Evangelism That Works

Have you ever just battled over your summer evangelism strategy? I mean really wondered if people would enter into a rich relationship with Jesus Christ, after you and your team invested so much time, energy & finance into the plan? Well, it’s important to know that your evangelism plan can work if you are properly prepared to receive the harvest. Here is how:

1. Plan events that will attract people to your worship space. For years, I have seen churches pack-out stadiums, high school auditoriums, parks, etc. We have also seen hundreds & thousands of people get saved, but here is the question. How many of those people are still in church today? How many of them even made it back to church? I have found that when we reach out directly from our worship space, people feel more comfortable to return because they have already become familiar with the environment. They have seen the parking, children’s ministry, worship style, leaders, pastors. They get the full picture and they hunger for a second visit.

2. Have your next event planned & ready for promotion. When someone has a great experience at your church they leave with this thought. I can’t wait to come back! So give them a reason to come back. Have a quality follow up event planned that they can return to. I guarantee, they will be back if they had a great first experience.

3. Develop a mobile & ministering congregation. They most effective type of evangelism is “personal evangelism”. The numbers are mind-boggling & there is so much information to support the fact that people attract people to a church. If we are going be an effective church when it comes to evangelism, our members are the key to the success. Most of your church growth will come from their visiting family members, friends, co-workers. etc. Event committees are great, crusaders/promo teams are great, television & radio is great, but in the end, they don’t get the job done. The people who get it done are the church members.

4. Challenge them to go deeper. Just ask yourself this: Are people coming just to check it out or are they really ready for change? I say, they are really ready for change. I can remember when I was invited to church, I was ready for it. If I wasn’t I could have been so many other places. So this is our chance to challenge them to go deeper in God. I think the best way to do that is water baptism. This is their way of taking a stand for what they have just experienced in Christ.

5. Position your church to receive the harvest. Once people get saved, where do they go? Who do they connect with? What if they don’t have family in the church? This is where your cell group strategy comes in handy. Cell groups provide an atmosphere where people can become comfortable. And you can be secure that there is someone who is taking a personal interest in that new baby in Christ.

In the past 19 months, VOSD has hosted over 10,000 people in our sanctuary through strategic outreaches, baptized close to 600 new members, added 2 new Sunday services & launched out 54 journey groups through the city. We are staying committed to reaching our community with the gospel.

Elevate.

Catalyst Leaders Training

Thanks to John Maxwell & Andy Stanley for the very first Catalyst Conference in Alpharetta, GA. I was invited by Pastor Sonny Jr. as a part of his staff right around 2002. It was an amazing conference. I think it really sparked something new in the Body & it changed the way church was done. I can remember that this was the first time I ever heard of Ed Young Jr. His session was powerful and innovative & at that time he was the most innovative pastor in the world. He continues to be a driving force. I think the overall purpose of the conference was to raise up young leaders who would take their place and bring an explosion to the church. It seems to have worked. And VOSD is going to follow suit. Starting this week, we will be gathering together with roughly 200 men for 3 weeks of strategic discipleship & training. We are calling it Catalyst Leaders. And it is by invite only. Each leader is encouraged to bring just 1 guy who aspires leadership in God’s kingdom and is willing to sacrifice 3 Tuesdays to the Lord. It is going to be life changing. Here are our goals:

1. To raise up 100 brand new leaders in the church. These leaders will be challenged to take their place and develop their leadership.

2. To transmit our vision in a spirit of commitment & excitement. As the church continues to grow & our circles begin to broaden, it becomes difficult to teach on commitment. This special gathering will give our staff an opportunity to impart into a brand new group of leaders.

3. To cause existing leaders to release ministry to a new breed of men. This will be lid removal at its finest.

4. To give leaders an inside look at the VOSD staff and dialogue about our greatest challenges & our greatest victories.

5. To break barriers that exist in our current level of ministry & our desired level of ministry.

The best is yet to come.

The 4 E’s of Growing Leadership

Allow me to share 4 things that will help your leadership to grow to a new level:

Education. Education is a lifelong journey. We need a continual attitude of commitment for education. Education does a number of things for us but it mostly gives us confidence. Confidence to minister. Confidence to know what we believe and to boldly approach the culture with the message of the gospel.

Experience. There is no replacement for the school of experience. Experience forges us for a new level of ministry. You have often heard that “every level has a new devil”. And this is so true, but consider that attacks, trials, problems & circumstances are a cue. A cue that things in our leadership must change. They are God’s way of getting our attention. They are God’s way of saying go up a little higher.

Exposure. Education can be a strong qualifer for a person’s credibility in ministry, but exposure is a stronger qualifer for results. Things are changing so quickly around us that we must stay exposed. I choose to expose myself to leaders & churches that are larger than mine. Do I do it to become larger? Is my motive for a church that is stronger in number or has a component to their church that I want? No. Every church has a unique dynamic. Every pastor should be doing ministry in a way that makes him feel that he is being effective for God. Exposure allows us to see how others are thinking. It allows us to take our ministry outside of the box.

Effective. An leader must be effective. We shouldn’t strive to be bigger, we must strive to be better. Bigger will follow. Listen. You cannot argue with success. Sure you can be a critic. Or you can be a pundit on “why they did this” & “why they did that.” But truthfully, you cannot argue with success. The bottom line of this whole endeavor is to be effective. I had a professor in college who asked us to write a paper on “Faithfulness vs. Fruitfulness” He was a the superintendent for the AG and his criticism was that pastors are more worried about faithfulness than fruitfulness. He did not knock faithfulness, but his question was…”What brings more glory to God?” Good question…

“What brings more glory to God?”

Keep on growing.

