OUTREACH/VIDEO IDEA - CLICK HERE TO WATCH VIDEO! - Check out people's incredible reactions when someone shows up and freely pays for their groceries. When we show people grace, we point people towards God's ultimate gracious gift--Jesus Christ! I wonder if this would not be a better…

Tonight I had two amazing studies that I know were led by the Holy Spirit working through me and our Friendspeak program.

First I studied with a young mother from Iran.  We were on our 13th week of Friendspeak in the book of Luke.  Friendspeak is a program that allows us to teach English using portions of the Bible from the books of Luke, Acts…

Story of Redemption 1.1. - "Intro and In the Beginning" (from Love and Creation) from James Nored on Vimeo.

In thinking about and planning for outreach, we often only focus on adults. And yet teens (and even those younger) can be incredible evangelists for…

Thanksgiving is a great time of food, family, and fun (the fun in our family includes watching the Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving game!). But did you know that Thanksgiving is also a great time and opportunity to reach out.



Here are seven simple but powerful ways to reach out this Thanksgiving and have a "missional" Thanksgiving. (A thank you to…

Tonight we had one of our "Coffee House" events at our church--a night of music (sung and played), art (painted by our members and displayed at our gathering), and spoken word (poetry, short readings--even a rap from our interns back in the summer). We are doing this once a month on Wednesday nights, and it has been well received.…

Jesus calls us to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and visit the sick. And if we do this to even "The Least of These," we have done this unto Christ (Mt. 25:40). So there are so many reasons to reach out to the poor in those in need in our community. It meets a need. It shows kindness. It brings glory to God. And as Mt. 25:40 shows, through this service, we…

Tonight was a fantastic night of service for those going to the Dominican Republic family trip this December. My girls, Gina and Emily, were able to serve alongside other families in checking the Magi boxes, making sure that they were ready for shipment.

But what really made the night was that the person who leads this…

Today we were blessed to have a study with a woman named Jacinta. She starting worshiping with us about three weeks ago, after being directed towards us by one of our church leaders who works for a local non-profit.

Jacinta checked on her connection card (member/guest card) that she was interested in a seeker Bible study. We have this listed as a prominent type of response that people can check on their card, which helps in setting up these studies. So we got…

I love sharing the gospel, seeing people come to faith, equipping others to reach out, starting missional movements within a congregation. I hope that, no matter your gifting, that is something that you want to see happen too.

While this is the church that God calls us to be--we are fundamentally a church on mission--this is…

I love sharing the gospel, seeing people come to faith, equipping others to reach out, starting missional movements within a congregation. I hope that, no matter your gifting, that is something that you want to see happen too.

While this is the church that God calls us to be--we are fundamentally a church on mission--this is…

Does prayer make a difference in reaching out to others for Christ--including starting seeker Bible studies? Does having a specific time and date and plan for a seeker study matter? Is there power in making a specific ask of people?

The answer to these questions is YES!

1. A Plan

Recently,…

How Do We Reach People for Christ? - The Apostle Paul was one of the major writers of the New Testament and one of the greatest evangelists who ever lived. In the close to his letter to the church in Colossi, Paul wrote:

2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our…

Vacation Bible School was once billed as an outreach event. And indeed it was at one time. Unfortunately, today it is often merely an event for our own children. So, how do we make VBS more evangelistic.

1. Pray for this event, that God will send seekers the church's way. Evangelism does not happen without…

I love sharing the gospel with people. And I love seeing people start following Jesus and be baptized into his name.

This past Sunday, Vololona (2nd from the left in picture above) and her nephew, Earnest (2nd from the right in picture above), were baptized into Christ! They are originally from Madagascar, and we came to know them through our…

Last Sunday night, my wife Becki and I went over the home of one of our neighbors, Venky and Sudha. They are from India (Andra Pradesh). We had a great time eating authentic Indian food and enjoying their home and company.

Venky was a doctor in India, but in order to be able to leave India and come to the US, he had to change his profession to that of an occupational therapist (it is hard for doctors to be allowed to leave India). And to get into the US, they…

There are a number of things involved and steps on the journey of a person going from being an unchurched person, non-Christian, or seeker, and become a baptized follower of Christ. Outlining all of the typical steps or aspects of an outreach strategy would be the subject of another post. 

However, one essential part of this outreach is having low key,…

As I detailed in a recent post, our church has adopted a local elementary school. While the children in schools are often adopted, the teachers often are left out. So our church decided to help the teachers--who are underpaid and understaffed--in many ways, including providing them school supplies.

After the church delivered a ton of…

One of the primary challenges that the church and Christians have in the US is bad PR. Amongst non-Christians and non-church going folk, churches and Christians are unfortunately often portrayed and viewed as intolerant, bigoted, and self-serving.

Some of the primary challenges of public schools and school administrators are:…

How do you reach the unchurched? Build it and they will come? Here is a very relevant article from ChurchLeaders.com on reaching the unchurched. 

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Another one came this past week. A flyer arrived in my…

Thom S. Rainer, author of a number of books on outreach and does research on this subject, wrote the following article, Evangelistic Churches and the MPI. This article gives research on some common things found in successful evangelistic churches.  I have copied the…