that robs the gospel of its power to challenge traditional ways of life and a kind of intransigence that either fails to communicate altogether or else alienates the converts from their culture? To this difficult question we must now turn. 2. (a) Any attempt to preach the gospel involves using the language spoken by the hearers. That language has been shaped by and has shaped their experience of life. It is the form in which they seek to grasp and make sense of the whole range of human experience.