What Can I Do Right Now? 

November 5, 2022 | NEW MINDS


In All Things New, we need to make an important distinction between the institutional and the individual.

Institutionally, planning for All Things New is ongoing. We won’t have answers to some important questions until we’ve continued to listen and respond to the needs of the local church. For many, the unknown can cause a bit of paralysis - we want to wait for clarity before we begin to do anything new or different. And while there is some merit to this in our institutional structures, there is no reason to delay our mission to the world as individuals!

Individually, we don’t have to wait for a formal invitation or even formal training from the Church to be evangelizers - it’s who we are as part of our identity as baptized Catholics:

"In virtue of their baptism, all the members of the People of God have become missionary disciples (cf. Mt 28:19)."

Joy of the Gospel, 120


With that in mind, here are three things you can do right now to get started living the mission of evangelization everyday.


Pray Intentionally


As we share in the Preparing For Mission Guidebook - the first step for any one who wants to live as a missionary disciple in their everyday lives is to develop a new heart - and in particular a heart for God.

Inevitably, if we allow God to give us His own heart, this will also lead us to have a heart for others, a heart for the mission of evangelization. We all need to take time to learn to pray in new and deeper ways. It’s easy to get stuck in a routine and lose the type of dynamic intimacy that we’re called to have with God.

We also need to pray for others. Sometimes our prayer can be generic - “God please help the whole world know you”. While this simple and beautiful prayer shows our missionary zeal - it might lead us to discouragement if we don’t see the effects of it. One of the things our prayer should lead us to is a better understanding of what the Lord wants of me to help effect the change that we are praying for.

An important way to do this is to pray more specifically:

Lord, who are the people you calling me to share the Good News with?

Lord, who are three people for whom my heart breaks, that I want to see return to a relationship with you and your church?

Everyone should ask the Lord to reveal to them three names that you can lift up in prayer every day. Pray for them. Fast for them. Put their picture on your wall! Beg God to open their hearts to His love and to provide you opportunities to be a witness to what God has done in your own life. If we hold these people up in prayer everyday, we will be more attentive to the opportunities we have to be witnesses to them.


Prepare your witness


There are two key things we all have to know in order to be effective evangelists - we have to know the basics of God's story - of what he has done for each of us and the gift of new life that he offers us. This can be called the Kerygma - or the core Gospel message.

There are many different ways of articulating this - some very simple - some quite complex - which means that many people can be too intimidated to try.

But each of us needs to be ready to share some version of the basic Gospel message with others. It could be as simple as “

We also need to share our own story, our testimony. When we tell the story of how God has moved in our lives, it demonstrates to others that this isn’t just theoretical - it’s real. And as a relationship with God has made a difference in your life - it can make one in theirs too.


Start a Small Group


Small groups are a key part of most evangelizing communities. One of the reasons for this is they help us practice a key model of evangelization - being in relationship with others and inviting them to go deeper (no matter where they are on their own faith journey). This can be called “Incarnational Evangelization” - based on an important principle of St. Paul:

“So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.”

- 1 Thessalonians 2:8

We share the Gospel with people, and we share our lives.

Evangelization isn’t just about inviting someone to a program at Church, or even just inviting them to Sunday Mass (though it should eventually lead them there). It’s about inviting them to new life in Christ and the graces He offers us through the Church. These invitations can become more meaningful and effective when they are done in the context of a relationship that accompanies others through the highs and lows of that journey.

There are many small group programs, bible studies, and curriculums for whatever the needs of your group are - whether they have lots of questions about who Jesus is or they’re looking to grow closer to Jesus and prepare for their evangelizing mission.

When it comes to being an everyday evangelist, the most important thing we can do is just to take the first step. To respond to God’s invitation to live as a missionary disciple.

As Pope Francis asks us in the Joy of the Gospel:

“So, what are we waiting for?”

-Joy of the Gospel, 120

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