Friday, December 28, 2012

Hobby Evangelism?


The Bible says "go into all the world ..." in order to share Christ. Part of that world meets in little rooms or classes that are orientated around hobbies. 

A teacher once told me: "Try something new every two years. Meet new people, make new friends and explore new interests."

Instead of having a passive hobby such as television, I thought that pursuing a hobby that could lead to witnessing would be a good idea. Sometimes it works well. Sometime, not so much.


I tried Chess, (http://www.chess.com/members/view/Prelgovisk ) but chess players aren't very talkative, and it wasn't as conducive to witnessing as I had hoped. I did enjoy it though. I met some nice people and learned a lot of neat openings.

I joined the "Civil Air Patrol" as a Chaplain, and this is proving to be a more effective opportunity. I get to speak to young people and also rub shoulders with the Search and Rescue community. I also upgraded my Ham radio license to "General Class" so that I may be a person of value to people in that community. To them I am "WP4NVR."

Am I still knocking on doors? Yes. But I am also getting through some formerly closed doors by adopting a new hobby or two. I will keep you posted on how it turns out.


Thursday, December 13, 2012

Motivating Our Members to Witness

About once a year we have a "Tract Day."


I order a "Sampler Pack" or assortment of gospel tracts from a couple of places and bring them to the church. During our Sunday school class,  I put the people in small groups and give each group a pile of tracts. I ask them to each read a couple and evaluate them on:

1. Clarity in communicating the Gospel


2. Was it really good, mildly interesting, OK, dull or offensive?"


3. Would it be something they would feel good about giving to someone? 

I have the groups come together and I ask a spokesperson from each group to give a quick review on their experience and share which were their favorite tracts.  I ask which ones we should order. 


I say "I am going to order our favorite tracts, but I want them all passed out. Who will pass out a tract if I order them?"

I place the order, and when they come in, I make a big deal about it. 
We have a scheduled Saturday as "Tract Blitz Day." We try and have every member come and pass out tracts for about 2 hours. Then we have a lunch at the church and share our experiences of what happened. 

The following Sunday, I ask them to give testimonies and praise their efforts in evangelism. We encourage and motivate each other to do more evangelism this way. 

I find that our church is more likely to pass out tracts they have read and got exited about then they would if we just had a few that we picked and put out for them to take. It works!