Evangelism--Strategy

Timothy Revett

The project director developed an outreach strategy that serves a twofold purpose:
improving educational achievement and forming congregations among the Ava Guaraní
and Mbya Guaraní who live in the metropolitan area of Asunción, Paraguay. The
evangelistic activities that lead to the formation of congregations come as a result of the
relationships built during educational activities carried out by the outreach team in the
communities. Over the last two decades the focus group has been experiencing a
migration from their traditional homelands to urban contexts. For this reason, the strategy
combines tribal group missiology with migrant outreach practices.

The strategy development project consisted of four steps. First, the project
director researched demographics about Guaraní spirituality and education to assess the
level of need in those areas. Second, he explored literature on outreach to tribal groups
and migrants to produce a selection of principles that guided the development of the
outreach strategy. Third, the project director’s colleagues provided input on the selected
principles and direction of the strategy. Finally, the project director presented the strategy
to a local partner ministry for official implementation.

Marlene Reinhold Grandinetti D.Min.

The aim of this project is to examine how evangelical congregations in the Chicago area are carrying out missional discipleship. The main research question is, ‘What are best practices for a missional approach to discipleship for the local church?’ Two additional questions are used to answer the main research question: (1) What are some of the major challenges these local churches encountered in their discipleship efforts? and (2) What lessons can be learned from the experience of these congregations when formulating a missional disciple-making strategy?

To explore and answer the research question, a multiple case study methodology is employed. This method examines three evangelical churches in the Chicago area who embody a missional discipleship, using three different types of data collection. These include two focus groups at each church involving semi- structured qualitative interviews with small group leaders and participants, six participant observations of events these churches carried out for people in their communities, and a collection of documentary evidence.

The data from this study was organized into findings and concluded with three emphases that can be implemented by churches in their discipleship practices. These include a profile of an authentic follower of Christ, implementing four processes that lead to disciple-making, and the desired outcomes of an authentic, spiritually mature follower of Christ, all leading to a missional approach to disciple-making.

Nicholas T. Wilbur

The purpose of this project is to develop a relational evangelism strategy to reach millennials of Cumming Baptist Church, Cumming, Georgia. The project director led selected members of Cumming Baptist Church to develop a multifaceted relational evangelism strategy that will minister effectively to the millennial population of Forsyth County, Georgia.

The strategy formation team met for six sessions to develop the strategy for the church. The project director instructed the team on demographic data from Forsyth County, information on millennials found through research, best relational evangelism practices, the biblical rationale for relational evangelism, and strategy formation technique. With this knowledge, the strategy formation team, led by the project director, developed a multifaceted relational evangelism strategy. Once completed, the strategy was presented by the project director to the pastoral staff, outreach ministry team, and deacons of CBC for approval and implementation.

O. Henry Powell Young IV

The purpose of the project is to equip next generation ministers at Cross Church, in Northwest Arkansas, with strategic evangelism implementation skills. The student did so by exploring the fields of evangelism and strategy implementation in next generation ministries. The project included the design and execution of a curriculum workshop which will be used to train next generation ministers at Cross Church, Northwest Arkansas, in strategic evangelism implementation skills. Research regarding the trends of salvations and baptism rates in the Southern Baptist Convention from 2010 to present. Existing strategic evangelism tools were presented along with new material designed by the project director. The project resulted in the development of a next generation evangelism strategy workshop and the equipping of next generation ministers at Cross Church, Northwest Arkansas.

Seth Robert Stiles

The first part of the project consisted of the construction and distribution of a church-wide survey about Christian witness in the workplace. A survey was helpful in developing an accurate approach to helping Northshore Bible Church members practice Christian witness in the workplace more effectively. The second part of the project consisted of constructing and teaching an essential “theology of the workplace” in a seminar based on key expositional and theological teachings from the Bible. In the third part of the project, the project director constructed and distributed two reproducible worksheets to seminar attendees. The first “self-assessment” worksheet enabled seminar attendees to gauge present engagement in Christian witness in the workplace. The second worksheet assisted seminar attendees in developing a personalized plan for improving Christian witness engagement in the workplace. The final part of the project consisted of establishing a way for seminar attendees to stay in touch with the instructor for encouragement. The project director documented the most popular issues, questions, successes, and failures from seminar attendees to discern trends for bettering future seminars.

Robert Alan Pinkston

Quebec has over 508,000 college and university students, of whom over ninety-nine percent do not know Jesus Christ as their savior. There are several good collegiate ministries operating in Quebec; however, all their numbers combined show only a 0.2 percent engagement of the university student population. To reach collegiate students for Christ in Quebec, there must be a concerted effort by the local church to engage college students with the Gospel. The project in ministry was to develop a strategy for the local church to use the University Impact House model to evangelize and disciple college students in Quebec.

