Evangelism and Church Growth: Research on Non‐Believers for Developing an Evangelizing Strategy in the Korean Context and the Diamond Evangelistic System*

Abstract

Introduction No matter how often evangelism is emphasized in growth, it is never too much. Donald McGavran originally used the term church as a synonym for evangelism and mission. He said that mission is proclaiming Christ and making people Christ's disciples and members of the that Christ had established. McGavran also emphasizes that evangelism and growth have an inseparable relationship: Evangelization intends the redemption of individuals and the multiplication of Christ's churches. Concern for evangelism and growth is an essential part of the Christian faith and an irreplaceable part of the work of the church. The is the Body of Christ and brings persons and nations to faith and obedience as it proclaims the gospel effectively in every people and incorporates believers from every people into ongoing churches (1) In order to evangelize effectively, what strategies are needed? Vaguely applying the same strategy to every walk of life does not bring about big results. Just as Paul became a Jew to a Jew, and a Greek to a Greek (1 Cor. 9:20), using different methods in approaching each individual is an important strategy. In other words, with a thorough research of non-believers as the basis for it, a customized approach is necessary. McGavran emphasizes it in this way: It is essential, therefore, not only in the United States but around the world to realize that carrying out eternal God's command can be done only by exact knowledge as to these different segments, their responsiveness or resistance to gospel, and other factors related to their discipling. Exact knowledge is essential (2) When dealing with evangelism, having such research as a foundation is necessary for effectiveness. Without accurate facts and information, it is hard to give an exact diagnosis. Without an exact diagnosis, any effort made in growth will be unproductive. Scholars of growth have already used social scientific methods to research the differences between growing churches and non-growing churches. In order to determine the laws of growth, scholars not only get help from theology but also from sociology, anthropology, psychology and statistics. Scientific method is also a God-given gift. As president of the Institute for Church Growth in Korea, I want to present the results of the experiential research that has been carried out on the non-believers of Korea. I was able to learn new insights through the thinking and values of non-believers, and with that as a source, a new evangelizing method could be established. I call this method the Evangelistic I will present in order the results of the research on non-believers in the Korean context, and the Diamond Evangelistic System. Research on non-believers for an evangelizing strategy in the Korean This research concerned 1,500 non-believers from a total of nine different provinces throughout Korea, and was carried out from March 2004 to May 2004. From those researched, an effective sample of 1,059 people were chosen for the analysis. This research dealt with demographic and sociological features such as gender, age, scholarly attainments, etc., and the main research contents concerned the lifestyle of the non-believers, plus their past life, experience of being evangelized, perspectives on churches, and religious tendencies. In this research, after examining the basic statistical data, an in-depth analysis was done by putting the demographic and sociological features of the population, the religious preference of the non-believers and the life styles of the non-believers as the independent variable. The confidence interval of this research is 95%, and the significance level was [+ or -] 3.1%. Here, I would like to present some important points. Basic statistical analysis 1. …