After years of working with churches on growth, one common thread clearly stands out: revival churches are totally consumed with a passion for the lost. It influences everything they do. While they may have vastly different personalities, membership, organizational structures and facilities, their burden for the lost outshines all else.
Talking with revival pastors is exciting! They share story after story of people who have come to the truth, of lives transformed by the Holy Spirit, and of various outreach successes. These churches are busy – with scheduled outreach activities, home Bible studies, prayer walks, fall festivals, and special Sundays to attract new people. New guests can be found in most services. Key ministries are promoted and new converts are recruited for involvement: bus ministry, Holy Ghost Sundays, Super Children’s Church, Jesus houses, car ministry, constant contact consciousness, home Bible studies, visitor follow-up, and special attendance thrusts for holidays. Busy – and exciting!
How can you transform your own church into high evangelism priority and potential? Three suggestions: First, make evangelism a top priority in your personal life. You can never lead people where you are not willing to go yourself. Don’t be shy to talk about your Bible studies, door knocking experiences, prayer walks, and tract passing. It’s easy to work personal experiences into sermons when you are consumed with soul winning on a daily basis.
Second, make evangelism a priority in every department and ministry. If you don’t have written job descriptions for every ministry leader, write them. In every job description there should be clearly defined activities during the year that focus on souls. If you have 12 departments and each has one or more evangelism events, that will provide at least 12 evangelism-focused events for your members to become involved in. But each event must be well-planned and promoted. To do this you need a comprehensive management system that includes an annual planning retreat, departmental one-year plans, monthly group planning sessions and regular tag-in’s. This provides the needed structure and motivation for each activity’s success.
Third, make sure these five key departments are well-staffed and high priority: visitor follow-up, home Bible study, personal evangelism, bus/van/car ministry, and new convert care. Historically, these five have seen more outreach success in Apostolic churches than all others. Want more details? Call 1-800-800-0247 and order Total Church Growth.