The Impact House is a rented house or apartment in proximity to a university campus. It houses Christian students who live on mission for God to impact their fellow students with the Gospel. The Impact House typically serves a free weekly meal to attract and connect with lost students. The Impact House also has weekly Bible studies, worship nights and prayer meetings for those that have responded and need to be discipled. The Impact House model, in existence since 2009 in Quebec, has proved effective in connecting with unchurched college students. The project in ministry adapted the strategy to implement in the local church context.

Tracy Mooney

Small-to-medium sized United Methodist churches often struggle with adapting to new technology. Unfortunately, this problem has now become a large obstacle which must be overcome by each individual congregation while trying to spread the message of Jesus Christ. While congregations could be evangelizing through technology, the lack of enthusiasm and/or resources in many congregations has stifled the voice of the Methodist church in the digital world, slowing the dissemination of their message of God’s grace and love. Seeking guidance from the growth of Methodism through John and Charles Wesley’s leadership, the research proposes a plan for small-to-medium sized churches to evangelize online. The project studies the benefits of creating Audio, Communication, and Technology (ACT) Teams, enabling a new generation of leaders and bringing them together with other United Methodist congregations to share and then implement technology resources. With ACT Teams, United Methodist churches can develop itinerant leaders that “go out” digitally to build relationships with people who may not be able or be willing to enter a physical church building. The project also explores the ways leaders can use video to create an atmosphere for viewers to have a transformational experience with God. The hope is that by following the Wesleyan example of evangelism, The United Methodist Church may break through the digital noise to connect to those in a new way.

Randall Cagle Clayton

The purpose of this project was to equip selected members of Immanuel Baptist Church in Greenwood, Mississippi, with conversational evangelism skills. The project began with project director researching the field of evangelism for the purpose of identifying essential conversational skills. Next, the project director developed an annotated bibliography based upon the completed research. After conducting research and identifying essential conversational skills, the project director wrote a report that discussed the findings. Expert evaluators evaluated the annotated bibliography.

The next step in the project was to develop a curriculum to equip selected members of Immanuel Baptist Church with essential conversational evangelism skills. The project director acquired skills for writing curriculum by completing a self-guided study, Design for Teaching and Training, by LeRoy Ford. The project director wrote the curriculum and an expert evaluator evaluated the curriculum. The project director next conducted a six-session discipleship class to equip selected members of Immanuel Baptist church, Greenwood, Mississippi, in essential conversational evangelism skills. Finally, the project director concluded the project by administering tan devaluating post0test results and evaluating students' role play encounters.

Blake Cordaris Allen D.Min.

Replanting efforts fulfill God’s desire for spiritual flourishing and gospel advancement. The goal of church replanting is to go from dying to flourishing. There is no pleasure found in the closing of a church that bears the name of Christ. For this reason, dying churches need biblical solutions to address their current conditions. The purpose of this project was to develop a replanting strategy to equip Living Hope Dunbar Cave to reach the unchurched in Central Clarksville, Tennessee. Chapter 1 presents the history and ministry context of Living Hope Dunbar Cave and the goals of this project. Chapter 2 provides an exegesis of three passages of Scripture (Ezek. 37:1-6; Rev. 3:1–6; Acts 2:40–47) to show that replanting efforts fulfill God’s desire for spiritually flourishing churches and gospel advancement. Chapter 3 presents the practical reasons for church replanting, including biblical stewardship, encouragement, and community vibrancy through gospel advancement. Chapter 4 describes the details and descriptions of the project itself, recounting the project goals, content, and teaching methodology of the eight-week series. Chapter 5 evaluates the effectiveness of the project based on the completion of the project goals. Ultimately, this project intended to take the first step in equipping churches for church replanting.

James Keith Adams

The purpose of this project was to develop an evangelistic outreach strategy for Fellowship Memphis. The project focused on local evangelism for the surrounding area of the two campuses of the church using demographic and psychographic research. Demographics describe who people are while psychographics explains what people prefer. The project director contracted with Church Answers to obtain demographics and psychographics. Dr. Sam Rainer disaggregated the data obtained from the report.

The goal of the demographic and psychographic analysis was to determine marketing and outreach strategies best suited for the community surrounding both campuses of the church. The demographics and psychographics of the campuses were similar, but the strategy planning team identified differences that would produce different focuses for each campus. The next stage of the project was researching best practices of evangelistic outreach utilized by effective churches. The project director surveyed and interviewed selected ministers from evangelistic churches to determine best practices in the field of evangelistic outreach. He then developed the strategy with the assistance of a strategy planning team.