Critique of the Book Concentric Circles of Concern

Bibliographical Entry

Thompson, Jr, W. Oscar . Concentric Circles of Concern. Nashville Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1999.

Author Information

W. Oscar Thompson, Jr., was an teacher at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in the area of evangelism. He was a pastor for twenty years prior to joining the seminary staff and was also president of the Oscar Thompson Evangelistic Association. He died of cancer in 1980.

Content Summary

Concentric Circles of Concerns is vibrant plan of specifics through love, to build up disciples for Christ. Thompson through the entire book associates the importance of relationship, love, prayer, and organization as a fortified team to accomplish discipleship. He states that there are seven stages in this procedure: get right, survey, pray, build bridges, show love, make disciple, and begin again. (Pg.30-31) He makes a stance of proclaiming that the word relationship is the most important word in the dictionary. That word alones provides a stem or basis from which the whole lot else can and will grow. He is very obstinate about relationship being the glue that holds everything together in the area of discipleship. He states throughout the entire book the foundation, that if you do not have a right relationship with those close to you, how can you have one with those far away. He goes even deeper by saying that you can't have a exact relationship with God and then treat others adversely. (pg93) 

He promotes his case by then moving to the concept of love. He shows the direct influence that relationships have on your ability to display love. He lays out a significance of love through the words that Christ shared in the Mark. Christ permits us to see in the book of Mark that when you love the least of mine you are showing your love to me. Thompson clarifies that text by telling us that Christ loves comes through when we meet the needs of other people. (pg.153)

 He also shows the importance of prayer throughout the complete process of discipleship to others. As he tells the different stories of settlement and salvation prayer becomes the backdrop of the all that was done in the people lives. It was amaze to see lives changed throughout the prayer while sometimes the person praying never had any contact previously. (pg.183) it was obvious that being directed by the Holy Spirit through prayer was essential to development of ...