How Does Scripture Function in Evangelism?

Question 1088.

Scripture in evangelism is not a set of proof texts we reach for after we have already made our own case. It is the message itself, and the power that makes the message land.

I have shared the gospel in enough settings, from the pulpit to a hospital bedside, to know how tempting it is to lean on my own reasoning, my own story, my own charm if I have any, rather than on the text. It never works as well. There is something the Bible itself does in a conversation that my best arguments cannot do on their own.

The gospel itself is Scripture’s content

Paul defines the gospel he preached as being “in accordance with the Scriptures”, twice, in a single short paragraph: Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:3 to 4). Scripture in evangelism is not an add-on to the good news. The good news is itself a claim about what Scripture already said would happen, now fulfilled. When I tell someone the gospel without reference to the Old Testament promises it fulfils, I am giving them half a message.

This is why I try, wherever the conversation allows, to show a person where the promise sits before I explain the fulfilment. Isaiah 53 does more work in five minutes of honest reading than an hour of my own summarising ever could (Isaiah 53).

Scripture carries a power my words do not have

Paul is not embarrassed that his preaching lacked the polish of Greek rhetoric. He tells the Corinthians that his speech and message were not in plausible words of wisdom but in a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that their faith would rest on God’s power, not human wisdom (1 Corinthians 2:4 to 5). Romans calls the gospel itself “the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16). That power is attached to the message, not to the messenger’s technique.

I say this as someone who has, at times, over-prepared a conversation and under-trusted the text. The temptation for a pastor is to think the outcome depends on how well I argue. Scripture in evangelism reminds me that the outcome depends on the Spirit working through a message I did not invent and cannot improve on.

Scripture creates faith, it does not simply support it

Paul’s question in Romans 10 is worth sitting with. How will people believe in Him of whom they have never heard, and how are they to hear without someone preaching? Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ (Romans 10:14 to 17). Faith is not generated by clever presentation. It is generated by the content of the message itself, encountered honestly.

That has practical consequences for how I share my faith. I would rather read three verses aloud with someone and let them sit in silence with the words than spend twenty minutes paraphrasing what I think those verses mean. The paraphrase is useful. The text itself is where the Spirit does His work.

Old Testament promise and New Testament fulfilment

Look at how Paul evangelises in Acts. In the synagogue at Antioch he walks through Israel’s history, lands on the resurrection, and argues directly from the Psalms and the Prophets that Jesus is the one those texts pointed toward (Acts 13:32 to 37). He does not start from a blank page. He starts from Scripture his hearers already knew, and shows them where it had been heading.

For a Gentile audience unfamiliar with the Old Testament, as at Athens, Paul adapts his starting point but never his authority. He quotes their own poets to build a bridge, then moves quickly to the resurrection and the coming judgement, matters he did not invent but received (Acts 17:22 to 31). The bridge changes. The content of the message does not.

Why apologetics still needs the text

I make full use of good arguments for God’s existence, for the historicity of the resurrection, for the reliability of the manuscripts. These have their place, and I would not want to talk anyone out of using them well. But an argument that wins the point without ever opening the Bible has not yet done evangelism. Scripture in evangelism means the goal is always to get the person into contact with the actual words of the actual text, because that is where saving faith is created, not simply where it is defended.

I have sat with sceptical, intelligent people who were unmoved by any argument I made, and then watched something shift when they simply read John 1 for themselves. That is not a coincidence. It is what the work of evangelism actually depends on.

Scripture in evangelism across different conversations

Scripture in evangelism does not mean every conversation has to look the same. A colleague at work who has never opened a Bible needs a different starting point than a nominal church member who knows the stories but has never trusted Christ personally. What stays constant is the authority I am appealing to. With the first, I might start further back, in Genesis or with the person and claims of Jesus in the Gospels. With the second, I might go straight to what faith actually means, since Ephesians 2:8 to 9 makes plain that salvation is by grace through faith, not a result of works, so that no one may boast (Ephesians 2:8 to 9).

Personal testimony has its place too, and I use my own story often, but I try to frame it as an illustration of what Scripture says is true for anyone, not as the substance of the case itself. My experience is not the authority. The text is. Scripture in evangelism keeps testimony in its proper, supporting role, pointing back to the same gospel Paul received and passed on rather than to my own biography as though that were the real evidence.

There is also a boldness that Scripture in evangelism produces which I do not think comes any other way. Paul, writing from prison, asks the Ephesians to pray that words would be given him to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel, for which he was an ambassador in chains (Ephesians 6:19 to 20). He does not ask for cleverness. He asks for boldness to say plainly what the text already says. I have found the same thing true in my own more ordinary circumstances. Confidence in evangelism rarely comes from having rehearsed the perfect argument. It comes from trusting that the message itself, faithfully spoken, carries its own weight, so that my job is simply to say it clearly and leave the result to God.

This frees me from a great deal of anxiety about the outcome of any single conversation. If Scripture in evangelism is doing the real work, then a conversation that seems to go nowhere has not necessarily failed. A seed may simply be planted for someone else, or for a later day, to water.

I would say one more thing to anyone who feels they lack the training to evangelise well. You do not need a theology degree to hand someone a Bible and read a passage with them honestly. Philip, told by the Spirit to join the chariot of the Ethiopian official, simply asked whether the man understood what he was reading and then explained the good news about Jesus beginning from that very passage of Isaiah (Acts 8:30 to 35). Ordinary believers, equipped with nothing more exotic than a willingness to open the text and explain it as best they understand it, have carried the gospel across the centuries. Confidence in Scripture in evangelism frees you from needing to be the most eloquent person in the room. You only need to be willing to point, honestly and clearly, at what the text already says, trusting that its own power will do what your eloquence never could.

I would also point out that Scripture in evangelism protects us from a subtle but real danger, the temptation to soften or reshape the message to make it more palatable to a particular hearer. It can be tempting, especially with someone we like and want to reach, to quietly trim the parts of the gospel that sound hardest, judgement, sin, the exclusivity of Christ as the only way to the Father, in the hope of making the message more welcome. Anchoring the conversation in the actual text rather than in our own summary of it guards against that drift, because the words on the page do not bend to our preferences the way our own paraphrase quietly can. I would rather someone reject the real gospel, faithfully presented, than accept a softened version that never truly saves, because it was never truly the gospel Paul received and handed on in the first place.

So, now what?

If you are trying to share your faith with someone, do not carry the whole weight of the conversation on your own shoulders. Open the Bible with them. Read a passage together rather than only summarising it from memory. Trust that Scripture in evangelism does the work that your best explanation cannot, because it is God’s own Word rather than your account of it. Pray before the conversation and during it, and remember that you are not responsible for the outcome, only for being faithful with the message you were given. For further reading on the message itself, see how Scripture functions in pastoral counselling, which draws on the same confidence in the text’s own power.

“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”

Romans 10:17 (ESV)