by Kwasi Kena
Click here for "This Lenten Season, Find Your Macedonia" (MP3 file)
During the night Paul had a vision: there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him and saying, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." When we had seen the vision, we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them. (Acts 16:9-10, NRSV)
Many of us have heard of Paul's "Macedonian call." Many of us have preached on this famous passage. On one occasion, however, a preacher said something revelatory about this familiar passage.
"Where is your Macedonia?" Throughout his sermon, a preacher repeated this question for emphasis. "Where is your Macedonia?" he asked and finally answered. "It's one step beyond your comfort zone."
One Step Beyond Your Comfort Zone
The word "go" from the Great Commission continues to hover over the church. This Lenten season, go one step beyond your church's comfort zone. Do more than prepare good Holy Week services. Invite members of the church to pray for people who need to know Jesus Christ, need a church home, and need a demonstration of God's love and grace. Involve your congregation in this prayer ministry by putting prayer inserts and three invitations to Easter Sunday worship in your Sunday bulletin. Allow time for the congregation to write the names of Friends, Relatives, Associates and Neighbors (FRAN) for whom they will pray daily throughout the Lenten season.
Each week, set aside time for people to pray corporately during the Sunday morning worship for the people written on their prayer cards. Encourage your congregation to pray about three people on the list whom they will personally invite to Easter Sunday worship service. Ask your congregation to give the invitations to the three people personally. If an invitation has to be mailed, encourage your congregation follow up with a telephone, e-mail, or visit to the invitee to personalize the invitation.
This Easter, Color Outside the Lines
Consider taking the Easter worship service to the people in the community. Here are some ideas:>
- Use art to reach your community. An innovative church, the House of Mercy (HOM), created the "Artbus Church," which meanders through St. Paul, Minnesota, in the spring, inviting people to paint God. (See "An Artful Approach to Sharing God's Truth" by Bob Newman.)
- Develop teams of people to conduct Easter Worship services in trailer parks, housing projects, nursing homes, retirement homes, prisons, and so on. Include children's services and Easter egg hunts. Consider using drama, liturgical movement, mime, clown ministry, puppet ministry, and lively music.
- Conduct your Easter service in a "neutral site." One church conducted Easter worship at the business of one of their members.
Take Prayer Into Your Community
Develop a relationship with various small businesses in your community: barbershops, beauty salons, hardware stores, and so on. Ask permission to maintain a "prayer box." The prayer box is for receiving prayer requests from the community. Create prayer request slips with room for the prayer request and check boxes for:
- Information about ministries of the church (provide a list or phone number)
- Contact information from the person (optional)
- Invitation to join the church mailing list (if you have A newsletter)
- ___ Other
Put the name of your church, worship times, contact information, on the box or on business cards to place next to the prayer box. Collect the prayer requests once or twice a week.
What's Next?
Each outreach event should lead to another one. If you work diligently to get people to visit your Easter worship service, plan to have a community food fest or concert or some other activity to draw visitors back for a second experience. Plan a compelling sermon series beginning the week following Easter to compel visitors to return. For creative sermon series titles, go to the Church of the Resurrection website sermon archives.
This Lenten season, dare to go one step beyond your comfort zone and find your Macedonia.
Suggested Resources
Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. Copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Evangelistic Preaching Helps. Copyright © 2007 The General Board of Discipleship of The United Methodist Church, PO Box 340003, Nashville TN 37203-0003. Evangelism website: www.umcevangelism.org.
This evangelistic preaching help may be printed, copied, distributed, reprinted in church bulletins or newsletters, or otherwise used for nonprofit local church worship or education with the inclusion of the copyright citation and General Board of Discipleship evangelism website as its source. It may not be used for profit or republication without prior permission. It may not be reproduced on another website, although other websites are welcome to link to it.
Evangelism Preaching Helps is a monthly online resource designed as an aid to assist in the preparation of sermons with an evangelistic focus. Highly effective evangelistic churches include at least one evangelistic sermon per month. Periodically, feature articles and sermon series aids will also appear in Evangelistic Preaching Helps. Thank you for your continued use of this resource. his page was developed by Kwasi Kena, Director of Evangelism Ministries for the General Board of Discipleship. If you would like to suggest ways to make "Evangelistic Preaching Helps" more useful, please send a comment to Kwasi Kena.
Posted 2-20-07.
