Julie-anne is a force for evangelism and mission. With 20 years of experience training university students in evangelism, she now works as the Specialist Consultant of Evangelism and Mission for City to City Australia.
She’s also the guest speaker at Leadership Camp in St Arnaud this year!
I had the opportunity to ask about her heart for equipping Christians to share their faith. It’s clear that she’s passionate about Jesus and I’m excited to meet her in person at Lake Rotoiti!
Julie-anne: I grew up in a long line of Christians and had a beautiful, devout Christian family.
Early on I committed my life to Jesus and haven't really doubted ever since – just had a real heart right from the beginning for people to know Jesus in the same way.
I led two friends to faith in year 11. Through that, God showed me what it meant to show Jesus to people because both friends’ lives were completely transformed.
It was amazing for them of course, but actually really good for me too, to see how important this is.
So from then on, I really just wanted everybody to know Jesus!
Julie-anne: No, I totally thought this was a normal part of life.
I was just always driven by knowing all these people who didn't know Jesus and thinking, what would help them come to faith? I probably didn't have heaps of patience for other Christians – I didn’t understand why it wasn’t a priority for everyone else.
So I didn't work out until my 30s that I was probably a gifted evangelist. It helped me to realise that God's gifted other people in other ways and that's okay. And the image that I'd had of what a gifted evangelist looked like was quite different. I was a bit more “ordinary”.
A lot of people would think of an “evangelist” as someone like Billy Graham, who was a really gifted speaker.
He gets up at a tent revival, speaks, and people become Christians.
But I think people have lost a bit of trust in the “event”.
As I was growing up in my faith it was hard to get people along to things – taking strangers to an event felt like it would be a real bait-and-switch.
When Billy Graham was around, people often had a real background of Christian faith. And so when he preached it actually was more just tipping them over the edge because they already knew enough to make that commitment.
And part of that is often in relationships – they're finding out about who Jesus is through you. So I think we've just got a bit more work to do before people become Christians.
It often takes about 10 years for my friends to become Christians.
By that time, they usually either commit to Jesus or they break up with me because they're just sick of hearing about Jesus.
Julie-anne: Yep. Heaps.
Most people are petrified about talking about their faith.
We get scared about it, but people are more open than you realise.
When Richard Dawkins put out The God Delusion, I read it and went, “Yeah, I agree with 98% of what you’re saying. But you're not talking about Jesus. You're talking about Christians.”
I think there's something good about being a bit of a muddling sort of Christian. We don't have to be super good at things, just more honest and sharing.
And if you introduce someone to another Christian, that's double the message – “Ah, you're a decent person and I like you. Maybe I've got some of this wrong in terms of church and religion.”
There are also quite a few atheists who are actually becoming Christians at the moment. Even Richard Dawkins called himself a “cultural Christian” a couple weeks ago.
I think it's coming back around a little bit, but we just need to be steady Christians and be open about what we believe.
God's doing some quite miraculous things to make people aware that they need to know more about Jesus. I'm interested to see what God's going to do. And I'm happy to be along for the ride, whatever it looks like.
Julie-anne: As I've gone around chatting with people, they’ve all said they want their friends and their family to know Jesus, and they know that this is what God's wanting as well – but somehow there's a disconnect.
It's that people don't know how to do it. So I'm just showing how I do it.
I’m trying to help people be more courageous about what they believe in and why, and not to worry about trying to convert people, but just to be who they are, pray for their friends and talk openly about their own faith.
I think it's fairly biblical in that we'd be a witness, talking about what's good about knowing Jesus, and letting God do the rest.
Julie-anne: Oh, I'm so excited. I love New Zealanders.
A lot of ministers are struggling with this kind of thing, like we all are, and I think it's a humbling thing for people to ask for help. So I'm really proud of anyone who gets to that point, and I feel very privileged to be in that space.
Check out other articles in the
series below.
More articles in the
series are to come.
