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What Others Say

Christian communicators have struggled with this issue for many years. No matter what discipline we are coming from we find that we come against the same issues. It is therefore heart-warming to find a resonance in the thoughts and opinions of others.

It has only been in recent months that the extent to which The Matrix is being used has become evident. It was orginally developed in the context of Christian radio broadcasting but it appears that its usefulness has found a resonance in a number of other areas of Christian ministry.

Tony Whittaker of WEC/SOON is one such person. He edits the W-E-B Evangelism Bulletin and contributes to Brigada. In his article Gray's the Color of Life he firmly endorses the Matrix while providing an illuminating section "Lessons from the Gray Matrix" and providing useful links to pages on related topics. This was further promoted through the Internet Evangelism Day.

Over recent weeks Tony has been collecting some of the feedback from those who have found it useful. Here follows a collection of some of their comments - both positive and negative (!):

In teaching about Evangelism

What I have found useful is the added dimension of attitude towards the message of Jesus. It broadens the scope of what we call evangelism to (rightfully) include anything that moves people up and to the right on the scale. For example: servant evangelism, friendship evangelism, etc. In a society such as ours (Western Canada, where several generations of people are resistant to the Gospel as a result of years of negative stereotyping and, sad to say, bad experiences associated with the message. ie. TV evangelism, abuse, not to mention the anachronistic nature of much of what passes for 'traditional' Church practice.

Yes, ignorance is increasingly a major obstacle, but a negative attitude towards Church in general aids and accelerates our society's decline into paganism. The Gray Matrix helps to define and graphically illustrate that dynamic.

A Church worker

I love the Gray Matrix. I was wanting our small group to talk about reaching out to the community, and I found the Matrix. Our Senior Pastor took it home and loved it, and used it as a basis for sermons on vision and mission. 'Moving people to the top right' has now become the catch-word for a visioning and strategic planning phase the church is going through. Our mission statement has become 'Working together with God, to help people grow from where they are now into fully devoted followers of Christ'.

An Alpha Course Co-ordinator

I use the Gray Matrix for training new Alpha leaders/helpers. Often they see their guests move through the matrix over a period of 11 weeks. It is a very exciting experience. It also helps us evaluate the effectiveness of the course. We count conversions, but we also count movement through the Matrix. I also use the Matrix in my general evangelism training. In combination with other tools it helps Christians learn to determine "spiritual addresses" of the un-churched people they engage, and choose appropriate approaches. It is very reassuring for Christians who had felt they had failed at evangelism because they hadn't been able to bring their un-churched friends to the point of conversion. In the past I've used the Engel's Scale, but I prefer the Gray Matrix because it measures attitude as well as knowledge. Thanks for making it available to trainers like me.

A Trainer of Writers

I'm an author and a trainer of writers. About half of my students are non-westerners (Youth With A Mission, etc.). I use the Gray Matrix to help my students focus their writing on a particular audience. The choice of that audience determines many things, such as:

On the negative side (to be fair!)

...it's a program - it places people neatly into little sections that do not define the person - just what you think the person is. it allows you to make friends based on where they set in the matrix, not where they are in life - I find it useless and silly :) I have no desire to "judge" where a person is in life. I desire to know them, and love them for them - not their section of a silly matrix. The biggest problem the matrix has is it pre-assumes only four possibilities and then strives to blend them together to create a matrix - bad form - are we sharing with people, or where we think people are? to place a person in the matrix is to develop another program :)

...or a bit more balanced...

I don't have the same issues as (the above) with the idea of a matrix, but I agree that these scales are pretty subjective and have limited use in application. (BTW: I prefer the Engel's scale to Gray's Matrix since Gray's is just a variation of it.) The best use I have had for these scales while working with outreach is in strategy training and planning to illustrate that not all people are at the same level of understanding and cannot be reached with a single program. Ministries need to plan evangelism with the different needs of people in mind. In that sense, the Gray Matrix would be a tool (...) could use to make his larger point that evangelism should seek to know people and love them as Christ does (as everyone in this group would agree is needed). IMHO, what (...) is talking about in not being pragmatic, more applies to reaching people one-to-one. As a pastor of a small church would. If an organization is planning to saturate a community (or a people group) with the gospel, you need some kind of analysis to know how do you plan large scale evangelism saturation to best reach them. I would be more in favor of doing original research to learn what are the bridges and barriers to the gospel and what are the perceptions toward the messengers that might hinder the people's understanding.

A 3rd Dimension?

I would prefer to add a third dimension to the matrix that demonstrates the work of the Holy Spirit and spiritual warfare and intercession. I think this too would address some of the negative responses or comments that this is too similar to the Engel Scale.