Dear Friends,
The evangelist William Wade is quite right that the gospel needs articulating with words. However, it is most curious that in the letters to the churches Christians (apart from the leaders and evangelists) are hardly ever exhorted to speak the good news but are constantly being advised on how to live! OK, there are a just few such references but what a surprising dearth compared to the number of times we are encouraged to get the walk right, both personally within the church family and in relation to outsiders, and to do good. When we are encouraged to speak it is usually in prayer.
As the article says, biblical theology means the evangel must be by words and yet the bulk of teaching by both Jesus and the apostles is that our prime witness is by the way we live. If the church today is being gagged by becoming ‘a silent witness’ then perhaps we need a fundamental reassessment of how we should live in today’s world.
