What can churches do to see evangelism flourish?

Churches that struggle to see conversions don’t run a ministry aimed at the critical step of conversion.

There’s often a lot of attention directed towards the previous step, engaging and connecting with people (carols, advertising, social media, public events); and there’s a lot of thought being put into the maturity/discipleship work which comes afterwards (Bible studies, small groups and training). But a ministry aimed primarily at that critical, intermediate step of seeing people converted – that is missing.

Why? Well, we’ve moved the goalposts: instead of running a conversion ministry, we expect the congregation to do individual, one-to-one evangelism, which doesn’t tend to yield great results.

So what should churches be doing instead?

The churches that see a steady stream of people converted over decades run a regular, dependable, biblical, repeatable, scalable, continual, evangelistic course. We call that a ‘conversion engine.’ A course like, Discover, Christianity Explored, Taste and See, or Simply Christianity.

That doesn’t mean that it has to be bigger than a Billy Graham crusade. In fact, it’s often the reverse – a conversion engine that’s simple, but runs continually, is well-practiced, and which the congregation is involved in and comfortable running too.

It’s also essential to have a follow-up pathway. So that five-week course turns into a Bible study, and that Bible study meets for the rest of the year.

We don’t have people finish the course, and then send them to a Bible study on Leviticus or Ezekiel. It would be madness to do that! We care for and develop these people thoughtfully, over time.

We talked earlier about the ‘three shifts’ in the life of a convert: Dead to disciple, disciple to disciple-maker, and distracted to delighted. What does it look like when churches do this well?

I think it usually takes place in three separate spaces: the heart, the head, and the hands.

What is needed in people’s hearts?

The inner zeal and passion to see people become Christians.

This passion isn’t a light switch which you can just flick on inside someone, so they say: I’m going to be an evangelist my whole life! Because evangelism is the most terrifying thing you’ll ever do.

The passion to be involved in disciple-making is like a sensor light: when you stop moving, it turns off.

We need to preach to people’s hearts the necessity of knowing and telling the gospel. It requires continual attention, continual energy, continual zeal.

What shift takes place in the head?

Gaining the confidence that God really is still at work. People need to be convicted that the gospel does save people, and they can be involved in the great mission of God.

This shift tends to happen through actual involvement in evangelism.

That’s best done by pairing experienced evangelists with inexperienced members of the congregation. As they’re sitting there watching, listening, observing evangelism, it builds their confidence that God is still saving people. The gospel still works.

And the third place, the hands?

By that, I mean growing in competence – training people how to share the gospel.

A couple times a year, you spend time together equipping people for evangelism.

The real key is to keep at it. Do it every year, not just once. That would be like saying, well, we’re not going to teach the new Year 7 students algebra this year, because we already taught Year 7 algebra last year. That would be madness!

That sounds like more things to pack into an already busy church calendar …

What I’ve seen from churches that generate lots of conversions is that they tend to do less, better. They’ve resisted the temptation to run a whole bunch of different things, like throwing darts at a dartboard. Instead, they have a gospel course which is well-oiled and repeatable. 

If a church can do that, they often notice something else astonishing. If their ‘conversion engine’ is thoughtfully done, it becomes a contact and connect event anyway.

Once people have passed through those two steps, they can move into the discipleship stage – an area most churches are pretty competent in.

The key to all of this is the perseverance of the leader in developing and executing a simple, repeatable plan. Doing this builds confidence in the church family, and allows you to improve your efforts over time.

The great news is that God is not done saving people in Australia! So let’s keep at it!