This month I’m in Jamaica and my team found out we would be doing a lot of street evangelism. This was honestly one of the last things I wanted to hear and I was kind of dreading it. I personally love deep conversations and building relationships, so it was really hard for me to see how street evangelism could be anything more than awkward small talk and forcing my religion on people. To further add to my already bad attitude, we have been walking at least 5 miles a day and it is HOT here. It seemed like no matter how much I prayed about it, I really couldn’t seem to get my heart in the right place.
When it came time for our first day of street evangelism, it started out kind of how I thought it would be like: hot, sweaty, and awkward. I felt similar to being dropped off on the first day of school, kind of lost and not sure what to do or where to go. We walked for a while, and then God led us to a woman’s house name Sharon. We started the awkward small talk, but then she invited us into her home. She was so humble, so loving, and so wise. We got to talk to her for a while and found out that she just really needed to be encouraged. Ironically, I walked away from that conversation encouraged. It was exactly what I needed, and we will be going back to continue building that relationship.
Afterwards I realized that I had a lot of negative connotations with the words street evangelism. I had put God in a box when all he called me to do is love this women and anyone we come into contact with like he loves us. After a few days of doing street evangelism, I can say it is still really hard, but I would walk 500 miles in the heat for the honor of being able to talk to and love people like Sharon.
