"I would like to thank you and your church for the Christmas celebration Sunday, December 2nd. You and your organization have no idea of the miracle that took place. My son and daughter have not spoken to each other for over 18 months. They each have little girls and the two grand children have been begging to play together but because of the parents differences this was not possible. The only gift that I had wanted for Christmas was to have my children and grandchildren get together and enjoy each other’s company. My daughter and granddaughter arrived at the celebration, and I called my son, he and his daughter came and everyone put aside their differences and enjoyed the lovely celebration.

This was an evening that I had prayed for, for a very long time. I am sure that the volunteers from your church spent many hours as well as funds, to put this together and I am hoping that they know that it comes down to more that Santa or snow or bouncers. My family could not help but notice the caring family atmosphere that engulfed the celebration and they are looking forward to attending your church next weekend. May God bless you and your wonderful church family."

- a letter sent to our church office after our Christmas Celebration 2007

 Our church has demonstrated that it is a congregation that really wants to be part of the community around it. In the last year it has put on three large community outreach events that have provided more than three thousand people in the surrounding neighborhoods the opportunity to interact naturally with church folks. These entirely free events have included food, games, balloons, story-tellers, petting domestic animals, and even a prayer booth. They were launched with the Community Christmas Celebration in December 2006, then the Easter Extravaganza the week before Easter Sunday in April 2007, and, more recently a fall festival gathering titled Community Pumpkinfest on October 31.

Small Groups and Worship

Having demonstrated effectiveness at the corporate evangelism level, the church leadership also wanted to put more emphasis on the personal aspect of evangelism. We decided to do that by taking advantage of the twice-a-year all-church focus on small groups. We opted to use the personal evangelism campaign material developed around the book “Just Walk Across the Room”* by noted author and pastor, Bill Hybels. This material was advertised as a four-week experience to equip a church for evangelism in today’s world. Promotion of the campaign and the signing up of people for small groups started the month prior to kickoff. On Sunday , September 9, the senior pastor gave the first of what would be four messages: all pointing towards how Christ-followers can start tuning into God’s guiding spirit and start listening to God’s urging to walk across a room to meet and get to know those who do not have Christ in their lives. During each of the four weeks, some 200 congregants participated in a variety of small groups to further explore and discuss the material using a four-session DVD and participant’s guide.

Starting Conversations

Many in the congregation have found evangelism to be a real challenge. However, the whole point of this campaign was to show that personal evangelism is no more challenging than getting to know those people we are around every day. It does mean letting the Holy Spirit lead us out of our circles of comfort and saying hello to someone we don’t know. It does mean taking a risk to develop new relationships by walking across a room, across a street, a backyard yard, etc. As Bill Hybels pointed out in his book, relational based evangelism can happen when Christ-followers become truly engaged in the lives of people around them. That means choosing to develop friendships, to discover the life stories of others, and to discern next steps to take with help and prompting of the Holy Spirit. The opportunities for spiritual conversations will come eventually. We just need to remember that people will come to accept God’s grace in His time, not ours.

Feedback

During the four weeks, people were encouraged to email their experiences and stories to the senior pastor, and they did. Church partners found themselves becoming more acutely aware of the people they were coming in contact with on a daily basis. A grandfather whose granddaughter is expecting walked up to a young mother in a restaurant and started talking with her about her relatively new baby. As he put it, “I don’t know why, but in the middle of the conversation, I found myself inviting her to our church to check-out the programs we have for young families.” A fairly new believer stopped the pastor after the last Sunday of the campaign to say that he had a much clearer understanding of his responsibilities. As he sees it, his job is to befriend people, show them real interest in their lives and leave the saving part to God.

Conversation Café

The same week the campaign started, the church’s Conversation Café opened. This is a neat place to invite new acquaintances for a cup of coffee, a latte, cappuccino, etc. before or after a service. Some interesting conversations have been generated, and some new friendships started in this non-threatening environment.

Matthew Party

There is a sense that church partners feel emboldened to take those walks across the room. There is an acute awareness by the vast majority that, “with the Holy Spirit’s help, I can do this evangelism thing.” People are telling each other about new bold steps they are taking to get to know neighbors, people at the office and someone they may have met at a store or in a restaurant. Some individuals and small groups are even getting ready to hold a Mathew Party or two. What’s a Mathew Party? You’ll find a great example in Luke, Chapter 5.

* “Just Walk Across the Room”

Copyright 2006 by Bill Hybels

Zondervan

Bernie Ryan

Small Groups Coordinator

Christ’s Community Church, Glendale, AZ