No Strings Attached

Relevance in the community is a key component to creating influence for your church. Community outreach is a great way to express God's love for the lost through simple acts of kindness with no strings attached.

Living Word conducted our first summer Operation Outreach event last Wednesday night. Despite weather that has been colder and wetter then usual our experience was very positive. I thought it might be helpful to describe how we Rock the Neighborhood with evangelistic activities.

The midweek service starts at 6:30 p.m. which is one half hour earlier than normal. In this way we capture as much sunlight as possible. Our youth band gets everyone energized with Hillsong’s “Tell the World.” Workers don distinctive t-shirts identifying them as Living Word outreachers.

This time we had 225 workers participate in fifteen separate events. 40 teens staged a “reverse car wash” in the parking lot of a local food market. (At the completion of the $1 car wash we award our guests a $1 for the privilege of washing their car.)

Several yard care teams mowed, raked and weeded the lawns of senior and disabled adults. Four groups of outreachers cleaned up local parks of litter and trash and two teams replanted gardens for our community parks maintenance department. Fifteen families with small children handed out hundreds bottles of ice cold water to softball game spectators. Half dozen eager teens bagged groceries at the supermarket and another team washed windshields at a local gas station. Two dozen soul winners hit the streets and led 138 people into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ.

All this outreach activity generates a pretty big appetite so the evening culminates with a free pizza party in the Fellowship Hall where testimonies are shared and new friendships are formed.

This is our tenth year conducting Operation Outreach. What I have learned is that if we will deliberately plan and organize every detail in advance, our congregation will respond and eagerly give their supply to these type of events.

Relevance in the community is a key component to creating influence for your church and community outreach is a great way to express God's love for the lost. Simple acts of kindness with no strings attached