Barriers to evangelism

What are the barriers to evangelism? What is it that stops me from sharing the news that Jesus came to seek and save the lost?

I guess that with our friends and family most often it is fear of rejection, or fear of being thought fundamentalist (the new f-word). But what about with everyone else? What is it that stops me sharing the gospel with every one else. I wonder if it is prejudice or self righteousness.

I guess we'd all like to think we're not self-righteous but society conditions us to think we are better than others, we are subtly taught it from the cradle and it is reinforced until the grave. We may like to think we are too sophisticated to live in tribes but in reality we just have tribes with different labels. There are the big tribes based on socio-economic status, background, education, or where we live. But then within them there's the sporty sub-tribe, or the gardening sub-tribe and so on.

The danger is that we never cross into other sub-tribes let alone tribes to share the gospel. But the gospel leaves me no room for such divisions, just read Ephesians 2 where Paul says the gospel overturns the biggest social division of his day, Jew and Gentile.

The big danger with tribes is that it leads to self-righteousness and the danger is that we don't take the gospel to certain groups of people. Yet the Bible makes very clear that the gospel is not just for the religious or the middle class. So why so often is that where my and the churches evangelistic efforts are targeted?

I need to keep revisiting Luke 5:27-31 where we see Jesus eating with Levi, the good religious church goers of Jesus day are shocked "Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?" How does Jesus reply "I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." We need to remember that and think about who the tax collectors and sinners are in our area that we need to reach and about how will we reach them? If Jesus says the gospel is for them dare I do any less than take it to them?

Another thing that will stop us is fear of what others will say, that we'll be misunderstood. Again reading Luke is helpful, in Luke 7:33-35 we see that Jesus was misunderstood as he spent time with sinners, as was John the Baptist before him. Yet both were driven by the need to reach the lost with the gospel, despite popular opinion.

What risks with the gospel does my self righteousness and fear of others opinions stop me taking?