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Pastors, lay people learn practical approaches to evangelism

Jan. 12, 2006

News media contact:   Linda  Green * (615) 7425470*  Nashville {016}

NOTE: Photographs and audio are available at http://umns.umc.org
<http://umns.umc.org/> .

By Linda Green*

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (UMNS) - Instructions exist for almost every aspect of
our material lives, but pastors and church leaders came to the Congress
on Evangelism seeking instructions of a spiritual kind: the "how-tos"
for winning souls to Christ.

More than 950 people, including United Methodists from the Philippines
and Norway, came to learn how they can "Let the Good News Roll" at the
2006 Congress on Evangelism, held Jan. 3-6. The annual congress provides
evangelical methods and methodology to earn disciples for the Lord.

"Evangelism is important because God mandates that we are to go and
preach to the whole world that Jesus is the way, the truth and the
life," said the Rev. Gary Exman, Columbus, Ohio, immediate past
president of the Council on Evangelism of the United Methodist Church.
The council is a sponsor of the congress and affiliate of the United
Methodist Board of Discipleship.

According to Bishop William Willimon, evangelism is done as a response
to the God who first reached out to us, and it begins in the heart of
God and God's desire to have a people.	"We call it Good News because it
is something that came to us rather than something that is derived from
us," said the bishop, who leads the denomination's Birmingham (Ala.)
Area.

Exman, a pastor in the denomination for 39 years, told United Methodist
News Service that the 50-year-old council was created to "propagate"
evangelism in local churches, districts and conferences across the
denomination.

Since 75 percent of United Methodist churches are in small-town and
rural settings, the congress aims to lift up Christ, to teach those
church leaders how to evangelize and to foster church growth, he said.
Exman also leads Come and See Ministries, designed to strengthen
small-town and rural congregations.

Congress officials also have been concerned about involving more young
people in evangelism work. In the last three years, the council has
provided more than 300 pastors and lay people under the age of 40 with
scholarships to attend the national event.

During the congress, church leaders focused on how to win people to
Christ in individual and corporate ways. "Evangelism is to bring people
to Christ and to bring them to a relationship with him," Exman said.

Jesus is called the evangelical who said that no one gets to God but
through him, Exman noted. "We must challenge people, even in this
politically correct day, in appropriate ways - which we Methodists are
very careful to not offend if possible - to bring people to Christ,
which Jesus called us to do."

But pastors often do not know how to extend an invitation to
discipleship. "An invitation is a long and tried and true standard of
evangelism," he explained. "Many of our seminaries teach theology, but
they don't teach as much 'how-tos.'"

To address that, the Foundation for Evangelism, based in Lake Junaluska,
N.C., has provided financial support for each of the 13 United Methodist
theological schools to have a professor to teach the how-tos of bringing
people to Christ.

Willimon outlined the differences between preaching and evangelism in
his discussions.  Evangelism, he pointed out, is a claim about who God
is and what God does, and it's a claim about reality.

"Evangelism is something God does. Evangelism is an act of God," he
said.

He said a lot of preaching, including his own, is far too
"anthropocentric and not theocentric," or is modern or individualistic
when it should be cosmic.

The Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell, pastor of Windsor Village United Methodist
Church in Houston, told participants that before anyone can do
evangelism, that person must make certain he or she is whole, healed and
well as a result of applying the spiritual disciplines in his or her own
life.

Caldwell, pastor of the denomination's largest congregation, said that
in order to make local churches grow, leaders who have a heart for God
are needed, and they must possess five characteristics: be Christian; be
consecrated and tithe; be competent; be compassionate; and be
community-minded.

"Once you get yourself together and your leaders together, the church
will follow," he said.

The Rev. Billy Abraham, professor of Wesleyan studies at Perkins School
of Theology in Dallas, told the gathering that bringing people to Christ
requires a recovery of nerve to say that regardless of what is happening
in the world, God created his kingdom and invites people to become a
part of it.

In other action, the congress:

"	Collected $13,000 for survivors of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita
and pastors affected by the storms. The money will be disbursed by
bishops in the affected areas. This year's congress originally was to
have been held in New Orleans.

"	Honored Charles Whittle of Fort Worth, Texas, for 50 years of
evangelical service.
"	Elected officers for 2006-08: the Rev. David S. Kerr of St.
Louis, president; the Rev. Joe Peabody of Dalton, Ga., vice president;
the Rev. Allen Black of Fayetteville, Tenn., secretary; the Rev. Patti
McGinn of Marshall, Texas, treasurer.

Next year's Congress on Evangelism will be Jan. 2-5 in Myrtle Beach,
S.C.

*Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in
Nashville, Tenn.

News media contact: Linda Green, (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.

********************

United Methodist News Service
Photos and stories also available at:
http://umns.umc.org

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