As Christians, when we encounter an unbeliever is it our job to convert them, care for them, or both?
The true nature of evangelism is more about caring for unbelievers than necessarily converting them.
According to Pastor Jim Powell, many Muslims believe that Christians don’t really care about them as individuals. Instead they focus on attempting to convert them, failing to ever know them on a relational level.
“Unfortunately, it didn’t surprise me, but one of the core views they have about evangelical Christians is one that they’re only concerned about converting them; we don’t care about them as people. I think that is actually a fair assumption.”
Many Christians fail to display genuine compassion and instead turn Muslims into salvation projects and Muslims can see right through the façade. Their thinking is,
“You’re only going to love me if I convert, you just want me to believe the Truth.”
What can we do to fight against this assumption?
“When you love people for who they are, much like the Good Samaritan, we don’t come with an agenda, but we just love them as a person. When they know that you care about them, then they are willing to listen to what you have to say.”
Another assumption is that Christians aren’t nice people.
“They have received so much vitriol, so many mean-spirited interactions with Evangelical Christians. I think we forget that the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love. Unfortunately, we often express our faith and passion, we express our faith in boldness, we express our faith in truth, we’re more concerned with truth and dogma than we are expressing our faith and love, and I think that really hurts our witness.”
