Rethinking Evangelism

Feb 20, 2019 by

By Bishop Steven Croft, Diocese of Oxford Website.

An (unauthorised) background paper for the General Synod.

The General Synod of the Church of England meets in London this week (20-23 February, 2019). The main theme of the Synod is evangelism in different shapes and forms. On Wednesday we will have perspectives from the wider Anglican Communion on Evangelism and Discipleship. On Friday there are three debates. The first welcomes and takes note of the report from the Archbishops’ Evangelism Task Group and commends the work of the new national Evangelism and Discipleship Department. The second explores growing faith among children and young people. The third explores Estates Evangelism. Finally, on Saturday, Synod will debate a private member’s motion from Mark Russell on encouraging youth evangelism.

Last week I read all of the background papers on evangelism at a single sitting. I’m delighted that the Synod is giving so much time to the ways in which the Church shares the good news. Each of the papers is focused and practical in its own way. But I was also left feeling that we would go much further. We need an exploration on what the Church understands by evangelism and how people come to faith which connects with the scriptures and the historic tradition of the Church and with our contemporary culture…

…Seven disciplines of evangelism…

  1. Prayerful discernment and listening…
  2. Incarnational mission (following the pattern of Jesus)…
  3. Apologetics (defending and commending the Christian faith)…
  4. The initial proclamation of faith…
  5. Catechesis (teaching and learning faith)…
  6. Ecclesial formation (growing the community of the church…
  7. Planting and forming new ecclesial communities…

Read in full here

[Editors note: I have posted this because Bishop Steven makes some excellent points in his reflections, for example the urgency of the task of evangelism, and the need for sharing of faith, and church growth, to come out of deep love for Christ rather than guilt, financial considerations, or putting techniques first.

However the major weakness of this piece is that it avoids setting out clearly what the gospel is. It does not mention the core elements of apostolic preaching: the death and resurrection of Christ, the necessity of repentance (from personal sin and adherence to cultural ideologies and norms) and the new birth.

This is not surprising. Bishop Steven is known to have changed his mind in a progressive direction on issues of sexuality and marriage, and is clearly following the current policy of relegating all disputed doctrinal matters to ‘second order’ status. His ‘Pastoral Letter’ released in October 2018, calling for full inclusion of ‘LGBTI+’ people in the church, alarmed many clergy and laity in the Diocese and further afield (see my comments here and here, and a broader evangelical response here).

A concern for evangelism in the Church of England should not be uncritically applauded if it is led by those who are altering the nature of the evangel.]

 

 

 

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