Michael Green’s valedictory work: a personal history of evangelismBeyond his prolific academic career, Michael Green is fondly remembered for his commitment to sharing the gospel with everyone.
Michael Green’s valedictory work: a personal history of evangelism
Beyond his prolific academic career, Michael Green is fondly remembered for his commitment to sharing the gospel with everyone. His passion for evangelism, the heart of his life and work, shines through in Evangelism: Learning from the Past, his last manuscript before his passing in 2019.
Green narrates how evangelists spread the good news, starting with first evangelist, Jesus, and his apostles. He then moves through the early church, the Middle Ages, the Reformation, and Revival movements. The book culminates with Green’s reflections on his own decades-spanning career in evangelism and how he adapted the timeless truths of the gospel amid the major cultural shifts of the twentieth century. Throughout the narrative, he focuses on what we can learn from evangelists through history to inform our own practice today. To this end, each chapter concludes with questions to encourage reflection.
Those who have been moved by Green’s work will treasure this deeply personal final addition to his extensive oeuvre. Evangelism: Learning from the Past will offer inspiration and encouragement to all evangelical Christians looking to revitalize and contextualize their work in proclaiming the good news to all.
“The faithful transmission of the gospel message is essential to the Christian faith in every generation. In this timely book, Michael Green takes his readers on a journey through Christian history, highlighting the myriad of ways that Christians have communicated the gospel in the past with an aim to equip Christians today for gospel conversations in the future. I pray that this book will be instrumental in equipping a new generation of Christians to share the good news of Jesus Christ with boldness and without hindrance!”
—Paul M. Akin
The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
“What should evangelism look like in our post-Christendom twenty-first century? We’ve never been here before. But what if the past—the Celts, the Moravians, the Welsh Revivalists—equips us for the future? Michael Green’s Evangelism: Learning from the Past inspired me with its punchy journey through the history of Western evangelism. I learnt much from the examples (and cautionary tales!) of great evangelists of the past. But I especially gained from the priceless insights and experience of Michael Green himself. The nuggets of wisdom from Michael Ots in the afterword are also worth the price of the book. Every evangelist and Christian leader will miss out on much unless they read this book.”
—Sam Chan
EvQ School of Evangelism, City Bible Forum
author of Evangelism in a Skeptical World
“Michael Green’s classic book on evangelism in the early church significantly formed my understanding of evangelism and mission over four decades ago. As I listen to church leaders struggle today with what faithful evangelism should look like in our current context, I believe this book has much wisdom from church history and from its author. In these pages we wrestle with the constancy of the biblical task of speaking good news. We must continually rethink that task and find fresh ways to carry it out in new contexts. I am thankful for the work of Michael Green and the way he has opened up the wisdom of the church through history.”
—Michael W. Goheen
Missional Training Center, Covenant Theological Seminary
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Michael Green (1930–2019) was one of the best-known British evangelical theologians and preachers of his generation. A scholar with degrees from the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and Toronto, Green had a passion for evangelism and a rare talent for communicating complex ideas in easy-to-understand language. In 1996, Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey granted Green a Lambeth degree of Doctor of Divinity. ?He led university missions on six continents, pastored St. Aldate's Church Oxford, and introduced innovative approaches in seminary education. He authored more than seventy books across a range of fields, including evangelism, apologetics, biblical commentary, and academic theology.
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Table of Contents
Foreword by David M. Gustafson
Introduction
1. Evangelism, Jesus Style
2. Evangelism in the New Testament Church
3. Evangelism in the Second to Fourth Centuries
4. Nominalism, Bishops, and Monasteries
5. Celtic Evangelism
6. Lights in the Darkness
7. The Reformation
8. The Evangelical Revival
9. Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Initiatives
10. The Welsh Revival
11. Crusade Evangelism
12. My Sixty Years in Evangelism
Afterword by Michael Ots
Index
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