As our Summer Ministry Training Week draws to a close, we will be turning our eyes to our 2018 Mission.
As I hope you know by now, we are going to be engaged in three weeks of mission from 11th March until Easter. All the Anglican Churches in our region will be working together, complemented by students from Moore College, to start conversations with people about who Jesus is and what he has done for us. Some of the specific activities we will be involved with include:
– Leafleting at railway stations
– Multi-faith dialogue between a Christian and other leaders
– TED-talk style presentations on who Jesus is with the opportunity for interaction
– After school pop-up kids club
– Seniors Health and well-being talk
– ESL Evangelistic morning
– A men’s event and a women’s event…. and more
With all the churches involved we have a unique opportunity to really turn up the heat on the conversation and bring Jesus onto the agenda of the people in our region.
But the real core of the mission is all of us as individuals bringing Jesus into conversation. By wearing a t-shirt or badge, you give people the opportunity to ask you what it is all about.
You then answer with the memorised “opening line” to get into “Jesus Is ______.” conversations. Something like this…
“We’re interested in people’s opinions. Jesus is… (Gesture to the “Jesus Is ______.” logo). What goes in the blank?”
It might feel silly, but the idea is to get a plausible sounding introduction rolling off everyone’s tongue and sounding normal, so that people don’t feel so quite stuck or hesitant in having a go at raising the “Jesus Is ______.” topic of conversation. Of course, it will still take courage!
In the past, people who were not prepared for when a friend, colleague or passerby commented on the T-shirt/badge etc. tended to stumble around into vague conversational dead ends like this:
“What’s that T-shirt all about?”
“Oh, err, um, it’s something the churches are doing at the moment.”
Conversation quickly tails off, because neither person knows where to go then.
We are going to equip your Growth Group leaders with some material soon so you can work on it together. By learning the line exactly, you are ready to go with something confidently along those lines when a real life opportunity happily surprises you!
In Christ,
Nigel Fortescue