God alone is sovereign in the response to our humble presentation of the gospel. No pushing, cajoling, arm-twisting, pressuring, or hard sell is needed. None! This truth should bring great peace and freedom to every believer who has ever invested in another by sharing the gospel of Christ. What God desires of his followers is faithfulness, just plant and water.

This is a story about evangelism. But it just might be different than any you’ve read about the intentional act of sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with an unbeliever.

Picture a kind-hearted woman in her 70s. We’ll call her Mary. She’s a woman who did not grow up in an active, vibrant, Bible-preaching faith community. Her experience was staid and stale, so lifeless she would rarely if ever talk about faith with her friends—and assuredly never with a total stranger. Who would invite a friend into a faith experience when you’re not even convinced that your own spiritual heartbeat has a healthy pulse? The faith in Christ that Mary knew and experienced was understated, dare I say bland, and therefore unequivocally private.

Yet the words of Jesus found in Matthew 28, commonly referred to as the Great Commission, are as true for Mary as they are for missionaries living and serving around the globe right now. “And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.’”

God commissions all his people to tell others about the love and grace they have found through faith in Jesus Christ, so that they too might become his disciples—people who confess Jesus as Lord, walk faithfully in his ways, and become lifelong learners of God’s truth, all because they  experienced a heart transformation that causes them to walk in submission to the teachings of Christ.

Who Will Tell Them?

Today, Mary is now at a much different place on her faith journey. God called her to leave the staid and stale behind. In its place is a church that loves God passionately, preaches the gospel consistently, and encourages believers to read their Bible regularly and walk in the ways of Scripture. The vibrancy of her newfound faith community has quickened her heart. The growth that she is experiencing on the journey, alongside other faithful believers, is something that she deeply longs for others to experience. I know this because she’s shared this with me with moist eyes. Her spiritual heartbeat is healthy.

Recently, as she was spending time with a group of long-standing friends, Mary was presented with an unexpected opportunity to fulfill her call to the great commission. In the middle of their lunch, she sensed the leading of the Holy Spirit to do something that she’d never done before—tell others about Jesus.

She admitted that in the moment she became incredibly nervous. (Which, in my experience, is completely normal.)

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