Typically, when we as Christians get fired up to do evangelism, we go out solo. We go and sign up for a book club or a cooking class or a football team, hoping to be the one person who tells them about Jesus.

These solo efforts are admirable and worthy. But the result is that we are the one and only bozo in the room who believes in the Jesus story. And no matter how true this story is, no matter how much evidence we can produce, no matter how logically we argue, our story—as true, logical, and rational as it is—remains unbelievable because there’s no other person in the room who also believes it.

One of the major reasons our friends aren’t Christians is that they don’t belong to a community of friends who also believe in Jesus. It’s not primarily because they haven’t heard the gospel (they probably haven’t, but they already think they know what you believe). It’s not because there’s not enough evidence for the Christian faith (because no matter how much evidence you produce, they’ll explain it away). In many cases, the number one reason our friends aren’t Christians is that they don’t have any other Christian friends.

So what we need to do is introduce them into a community of Christian friends. How do we do this? By getting our Christian friends to become friends with our non-Christian friends.

The Non-Christian Bubble

I read the New York Times every day. It’s my number one go-to source for news. I also love its crossword puzzles. But I’ve heard that many of the staff members at the New York Times do not know any Christians. It’s not just that they don’t have any friends who are Christians; they actually don’t know a single real-life Christian!

So it’s not just Christians who can live in a bubble. Our non-Christian friends often live in a bubble with only non-Christian contacts.

Chan, Sam, and Ed Stetzer. 2020. How to Talk about Jesus (without Being That Guy): Personal Evangelism in a Skeptical World. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

Check out our Bible Study on Sam Chan’s book How to Talk About Jesus. It is on Amazon as well as part of the Good Questions Have Groups Talking subscription service. Like Netflix for Bible Lessons, one low subscription gives you access to all our lessons–thousands of them. For a medium-sized church, lessons are as little as $10 per teacher per year.

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