The story of the prostitute who crashed the Pharisee’s party has often captured my attention.

I’ve often wondered what triggered such an emotional response in her that she’d break all protocol and wipe the feet of Jesus with her tears. (Read more about the prostitute of Luke 7 in my sermon notes: Who do you see?)

In my evangelism teaching, I often ask

How can I find that same passion that leads to the spontaneous worship of Jesus?

What triggered that passion in this prostitute?

In an earlier post on a wrestling with a definition of evangelism, I noted:

I see Jesus asking questions of the heart as in the story of the Good Samaritan, or talking with the woman at the well.

I see Jesus forgiving people.

A prostitute who hears “come unto me all ye who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest” finds forgiveness and anoints the feet of Jesus with perfume and her tears.  She was forgiven much, she loves much.  So much that she breaks all sorts of social protocol and wrecks someone’s dinner.

To a woman caught in adultery – “Who condemns you, neither do I.”  To a teenager broken over sex outside of marriage – there is hope in that story that she or he can be restored to God.

I see Jesus seeking after people, Zacchaeus in a tree.  With a little sanctified imagination, I can imagine that Matthew was at that dinner as well, a life transformed as a witness to Zacchaeus.

The four points we typically scripted outline are not recorded in any whole outline in the teachings of Jesus.  He invites well known sinners to come and see, come and follow.  . . .

I wonder how we as Christians can recapture that sense of invitation: “come and see this man” (Samaritan), “Come and see” (Nathaniel), “Come unto Me” (Jesus).  How as a church can we create that place where people can investigate, explore, and discover?

The post Audio Sermon: The Forgiven Prostitute appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Evangelism Conversations through Popular Novels, or Novel Evangelism.

Its an evangelistic bridge building strategy to help the believers in your church recognize and participate in more conversational opportunities about people’s spiritual journey.

I’m familiar with using the same ideas in popular music, and movies, so the idea isn’t new.

Listen to my friend Bill Feree talk about how he’s doing this in a Sunday school Class.

Key takeaways about personal evangelism:

The post Novel Evangelism: Build Bridges through Books appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Pastors Allen and Debbie Kemp led their church into a Faith in Action Sunday, following a program that has been developed by World Vision.

They chose to take their regular Sunday service and move it to the front lawn of their church — going to the streets, so to speak.

Their church has done several short-term mission trips. This idea came out of wondering why can’t they do some of that same compassionate work in their local neighborhood.

One additional feature of their missional event was the prayer station (Follow the link to see how to do a prayer station).

Staffed with elders trained in compassionate prayer, this was a place where people could unload their burdens and have someone pray with them.

People self-selected to sit at the table.

This is a place where evangelism conversations can happen normally, as people express their spiritual thirst. (See What is Spiritual Thirst?)

This is also a place to hear about community needs that might be under the radar.

Alan and I did a phone conversation about how to setup the prayer station.  Listen here:

The post The Prayer Station at Faith in Action Sunday appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Jeff Johnson is the author of Got Style?

In this Evangelismcoach podcast episode, I talk with Jeffrey Johnson about every evangelism style has a place in the ministry of evangelism.

The styles (with one of the characteristics of each style) are:

In 6 chapters of Got Style? Personality Based Evangelism, Johnson maps out a biblical example of each style, and speaks of strengths and weaknesses of each.  This goes way beyond the “this is the best or only way of evangelism” most books focus on.

We’ll be talking about how personal evangelism fits into the local church.  The big problem that we see with most evangelism training is that it is divorced from connecting people to the local church.  How can we help the church support the work of evangelism?

The post Evangelismcoach Podcast: Jeff Johnson Personality Based Evangelism appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Tonight I was asked by a guy in our church

Being a greeter is much more than shaking hands as people walk in the door of your church during worship services.

So many churches simply recruit warm bodies to fill the role of church greeter without much

into the role that greeters have come to play in American churches.

Greeters are the front line of your church’s hospitality ministry.

They are a vital part of your organized friendliness that helps members and visitors connect.

But how do you train greeters?

(There are only so may ways to say “Good Morning”.)

What does a church greeter training meeting look like?

What resources might be available to help with recruiting and organizing greeters?

Author of The Work of the Greeter, Paige Lanier Chargois has found some insights from her research and experience across the United states and 47 different countries.

Thank you for providing this valuable service. I attend a smaller church and there were several points that we will be able to work on for an improved more complete welcome to those who are seeking to worship together with their brothers and sisters. Thank you. I look forward to going over the presentation power point with our group next.

Diane

You will need the most recent version of the Adobe Flash Player to see the replay.

Her first solo book is Certain Women Called By Christ:  Biblical Realities for Today which is based on the Gospel of Luke 8:1-3.

