Beau and Shanna Niewoehner
COURTESY PHOTO
Beau Niewoehner, 28, doesn’t have a college degree or seminary training. But that didn’t stop him from being named a Harry Denman Evangelism Award winner in the Northwest Texas Conference.
Niewoehner is youth pastor at First United Methodist Church and campus minister at Howard College – both in Big Spring, Texas. He credits Mikey Littau at the Wesley Foundation at West Texas A&M University with giving him the tools for ministry. Littau brought him in for training and ministry opportunities.
Today Niewoehner isn’t afraid to go outside the church building and talk to people others might ignore. “Jesus never really offended the sinner in the Gospels,” he says. “Instead, he offended the religious officials. I’m trying to befriend the sinners so that they can have an experience of Jesus.”
He continues. “I don’t ask, ‘Do you know Jesus?’ Jesus didn’t start conversations with ‘You have to be born again.’ He started with what the kingdom was, and people asked questions.”
Niewoehner builds relationships first, living out of what he calls his “constitution,” the Bible. First in that lifestyle is his relationship with his wife, Shanna. “If you’re a Spirit-filled Christian,” he says, “you should be an extension of the Scriptures.”
A driving principal for Niewoehner is simply being a friend.
“You can articulate what you believe,” he says. “Even if they don’t accept, you come out stronger.”
Once people become interested in God’s kingdom, Niewoehner presents Jesus as the way to get there.
“If you really love somebody, if you really want to be their friend, you bring up the kingdom,” he says. “If we don’t love people enough to get in to their mess, how can they hear the kingdom news?”
The Rev. Erik Alsgaard is managing editor of the UMConnection newspaper in the Baltimore-Washington Conference.