I've been living overseas for a year and two months now.  One of the unique aspects of being abroad is being outside of the din of American life.  This perspective, in a way, is like one of those Wordle maps.  You start to hear how often and in how many places a concept or word is being used.  If I could say that there was one concept that I've noticed being constantly pounded upon in Christian podcasts, blogs, books, and articles, the largest phrase in the 2008-2009 Christian vocabulary Wordle would be "The Kingdom of God".  Somewhere in the midrange frequency font size would be some form of "cultural renewal" or "redeeming culture".

There is a lot we could say about this - particularly involving the pendulum swing of trends - but I want to narrow the focus to a question that Christianity Today asked yesterday.  The writer, Ted Olsen, asked, "A question for Christian leaders (whether in the church or elsewhere): have you found the recent Christian emphasis on “building for the kingdom” and cultural renewal to detract from evangelism? Or is it actually helping to “reach souls”?"

My answer to that is that yes, I do believe the current emphasis to be a hindrance to evangelism.

Overwhelmingly, when I listen to a sermon, or read an article or blog about the Kingdom of God it is essentially a Gospel-less social gospel.  It is about what we need to be doing.  It tends to use Jesus' statements in Luke 4 or Matthew 5 about going to the poor, captives, blind, and oppressed as a mandate to the exclusion of other large sections of scripture.  It is exhortation after exhortation to be busy - "we must make heaven on earth now!".  There are trumpeting exclamations for 'movements' and 'revolutions'.  There is rarely mention of the cross or of our need for a Savior because it usually focuses on Jesus as our example at the expense of both Jesus as our Savior and Jesus the reigning King.  The end result of this is moralistic social gospel instead of Gospel-centered living.

What that kind of preaching, writing, blogging, believing does is 1) make prideful Pharisees if people are really active, 2) burn those people out eventually, or 3) completely demotivate those who aren't active.  Part of the ubiquitous babel of American culture are celebrity-endorsed humanitarian campaigns.  We have to save Darfur, Rwanda, the ice caps, adopt children from around the world, end sweatshops, and so on and so on.  If we're left with a 'deeds not creeds' moralism absent of the Gospel, how is the church's call any different?

Being busy doesn't change hearts.  Only the Gospel can do that.  

Christians like to look at the early church and at their radical generosity and the way they lived counter-culturally.  But did they do that because they were told that was what they must do?  Did they do that because they were goaded into it?  Or did they do it because of the radical nature of the Gospel compelled them to?

In Acts 2 Peter explains to the Jews why the Holy Spirit that was promised in the Old Testament (16-21) has been poured out on the disciples (33); because the Messiah promised in the Old Testament (25-31) was Jesus who proved Himself through miracles (22), was crucified (36), resurrected from the dead (32), and exalted to the right hand of God (33).  Additionally, all of this was done according to God's definite plan and foreknowledge. (23)  Here is Peter presenting the Gospel in a similar way to Jesus in Luke 24 and Paul in 1 Corinthians 15.

The crowd then asked Peter what they must do.  Peter's response?

"Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." (38)  Three thousand became Christians that day.

The next paragraph is the section about the radical generosity of the believers.  What is the first thing it says they did?  Devoted themselves to the apostles teaching. (42)  The teaching wasn't "go and do all of these things you must do now".  It was as Peter just explained.  God planned this, Jesus died and rose for your sins, and you are saved by grace (39); so repent.  It was this message that compelled the early Christians to such a radically generous lifestyle.  

In conclusion, yes, I do think that the current overemphasis on "Kingdom building" is a hinderance to evangelism because it plays into our innate American pragmatism of action and results.  Ultimately, this kind of gospel makes too much of what we do, too little of what God has done, and if that imbalance exists, why tell anyone about Him?  If the Gospel is not preached and hearts aren't changed - in other words, if evangelism (and discipleship) aren't happening within the church - it makes sense that it wouldn't happen outside as well.  

[For a great message on a very related topic, listen to Ajith Fernando's recent talk at The Gospel Coalition's 2009 conference.]