Just Walk Across the Room – Bill Hybels

The last few days I have been reading ” Just Walk Across the Room” by Willow Creek Pastor Bill Hybels.

It has been on my reading list for quite some time now, but I just got around to it now.

My own Journey of Faith has evolved from feeling guilty I wasn’t handing out enough tracks, to realizing that evangelism is about building relationships over time. Bill affirms a lot of those theories in “Just Walk Across the Room.”

Reading this book brings me back to Salt Lake City a few years ago. I was going there to attend a business convention and a friend and colleague of mine called me and asked me if I would mind sharing a room with another colleague from another province. For some reason I agreed, even though I had never met this gentleman, and I love my privacy.

But during that week, I got to know him a bit. He was trying to raise a daughter alone since his wife had left him, and he found it challenging. But mostly we talked business. We talked a lot about personal success principles that would take him to the next level in business. And if you know me, being the good little Mennonite, Christian boy I am, my life philosophies are steeped in a Christian world view.

And he caught that eventually, and towards the end of convention, we talked at length about Christ and what He means to us. Before he left for home, he told me: “I am going home and will start attending church with my daughter. Thank-you for talking to me so openly and honestly about what you believe. I think you are the first Christian I talked with that didn’t try to convert me, and if you had, we wouldn’t have talked.”

I don’t know where he is today, whether he came to the point of embracing Christ. But I do know this, we need to care more about the person then about converting them. I was so glad I had decided to share a room that weekend.

Just Walk Across the Room: Simple Steps Pointing People to Faith