Kirk Cameron and the Gospel of Christ

I was flipping through the channels last night, between watching my new show “Heroes” and Monday Night Football, and I caught a glimpse of an old sitcom my family watched when I was in school called “Growing Pains”. I watched it for a few minutes, and the thing I have discovered about most sitcoms you formerly watched is that when you watch them now they don’t ever seem as funny as they did then. Regardless, I was more interested this night, because this past weekend I went to a conference called “Transformed”, which is put on by a group called Way of the Master . The Way of the Master is actually a religious television show that is featured on TBN, and stars Kirk Cameron, who played Mike Seaver on “Growing Pains”, and an Australian evangelist named Ray Comfort.

The show has become very popular in Christianity, and has elicited such awards as the People’s Choice Award for Best Religious Show, as well as other notoriety. The show’s emphasis is on evangelism, and they routinely go up to strangers on the street and interview them about their perspective of going to heaven, as well as their notion of their own goodness. One of their foundational methods is to use the Ten Commandments to get people to the place of seeing their own guilt before God. Once they are ready to accept their own guilt before God, then they present the gospel of Jesus Christ to them. There seems to be some merit to what they are recommending, but I caution against a one-size-fits-all approach to evangelism. To their credit, however, throughout the conference, they pointed out that their method is not to give people a rote script to follow or to memorize, but to place principles in the hands of believers, while at the same time encouraging them to ultimately depend on the power of the Holy Spirit to guide and direct them as they talk to people about Christ.

Overall, I think the show is very sound in its theology, and I benefited greatly from the conference. It is also very encouraging to see how God has radically transformed the life of one of TV’s former celebrities, Kirk Cameron, as he held his bible, expounded scripture, talked very clearly about giving the gospel, and even boldly witnessed to thugs in the ghetto of New York.