By Larry Rosenbaum
When I came to San Francisco in 1975, I looked for a church that was committed to evangelism. I found a small church of about 100 that had two full-time staff members: a pastor and an evangelist. The primary ministry of the evangelist was to train church members to evangelize and oversee outreach ministries in the church.
Today, the staff evangelist seems to have gone the way of the dinosaur. I am familiar with hundreds of churches, but do not know a single one that has on staff an equipping evangelist. Some are large churches with thousands of members and 30 or 40 full-time staff members, yet nobody on staff has as his primary ministry to equip, motivate, and coordinate outreach ministries for the church.
There are two kinds of church growth: the addition of new converts (conversion growth) and attracting Christians from other churches (transfer growth). Most church growth that has occurred in the U.S. since 1980 is transfer growth. Adding a youth pastor, singles pastor, or music minister to your staff will make the church more attractive to Christians, contributing largely to transfer growth. Adding an evangelist to your church staff should lead to conversion growth.
Many churches today experience growth by attracting self-centered, worldly Christians and false converts who like attending church. Our churches would be healthier without such people. Instead, we need to attract true believers who want to die to self and serve Jesus Christ by reaching out to the lost.
“Where there are no oxen, the manger is clean, but from the strength of the ox comes an abundant harvest” Prov. 14:4. Evangelists cause problems for the church. They challenge complacent Christians to witness. They bring new believers into the church with lots of problems. Often long-time church members don’t want these new people in their church.
What our churches need is a “back door revival.” We could use a few “blessed subtractions” of those who oppose the Great Commission. A good way to achieve this is to hire a full-time staff evangelist. Give him opportunities to preach on Sunday morning about the responsibility of Christians to witness and to train people in witnessing. Give him freedom to organize, facilitate, coordinate and promote various kinds of outreach in the church. Those who do not want to witness can find hundreds of other churches to attend. Those who believe in the Great Commission will be attracted to a church that is committed to evangelism.
I encourage each of you to speak with your pastor, elders, and church board. Urge them to make the next person they hire an equipping evangelist. You can show them this teaching. Then pray. Pray that God will raise up an evangelist in your church who can be on staff, or lead you to one who would work well with your church fellowship. Pray that God will move in the hearts of your church leaders to hire him. Please call or write me if I can help you with this.
