Identity, Mission, and Call By Alan Avera W
hen I was pastor of Faith ARP Church in Olney, MD, one of our el- - can Embassy in London. The only church he knew in London was
All Souls in central London. He knew that church through the writings of John Stott, so he decided that he and his wife, Karin, would make All Souls their church home while in London.
Chuck and Karin arrived in London sometime in late 1994 or early 1995. Just prior to that, Rico Tice was called to be minister of evangelism at All Souls, where he still serves today. With the active encouragement and support of John Stott, Rico began developing what would become Christianity Explored. Very early on, Rico recruited Chuck and Karin to be table leaders, or discussion lead- ers, in the very interactive approach. Both Chuck and Karin found this to be personally transforming as they experienced secular people interacting with the Gospel of Mark and committing their lives to Christ as a result. When Chuck and Karin returned home after their time in London,
doing in London.” This was before Christianity Explored actually launched beyond All Souls. So literally, I’ve known of the impact of Christianity Explored no videos or written materials. I listened to Rico on an old cassette tape as he led the course at All Souls, and then I tried to reproduce it with a small group in Maryland. Fast forward to 2004, when I came to be Executive Director of Outreach North America for the ARP Synod. I recognized that the ARPC, like most denomina- tions, needed help in evangelism. While there are many good approaches out there, such as Evangelism Explosion (EE) the vast majority of our churches are seeing few converts. So in early 2005, I contacted my friend Chuck, who by this time had retired from the government and completed seminary at RTS Orlando to become a better equipped layman, and then had moved to Nashville to be near his grandchildren. I asked Chuck if he could connect me with Rico Tice in London. Chuck responded, “Alan, your timing is amazing. I’m having Rico come to
my church (PCA) in Nashville to conduct an evangelism training/Christianity Explored conference two months from now. If you register for the conference, I’ll make sure you meet Rico.”
4
As I learned more about Christian- ity Explored relational approach and the way it gets people to discover Je- sus for themselves in one of the earli- est writings about his life, the Gospel of Mark, I saw more and more how it could be a great counterpart to a more direct approach such as EE. Then I met with Rico at a coffee shop, and he outlined the Reformed Theol- ogy from 2 Corinthians 4:1-6 that lies behind the Christianity Explored ap- proach. In this passage from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, we see the need for our gospel presentation to take into account God’s sovereignty, gospel integrity, and our God-given creativity. As we clearly proclaim Je- sus Christ as Lord and serve others for Jesus’ sake, we trust the gospel to do its work as God opens blind eyes to see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
I asked Rico if we could host a con-
ference like this in an ARP church. He said he would be delighted, and then told me how to schedule it. I ap- proached Sinclair Ferguson, who was then the newly installed pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Colum- bia, about whether he would be inter- ested in hosting a conference. Sinclair told me that he had used Christian- ity Explored at the Tron Church in Glasgow, and he would look forward to introducing it at First Presbyterian. That conference was in 2007, and while Rico and his team were in the Carolinas, we also had the training at First ARP Church in Gastonia.
What is Christianity Explored? It is a seven-week journey through the Gospel of Mark that helps people dis- cover for themselves the answers to three key questions: • Who is Jesus? (his identity) • Why did he come? (his mission) • What does it mean to follow him? (his call) Christianity Explored can be out- lined with three words: identity, mis- sion, and call.
Each session is ideally done
around a meal, or at least a dessert or appetizer, so that you are building relationships and sharing the gospel out of relationship. There is an open-
The Associate Reformed Presbyterian
Synod Emphasis
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32
