Evangelism As A Process
Some years ago, James Engel wrote a book entitled, What’s Gone Wrong With The Harvest? (Published by Zondervan). In his book he introduced what is now a widely used tool known as ‘the Engel Scale’. The Engel Scale is used to describe the spiritual decision making process. The scale has a series of negative and positive numbers that track the unbeliever’s progress toward conversion (and beyond):
-8 Awareness of Supreme Being, no effective knowledge of the Gospel
-7 Initial awareness of Gospel
-6 Awareness of fundamentals of Gospel
-5 Grasp of implications of Gospel
-4 Positive attitude toward Gospel
-3 Personal problem recognition
-2 DECISION TO ACT
-1 Repentance and faith in Christ
REGENERATION–A “NEW CREATURE”
+1 Post-decision evaluation
+2 Incorporation into Body
+3 Conceptual and behavioural growth begins
The Engel Scale reminds us that evangelism is a process. If we see evangelism only in terms of people being “converted” most of our evangelistic efforts will be counted as failures. Few people can live with that level of failure, so few practice the art of personal evangelism. If we understand evangelism as being used of God to help someone in their journey toward Christ, helping someone take one more step towards God is as much “successful evangelism” as is helping someone over the line.
We can all do that!
The Engel Scale is in no way meant to imply that it is a merely human enterprise to bring one to a saving knowledge of Christ (Rom. 1:16-17). Neither is it saying that human wisdom is necessary to bring about the new birth (1Cor. 2:4, 5). It merely recognises that God works a series of “miracles” to transform an unregenerate sinner into a child of God. The wise evangelist will tune in to what God is doing at the different stages and will modify his or her behaviour and prayers accordingly.
I don’t think Engel’s “scale” works much any more. It pre-supposes as Evangelism as a linear process. I no longer think that it is.
Acorrding to his scale, people must understand before acting. But I think that some people will act before understanding. Understanding comes later.
When I became a Christian, I didn’t understand everything that it meant. I just knew that I needed to follow God and that Jesus was the way to do so. It took a year or so for me to start understanding the Bible, and the full implications of my decision to follow Jesus.
Evangelism is a process — I just don’t think it’s linear as depicted by Engel’s scale.
Pastor Chris
EvangelismCoach.org
The Engel scale has helped me and I know of others in moving from an event 0nly view of evangelism to seeing it as a process as well.