His feet were always filthy. My brother Tomas ran Cross Country Track all four years of high school, and he was good. He went to state a number of times, both individually and as a part of a winning team, and although he rarely brought home the gold, he was still one of the fastest runners in Texas for a couple years. Running Cross Country is a dangerous endeavor, though. The course is not on a track, but instead goes up and down hills, over fields, down sidewalks, and pretty much anywhere else you can imagine. It is 3.3 miles, or 5 kilometers, of running, and the course can be as evil as the coach that maps it out. When it rains, the courses are muddy, and with everyone running over the same patches of ground, it gets churned up and the mud goes everywhere. It was not uncommon for Tomas to finish the course and be covered from the waist down in mud.
Hence the danger. With practices early every morning and meets every Saturday, it was a regular occurrence for Tomas to track an inordinate amount of filth into the house and the car on a regular basis. You knew when Tomas was home and where he was in the house because you could follow his trail from the back door. Mom would be furious, and after a while, she started making Tomas hose off his legs in the back yard before he was allowed in the house.
If Tomas had been born in New Testament Rome or Greece, he might have been given the honored post of euangelion, which in Greek means the gospel or good news bringer. When an army won a decisive battle in a war, this was the person who would be immediately dispatched to travel as fast as possible to the victorious army’s major cities to share the news of conquest with the people. His friends and family would praise him for his filthy feet, for they would be another sign of a nation’s triumph, another sign of glory. No one would complain or reprimand him for tracking mud into the house; instead, the mud might be a joyous reminder that the euangelion stopped here!
Can you imagine such a world, where filthy feet would bring rejoicing and celebration? It seems backward, upside-down, and wrong. And yet listen to this truth: God calls us to do just this. You see, God, like the triumphant kings and commanders of old, sends out euangelions to share the Gospel message, the Good News of Christ’s victory over death, with the world. God sends out messengers to share the light and love of Christ with the whole of God’s creation, and when we encounter such a person, we are called to celebrate the work that God is doing in and through that person. We are supposed to rejoice, no matter how filthy the Gospel bringer’s feet are.
Hear the words of God through the prophet, Isaiah: “How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, ‘Your God reigns!’” (Isaiah 52:7). God calls us to celebrate the feet of the Gospel bringer, to rejoice that someone has come to us to share with us the great news of victory that we have in Christ. Their feet are beautiful, for their feet have become the instruments through which the Gospel message is conveyed.
Tomas showed me what it meant to be a “dirty feet evangelist.” He reminded me daily that the beauty of the messenger is found in the Message. And he reminded me that I am called not only to see his filthy, muddy feet as beautiful; I am supposed to join him in spreading the message. I am supposed to get my feet dirty as well.
The Great Commission is the last words of Jesus from Matthew’s Gospel. In it, Christ charges his disciples with the task of evangelism: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” We, like the disciples, are called to go. We’re called to get our feet dirty, to go out into the world around us and share the Gospel with everyone we meet.
Sometimes it is easy for us in the church to fall into the mindset that “if people want to hear about Jesus, let them come to church.” We expect others to come to us so that we can tell them about Jesus. And whereas this does happen every so often, the truth of the matter is that the majority of the time, we must go to the others. We must answer Christ’s call to “go.”
This is the true call of the church. Contrary to what seems to be popular opinion right now throughout our society and culture, church is not about budgets, or worship styles, or building campaigns, or even membership. It is about being an authentic conduit of the Gospel for others as we grow closer together as the people of God. And this sometimes means leaving our comfortable spots in the pews, our comfortable social circles, our comfortable conversation and societal barriers, and going to places that might be a little uncomfortable for us at first.
So what does proclaiming the Good News of Christ’s victory look like for us? How do we share this Gospel message? It could be that this week you make it your goal talk to a friend or loved one about your faith. Maybe you invite someone to church. Did you know that the majority of non-churched Americans do not attend any religious service simply because they have never been invited? What would our congregation look like if each of us brought at least one friend to service next Sunday? Just think of how better the songs would sound with twice as many people singing along! Maybe you do not actually say anything, but you try to do a better job of living out Christ’s teachings this week. You go out of your way to help those who are suffering. You spend some time at the hospital, or one of the hospice homes, or even the local prison, listening to and being with those who are suffering, who are bed-ridden, who our society has cast out. Maybe you take the time to look someone in the eye and make sure they know that Jesus loves them.
Listen to this message from Paul’s letter to the Romans: “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring the good news!’”
Friends, this is proof of the need for evangelism, the proof of our need to go out and share the Good News of our victory in God. How will people turn to Christ if they do not believe in Him? And how can they believe in Him if they have not heard of Him? And how can they hear without someone telling them? We are called by God—commissioned by Christ Himself—to go and make disciples. We are charged with the task of getting our feet dirty and going out to tell the people about our God who loves them and died for them and lives again for them.
How are you going to answer that call? Where are you going to go?
May you answer that call to be a Gospel bringer in the world today. May God give you the strength to move, the courage to speak, and the words to say when the time comes. May God use your witness to plant, nurture, and grow seeds of faith within everyone you meet. And may you not be afraid to get your feet dirty as you take up the commission and go.
I feel like evangelism is one of the aspects of Christianity that often gets forgotten. We focus so much on our lives and our struggles and joys that we easily forget that a huge part of our faith is sharing it with others. Or we figure that that is left to the professional missionaries and evangelist organizations. But when you think about it, how often have you taken the words and ideas of a stranger to heart versus those of a friend, of someone you know or at least trust and respect. That is really where evangelism happens, and you see that in Acts--people were baptized after they had personal conversations with members of the early church. And while evangelism might not always go as deep as sharing your faith story right then and there, it is the seeds we plant and the relationships we grow--the things we do on a day to day basis--that can have the biggest impact.
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