Affinity Evangelism

... on an Affinity Evangelism project.  It has been done in several places. Briefly, here is one story ...

About 10 churches in the Apex, NC area created a week of affinity evangelism events. They hosted about 26 events with 4 evangelists from the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College.  Affinities included poker players, scrabookers, senior citzens, a women's prison, home improvements, a baseball clinic, veterans, software engineers, a sweethearts dinner, golfers, sportsmen, parents of teens and others. These were fun, creative events, each with their own unique gospel presentation. See a news story about the event here.

That's still a relatively small event.

But what if churches started strategizing regionally to saturate a state or part of it? I think about the cooperative spirit of some of the places I have worked previously.

What if the churches in the cities across the Iron Range in northern Minnesota ... Virinia, Chisholm, Hibbing and Grand Rapids all the small towns surrounding them all worked together to have a massive week of affinity events? Or what about all the churches across the MN I-2 corridor from Duluth, MN to Grand Forks, ND? There is a great cooperative spirit there.

But I have seen that same cooperative spirit elsewhere with churches in the Mohawk Valley region of New York: from Herkimer to Oneida, from Boonville to Bridgewater. Or in northeast Ohio from Conneaut to Madison, from Ashtabula south to Jefferson. The North Country in northern New York could come together again. Last time they had churches from A-Bay south to the village of Mexico (not the country) and from Lake Ontario over to Lowville.

Instead of doing a large festival, these regions of churches could create dozens of affinity events utilizing both locally recognized and national evangelists and their organizations. Whereas evangelistic festivals/crusades can costs hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions, a group of regional affinity events like these could cost significantly less.

In terms of total numbers of persons attending, festivals and affinity events could reach similar amounts of people. Some experts suggest that there is even a higher rate of conversion through affinity evangelism than festival evangelism.

The great thing about affinity evangelism like this is that it can be down in small towns and larger cities and make a significant impact, especially when there is a group of churches working together.  Think cooperatively.  We can reach more together.  It can be done.