AAEVS - The Mission of Evangelism (Part 1)

“Our vision is to be a church dedicated to the proclamation of the gospel throughout the world. Our aim is to make disciples of the nations and establish worshipping communities like our own. Our evangelism is joyous proclamation: we announce the victory of Christ over His enemies and the rescue of His people. By this means, we seek to bring every area of life under the Lordship of Christ.” ~ Evangelism Paragraph 2a-e

"For from you sounded out the word of the Lord not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith to God-ward is spread abroad; so that we need not to speak any thing. For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God;" ~ 1 Thessalonians 1:8-9

"All of Christ for All of Life for All of the World" ~ Motto of Canon Press

Now we arrive to the last article of the Elders' Vision Statement. First, we talked about the centrality and warfare of the Kingdom; second, we talked about the attributes and systems of a church community; third, we talked about the importance and expression of worship; in this section and the next, we will go over the mission and assurance of evangelism.

If we're honest, we don't evangelize as we like; we are caught up daily in our own worries and complaints that we ignore the global vision of the Kingdom of Christ in our community and in the world at large. We know we ought to be salt and light, but we are afraid of what the people around us would think of us; we know that God says that the fear of what people think of us is a trap, but we fear the loss of our privacy and dignity from our peers. Nevertheless, it seems the reason why we don't evangelize much is because we lack a passion for evangelism.

So how do we become excited, by the Spirit of God, for evangelism? To be passionate about evangelism, we must be passionate about the Gospel; and to be passionate about the Gospel, we must rejoice in its fruit in our lives. Once we rejoice in God's mercy and what He is working in us, we desire that others might partake of the glory and joy of the triune God.

To do this, let me give you an outline of evangelism which is an acronym based on the EV statement: MAP (Mission, Action, and Purpose [Goal])

Mission

• Vision
• Aim
• Evangelism
• Means
• Seeking

Action

• Dedication
• Nation Discipleship and Establishment of Worshipping Communities
• Rejoicing
• Announcement (Forth-telling)
• Total Subjection

Purpose

• Gospel in Every Place
• Like-minded Unity and Worship
• A Bold Message
• Proclaimed Victory
• The Acknowledgment of the Lordship of Jesus Christ

I will go over this in more detail in my next post.

(If a lot of you find the text color to be annoying rather than interesting, I will remove it)