sharing it and trying it and you're going to learn through the sharing and the trying. That's where you're really going to learn what works, what doesn't work.
00:32:04
Speaker
and doing any and it be would be ready to I don't like to use the word Phil because I think the Lord uses whatever we do but be ready to make mistakes and to learn from them and to grow from them and to be able to see this Holy Spirit at work but I think that's the main thing is just starting to get started and being able to you know try some things out and then go from there and
00:32:32
Speaker
Yeah, I would say just a couple of suggestions and getting started is I think it's highly valuable if you can get connected to someone who's already doing it.
00:32:47
Speaker
Um, just as a model, yeah, you can watch YouTube videos, but there, there is honestly a level of fear from going to watching a YouTube video to go into your Muslim neighbor and sharing the gospel. And I understand that. Uh, and so I, I would say find someone who's already doing it. That is a great way to get started. I'm not saying you have to, you could just go do it.
00:33:09
Speaker
But if you feel like this apprehension of like, I just need to learn a little bit more. And I don't mean head knowledge. I mean, practically, what does a conversation look like? Because a canned gospel conversation on a YouTube video, that's not how it always goes. People ask questions. They have objections. It's a conversation. So I think seeing that happen is super important. Whenever you learn a best practice, I encourage people to use it 100 times.
00:33:38
Speaker
And you're like, whoa, I got to share the gospel 100 times. Yes, please share the gospel 100 times. But what I see happen often is someone learns a tool or a method and they do it like three times and are like, ah, that didn't work. And they go on to the next tool and they try it three times and like, ah, that didn't work. Like.
00:33:56
Speaker
That's going to happen with every method. Every single method, you are going to have that and you're not going to get proficient and confident in a method. What we're saying, use a best practice, something that a lot of people are using and that God is blessing.
00:34:12
Speaker
It's not our method that is what's bringing people into the kingdom, but we do see throughout history and through practical experience, there are certain ways that God is working at certain times. And we just want to grab onto those best practices and say, to the best of our ability, we will be faithful to the scripture. We want to look at the world and see where and how God is working. And we want to join him in that, in that way, in this time, in this place.
00:34:35
Speaker
And as you talked about ways for people to get involved or to come alongside someone already doing it, there's so many avenues to do that. And I will encourage you to reach out to me. My contact information will be in our show notes.
00:34:51
Speaker
I would love to be able to connect you with some folks that are out there doing it wherever you might be. I will help you find that person or those people to connect with. The accountability is also important. The training and the accountability that you get from connecting with others.
00:35:07
Speaker
like Global Gates or International Commission or Global Frontier Missions. There are just a lot of groups that are out there, particularly reaching those that are here among us, refugees and immigrants in the diaspora. So please reach out.
Closing and Further Resources
00:35:23
Speaker
Yep, great word, Rebecca. Thank you for listening to this episode. We barely scratched the surface. Like we could have a whole season on contextualization. Some of you listening, you're like, yeah, I'm wrestling with this. Thank you, it was helpful. Some of this, it's brand, brand new. Hey, dialogue with us. Let us know what will continue to be helpful as you seek to reach the lost among the unreached in the diaspora and make disciples and glorify Jesus. Thanks for listening to Let's Talk Diaspora.
00:35:54
Speaker
Haradi Jews are some of the most unreached people in the world. But God is moving in this community and we sense that the time is ripe to increase our efforts to reach them with the good news. The key to this outreach is prayer. We invite you to journey with us into the world of the Haradium
00:36:09
Speaker
and to meet Haradi men and women as well as the believers who serve them and to join us in the critical work of prayerful intercession. Start learning and praying with us today with a free digital download or you can request a free copy at upgnorthamerica.com forward slash resources.