Friendship Evangelism Part 2

I wonder if my initial comments about friendship evangelism were a bit naive. Maybe professional "befriending" is actually a commonly accepted phenomenon. People talk about developing networks. This happens on different levels, from the exchange of business cards, to schmoozing at corporate events, etc. It happens in sales. It happens in college. If a student is wise, he/she'll not burn any bridges in classes through obnoxious rhetoric, will keep in touch with his/her favorite professors, and will use those connections for a variety of purposes--getting good recommendations, finding jobs, soliciting advice, etc.

Here's what I'm realizing. Being intentional about developing "networks" or "friends" doesn't necessarily make it insincere. The fact of the matter is that we constantly depend on other people in order to function in our lives. What has happened, I believe, is that the relationship aspect of these dependencies has, in the world of groceries, malls, and Internet shopping, etc., been eliminated. I don't need to know my bank teller in order to trust that when I deposit 1,000 into checking that it goes into the right account. All this stuff is controlled by mechanisms. As a result, a dichotomy has emerged between relationships which are "strictly for meeting needs," and relationships which are strictly social/friendly. Having gotten used to that, I think that when the separation begins to blur again, I feel uncomfortable and dishonest.

This is especially true as an evangelist. For example, I want to grow the church and evangelize by adding new members to the congregation. You, a stranger, and definitely in need of conversion (sorry for the crass terms), walk into our ALPHA program. You better believe that I'm going to go out of my way to be friendly and welcoming to you. Question: am I being civil and hospitable because it's my job to grow the church, or because I care about your salvation, or because I genuinely love strangers and want to be friends with people I've met only once?

It's a tricky business. And the evangelist better care about more than simply whether or not the stranger gets into Heaven. Even though the question of a person's eternal salvation is of grave importance to me, I recognize that it is inhuman to develop a relationship with someone strictly on the grounds that you desire for this relationship to result in their conversion. But maybe this the point: that developing a relationship in order to do your job doesn't have to be dishonest and fake, but that the friendship desire cannot be limited to any one gain or motive. The challenge as an evangelist arises soon, however. You can't be best friends with everybody. You can care about the "hungry masses" as Jesus did, but you can't cannot invest a true friendship in every one of them, right? I mean Jesus had 12 disciples. He taught and fed the masses. He befriended 12.