Baptist in Berkeley

One advantage of Golden Gate Seminary’s exotic location is that it gives Southern Baptist students hands-on experience with reaching a bizarre culture for Christ. Any lessons learned in Marin can then be applied to other alien locales like Papua New Guinea or France.

The school’s Evangelism 101 class sought to impart such practical knowledge by sending us out into the community to share our faith. Course requirements included write-ups of two "evangelistic encounters" in which we had to document our efforts to win lost Marinites to the Lord. A daunting task, to be sure, but the class provided plenty of preparation. We spent weeks analyzing the characteristics of rival belief systems such as atheism, Mormonism, and the New Age movement.

To be honest, this was my favorite part of the course. I enjoyed poking holes in other people’s beliefs and making snide comments like, "Why is no one channeling an ascended master named ‘Ted’?" But when the fun ended and we set off in search of evangelistic encounters, I found that hole-poking cuts both ways.

Somehow I hooked up with a group that was doing street evangelism in Berkeley, which is not exactly going after the low-hanging fruit, I realize. But folks in Berkeley did prove more than willing to talk about spiritual issues, even if their views were a little, well, "out there." Take Ronald, a middle-aged man who was sipping coffee at a sidewalk table. After I offered him a booklet with a 4-point outline of the New Testament, Ronald stated that he had already taken a class on the Bible in college. In his opinion, the gospels presented an entertaining but illogical account of Jesus’ life.

"Take the story of Jesus healing the man with a crippled hand," Ronald offered by way of example. "We are told that after seeing a withered limb become whole, the Pharisees immediately hatched an assassination plot. Does that seem like a reasonable response to an astounding miracle?"

Here I mumbled something about religious leaders protecting their own turf, but Ronald had plenty more ammo. It was tough to squeeze it all into one "evangelistic encounter" report, in fact.

I guess that’s the problem with poking holes. It’s only fun when you’re letting the air out of the other guy’s balloon.