Christianity Explored

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Christianity Explored is an informal Christian evangelistic teaching course developed by Rico Tice and Barry Cooper at All Souls Church, Langham Place, a leading Anglican church,[1] and published by The Good Book Company. The course is considered to stand within the conservative evangelical tradition. Christianity Explored Ministries has also developed a second evangelistic course in 2016 Life Explored.

Course outline and versions

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The third edition of the course was published on 10 May 2011. The sessions are:

  1. Good News
  2. Identity
  3. Sin
  4. The Cross
  5. Resurrection
  6. Grace
  7. Come and Die

There is also a day away that features three bonus sessions: The Sower, James and John and Herod. Spin-offs include a youth version, revised in 2010 for two age groups: 11 to 14 years ("CY Nano") and 15 plus ("CY").[2] The seven session "Soul" DVD [3] is designed to work with CY, and can also be used as a stand-alone resource. There is a follow-on course entitled "Discipleship Explored", written and presented by Barry Cooper, and "English Made Easy" editions of both Christianity Explored and Discipleship Explored.[4] Christianity Explored publications are also available in Bulgarian, Dutch, German, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Luganda, Polish, Spanish, Swahili and Welsh. Translations in progress include French, Mandarin, Norwegian, Portuguese, Russian and Swedish.[5] In 2011 the course, already being used in over 50 countries, was rolled out in the United States: it was endorsed by John Piper and Tim Keller.[6]

Use

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The Church of England generally (e.g. in the 2003 publication "Evangelism - Which Way Now?") considers it, along with Alpha and the Emmaus Discipleship Course, as one of a "trinity" of courses covering all wings of the church. Other churches have also used the course: in 2006-7 the Presbyterian Church in Ireland’s board of youth and children's ministry used the youth version CY extensively with the Boys Brigades.[7] It has also been used in Asia, with leader training run by the Methodist Church in Singapore.[8]

The course is popular with conservative evangelical churches.[9]

Comparison with other evangelistic courses

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Christianity Explored is distinguished from the Alpha Course by shorter videos in less formal settings, less charismatic emphasis on the Holy Spirit and by an expositional study of scripture – in this case Mark’s Gospel.[10] 9 Marks comments that Christianity Explored is "plainly an answer to the Alpha course". It says that the course does a "fairly good job of explaining the gospel clearly" but finds it over-full of material, and holds the view that "the use of the sinners' prayer and immediate assurance is ... troubling."[11] It credits Christianity Explored with "the best treatment of sin, giving it a whole session", along with a good treatment of grace and the atonement.[12] This is in agreement with (or perhaps derivative from) a 2001 article in the British Evangelical Council magazine which commended Christianity Explored, in direct contrast to Alpha, for its teaching on grace, penal substitution and the Holy Spirit.[13][14] The course has been described as a conservative evangelical alternative to the charismatic leanings of the Alpha Course.[15]

The 2003 book 'Evangelism: Which Way Now?' offers a detailed examination of the benefits and drawbacks of Christianity Explored amongst other evangelistic courses and approaches to evangelism.[16]

See also

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References

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