Engagement Strategies. There is a familiar adage: "Information without application equals inoculation." This holds true in almost every situation. I have noticed this to hold true in the field of evangelism education. I have experienced that any effort at training Christians in evangelism is of little or no value in accomplishing true evangelism unless there is an equal effort at engaging Christians in evangelism. For this reason, Church Partnership Evangelism holds as a central aspect of its ministry the commitment to training lay people in personal evangelism through a strategy that actually engages them in the activity.
Every day of a CPE event begins with training in personal evangelism and in the proper use of a specific tract used for doing personal evangelism. The lesson usually lasts about 45 minutes. The rest of the day is dedicated to sending participants out two by two to pre-arranged appointments or door-to-door for the purpose of doing evangelism. As a result, when our CPE event comes to an end, we will have engaged significant numbers of lay people in practicing what we preached to them; We do Personal Evangelism.
However, although we have done the work of evangelism, our job is not done. There must be an equal commitment to disciple those
who have made professions of faith as a result of one's personal evangelism. Unfortunately, in the excitement of successfully
sharing one's faith, it is easy to pay little more than lip service to discipleship.
Temptation to Let Discipleship Slide. I
recall one of our first campaigns in which we worked with a church that was experiencing good responses to the gospel. When
we encouraged them to break away from evangelism efforts to do discipleship, they assured us that they would get to that when we left,
but they wished to continue to strike while the iron was hot in evangelism. Now discipleship and follow-up of new believers
isn't as exciting as the initial evangelism---at least it wasn't for them, and all our encouragement to do follow-up went primarily
unheeded by that church.
A ministry may attempt to avoid slacking off in discipleship by providing follow-up material for the discipleship of new Christians. (CPE provides its own follow-up material.) I recall a short-term missions campaign I made with a prominent Christian organization. The organization left behind, in the wake of a seemingly successful ministry, loads of discipleship material to be used with those who had indicated a decision for Christ, along with a stack of cards with the names and addresses of those who indicated they had made a decision for Christ.
Upon returning to the same field a year later, the stack of material was still there in the church's crammed office, and so was the stack of decision cards. To make sure that discipleship is taking place, a ministry may even go beyond encouraging discipleship and providing material to establishing training in personal and small-group discipleship. But even here, this effort often falls short of the actual need to engage lay people in discipleship. So we at CPE must also do Discipleship. Every morning of a CPE event, we also take time to train in personal and small group discipleship.
Purposeful Discipleship. In order to do discipleship, we attempt a second visit with any individual making a decision for Christ for the purpose of establishing a discipling relationship with them. If they want a third visit, we make it a priority over everything else. Many times, on the third visit we will be greeted by additional friends waiting to hear our message the message of Christ. On those occasions, we set aside our discipleship material and present to these new guests the good news and give them the opportunity to decide what they will do about Jesus.
Generally, the result of such times is a third visit for discipleship with not one individual, but a small group or cell of brand-new Christians ready to begin an ongoing discipling relationship. These new disciples and new discipling groups are the building materials for new churches and new outposts from which the Gospel of Jesus Christ can spread.
Recap.
Where all this leads to is real evangelism and real discipleship springing from regular Christians, resulting in the foundation of new churches and in real gains for the Kingdom.
Yet of the original 106, fifty-eight people were engaged in regular personal discipleship and thirty-eight were attending cell groups. One group had nineteen new converts in it. The pastor also noted that twenty-four were attending the services of the church, and another fourteen had already been baptized. Finally, the pastor added that above all this, he rejoiced that his people had been brought to a new level in ministry. He rejoiced also that his congregation laid the foundation for future growth in evangelism, discipleship, and the planting of new churches. This is how Church Partnership Evangelism can help mission churches start new cells and plant new churches.