Evangelism for Today: Offering Christ the Way God Created Us

Sometimes we need to pause, breathe deep, look at the facts, and correct our course. That is the prayer for Evangelism for Today. Christianity is in decline across much of the world and most significantly in the United States and Europe. However, this decline can be seen dramatically in an analysis of the Methodist Movement launched by John Wesley. At one time the fastest growing Christian movement in America, the Methodist church (all those that consider themselves as descendants of John Wesley’s teaching) is in decline. Now is the time to stop, take a deep breath, look at the facts, and correct our course as the people called Methodist, lest we become an organization ＂having the form of religion without the power.＂ (The Works of John Wesley, ed 1827) The first half of this book seeks to review how the Methodist movement started and where it began to go wrong. The church has spent decades trying to revive the movement. Efforts to create a ＂big tent＂ have failed as have both running from the idea of evangelism and offering one-size-fits-all evangelistic efforts. Today, we need a new way of looking at who the church is, and how the world is to be reached. This can be done by looking at the unique ways God knit us together and finding new options to reach others for Christ based on how we are made. We are uniquely made with personalities, spiritual gifts, strengths, and weaknesses. The recognition of our uniqueness and the use of that to reach the world for Christ is the focus of the second half of the book. May we join in what God is already doing as we share Jesus with the world. Dr. Jay L. Fraze is an Ordained Elder in the Global Methodist Church. He currently serves as the Senior Pastor of First Methodist Church of Corsicana, TX and as the Dean of the Cabinet of the Mid-Texas Provisional Annual Conference of the Global Methodist Church. Over the past 30 years, he has served numerous churches as laity, staff, and clergy in churches large and small. During this time he has seen the need to ’stop sharing sheep between pastures’ and find new ways to reach new people for Christ. When he is not serving in his ministerial capacity, Jay can be found spending time with his family or sharing the beauty of God’s underwater world with others as a Master Scuba Diver Trainer.