Michael J. Gehring

As the Broken White Lines Become One

Michael J. Gehring

In As the Broken White Lines Become One, Michael Gehring recounts his spiritual journey through the landscape of late-twentieth-century southern American Christianity. This account depicts how and why he drifted away from the Roman Catholic Church, fellowshipped for a while with the Assemblies of God, sojourned for a prolonged time as an outsider to the institutional church, and eventually found a theological home within United Methodism. What follows is a spiritual journey with a lot of turns. The work is not intended to be a complete autobiography. Significant biographical details and relationships are not included as this narrative focuses on the shifting and sifting grounds of American Christian denominations. This chronicle primarily concerns the spiritual journey that led him to United Methodism and what it was like, not only to choose it, but also to inhabit it.

The Oxbridge Evangelist

Michael J. Gehring

In The Oxbridge Evangelist: Motivations, Practices, and Legacy of C. S. Lewis, Michael Gehring examines the evangelistic practices of one of the most significant lay evangelists of the twentieth century. In the early 1930s not many who knew Lewis would have guessed that he would become such a significant evangelist. He has left an evangelistic legacy that has influenced millions across the world. Yet Lewis scholarship has not given sufficient attention to this crucial aspect of his legacy. This work examines Lewis's loss and recovery of faith, and it shows how his experience heightened his own awareness of the loss of the Christian faith in England. Because of his ability to identify with others, Lewis engaged in the work of evangelism with uncanny skill. This work required singular courage on his part; it cost him dearly professionally and in his relationships. Gehring critically explores Lewis's motivations, practices, and legacy of evangelism. In doing so he provides penetrating insight for those interested in the theory and practice of evangelism in a culture that too readily leaves it to the crazies of the Christian tradition or relegates it to the margins of church life.