Explore God is a two month city-wide evangelism campaign my home church is participating in. My senior pastor has been a key player in vision casting and recruiting with 330 Austin area churches that are involved. The campaign officially launches after Labor Day, following a great deal of preparation and promotion.
There are five primary components to the campaign:
1) mass advertising via spiritually oriented questions on billboards, radio, and TV,
2) basic training for church members in asking spiritually oriented questions and learning to listen well,
3) two months of seeker friendly sermons in 330 participating churches addressing basic life questions,
4) two months with thousands of seeker friendly mid-week small discussion groups addressing basic life questions,
5) encouraging church members to seek out opportunities to ask basic life questions where they live, work, and play with those willing to engage in these kinds of conversations.
In the gospels we see evangelism taking two basic forms: “come and see” and “go and tell”. Both are Biblical, but the great commission and the epistles focus on “go and tell”. Another more contemporary label for “go and tell” is ”missional living”. It involves living incarnationally among the lost, demonstrating and proclaiming Christ in relevant ways to them.
It appears to me that components two and five of the Explore God campaign are the components that best represent missional living, with component four also containing some missional elements. The greatest challenge and the greatest measure of success with this, and any evangelism campaign, is what happens after the campaign is over?
It would be wonderful if tens of thousands of seekers in our city hear and understand the gospel as a result of this campaign. Perhaps resulting in several thousand coming into a saving relationship with Christ. But that is aiming too low.
There are two other things that would thrill me far more.
1) GOOD FOLLOW-UP OF CONVERTS. Will these new converts receive initial follow-up in a timely manner? Will they be incorporated as long-term members into Austin area churches? Will they receive and respond well to quality discipleship training? Sadly most outreach campaigns devote little attention to these issues.
2) EMBRACING A MISSIONAL LIFESTYLE. Will the Christian participants in this campaign be permanently changed as a result? If not, we may need Explore God 2 next year and the Return of Explore God the following year, and Explore God the Sequel the year after that. An endless stream of high profile, resource intensive, evangelism campaigns in which to involve our congregations so that they will, for a brief period of time, engage the lost.
My home church conducted a survey of its members and attenders earlier this year. The survey asked many dozens of questions regarding a spectrum of important issues. One of the findings of the survey was that most of our members and attenders NEVER or RARELY share their faith. This is in a church that promotes outreach very aggressively from the pulpit and with its programs.
Will this campaign help turn this around? I hope and pray it does. Will members and attenders at my home church and the other 330 churches in the city start to more regularly and more effectively share the gospel where they live, work, and play? Time will tell.
Evangelism is a tough area of obedience for most believers. To be honest, it is a tough area of obedience for me.
How do Christians develop deep personal convictions that translate into how they live their daily lives? Convictions regarding the reality of heaven and hell. Regarding the hopelessness and eternal destiny of the lost. Regarding their personal responsibility to demonstrate and proclaim the gospel. Regarding their responsibility to take the gospel to every people group on the planet. That is the million dollar question. I would love to hear your thoughts.
Sunday, September 1, 2013
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