Winsome Persuasion – Christian Influence in a Post–Christian World

Christianity Today's 2018 Book of the Year Award of Merit - Apologetics/Evangelism How are Christians viewed in the broader culture?We blush at the possibilities. Brainwashed fanatics? Out-of-touch dogmatists? Buffoons?The task of bearing faithful witness to Jesus is complicated by persistent—and not altogether baseless—cultural stereotypes. In our post-Christian society, thoughtful Christians are considering again how to engage the dominant culture as a minority, a counterpublic, amid varying perceptions and misperceptions.In this timely book, Timothy Muehlhoff and Rick Langer ask what our interactions with the dominant cultural ethos should look like. How might we be persuasive and civil at the same time? How should we respond to those who ridicule and caricature us? How can we challenge the beliefs of other communities with love and respect?Muehlhoff and Langer present a model for cultural engagement that integrates communication theory, theology, and Scripture. Penetrating, wise, and relentlessly practical, it includes test cases and examples from history, such as William Wilberforce and Harriet Beecher Stowe.Now more than ever, Christians need what Winsome Persuasion offers: a compelling vision of public engagement that is both shrewd and gracious.

"If we're going to engage the public effectively on LGBT issues—or other hotly contested social issues—we need to think through the kinds of issues Winsome Persuasion so deftly examines.", "Too many books simply make assumptions about secular modern culture and about the way that we need to respond. Muehlhoff and Langer take the necessary step of analyzing the way that culture works, especially with regard to media and social issues, and their deft analysis generates significant insights. The authors apply orthodox Christian principles to hot-button issues without being shrill or partisan. In so doing, they model what the book strives to teach.", "Winsome Persuasion is timely and a much-needed tool that offers practical, common-sense ground rules to those wishing to engage effectively in the public square as well as a comforting sense of structure that offsets the sense of disorientation commonly experienced in public dialogue."

Tim Muehlhoff (PhD, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) is a professor of communication at Biola University in La Mirada, California, where he teaches classes in family communication, interpersonal communication, persuasion, and gender. He is the author of I Beg to Differ and Marriage Forecasting, and the coauthor of The God Conversation: Using Stories and Illustrations to Explain Your Faith and Authentic Communication: Christian Speech Engaging Culture. Muehlhoff and his wife, Noreen, are frequent speakers at FamilyLife Marriage Conferences, and Tim also serves as a speaker/author with Biola's Center for Marriage and Relationships. Richard Langer (PhD, University of California, Riverside) is professor of biblical and theological studies at Talbot School of Theology and director of the Office for the Integration of Faith and Learning at Biola University. Specializing in the areas of theological integration, moral philosophy, bioethics, political philosophy, and philosophy of religion, he has also taught at Trinity International University and the University of California. An ordained minister, Langer previously served as senior associate pastor of Trinity Evangelical Free Church in Redlands, California, and as a missionary with Campus Crusade for Christ. He also speaks at seminars and conferences around the country and is a board member for Forest Home Ministries. He has served on the boards for Building a Generation, the Southwest District of the Evangelical Free Church of America, and the Internal Review for Research Protocols at Loma Linda University Medical Center. Additionally, he won Biola University's Provost Award for Excellence in Theological Integration in 2008.Langer has contributed articles to publications such as the Journal of Spiritual Formation and Soul Care, Christian Higher Education, the Journal of Psychology and Theology, Philosophia Christi, and the Journal of the Christian Institute for Disabilities. He and his wife Shari have two grown children. Quentin J. Schultze is the author of over a dozen books on the relationship between faith and communications. He serves as executive director of the Gainey Institute for Faith and Communication and as Arthur H. DeKruyter Chair in Faith and Communication at Calvin College.