Video: A Non Christian’s View of Christians

This was originally posted April 30, 2009. A student watched these videos last week and said they really made her think. I thought I’d bring them to the front of the blog so new readers would get some use out of them, too.

Last night I invited my friend Alex who is an Atheist to the high school Bible study I teach. We videotaped the event to show other youth workers what we’re up to. I believe this illustrates a missing link to our outreach programs. If we can talk to non-Christians, we’ll have a better idea how to reach them.

The purpose of this interview was to help students understand how Christians are perceived by non-Christians and what we can do about it. The purpose was not to have an in-depth discussion about Atheism, although the topic was addressed by some of the questions from students. For some great videos about Christianity vs Atheism, click here. This link will take you to some lectures taped at Saddleback Church on September 5 & 6, 2009 by leading teachers on the subject.

Click here for a list of questions I asked Alex. The sections are numbered. Each video has a corresponding number next to the video number to indicate which section’s questions that video answers.

Video #1 (Section 1 questions & first 3 questions of section 2)

There are a few videos in this post which makes it take up a lot of space on the screen. Click the “read more” link below to see the remaining videos.

Video #2 (Last 2 questions of section 2 & questions/answer time)

Video #3 (question/answer time continued)

Video #4 (Section 3 questions)

Video #5 (Section 3, continued)

Video #6 (Section 4 questions 1-6)

Video #7 (Section 4 questions 7-10)

Video #8 (Section 4 questions 11 & student questions)

Video #9 (End of student questions & wrap up/challenge – until the battery died)

The night was a great eye-opening experience for our students. They were attentive the whole time and asked great questions. We could have easily gone another hour, but were under time constraints.

I highly recommend doing something like this in other ministries. The goal of the night was to help students understand how non-Christians view the Christian world. My hope was to help them become aware of how we can be more sensitive and effective. We do this by being intentional about the Christ-like image we project to our non-Christian friends.

Two things I will do differently for my next interview: 1. Write the questions on cue cards. It was too difficult to read them on my iPhone without glasses, 2. Use a video camera that can plug into a wall. We lost a few great minutes at the end of video 9. The good news is that we got 99% of the interview and wrap-up/challenge.

My friend Josh Pease wrote a blog tonight about this same topic of being sensitive about the approach we take when reaching out to non-Christians. Click here to read it. He has some great food for thought.