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As
a fellowship, we affirm these values in our evangelism:
- As Christians called by the living God, we seek first of all to honor
him and his ethical standards in all of our private and public lives,
including our efforts to persuade others to believe the good news about
Jesus Christ.
- As Christian evangelists, we seek to follow the mandate, motives,
message and model of our God, who is always pursuing and reclaiming
those who are lost in sin and rebellion against him.
- We believe all people are created in Gods image and therefore
endowed with the capacity to be in relationship with their Creator and
Redeemer. We disavow any efforts to influence people which depersonalize
or deprive them of their inherent value as persons.
- Respecting the value of persons, we believe all people worthy of hearing
the gospel of this loving Lord, Jesus Christ. We equally affirm the
inalienable right of every person to survey other options and convert
to or choose a different belief system.
- We believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ and affirm the role and goal
of the Christian evangelist. However, we do not believe that this justifies
any means to fulfill that end. Hence, we disavow the use of any coercive
techniques or manipulative appeals that bypass a persons critical
faculties, play on psychological weaknesses, undermine relationship
with family or religious institutions, or mask the true nature of Christian
conversion.
- While respecting the individual integrity, intellectual honesty and
academic freedom of other believers and skeptics, we seek to proclaim
Christ openly. We reveal our own identity and purpose, our theological
positions and sources of information, and we will not be intentionally
misleading. Respect for human integrity means no false advertising,
no personal aggrandizement from successfully persuading others to follow
Jesus, and no overly emotional appeals which minimize reason and evidence.
- As Christian evangelists, we seek to embrace people of other religious
persuasions in true dialogue. That is, we acknowledge our common humanity
is equally sinful, equally needy and equally dependent on the grace
of God we proclaim. We seek to listen sensitively in order to understand
and thus to divest our witness of any stereotypes or fixed formulas
which are barriers to true dialogue.
- As Christian evangelists, we accept the obligation to admonish one
who represents the Christian faith in any manner incompatible with these
ethical guidelines.
Revised by Doug Whallon from A Code of Ethics for the Christian
Evangelist, © InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, 1989.
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