If your church is looking for ways to grow in evangelistic outreach…
If you wonder how to motivate people for outreach…
If you want to turn spikes of evangelistic activity into sustainable outreach…
Then you may want to consider starting an Ambassador’s Fellowship.
What is an Ambassador’s Fellowship? – An Ambassador’s Fellowship is a group of Christians who meet regularly to encourage one another toward personal evangelism. These people aren’t special “evangelists,” just ordinary men and women who have a heart for lost people.
Why should I start one? - Because we all need support in reaching out to lost people. Evangelism is hard. It’s like trying to exercise on your own – it’s usually better to do it with friends. When you meet together you can encourage one another to hold each other accountable, pray together and share questions you have about talking about Jesus. And you share the blessings, too.
How do I start one? – It’s easy. Starting an Ambassador’s Fellowship involves finding a place and a time to meet – preferably once or twice each month. You might meet in a home or a church, or any place you can talk freely and pray together. Then gather together a group of people who would like to grow in outreach and invite them to this meeting. We can help you with the content of the meetings, especially as you get started.
What should we do at the meetings? - Four things: 1) Pray for one another and for non-Christians. Pray by name for neighbors, friends, family, co-workers, etc.; 2) read the Bible and a book on personal evangelism; 3) share about your outreach experience; 4) train yourselves and plan for outreach. You don’t need to do all these equally at each meeting, but these elements should make up the ongoing diet of an Ambassador’s Fellowship.
What resources are available? – We recommend starting with a few basic resources: 1) The Gospel of John – read it between meetings and reflect on it together. Your meeting doesn’t need to be a Bible study, but you do need to fill your minds with God’s word. 2) A prayer journal – ask someone in the group to keep a journal of prayer requests and answers to prayer. This will act as a reminder to persevere in prayer and as a source of praise for answered prayer. 3) For your first reading, we recommend either “Evangelism for the Tongue Tied” by Chap Bettis or “Concentric Circles of Concern” by Oscar Thompson, Jr. Both are biblically-based, practical and written for ordinary Christians.
What is the goal? - The goal is to support one another in pursuing the mission of God and the mission of the church – to go into all the world and make disciples. To do that you will fill your mind with the truth of God’s word and with practical ideas from books. You will enlarge your heart for lost people by praying and speaking with non-Christians about Christ. And you will sharpen your skills as you do outreach and talk about it together.
How can the Philip Center help? - We can help through coaching at every stage of your meetings – from start up, evaluation of the first few meetings, problem solving and growing stronger as you go. We can also assist you in multiplying these meetings, as others catch the vision and excitement of personal evangelism. We offer a newsletter just for Ambassador’s Fellowship, and we are available by phone and email. We exist to support your growth in outreach, so feel free to call on us.
