Currently, we have several categories of people on the field. Some are regular members of a local church, while others are not. There are practitioners of various religions, even in areas with a high density of Christians.

There are unreached and under-reached people, long-time church members but poorly trained, regular Christians who are content but unable to positively influence others or bring transformation to their surroundings. Let’s not forget those near and far—Christians, servants of God, peoples, and nations that have backslidden and need to be restored and brought back into the race! This is also an important subject of intercession.

We can also view these as wonderful opportunities presented to current and future witnesses of Christ. If others, such as T. L. OSBORN in their time, were excited to travel thousands of kilometers to take part in or open a street towards “black gold,” how much more should we, who have this “black gold” within reach, quickly realize its value in the marketplace of Heaven?

We should be willing to “sell everything” to buy as much of this black gold as possible, while many in the church are completely unaware of its true worth. And they will learn by example. Through this realization and by evangelistic prayer, we must change the way we see those around us—our children, our neighbors, the most despised people in the world, and even our enemies! They are precious in the eyes of God.

Heaven has paid a great price for each one, and now there is a search warrant issued with rewards for whoever brings one of them back. This reminds us of what the Spirit said through the Apostle Paul:

“So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view…” 2 Corinthians 5:16

We must, both individually and collectively, break away from our current practices and traditions, or at least adapt them to this new reality. Among these trends are:

• The habit of relying solely on large evangelistic campaigns and other traditional methods of evangelism, which often yield mixed or uncertain results.
• The tendency to entrust evangelism, discipleship, and the establishment of new local churches primarily to professionals, or at least to well-trained servants of God. But how many are there?

In any case, it is now certain that if we do not change our approach, the Great Commission cannot be accomplished in time! These servants of God, however, remain great assets for implementing and overseeing this new strategy, if they accept it with an open heart and embrace it…

This text is an excerpt from the book STRATEGIC EVANGELISM written by Basile & Véronique HOUINATO.

We invite you to read the following article: FRIENDSHIP EVANGELISM.

RESOLUTIONS. RESOLUTIONS. RESOLUTIONS.