Don’t Cram it Down Their Throats
It was going to be a battle to get these big white pills down Rudy’s throat, but that is what the vet said he needed and somehow it became my job. Rudy was our usually affectionate beagle mutt. He had a sweet adorable face and sad eyes that stole Deb’s heart when she first saw him at the pound. Our boys were young at that time and over my better judgment we brought him home and the boys loved him. The vet recommended we put the pill in a banana, but Rudy would have none of it. When anyone tried to force that pill into his mouth he became anything but sweet. He growled and fought with everything he had. In fact he seemed to know when it was coming and took off. I think he could smell that pill and was often nowhere to be found. There had to be a better way.
I read of a woman who had to give her dog a liquid medicine and he was as fond of it as Rudy was his pills. Day after day she forced that liquid down the dog’s throat. One day in the midst of the struggle the bottle slipped out of her hand and the medicine fell to the floor. To her amazement her dog started lapping it up. What she found was that it wasn’t that the dog hated the medicine, he hated how it was being forced down his throat.
Sometimes as Christians we get so convicted about telling others about Christ that we try to confront them or force the gospel on them. Often the way we present it can repel someone rather than draw them. When sharing our faith is like selling something someone does not like we probably have the wrong approach. When I was young I was taught several “in your face” methods of evangelism. One of them entailed a 20 to 30 minute presentation where I talked and the other person listened. What was amazing is that God used even that method at times to bring people to himself; in spite of how badly I did my job. I believe that the cross should be what offends someone, not the way I come across. I found that trying to cram it down someone’s throat rarely works. And I believe what people often reject is not the gospel but the way we present it. People are often not rejecting Christ, but Christians.
“If someone asks about your Christian hope, always be ready to explain it.
But do this in a gentle and respectful way” (1 Peter 3:15). All of us need to be ready to share our faith. When we share our faith, however, we are to do this in a gentle and respectful way. Trying to force anything down someone’s throat is not gentle. You never read of Jesus forcing someone to accept his message. In fact, the ones he rebuked the most were the religious folks.
When we talk with people with respect we honor them and value them. When we try to manipulate them they can smell it coming, just like Rudy could smell that pill before he saw it. It is the job of the Holy Spirit to convict and draw our friends to the Lord, not ours. Learn to have interesting and mutual spiritual conversations with people and listen to their point of view and their struggles. Love them, rather than condemn them. Let’s leave the cramming of things down a throat to the poor folks who have to get their dog to take some medicine.
