Sadly to say that most of the unsaved people in our communities will never come to a church building because of preconceived ideas about churches, like that they are nothing but dead religion or they are not relevant to their life or today’s society. Many people have had a bad experience at church therefore; they believe all churches are alike. If we are truly going to fulfill the Great Commission that Jesus told us was our job as his disciples to “go into all the world and make disciples.” We are going to have to go to the world. Go into our communities and present the gospel to the world on their turf. It really does not matter what this looks like as long as the gospel is presented. If we can find a need in our community to be a blessing to people, it will open the door for people to hear the good news of Jesus. I have seen churches go into their community and spend upward of $10,000 on an event that was a blessing however; the gospel was not presented. Essentially this equals nothing more that a carnival or a fair that the world puts on for themselves however; it was sponsored by a church. If we are going to make disciples we must present the gospel in a nonthreatening way and give people an opportunity to respond to the message by giving their lives to Jesus. Otherwise, we are throwing money at the wind.
A few years we got to partner with a local ministry called React that holds monthly events in our city with free food, prizes, and entertainment however; the Gospel is clearly presented to all that attend. We did a scaled down version of our “What is a Christian” program and were able to lead the ones who wanted to be born again to Jesus.
Each year our goal is to do several programs outside of a local church building. Out where the people are. In communities, parks, schools, anywhere we can get a crowd to hear the Gospel.
Someone once said "We're no longer fishers of men, but keepers of the aquarium, and we spend most of our time swiping fish from each others bowls."
I pray this changes! I pray that more churches would have us in to do events at a neutral location where more unchurched people will come and give their lives to Jesus and then be invited to a local church and become disciples of Jesus.
Jerry Moyer
Jubilee Gang Ministries
www.jubileegang.com