There was a time when I thought I needed to explore some other expressions of faith. I didn’t want to go far. I just thought maybe the idea that Jesus loves me—and others—and that I might reciprocate by loving Jesus and others was too simple. Everyone else had so many other rules that I assumed I must be missing something.
So I pursued and found a Pentecostal group willing to train me in street evangelism. It seemed a little edgy—just what I was looking for. They embraced my willingness to talk to strangers as a huge asset. My gift for invasive conversations was precisely what they were looking for.
So I began the training with passion and dedication.
The first step was to ask for forgiveness for all of my many twenty-year-old sins. That required a great deal of out-loud praying, with many others doing the same. This experience was quite a jolt to my First Baptist sensibilities, but I was in.
The next step was to perfect my testimony so I could quickly help people know as much about me as possible in the time available before they walked away or called for help. In that small window, I was also supposed to impress upon them that if Jesus could love me, he could even love them.
According to the training, sharing one’s testimony was supposed to take no more than the time it would take to ride an elevator from the first floor to the tenth floor—a moment in time that would change their life and yours. Thus, the expression “elevator testimony.”
It seems very hard to actually witness to someone in an elevator, since everyone is looking straight ahead as lots of people come and go, but the term has remained.
(Editor’s Note: For the unitiatied, “witness to” in evangelical-speak means to “tell someone about Jesus.”)
Given my assignment, I am sure there was someone else with me besides Jesus, but for the life of me, I cannot remember who. My memory of this experience is as follows.
My first stop was with some bikers straight out of Sons of Anarchy, gathered on a street corner. I walked into the group of burly guys and asked them if they “knew Jesus as their personal savior?” A look passed between them, which prompted one guy to step forward and tell me he wanted to hear what I had to say.
So we sat down on the curb, and he allowed me to practice my training. Convinced that I may have changed this man’s life—though life has taught me he probably, as a child of the South, already regularly attended Sunday school—I moved on.
Night was falling as I entered the public playground where I had taken children in my care to play many times before. What my naiveté did not know was that this spot had become the designated place for drug exchanges after dark.
I did think it strange that this location was on the list of evangelism opportunities at this time of night, but sure enough, there were about five or six adolescents and young adults lingering around the swings. So I approached with confidence and delivered my elevator speech with enthusiasm and engagement.
They were not rude, but it did seem as if I had intruded on something already in progress. Knowing I could not win them all, I turned to leave and saw a guy on the swing look over his shoulder and say to his friends, “Hey, do you think she was on crack?”
I am not sure whether it was concern or envy, but I knew my days of street evangelism were complete.
Based on this experience, I did my doctoral work in evangelism.
Retired campus minister, campus ministry coordinator for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina, and Collegiate Specialist for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.