Daily Verse | Isaiah 44:6
“This is what the Lord says—
Israel’s King and Redeemer, the Lord Almighty:
I am the first and I am the last;
apart from me there is no God.”

It’s Friday and the end of the week. Dancing in the rain is not as much fun as dancing in the shower.

I don’t typically share much that is personal on these pages, primarily because this isn’t a journal about my life. It’s a place for me to sound off about how I see faith, culture and politics — with an emphasis on politics. Anyone reading this blog for any length of time will know that I have strong opinions about our national politics and our political culture, and even stronger convictions about our rights as American citizens.

However, I just came in from cutting my lawn and am writing this for Friday morning. That’s relevant because we and some of our neighbors are hosting a block party for our street Friday night. We have about 75 people coming and we’ll have a taco truck, games for the kids, music, perhaps a small bonfire in the evening, and we invited the local sheriff to stop by.

We’re doing it because we want to get to know our neighbors. Earlier this year my wife and I invited couples near us to form a group to get to know each other around some meaningful conversation. We meet once a week for dinner and conversation, then spend an hour or more discussing a passage from the Gospel of John. It’s been a great way to build relationships with them and move past the wave and “Hey, howz it goin’?” stage of being neighbors.

The block party is another step in the process of building a community right where we live. What better way to break the ice than to bring the neighborhood together for an opportunity to do more than wave as they drive past the house or give them a nod as their garage door closes?

What surprised us is that the highway commissioner for our township was excited about what we are doing. She is fully supportive and will deliver tables, chairs, and blockades for each end of the street with “Block Party” signs. As my wife was working out the details with her, the commissioner said something to the effect of, “We need to be getting out and mixing it up after being locked down for so long.”

That’s true. The pandemic created a lot of fear and isolated people as they hid in their homes and behind masks. It’s tough enough in our current culture to get to know neighbors and the Chinese Lung Pox made it that much harder by keeping people separated.

As a Christ-follower, this is also a way to build relationships with people in whom God may be doing some work. Before his ascension, Jesus gave his disciples “the Great Commission.”

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

— Matthew 28:18-20

You can’t make disciples if you don’t know anybody, so getting introduced to neighbors is a practical way to start that process. I don’t go into the event with any agenda other than to meet people who live up and down the street and listen for what God may or may not be up to. I try to follow Henry Blackaby’s advice: “Watch to see where God is working and join Him in His work.”

That’s a different approach from what most Christians are taught, which is to “do” evangelism. “Evangelism” in the traditional sense of the term is a terrifying act in which you approach total strangers and ask them if they know where they’re going when they die, then share the “Four Spiritual Laws” with them and hope they make a decision to follow Jesus. After that you flee back to the group that sent you out and tell your story to them.

There’s no doubt the Four Spiritual Laws are biblical truth and explain our predicament in relationship to God. And it’s true that some people have come to faith through this method of outreach. But the approach — basically confronting someone with a heavy personal choice that they may or may not have ever thought about — isn’t necessarily the only, or even the most effective, way to talk to someone about Big Truth. We live in an easily offended, post-Christian society now.

Jesus certainly used different approaches in his ministry that depended on what he saw God his Father doing.

“I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does” (John 5:19).

So the problem, as it were, with the old style scalp-seeking method of evangelism, is that it bypasses what you see God doing and then joining him in it. The better way to approach making disciples, I believe, is through personal relationships and paying attention to what God is doing in those.

In order to have personal relationships, you have to spend time with people. That’s the deeper purpose behind the block party — not just the fun of eating tacos, meeting new people, playing some games and finding out what you have in common — but to discern whether there are needs to be met, questions to be answered, or connections to be made.

There is no pressure—just participation. As Blackaby also said:

Have a great weekend and I’ll see you Monday.