As we talked I shared my teammates' experiences in evangelism in France since the 1950s. Since Tom did not speak much French, but wanted to get the gospel out, he decided to employ a hi-tech, cutting edge approach.
THE IMPERSONAL ATTEMPTS
TRUE STORY 1: Way back when, Tom knocked on doors and asked, «Est-ce que vous voudriez écouter ce message, s'il vous plaît ?» ("Would you mind listening to this, please?" ) If they responded positively, he hit the play button on his spanking new cassette player and began the recorded gospel message.
I guess today this would be a bit like doing door-t-door with an iPad with a YouTube clip from the Jesus film 8-)
Ok, so this impersonal approach is a strawman. Or is it? Two more examples.
TRUE STORY 2: The evangelical protestant church that I helped to plant, organized a “Year-of-the-Bible” multimedia conference. Five thousand invitations were distributed to
homes surrounding the church’s facility. No one came as a result of the distribution.
One woman came because she had seen the half-page article in the local
newspaper. Eight people (out of about 40 total) came because they had been
invited by a friend from the church.
TRUE STORY 3: Anne-Marie, a Campus Crusade worker distributed invitations during the World Cup. She reported: “10,000 tracts were distributed in the streets to invite
people to the event ‘Succeed.’ Only two people came, and they did not come
because of the distributed publicity but because two of their friends had
invited them.” (reference: David Brown, Une église pour aujourd’hui, 67.)
THE RELATIONAL IMPERATIVE
Tom was and is insightful. In spite of the pressure to "get the message out" and into people's auditory canals, he sought ways to get the Good News into people's hearts. So he went to L'Abri and spoke with Francis Schaefer, came back to France and purchased a castle!
During the hay day of the hippy movement, young people traveled all across the French countryside, stopping at places like the Château at St. Albain. Here there was no "us" and "them," like there was when a "longhair" walked into a church building.
The Château was (and is) a neutral meeting place where unbelievers and believers could talk about superficial and deep issues, about life and the afterlife.
A camera clinic at one of the Château's "artistic days"
The working principal of the Château of St. Albain was, "the effectiveness of the evangelism is in direct proportion to its relational context." People came to Christ and churches were started from that innovative ministry.
Relational = cutting edge.
Cooking class at the Château
In the 21st century, having contributed to a successful church plant, my wife and I began to wonder, how might we adapt the Château's relational principle to an urban context? What would a "château-in-the-city" look like?
More to come…