Her second book, The Work of the Greeter was released in June ’09.  It provides the biblical basis of hospitality along with practical directions and instructive information about launching or sustaining a congregation’s greeters ministry.  It is part of Judson’s book series covering every task in the church.

Paige has served as Director of Membership and Maturity with the Saint Paul’s Baptist Church in Richmond VA at which she developed the structure to accomplish the Pastor’s vision for small groups.  More recently she has served as the Pastor of First Baptist Church in Franklin, VA.

Dr. Chargois teaches theology, world religions, and missions at Richmond Virginia Seminary.  She is a member of the Saint Paul’s church family, and continues to serve the Kingdom of our Lord as a church consultant, leadership trainer, workshop leader, and Bible teacher along with being tapped to preach at churches and retreats.

Thank you for providing this valuable service. I attend a smaller church and there were several points that we will be able to work on for an improved more complete welcome to those who are seeking to worship together with their brothers and sisters. Thank you. I look forward to going over the presentation power point with our group next. I hope that your Columbus Day weekend is a blessed and joyous one!!

The post Webinar: Training Church Greeters Resources appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Join Chris Walker of EvangelismCoach.org talking with Bill and Gail Royster, The Welcome & Hospitality People, church hospitality consultants for more than 25 years as we talk about “the little things” that help to make a great first impression.

We’ll look at easy to hard fixes that you can make this weekend when it comes specifically to preparing your church building for worship.

We’ll also be discussing Chris’ book How To Welcome Church Visitors and Church greeters 101

Listen in to the podcast

The post Podcast: Expert Interivew on Church Hospitality – Little Things Mean Alot appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Do you like the look or feel of your church websites?

• They are embarrassing.
• They are clumsy.
• They are hard to keep up to date.
• It was designed 10 years ago in HTML and uses expensive software.

What if you could fix that

• for free (do it yourself) or
• for a small fee and outsource a new setup and then upkeep yourself?

I’ve arranged a conversation with the three experts I look to when it comes to my ministry website.

I knew absolutely nothing 2 years ago, and what you see here at EvangelismCoach.org I learned in under 30 days.

In fact, I understood things in under 2 weeks and I still run the entire website all by myself.

It’s really easy, the software is free, and the learning curve was short.

I don’t know a thing about graphic design or HTML or PHP (well, now I know very little).

If you can write, and hit a publish button, you can make an easy to use and keep current church website.

I interview

• Yvon Prehn of Effective Church Communications, who has lots of videos for the do it yourself type
• my personal guru, Neal Locke, who will do simple migrations or start-ups for you
• Paul Steinbrueck of OurChurch.com, who can do more complex websites and custom designs

Paul Steinbrueck

Twitter: @Paulsteinbrueck
OurChurch.Com – Comprehensive Web Solutions for Christians

OurChurch.Com web design, hosting, & marketing services: http://OurChurch.Com
Christian Web Trends Blog: http://blog.ourchurch.com
Church Website Tips page: http://blog.ourchurch.com/church-website-tips/

Twitter: @YvonPrehn
website: www.effectivechurchcom.com
YouTube channel: www.YouTube.com/yvonprehn

Twitter: @MstrLocke
my website:  http://www.mrlocke.net

Here is one solution to turn your clumsy embarrassing church website into a awesome front porch for your visitors to come and see you before coming to see you.

Sure, you could do it free, but has anyone fixed your church website site in 10 years?

Clover Website is one solution to a church website that works.

I subscribe to a email list of church administrators and this one has been highly recommended in that list.  You can read those recommendations here.

We just switched to Clover Church Websites Sites last month. Our Youth Pastor maintains it and loves it. They even have a live person that answers the phone if there are any questions!

Definite limitations due to the fact that they’ve designed it for easy use by non-web designers but the benefits, in my opinion, far outweigh the limitations. We haven’t been backed into a corner by any of the limitations.  Most have an easy work around.

Look into Clover for your church website.  This is an affiliate link which will benefit our ministry work in Latin America.

The post Expert Interview — Simple Church Websites that Work appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.

Ed Cyzewski (MDiv Biblical Theological Seminary) is a freelance writer, speaker, and blogger in New England.

He is the author of Coffeehouse Theology: Reflecting on God in Everyday Life (NavPress), an introduction to contextual theology for lay readers that explained the roles of context, God, scripture, tradition, and global Christians in the forming of theology.

Ed blogs regularly on theology at www.inamirrordimly.com and on writing at www.edcyz.com.

Twitter: EdCyzewski

October 13, 2009, 3pm: Webinar: Matching the Gospel to a Persons Need

Guest: Brad Long, Executive Director of PRMI.org

The post Webinar Resource: Coffee House Theology appeared first on EvangelismCoach.org.