realmealministries.org

I was invited to participate this week in a blog book review tour of Jeffrey A. Johnson’s new book Got Style?: Personality-Based Evangelism.

Got Style? is published by Judson Press. Jeffrey Johnson (MA, PhD) is senior pastor of Mount Vernon Baptist Church in Hurricane, WV. He is involved in national evangelism and training initiatives with the American Baptists.

Got Style is an important contribution for our day in which denominations and local communities of faith are awakening to the missional context of the West in the 21st century. For too long, we have mistakenly thought of “evangelism” as a gift that a small percentage of Christ followers are given by God. Instead, it is high time for all Christ followers to recognize that evangelism is both a gift that some will have and a value that all Christ followers must hold. Toward this end, Johnson has produced a resource that will empower all Christ followers to serve as effective personal evangelists regardless of their giftedness or personality.

Johnson offers this definition of evangelism: “The simplistic and practical definition of biblical evangelism is inviting someone to meet Jesus. Introducing someone to Jesus might be an even better definition.” (p.91-92). Got Style?: Personality-Based Evangelism roots its approach in six personality-based styles of evangelism: assertive, storytelling, invitational, analytical, relational, and incarnational. Each of these is aptly illustrated and rooted in examples drawn from biblical characters and modern examples. The key is for individuals to identify their particular style and learn to work within this natural strength. In a sense, a personality-based evangelism draws from the same theoretical stream as strength-based leadership theories. The idea is that there is no “cookie cutter” approach to evangelism. Instead each Christ follower needs to discover and learn to share their faith in the way that comes most natural for him or her. For this insight alone, I applaud Johnson.

The book contains an assessment for individual to discover their style. It also contains a helpful chapter on implementing a training session within a local congregation and an excellent appendix of evangelism resources that is organized by the six personality styles of evangelism.

Got Style?: Personality-Based Evangelism is well written and helpful. I recommend it to pastors, congregations, and individual Christ followers. Ours is a day when we need all hands on deck in terms of advancing the Christ following movement in the Western world. As reported by the World Christian Database, the Western world is experiencing a net loss of over 5000 Christians every single day. Got Style? will empower the church to reclaim personal evangelism as a core value practiced by the entire community. One cannot read Got Style?: Personality-Based Evangelism without gaining confidence in one’s ability to share the good news of Jesus the Messiah.

Tags: Community, Mission, calling, church, conversion, ecclesiology, education, evangelism, learning, missional church, missional leadership, missionary, world mission, world religion //