Church Growth Interview

The people over at VETI have definitely got a new swagger. Under the leadership of Kevin Young, M.Div they are making some powerful leaps towards developing a curriculum that is relative, inspiring & forward thinking. I was recently contacted by their office for an interview about church growth that will be taking place in a few weeks to be shared with VETI students all over the world. I want to practice on you guys. There are a series of 7 questions:

1.In your opinion, what would you say was the single most important contributing aspect for the growth of your church?

When we took the church it was at a weekend attendance of 600 people. A lot of the heavy lifting was done in regards to securing the building and remodeling the facilities. A team was assembled, but we did not know what that team would do in the absence of an experienced leader. In my opinion, our team was the difference. The team is empowered, collaborative, professional & progressive. I think the team is the single most contributing factor. Because of our team, the church has doubled in 18 months.     

2. What resources (books, seminars, sermons, etc.) do you find helpful in developing an attitude for church growth?

There are many books that we read but we are finding that we are in need of newer concepts. Pastor Sonny really taught us to take a look at models. And we have found that there is a trend for that all over the world. Most pastor’s of growing churches are a part of a network of other growing churches. There is a powerful information sharing that goes beyond books and printed information, because pastors of growing churches want to see how things function. I feel that we need a network for pastors in VO because of the uniqueness of our ministry. Pastors who want to grow could really benefit.

3. Has the use of technology (internet, media, social networks, etc.) contributed to your growth?

We have taken the internet & technology very seriously in our church. We have a whole staff dedicated to just that particular area. Our feeling is that any church that is not online or using such free sources such as social media are dinosaurs in this age. The numbers are very specific as to why media is important. People want their information & they want it now. They will usually go to the church that will provide it quickly & accurately. Evangelism has become much easier because of technology.

4. Can you comment on how VOI’s core ministries contribute to church growth?

The core ministries have certainly set the course for our church. In terms of values, principles & exposure, there is no measure to its benefit. If I were to describe its purpose it would be to solidify. Our members have become more solid as a result of these core ministries. 

5. In what ways do you engage the community surrounding your church?

We are a church of cell groups. Our task is to infiltrate our community and to create church community through this strategy. What we have found is that evangelism has become the general result and people are fitting in. Another way we have engaged our community is through community activity. We want to develop a better relationship with community leaders & city officials. We have actually partnered on a few projects in the past. We look to do more in the future. Television has also brought a new awareness to our church in the entire county. We have purchased network time and we are trying to expose the community to an outreach that is younger & more family-based.

6. If you could state the single most influential church growth principle in a sentence what would it be?

Teamwork makes the dreamwork. Empowering leaders to do the job. Building a church is hard work. 

7. If you had the chance to start all over again, what would you do different?

That is a tough question. There are a few things. I would have definitely done more in the community. I think we could have made more in-roads in regards to working with community leaders. But it is not too late. Also, there were some leadership choices that turned out bad. I didn’t realize that we were at a level where we needed more professional types. Also, I would be more careful with people taking too much ownership of an area of ministry or department. Change readiness is a important key.

10 Things You Might Not Know About Mega-Church Pastors

Since everyone in Victory Outreach is on the Mega-bubble. I thought it would be nice to post a blog I received from my friend Samuel Chand over @ Leadership Network. They do some great studies on leaders, churches, finances & other various topics pertaining to church growth. 

Leadership Network surveyed 232 pastors of churches with an average weekend worship attendance of at least 2,000. Here are 10 things you might not know about megachurch pastors. 

1. They think of themselves more as teachers and directional leaders than as pastors.
2. Preaching tops the list of things they do best.
3. They haven’t always worked in churches.
4. Being an extrovert isn’t mandatory.
5. Family stays at the top of mind when it comes to prayers.
6. They usually like the people they work with.
7. They believe their top gift is leadership.
8. They are actively involved in sports.
9. They find worship at their church helpful for personal spiritual growth.
10. They’re not thinking about quitting.

Declaring War on Meth

This summer VOSD has set out on a campaign to rescue a generation from the problem of Crystal Meth. For many years San Diego has largely been effected by the problem of Meth and continues to be a major hub & channel for the traffiking of this wicked chemical. But for us, it is personal.

Just about 2 years ago, Georgina & I found ourselves in a fight for a family member who was deeply entrenched in this drug and her life was spinning out of control. In fact, statistics show that women are the #1 abusers of Crystal Meth and the numbers continue to rise across the country. We did not know what we were in store for? The war on meth started in our home.

This entire summer, VOSD has dedicated our energy to the awareness & intervention of fighting the problem of Crystal Meth in San Diego. We have committed ourselves to the war and it is a war we cannot lose.

Our first event took place this past weekend. With over 2500 people in attendance, we featured the live action drama, “Cry of the Young. Choose Life or Choose Meth.” We were excited to see so many who rallied around the cause and were impacted by the drama. Lives were transformed and set-free from this powerful chemical. I was shocked to see that most of the young people who came up for salvation & deliverance were women. It is amazing to see the grip this wicked chemical has on young women. Meth destroys the body and is destroying our women.

When the war on meth started in our home, we settled in for a serious fight. We refused to lose the war and we knew that we could only reclaim our loved one through the power of prayer. We prayed fervently, fought passionately, practiced tough love and won the battle. Today our loved is saved and on fire for God. She involved in ministry and has continued her educated. There is no way this could have happened without the love of God. God was responsible for the change. God gave us the victory.

In San Diego, the war has just begun. Every event we do this year will be dedicated to bringing awareness & intervention to Crystal Meth. Our goal is to reach hundreds & to bring awareness to thousands through TV & radio. This is a war we cannot afford to lose.

Pastor Al