EVANGELISTIC OUTREACH AT GRACE LIFE CHURCH OF THE SHOALS

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Published: Friday, 10 December 2010 09:31

It was a tremendous blessing to be the “Gospel preacher” at the Fall evangelistic outreach for Grace Life Church of the Shoals. Pastor Jeff Noblit has been the senior pastor-teacher for many years. I have observed, from a distance, how the Lord Jesus has been using this precious brother and his staff, to build a ‘true New Testament church’ which seeks to line up with the Word of God in every way. It was an awesome privilege to be a small part of their on-going “fishing expedition”. They entitled this fall outreach, “From Darkness to Light”! In my 27 years of preaching, I have rarely seen a local church that was more faithful in intense preparation; passionate intercession; and in personally inviting and then bringing hundreds of people to the outreach crusade! It was an overwhelming joy and also an awesome encouragement to serve among a local church that takes this “great mission” seriously. I asked Bro. Matt Fowler, who is one of the associate pastors at Grace Life Church, to share a testimony concerning the many areas in which the church prepared for this tremendous evangelistic outreach to the Community. What about you brothers and sisters?

Bro. Matt Fowler writes:

"While we fully understand that only the Holy Spirit can bring a lost sinner to conversion, we also understand that we are to use God’s ordained means to compel men and urge sinners to come to Christ. The doctrines concerning the glorious grace of God should never lead a church to an attitude of lethargy or lack of zeal for evangelism. But they should inspire us to reach out to the lost and to purposefully use ‘God-glorifying’ ways of bringing men to hear the glorious preaching of the Gospel. Thus, while relying fully on God (and not gimmicks) to bring the Gospel to bear on lost sinners’ souls, we began preparing for our Fall Outreach with Bro. Ed in July. Below is a sampling of some of our preparations at Grace Life for the week of Fall Outreach: Beginning in July, we asked each of our Small Group leaders to visit those individuals in their classes with a couple of goals in mind. First, we wanted them to give out informational fliers concerning our Fall Outreach schedule. Secondly, we wanted them to encourage the class members to begin to pray that God would save the lost and edify His people. The months of July and August also gave us time to challenge our people to look specifically for friends, neighbors, and associates that they could invite to our Adult Friend Night during Fall Outreach. There were hundreds of adults who came under the sound teaching of the Gospel. Our students also had a night where they invited many of their friends and classmates to enjoy a free meal, followed by the preaching of the Gospel.

There were a few hundred unconverted students who were in attendance. God also opened a door for ED to preach the Gospel with more than 300 area student athletes during the week. In preparation for the fall outreach, we had a couple of outreach visitations on Wednesday nights, that we used to canvas our community with both fliers that contained information about the Fall Outreach; and also a audio “cd” that contained a message that had been preached by Bro. Ed. We asked our people to spend some time the week before Fall Outreach engaging in a couple of different activities: First, we asked them to consider cutting off their televisions for the week. Secondly, we asked them to prayerfully lead their families through a study entitled ‘The God Who Saves’, which is published by Matthias Media. Our regular Wednesday night service the week prior to our Fall Outreach was used simply to pray and plead with God to do what only He could do; which is to turn hearts of stone into hearts of flesh! God used Bro. Ed to preach the truth to us all week long. Ed’s messages were full of both light and heat! We are still following up with many of those who came forward, expressing a need for prayer or a desire to speak with someone concerning the state of their soul. We have learned over the years not to deal too hastily with those we call “seekers”. Our staff of pastors has a list of men and women that we are constantly praying for, who have expressed a desire to receive further counseling about the Gospel and their need for Christ. We meet with them and diligently discuss what the Scriptures have to say concerning sin, repentance, faith, conversion, and baptism. As pastors, we know that the work of counseling seekers is surely one of the greatest responsibilities that is entrusted to us by the Chief Shepherd! Many times, we have found that the work of evangelism begins after the evangelist has already left and returned to his home. He plants the wonderful seed of the Gospel, and then we are allowed the many opportunities, to water the Seed and see Gospel growth occur, through our follow up with those who were affected by the preaching of the Gospel.”

Oh dear friends, this is exactly what the Lord requires of us. Only He can perform that miracle of ‘catching a soul’; but this church was faithful to employ the tools for fishing! Personally, I am so very grateful that Pastor Noblit and his staff allowed me to come alongside this precious local body of Christ, to let down the Gospel net, during this powerful week of outreach!