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Today's Christian, March/April 2006
The Alpha (Course) Man
Former lawyer Nicky Gumbel is the driving force behind the popular evangelism program.
By Greg Asimakoupoulos
The clearest Anglican contribution to evangelism for the past few decades can be traced to the work of the Rev. Nicky Gumbel. Gumbel, a lanky Brit with salt-and-pepper hair, has become the public face and voice of an evangelism phenomenon called the Alpha Course.
In the late 1970s, Gumbel was a barrister (lawyer) in London who had recently become a Christian and was attending Holy Trinity Brompton. HTB, as members call it, is an Anglican congregation in an affluent section of London that experienced renewal through contact with John Wimber and the Vineyard movement. As the church began to grow through a steady stream of conversions, its leaders offered an in-house class for new believers. They called the ten-week course Alpha.
By the early '80s, Gumbel was one of several laypeople asked to give lectures on basic Christian doctrine. Alpha participants loved his talks, and Gumbel began to feel God's call to ordained ministry. He began his theological studies at Oxford in 1983 and was ordained in the Church of England a few years later.
In 1990 the Rev. Sandy Millar, vicar (senior pastor) of Holy Trinity Brompton, asked Gumbel to oversee and teach Alpha. The second series of classes he led consisted entirely of nonbelievers.
"That's when I realized that what we were teaching in Alpha was as much a pre-evangelism course as it was a course for new Christians," Gumbel says. "Shortly thereafter we began to target our invitations to those who weren't convinced of the claims of Christ."
In 1994 HTB videotaped the 15 talks of the Alpha Course and began selling Alpha curriculum. More than 7 million people have participated in 30,000 courses, spread across 155 countries in 55 languages.
Gumbel, 50, is the father of three grown children. He became vicar of Holy Trinity Brompton last year.
Alpha's influence and reach is not limited to churches. "Of the 160 prisons in England, 137 offer the Alpha Course," Gumbel says. "I never could have imagined how God would use this thing called Alpha in a million years. It truly is a God thing."
What Is Alpha?
The Alpha Course is a ten-week opportunity for believers and seekers to explore the validity and relevance of the Christian faith for comtemporary life. It is a practical introduction to the basics of Christianity, centered around a meal, a talk, and small-group discussion. Discsussion topics include:
- Christianity: Boring, Untrue, and Irrelevant?
- Who Is Jesus?
- How Can I Be Sure of My Faith?
- How Should I Read the Bible?
- Why and How Do I Pray?
- How Does God Guide Us?
- Why and How Should We Tell Others?
- Does God Heal Today?
For more information, or to find an Alpha Course in your area, go to www.alphausa.org.
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Copyright © 2006 by the author or Christianity Today International/Today's Christian magazine.
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March/April 2006, Vol. 44, No. 2, 10
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