A New and Ancient Evangelism: Rediscovering the Ways God Calls and Sends

Evangelism has a bad reputation. It's been loaded with sales tactics, market analysis, and high-pressure psychology, an approach that often flattens other cultures and dishonors those we want to reach. Evangelizers are encouraged to believe that everything depends on their understanding of the gospel and their powers of persuasion. No wonder so few people want to get involved in sharing the faith.

This book recovers the ancient tradition of the church's evangelism, rooted in the conversion stories of the Bible, to offer a truly biblical understanding of evangelism. Drawing on twenty-five years of experience teaching evangelism to laypeople and ministry students, Judith Paulsen shows that God uses ordinary people of faith within their everyday spheres of influence to draw people to himself. She helps readers share the good news in a way that is authentic, respectful, and ideally suited to the cultural dynamics of today's world. Above all, she places the real work of evangelism where it belongs: with the God who is still at work calling people to himself.

This book will be a valuable resource for professors and students in evangelism, discipleship, and missional theology courses as well as pastors and church leaders. Discussion questions are included.

Author: Judith Paulsen
Publisher: Baker Academic
Published: 06/25/2024
Pages: 224
Binding Type: Paperback
ISBN: 9781540967060

About the Author
Judith Paulsen (DMin, Fuller Theological Seminary) has served for over a decade as professor of evangelism at Wycliffe College, University of Toronto, in Toronto, Ontario. She previously directed the Institute of Evangelism at Wycliffe. A daughter of missionaries, Paulsen lived her early childhood years in northwest India. She served for 15 years as a priest in the Anglican Diocese of Toronto and currently works with congregations and denominational groups across North America to cultivate a richer understanding of, and enthusiasm for, the calling of evangelism.