Book Review : I Once Was Lost: Written by Don Everts & Doug Schaupp : IVP Press
I’ve been thinking a lot about being in friendship with people who aren’t Christian. Especially since e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g Christian seems more suspect these pandemic-politic-cray-cray days to those who don’t follow our faith…and even to some who do.
I read the book Tactics by Greg Koukl, that was lauded as a great discussion book for interfacing about faith in discussions. And though it had some useful tools for dialoguing, I found it a book more about debating. Or even a book more helpful in conversations that were a one off—Discussions struck while waiting in-line, sitting next to someone on a plane, or even responding to comments on Facebook—Not super helpful with friends that I am in long-term relationships with. In fact, I think my friends would be pretty put off by some of the blunt conversational tactics deployed in this book, and I would come across as aggressive. Besides—with the pandemic and smartphones, who’s even talking to each other in grocery store lines anymore?
Don’t get me wrong, I did learn some great conversational tactics in that book. But I wanted something more.
“We don’t look hard enough to see and affirm the spiritual impulses of our Buddhist neighbors or the real humility before nature of the stoned guy next door or the great parenting skills of the mom who dabbles in Wicca. Where there is distrust, our aloofness can come across as judgment. We have the power to combat this by looking for good in people and affirming it. That habit builds trust.”
Everts & Schuapp, 45
I wanted to think and read about being in relationship with friends who don’t know Jesus. How do I be in dialogue in a respectful way with them? Are there common pathways forward in spiritual journeys towards Christianity? In a post-truth era, how do people even think about spirituality? And how do we do that for people in this generation.
What’s on Your Walkman?
Technically if we are talking about identifying as a specific labeled generation, I’m on the cusp of being a Millennial, but my thinking and how I grew up definitely identifies way more with being a Generation Xer. In fact, so much so, that I hate even talking about Generations like that—Let’s just let ourselves in after school, watch Who’s the Boss and paint my nails black. But this book hit right at home for me, like wearing a Hyper Color sweatshirt while listening to Nirvana on my walkman.
As a Christian in 90’s youth group, we talked about the “Roman Road” path to salvation and the “Four Spiritual Laws”. To put it bluntly—I wore Christian t-shirts to school during the middle school years. (I was that cool.) Sure we knew about “relational evangelism” but there was also a heavy emphasis on having friends “pray the prayer” have a “conversion moment” and also having a “dynamic testimony”.
Now, as an adult, I see our world filled with relativist truth. I wonder how my friends will come to know the ultimate truth in the life of Jesus Christ. I’ve recognized that more than a moment of “praying the sinner’s prayer” to follow Jesus, it’s often a journey of finding that narrow path and walking on it for a while…usually with a friend.
{And to my friends reading this book review, who aren’t Christians. I hope it doesn’t creep you out that I read books about sharing my spirituality. I want to do it well, with grace, humbleness, and authenticity—not trite phrases and poorly designed t-shirts. Also, as this book emphasizes, I hope you know we are friends despite my beliefs and yours (and our t-shirts).
Time in the Fields
Don Everts and Doug Schaupp have spent plenty of time on college campuses, building relationships and sharing Jesus. They share their expertise of combined decades of campus ministry—Especially noticing a real change in how students communicated and responded in the 1990’s. Those college students then, are my contemporaries now—we are professionals together, taking parenting classes together, and living in our small college town raising a family and sharing our lives. Though the world has moved on a lot from post-modernism, it also hasn’t. Evert’s and Schaupp’s astute ordering of their spiritual sharing experiences helps me to think about my own relationships and conversations now.
“The reality is we each need to make a decision to serve out non-christian friends…It takes energy and Humility and risk to serve others, to allow others’ needs to guide our actions.”
Everts & Schuapp, 133
In fact, this is probably one of the best books I’ve ever read on the subject. Though a bit confusing at times as the text switches between the two authors, clearly they both have had a vast array of experiences around spiritual development and cultivating spiritual curiosity. Published in 2008, their thinking still provides a strong framework for me to approach the subject. In fact, I literally ordered six copies of this book while I was reading it to give one to my husband and my dope lady prayer group.
The Five Thresholds
The book is structured largely around five thresholds that they see in the landscape of postmodern conversion. These thresholds are:
1. Friends move from distrust to trust of a Christian.
2. Friends move from complacent to curious.
3. Friends move from being closed to change to being open to change.
4. Friends move from meandering around spirituality to truly seeking.
5. The final threshold, friends make a decision to enter the kingdom itself.
The rest of the book is spent fleshing out what these thresholds look like and giving practical examples and interactions.
Beautifully the authors remind us to have authentic and loving interactions with our friends. They are not using the language of past evangelists—winning, prize, and jewel. Instead, we are reminded that at each stage something “wonderful and mysterious happens” and then our friends cross into the next threshold, just as in our own lives something “wonderful and mysterious happens” and we come to know Jesus as our Savior. The authors employ language of the seed and the sower, and our careful observation of a spiritual landscape to understand what gardening stage one might be at.
And it’s good to remember, what is your own spiritual soil like? What is being grown in your own life? Though this book provides an interesting framework of thinking about faith conversations, the best way to share our faith, is having our own authentic relationship with Jesus that spills out into all areas of our life. We need to be carefully tending our own lives for this flourishing to be vibrantly abundant.
“If the Spirit of God works in the concrete circumstances of someone’s life and in the profound depths of their soul, they can cross threshold four: moving from meandering toward Jesus to seeking some final conclusions. And once someone, is seeking, only God knows where it might lead.”
Evert & Schuapp, 101
Put this on your must read list! It’s quick and easily accessible. It even has some on-line resources to accompany it.
I’m giving it 4/5 fist bumps of book reading goodness. 👊🏻 👊🏻 👊🏻 👊🏻
I’m not very versed in evangelism texts like this, so if YOU have any recommendations for me, please drop some titles in the comments. I’d love to learn more about and have some personally recommended books.
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