A helpful article by Mark Dever, taken from ‘The Gospel and Personal Evangelism’ (Crossway 2007).
Many “ordinary” Christians feel scared or ill-equipped in evangelism, and often the “professional” clergy folk give the impression – intentionally or unintentionally – that they’re the only ones who can do it. Should we leave evangelism up to the extroverts and the professionals?
No – it’s for all Christians! What Scripture says on the subject:
‘The Original Jesus, or How the New Testament bears witness to him’
A Christological Survey & Summary of the New Testament, taught by John Stott at The London Lectures in Contemporary Christianity, 2000
Regardless of whatever people may think of him, Jesus of Nazareth has been the dominant figure in Western culture for almost 20 centuries. 3 particular ways we can notice his dominance:
(i) He is the centre of human history. One third of world claims to be Christian, split history into BC/AD
(ii) He is the focus of Scripture. Jerome: “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ, because the Scriptures are full of Christ.”
(iii) He is the heart of mission. Why do Christians cross continents and cultures as missionaries? To commend a person, Jesus Christ.
In this lecture, Stott considers the New Testament evidence for the Original Jesus, in general, except for the book of Revelation which he considers in a later lecture. He summarises each New Testament book and in particular considers their teaching on Jesus Christ. He proposes that the lecture series is appropriately called ‘The Incomparable Christ’, for there is nobody – past, present, or future – like Jesus.
