Beautiful feet...

"Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!"

Romans 10:13-15

This passage expresses the passion which drives me. 'How are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard?' Though most of the people we meet in our everyday lives here in the UK have heard of Jesus, very few really understand what Jesus is all about, or who he is. For older people there is so much baggage - memories of being bored in church, headlines about child-molesting priests. To younger people, Jesus just seems completely irrelevant. And many younger people (say, 40 and under) grew up while church attendance was steadily declining, and quite possibly were never dragged to Sunday school and may know very little about Jesus.

This is where proclamation comes in - proclaiming the good news. But this is tricky. How can you proclaim if people don't want to hear? Do you just do it anyway? Hence men standing on street corners with loudhailers, large posters at train stations with Bible verses (King James version, of course), leaflet drops, door knocking. I have great respect for anyone who goes cold-calling for Jesus - I have spoken to people for whom this approach has borne fruit. Praise God. The very thought of it makes me cringe in horror. I may be an in-your-face kind of person but I can't bear in-your-face evangelism. But at least door-knockers and street preachers have a sense of urgency! (that is a quotation from someone but I can't remember who...Shane Claiborne??).

The area I am working in does not lend itself to the above approaches. My part of Tower Hamlets is over 50% Muslim - door knocking and large posters with Bible verses in my area are simply going to wind people up. The Alpha Course, fantastic though it is in some contexts, works best with people who already have some basic knowledge of Christianity and want to know more. If you have no idea that Jesus might be relevant to your life, you aren't going to go on an Alpha Course.

So much of the work I am doing would probably be described as 'incarnational', based on the fact that Christ was incarnated into our world - he 'became flesh'. 'The Word became flesh and lived among us' - in the same way, incarnational missionaries seek to live among people and 'proclaim' Christ with their lives. So I am running a reading group for people with mental health problems (we read fiction, not Scripture); helping to promote a mentoring project for women recently arrived in the UK (mostly Bangladeshi Muslim women); working as an assistant to a university chaplain, which largely involves serving food to people, chatting, and washing up. I am very conscious that my life does not have a holy aura most of the time. Do people see Jesus in me? What a terrifying question. I find this verse from Philippians immensely comforting:

For it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Philippians 2:13