The Lord has a wonderful sense of humor.

I was attending an international conference on world evangelization a few months ago and was squirming in my seat. A well-known Christian leader, concluding his powerful keynote address on “Bearing witness to people of other faiths,” challenged the 4,000 conference participants to commit personally to reach out to “someone from the Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist faith” in the near future. It sounded very spiritual and good, but the problem was that I (like most Americans) just don’t like making an open-ended commitment. (Hence the squirming.)

But I had to mark something on my commitment card before leaving for a lunch appointment with a former missionary colleague (a Muslim-background believer who lived in the city where the conference was being held). So I reluctantly ticked the “yes” box and turned my card in at the door.

My former colleague had brought with her to our lunch a friend named Shanaaz, whom I assumed was also a Muslim-background believer. They both had many questions about the international conference, so that topic naturally dominated our conversation. Halfway through lunch it suddenly hit me smack between the eyes, after listening to yet another odd-sounding remark from Shanaaz about religion, that she was in fact not a Christian sister at all but a nominal Muslim—and that I was “bearing witness” to someone from another faith less than 30 minutes after reluctantly ticking a little square box committing myself to do just that. O ye of little faith! I tossed up a silent prayer (part confession and part intercession) and started recounting to Shanaaz some of the amazing stories of God at work across the globe that I’d heard in the conference, gossiping the good news to her. And (like most of us when the gossip gets going) she was all ears.

I’ve been involved in international outreach for almost three decades now: short-term mission trips, ministry to international students in the US, studying overseas, teaching overseas, and now serving overseas as the director of an international mission organization. Along the way, I’ve come to realize that whether we are reaching out to seekers from other faiths or to seekers within our own close circle of family and friends, the same basic principles of “bearing witness” generally apply—and that witnessing rarely, if ever, has anything to do with learning the right “techniques” or “methods” of evangelism. Here are a few of the things that I’ve learned:

1) Be yourself – We need to be careful here! This may seem simplistic, trite, or even “post-modern” at first glance, but it captures a profoundly important theological truth at the very core of God’s sublime plan for gathering a lost and dying world of rebellious loved ones back to himself. As Christians, bearing witness to Christ always involves being ourselves because we by faith literally have “Christ in us, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). What non-believers (or believers of other faiths) need above all else is Jesus, and that is precisely what (or rather who!) we as Christians have with us at all times and in every circumstance. I don’t fully comprehend what it means for the living God, the ruler of the universe, to be living in me, but I do know that because of this profound mystery, I essentially have everything that I will ever need to be personally and intimately involved in what he is doing in our world to woo the lost back to himself. When we are truly ourselves as Christians, when we are truly at ease with and in our new identity in Christ, we cannot help but bring Christ into contact with everyone we meet. As Paul puts it, “We are the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing.” Every true child of God, regardless of spiritual gifting, has already got what it takes to “spread everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him” (2 Corinthians 2:14-15). We’ve got Christ. So relax! Let the Christ-life exude from you.

2) Tell your story – While driving along the Pennsylvania Turnpike, my oldest brother and I pulled up to a tollbooth just outside of Philadelphia. As he was collecting our road toll, the tollbooth attendant casually asked us if we were Christians. Yes, we said. In two minutes flat (with no other cars behind us), the man shared with us the remarkable story of how God had rescued him and his marriage, restoring his wife to him. It was a joyful (albeit brief) time of fellowship and communion with another brother in Christ. Before we left, my brother mentioned to this newfound brother in Christ that I was a missionary in Asia. “Praise the Lord!” said the attendant. “This is my mission field,” he added wryly, pointing to his tiny tollbooth. Indeed it was!

We all have compelling stories that speak of God’s faithfulness and redemption. We might not all be equally adept when it comes to reasoning with nonbelievers about the faith, but we all have personally encountered God’s redemptive love and can speak about it from the heart. “Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you,” said Jesus to the Gerasene man after casting a legion of demons out of him (Mark 5:19). “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did,” said the Samaritan woman to the people of her village (John 4:29). We, too, can tell our own stories. And as we do, others will listen.

3) Pray, pray, pray – Julian, my college roommate during my final year as an undergraduate, was a professing atheist. Despite our differing religious outlooks, we got along remarkably well and had many frank talks that year about what I believed and what he believed. As a going-away gift, I presented Julian with a Bible. He promised that he would try to read it. Then we said our farewells. And while he was reading the Bible, I was praying. After a year or so of intense prayer for Julian to become a believer, I noticed a subtle change in my prayers for him. I was now thanking God each day for the day when Julian would finally become a believer. Sure enough, a few months later Julian wrote to me and said that he had just been baptized into the faith in a small pond a stone’s throw away from our old dorm room.

Years later I suddenly realized, while reading through the Gospel of John, that Jesus had been praying for Julian to come to faith long before I ever did. On the night before he died, after praying first for his disciples, Jesus added, “I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message… May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (John 17:20-21). Jesus had Julian in mind—and you and me—when he prayed that prayer. The Apostle Paul asked other believers to pray for him so that he might present the gospel both clearly (Colossians 4:4) and fearlessly (Ephesians 6:19-20) to non-believers. Prayer, then, is an essential part of the larger spiritual process by which non-believers are brought to faith in Christ. Do you want to see others around you trust in Christ, but dread sharing your faith? Then start praying!

4) Spread the Word – I love the emphasis that Luke places on “the word of the Lord” in the Book of Acts. For example, “The whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord” (13:44); “The word of the Lord spread through the whole region” (13:48); “all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord” (19:10); “the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power” (19:20). In this way, Luke gives God’s Word its proper place of honor at the cutting edge of both evangelism and missions, where God’s kingdom of grace and truth is continually coming into sharp contrast with the kingdom of darkness. Whenever and wherever unbelievers are encountering God’s Word, the power of God unto salvation is present.

Shanaaz, toward the end of lunch, mentioned that she was reading the Quran through for the fourth time. I knew exactly what to do. Pulling my worn Bible out of my backpack, I removed my personal notes and bookmarks and handed it to her, asking if she would commit to reading it through as well in her search for truth. She agreed.

Saying good-bye outside the convention center, Shanaaz said wistfully, “I wish I could go in to see and hear everything that is going on in your conference.” I wish she could have too. Maybe, just maybe, the next time this particular international conference on world evangelism rolls around, Shanaaz will be on the inside looking out instead of on the outside looking in. That is my hope and my prayer. (And I invite you who read this article to pray for Shanaaz as well. She will make a wonderful sister in Christ one day!)

Dr. Joel C is executive director of a non-profit organization that places and supports students and professionals in cross-cultural ministry contexts within Asia.

He will also be one of the LBS J-Term Speakers - visit www.lbs.edu