Evangelizing Neopagan North America

Encounter North American evangelism from the Great Awakening to the present day A History of Evangelism in North America guides readers on a tour through circuit riders and tent meetings to campus evangelism and online ministries. Academic research combines with gospel faithfulness and love for the lost in this historical survey. Encountering these prominent evangelism movements will inspire innovation and courage in the call to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ. Few Christians recognize the historical backgrounds of various evangelistic ministries, their theological traditions, or their guiding principles. A History of Evangelism in North America explores evangelism methodologies and legacies from the early 1700s to today. Experts deliver current scholarship on twenty-two evangelists and ministries, including the following: John Wesley and itinerant preachers The camp meeting movement The American Bible Society and Bible distribution evangelism The Navigators and personal discipleship Billy Graham and crusade evangelism Campus ministries The Jesus Movement 21st-century evangelistic approaches A History of Evangelism in North America promises to have lasting value for those who study evangelism, missions, Christian history, and the church in North America.

"Evangelizing America probes the interdependence of culture and faith, surveys different approaches to evangelization among contemporary Catholics, and looks at what evangelization means in a parish context."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Eighty percent of all new church members become part of a local congregation because of a previous relationship or friendship with another member of that congregation. Yet in spite of a number of excellent books written concerning relational evangelism, little seems to happen in actually motivating, training, and mobilizing church members to evangelize their neighbors, friends, businesses associates, and family members. That is, until You Are My Witnesses. This new book is designed to be used by small groups in local churches as an action-reflection training manual for those committed to be Christ's witnesses.

David Bosch (1929-1992) was one of the foremost mission theologians of the twentieth century; a prolific scholar, committed church leader and active participant in the global conciliar and evangelical mission movements. His distinctive role in the South African church's struggle against apartheid is less well known, however. After reviewing Bosch's background and exploring key themes in his understanding of mission and evangelism, Livingston explores Bosch's legacy from the perspective of the missionary nature of the church. The church is God's kingdom community, acting as a witness to and instrument of the coming reign of God. The church is God's alternative community, simultaneously set apart from the world but also existing for the sake of the world, exemplifying the radical implications of Christ's new community. It is also God's reconciled and reconciling community, serving as a sign and embodiment of God's love in Christ. For those acquainted with Bosch only as the author of his magisterial Transforming Mission, A Missiology of the Road shows how Bosch integrated his theology and practice in a faithful, contextually relevant way within South Africa and the global church.

In a period of tumultuous transition for the church as it moves out of the Christendom era and into the unknowns of the post-Christian era, it is strange that so little has been written about the church's calling out of the dominion of darkness (Satan) and into the kingdom of Light (or, God's dear Son). The very word ecclesia speaks of a people "called out." In the New Testament the theme of spiritual warfare is ubiquitous, and yet is relegated to the margins in our present cultural whitewater. In The Church and the Relentless Darkness, Robert Henderson approaches the topic of spiritual warfare directly, and focuses on its manifestation in local Christian communities. Using the Letter to the Ephesian Christians as his base, Henderson portrays the relentless darkness that comes with all satanic subtlety on unsuspecting communities, but he brings with this a message of hope and encouraging disciplines.

This excellent collection of essays, written by a diverse group of Christian leaders working on the frontier of mission within the present North American context, lays the groundwork for the newly emerging missionary encounter of the gospel with North American culture. Demonstrating that the missionary identity of the church is to be found at the intersection of culture-gospel-church, these essays outline the missionary agenda now before the church as it confronts North American assumptions, perspectives, preferences, and practices.