The Problem of Gospel Static

Imagine a phone call with a lot of static (“noise”) on the line—so much that you are only understanding part of what you hear. That’s what the gospel of Jesus Christ can sound like to people whose worldviews are strongly influenced by non-Biblical belief systems. We call this problem “worldview noise.” And if we do not understand the worldview noise in our communication of the gospel and do not find a way to penetrate it with clarity, our evangelistic efforts will likely produce spurious fruit. There are two reasons why unbelievers do not understand the gospel. The first is something that all unbelievers everywhere have in common, to the same 100% degree—spiritual blindness. And only the Holy Spirit can lift this veil and open an unbeliever’s understanding of the gospel. But the second reason for not understanding varies greatly from unbeliever to unbeliever. It’s worldview noise. Depending on the types of spiritual influences in a person’s earlier life, his or her worldview noise may be very dense or not dense at all or somewhere in-between.  →