God Space – Where Spiritual Conversations Happen Naturally by Doug Pollock

There is no singular topic more important than the Good News of Jesus Christ.  Yet that is often the subject that is least brought up in conversations for a variety of reasons.  If both or all parties are Christians, the gospel is often not mentioned, because people view each other as having accepted the good news so there is no sense discussing it more.  When non-Christians are present, it is often not discussed because Christians hope their example will be enough, or they often think others have heard it before so they talk about sports and other things, or Christians want to fit in and not be rejected by the world.  That fear of rejection often comes because Christians have not been equipped to create the environment to discuss the good news.  Doug Pollock draws the reader in to consider many factors about how to make that space of conversation an opportunity to share Christ.  Too often Christians go for the jugular and just move through the gospel without creating thirst on the part of the non-Christian.  We get more focused on information, rather than transformation.  He begins by delineating 10 Spiritual Conversation Killers.  Things like using our language rather than theirs, disrespecting their views, having an agenda to get through the message, or controlling the conversation make people feel boxed in. Then he has four great chapters on “Noticing, Serving, Listening and Wondering Your Way into Spiritual Conversations.”  Each of these chapters put the reader at ease resting in an easier, other-focused way of drawing a person into a spiritual conversation.  His chapter six on “Wondering Your Way into Spiritual Conversations” was especially good in turning the hearers comments into “wondering” questions that allow the non-Christian to be drawn into deeper spiritual conversations about God that they may not have considered.  I appreciate his quote from Howard Hendricks, “Show me a man with a bag full of successes, and I’ll show you a man with a bag full of failures.”  We are successful, because we’ve tried so many times to do it right, but failed over and over.  However, because we persist, we find better ways to do things right and then find success.  Concluding his book, Pollock gives 99 wondering questions to help give many ideas how to get the “other” person talking and drawn into the good news of Jesus Christ.  His approach makes me think of Paul’s comment to the Colossians, “Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.” (Col 4:6)