No, this is not a complaint or warning about subversive activities! We mean, are you, our friends and subscribers, using Evangelical Times as effectively as possible? A church known to us has increased its order for ET by 50% and now offers a free extra copy of the paper to anyone who has already paid for one. These extra copies are passed on to people outside of the church, almost as an evangelistic tool. At less than the price of a cup of coffee, a copy used in this way has got to represent good stewardship of scarce resources! (Please also note that Evangelical Times is a charity and any profits from the sale of the newspaper or advertising are ploughed back into the work of the gospel.)
In what sense can ET be regarded as ‘evangelistic’ literature? Our answer is that many people today, known personally to readers, are genuinely religious but have never understood, or even heard, the gospel of God’s free grace in Christ. For such people, conventional ‘evangelistic’ literature may be unsuitable. A publication like ET, on the other hand, contains sufficient of the gospel in each issue to enlighten such folk. The combination of news, Christian viewpoints, historical articles, devotional writing and Bible exposition is a non-threatening but potentially potent force for spiritual good to anyone willing to read it.
