Soon after I started teaching preaching (in 1989), I became fascinated by a space — a vacant space. James Engel created The Engel Scale in 1975. In it he attempted to describe ‘the spiritual decision process’, tracking how people moved towards Jesus and then on to maturity. God has a role; the Communicator has a role; while ‘Man’ has a response, warming up as you slide down the Scale…
Our overall objective is to help people reach the blue-shaded area where they know, love and serve God. There may be several paths to take. The red path suggest that a person is already eager to know more and come to faith without any significant hindrances. The blue path indicates a lot of resistance at the beginning, but warming up to Christian faith. The green line demonstrates a path in which there is much change in attitude before any significant learning is done. As for the yellow path, that also is possible—a very reluctant sinner who resists for a long time but ultimately gives in to God who, in love, has pursued him. (Handbook, 58)
It proved to be a transformational exercise for me.
I discovered that rather than there being just two or three words in the vocabulary — with ‘preaching’, ‘teaching’ and ‘evangelizing’ the leading contenders — there were, in fact, closer to thirty-two words in the vocabulary (with one scholar settling on this very number). WOW. Such diversity… I tried to engage with most of them. Along the way, I stumbled across an observation in Peter Adam’s Speaking God’s Words that galvanized me. He had taken the different words which he had discovered in this vocabulary and placed them in five groups, which I like to call The Adam’s Family: information, declaration, exhortation, persuasion, and conversation.
As I became more familiar with each member of the Adam’s Family, a thought occurred to me. While each of these words could be used by the Spirit at any place in the quadrants of the Gray Matrix, nudging people in a nor-easterly direction, might they each have a particular role in a particular place? I think it is possible. Even more fascinating, the order in which Peter Adam listed them appeared to be a suitable order for them, as we travel up and across the Matrix. It looks something like this (with ‘intrigue’ being adopted into the family — from my DMin work on the parable, next door in the Gospels — as a possible way forward for those deep in Quadrant A):
This diverse vocabulary at work, with a diverse audience situated in diverse places — the temple courts, the synagogue, the riverside, the marketplace, the lecture hall, the home etc — raised some questions for me. Is that hallowed ‘ministry of the word’ sufficient? Is the ‘sermon slot’, together with a dollop of small group Bible study and a pinch of personal Bible reading, enough? Is there not a case, as Peter Adam himself concludes, for ‘many different ministries of the Word’, developing a more spacious approach to preaching and communication, while intent on equipping and involving a wider range of people?
In my childhood, I remember trucks in India often being equipped with a Fatta Box. ‘Fatta’ is a word used for when things break down. So, essentially, it is a tool box equipped with what is needed when faced with challenges along the journey. Maybe preachers need a Fatta Box? Read the audience. Know the time frame. Understand the culture. Be adept with a range of genre. Try different things. I work a lot with deductive and inductive. One of the preachers I admire most in this New Zealand setting is John Tucker, at Carey Baptist College. He is just so adept with deductive and narrative! And then, maybe local churches need to nurture a team of communicators — not as clones of the senior pastor, but as a group being equipped for different types of communication to be used in different situations, in the power of the Spirit, who is in control of the nor-easter.
About Me

the art of unpacking
After a childhood in India, a theological training in the USA and a pastoral ministry in Southland (New Zealand), I spent twenty years in theological education in New Zealand — first at Laidlaw College and then at Carey Baptist College, where I served as principal. In 2009 I began working with Langham Partnership and since 2013 I have been the Programme Director (Langham Preaching). Through it all I've cherished the experience of the 'gracious hand of God upon me' and I've relished the opportunity to 'unpack', or exegete, all that I encounter in my walk through life with Jesus.
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Hi Paul, thank you for this helpful blog on the process of evangelism. Your blog and the intriguing conversations discussion group you've been facilitating has got me wondering about whether the rate of gospel uptake by a local community could be represented by an equation similar to that of a heat transfer equation in physics?
Thermal engineers use an equation to calculate the rate at which heat is transferred across a thermal conductor that is represented like this:
q = h x (t1 -t2)
Where:
q is the heat flux
h is the heat transfer coefficient
t1 is the temperature on one side of the thermal conductor
t2 is the temperature on the other side of the conductor
The higher the heat transfer coefficient of the conductive material, the greater the rate at which heat is transferred through it.
The greater the temperature difference between T1 and T2, the greater the rate at which heat is transferred through it.
I wonder if the rate at which the gospel can be transferred across the social barrier between a Christian community (a church) and the local community it resides in could be represented by a similar equation:
r = g x (a1 – a2)
Where:
r is the rate at which the gospel can be transferred across the social barrier between church and local community
g is the gospel transfer coefficient of the local community
a1 is the level to which the local church community represents the gospel in word and deed
a2 is the level to which the local community represents the gospel in word and deed.
The higher the gospel transfer coefficient of the local community, the greater the rate at which the gospel may be transferred to it.
The greater the difference between the level to which the local church represents the gospel and the level to which the local community represents the gospel, the greater the rate at which the gospel may be transferred from church to community.
I wonder if the difference between the church's and local community's representation of the gospel may also determine the level of intrigue a community is likely to have toward the gospel.
eg. I think NZ will have a higher gospel transfer coefficient g relative to places where it is illegal to publicly communicate the gospel. But NZ churches may have a low differential between the level at which the local church and local community represent the gospel i.e. not much driving force across the social barrier between church and local community means a low level of gospel intrigue by the local community.
Such an equation might help churches to develop greater levels of intrigue while also being patient if they are located in a community with a low gospel transfer coefficient?
Thanks, Ken, for this reflection.
I reminded myself that I got 53% in Scholarship Physics in 1977 and consulted my brother, who taught Physics, and took courage! [You and he would have a very good conversation methinks!]…
I think I got the general idea of what you are suggesting, but I'm not clear here and there. For example:
How does a local community — outside the local church one — represent the gospel in word and deed? Do you have any examples in mind of how this looks?
Paul
Hi Paul,
Thanks for this thought provoking piece. I am teaching a class on Communications in Ministry at Eastwest College, Gordonton in the coming semester and this has given me some helpful inputs for the class.
I am especially intrigued by the inclusion of themes of 'subversion' which you have incorporated into the Gray Matrix. This connects to some thinking and reading I have been doing around the idea of the 'subversive fulfilment' provided by the Gospel of secular (and other) narratives. Dan Strange deals with this in his excellent book 'Plugged In', as does Tim Keller in 'Centre Church'. I think this is a very fertile field for gospel interaction with those who are very much at the south-western tip of Gray's Matrix.
Best wishes,
Lewis
Hi Lewis — I would very much like to meet you and have some conversation together.
I am in Auckland, if you are up this way sometime. I've been aware of Eastwest College since its inception, but have never visited. This would be a good excuse!
best wishes
Paul