Here’s a profoundly good statement about evangelism and those who do its good work, from The Bible Speaks Today commentary on John, by Bruce Milne. The author of this passage is reflecting on Jesus’ words to Nicodemus, “You must be born again.” I’m preaching on this text this Sunday.
The truth of new birth has far-reaching implications for those engaged in evangelism, for it teaches us that becoming a Christian is always a miracle. The Christian witness therefore will inevitably be a person of prayer, and churches which engage in evangelism with integrity will inevitably be prayerful churches, beseeching God for his intervention to enable dead people to be reborn. Salvation is of God, and no advance in Christian evangelistic methodology will ever eliminate or replace this. As truly today as in the first century, the key to effective mission for the living God is prayer to the living God. Only God can save.[†]
† Bruce Milne, The Message of John: Here Is Your King! (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993), 79.