We have invited these writers to share their experiences, ideas and opinions in the hope that these will provoke thought, challenge you to go deeper and inspire you to put your faith into action. These articles should not be taken as the official view of the Nelson Diocese on any particular matter.
Julie-anne is a force for evangelism and mission. With 20 years of experience training university students in evangelism, she now works as the Specialist Consultant of Evangelism and Mission for City to City Australia.
She’s also the guest speaker at Leadership Camp in St Arnaud this year!
I had the opportunity to ask about her heart for equipping Christians to share their faith. It’s clear that she’s passionate about Jesus and I’m excited to meet her in person at Lake Rotoiti!
Julie-anne: I grew up in a long line of Christians and had a beautiful, devout Christian family.
Early on I committed my life to Jesus and haven't really doubted ever since – just had a real heart right from the beginning for people to know Jesus in the same way.
I led two friends to faith in year 11. Through that, God showed me what it meant to show Jesus to people because both friends’ lives were completely transformed.
It was amazing for them of course, but actually really good for me too, to see how important this is.
So from then on, I really just wanted everybody to know Jesus!
Julie-anne: No, I totally thought this was a normal part of life.
I was just always driven by knowing all these people who didn't know Jesus and thinking, what would help them come to faith? I probably didn't have heaps of patience for other Christians – I didn’t understand why it wasn’t a priority for everyone else.
So I didn't work out until my 30s that I was probably a gifted evangelist. It helped me to realise that God's gifted other people in other ways and that's okay. And the image that I'd had of what a gifted evangelist looked like was quite different. I was a bit more “ordinary”.
A lot of people would think of an “evangelist” as someone like Billy Graham, who was a really gifted speaker.
He gets up at a tent revival, speaks, and people become Christians.
But I think people have lost a bit of trust in the “event”.
As I was growing up in my faith it was hard to get people along to things – taking strangers to an event felt like it would be a real bait-and-switch.
When Billy Graham was around, people often had a real background of Christian faith. And so when he preached it actually was more just tipping them over the edge because they already knew enough to make that commitment.
And part of that is often in relationships – they're finding out about who Jesus is through you. So I think we've just got a bit more work to do before people become Christians.
It often takes about 10 years for my friends to become Christians.
By that time, they usually either commit to Jesus or they break up with me because they're just sick of hearing about Jesus.
Julie-anne: Yep. Heaps.
Most people are petrified about talking about their faith.
We get scared about it, but people are more open than you realise.
When Richard Dawkins put out The God Delusion, I read it and went, “Yeah, I agree with 98% of what you’re saying. But you're not talking about Jesus. You're talking about Christians.”
I think there's something good about being a bit of a muddling sort of Christian. We don't have to be super good at things, just more honest and sharing.
And if you introduce someone to another Christian, that's double the message – “Ah, you're a decent person and I like you. Maybe I've got some of this wrong in terms of church and religion.”
There are also quite a few atheists who are actually becoming Christians at the moment. Even Richard Dawkins called himself a “cultural Christian” a couple weeks ago.
I think it's coming back around a little bit, but we just need to be steady Christians and be open about what we believe.
God's doing some quite miraculous things to make people aware that they need to know more about Jesus. I'm interested to see what God's going to do. And I'm happy to be along for the ride, whatever it looks like.
Julie-anne: As I've gone around chatting with people, they’ve all said they want their friends and their family to know Jesus, and they know that this is what God's wanting as well – but somehow there's a disconnect.
It's that people don't know how to do it. So I'm just showing how I do it.
I’m trying to help people be more courageous about what they believe in and why, and not to worry about trying to convert people, but just to be who they are, pray for their friends and talk openly about their own faith.
I think it's fairly biblical in that we'd be a witness, talking about what's good about knowing Jesus, and letting God do the rest.
Julie-anne: Oh, I'm so excited. I love New Zealanders.
A lot of ministers are struggling with this kind of thing, like we all are, and I think it's a humbling thing for people to ask for help. So I'm really proud of anyone who gets to that point, and I feel very privileged to be in that space.
Check out other articles in the
series below.
More articles in the
series are to come.
