Learning how to evangelize to friends can be challenging. Friends rarely take what you say seriously. Chances are that they are used to you being a spiritual person and they have built defenses against you.
To break through their defenses you need wisdom and courage. Good for us, God has not left us without strategies to evangelize to our friends.
From scripture, we find strategies that God has provided for us to evangelize to our friends. In this article I will walk you through one of the easiest strategies you can use to evangelize to friends.
How to Evangelize to Friends: Set an Example
Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity.
1st Timothy 4:12
From this scripture we can learn a lot about evangelizing to friends. While friends can despise us, they can’t despise the fruit that we bear.
In this verse, we are directed to set an example to other believers in five key areas. These are the same areas in which you are to set an example if you want to evangelize to your friends.
Though it may take time and some of your friends may still not turn to Jesus, this is the right thing to do.
1. Your Speech when Evangelizing to Friends
Jesus told us that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. When you go to evangelize to your friends, remember that you cannot speak anything that is not overflowing from your heart.
You will only speak the word of God to your friends if your heart if full of it. If you spend a lot of time talking about worldly things with your friends, you will find it hard to speak the word of God to them.
Therefore, the first thing to do when you want to evangelize to your friends is to fill your heart with God’s word. You have to meditate upon God’s word day and night just as we are commanded in the book of Joshua.
Once your heart is full of God’s word, you will find yourself quoting scriptures in the middle of casual conversations with your friends.
The more you are full of the word, the more it will overflow to your friends. Before long, you will realize that most of your conversations with your friends turn to sermons.
Do that for a while and the word that you speak to them will transform them.
2. Your Conduct when Evangelizing to Friends
Your friends know your conduct. We are told in the book of Proverbs that even children are known by their conduct.
It is easy to evangelize to friends if your conduct agrees with your message. Before you ask your friends to consider Jesus in their lives, let them see Jesus in you.
Your prayer life should be like that of Christ. Your compassion and kindness should mirror that of Jesus. Once your friends notice how good your conduct is, they may even come to receive Jesus before you ask them to.
The character of Jesus is appealing. If you copy what Jesus did, you will draw your friends to Jesus without struggling.
Therefore, work to have your conduct similar to that of Jesus as a way to evangelize to your friends.
3. Love when Evangelizing to Friends
Jesus asked us to love our neighbors as ourselves. There is no other way to win people to Jesus other than to show them love.
In the world, there is no love. But since all people desire love, we can easily win them to Jesus by showing them love.
Love is demonstrated through actions. Paul tells us that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. The love that Jesus had for us was demonstrated through His death on the cross.
Likewise, it is not enough to tell your friends you love them. Demonstrate it through your actions. Pray for them, teach them, guide them etc.
Be of great help to them. When they have no food, give them something to eat. If they don’t have peace, offer them the peace you found in Jesus.
When they are sad, tell them about the joy that you found in Christ.
They will be drawn to Christ if they see that indeed you are what you are talking about. If it is joy, they will believe you if they know you to be a person full of joy.
Above all, you can only show love to your friends after you have understood the love that Jesus showed you.
4. Faith in Witnessing to Friends
Our faith in Jesus is a huge factor when it comes to evangelizing to friends. The faith you have in Jesus will determine the depth of your conviction when evangelizing to friends.
In fact, if your faith is low, you will not have the courage to witness to your friends. But if your faith is strong, evangelizing to your friends will come naturally.
Remember that faith comes from hearing the word of God. This point ties with the first point where you are to meditate on the word of God day and night.
It is through meditating on the word of God that your faith will grow. And as your faith grows, so will your boldness in reaching out to your friends.
When your faith has grown to tremendous levels, you will be willing to lose many things including your life for Jesus.
The fear of losing friends when you evangelize to them is removed by the growth of your faith. It is better to lose friends than to have friends who don’t believe in Jesus.
5. Purity in Evangelizing to Friends
Purity is part of your conduct. It is through your pure conduct that your friends will believe that you are actually a disciple of Jesus.
As followers of Jesus, we are asked to live pure lives. If your friends can find faults in you, they will have doubts about the message of salvation that you speak to them.
But if you are pure in your ways, it will be easy for them to believe you.
The best way to evangelize to your friends is by making yourself an example in these five areas. Once you achieve a high standard in these five areas, your friends will be forced to choose between accepting Christ to remain your friends or rejecting Christ and losing you as a friend.
All the best!