REPOSITIONING THE LOCAL CHURCH FOR EVANGELISM 

Key Scriptural Verses: 

Isaiah 59:21; Isaiah 61:10; Acts 1:8; 1 Corinthians 11:25-26; 

Mark 2:1-5, Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:15 

1. INTRODUCTION – THE CHURCH OF PENTECOST’S COVENANT WITH GOD IS AN EVANGELISM COVENANT 

At the inception of The Church of Pentecost, the Lord entered into a covenant with the Church, which was received through prophecies at Akroso in 1931, confirmed in 1940 at Easter Convention in Winneba and repeated at a general convention in Koforidua in 1948. Portion of the covenant reads,  

It is not because of how few or many you are in membership that I have chosen to covenant with you. I have done this out of my eternal purpose and goodwill for my church”. “That the Church will grow big into a Pentecostal Church where the gifts of the Holy Spirit will operate bountifully upon men and women…. “That the Church will spread across the world, a great international church which will send missionaries to Africa and the rest of the world”. “That the Church will make disciples for the Soon-coming Christ” (Onyinah & Ntumy, 2019).  

This evangelism covenant can be likened to God’s word to Israel in Isaiah 59:21 (KJV), 

“As for me this is my covenant with them saith the Lord: My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed nor out of the mouth of thy seed’s seed saith the Lord from henceforth and forever”.  

This covenant illustrated in the above scripture is generational – “your seed and your seed’s seed forever”. Bringing this to our context as a Church clearly suggests that the covenant God has with us must be passed on to the future generations of CoP members. 

It is worth noting that the covenant to make the Church a great International Pentecostal Church has been fulfilled, evidence of which is explicit in the Church now operating in 139 nations in the world. However, the Church cannot rest on her oars. Rather we should move on to possess all nations of the world and affect every sphere of society till the second advent of Christ. To achieve this goal, evangelism is key and should be aggressive at the local church, hence, the need to reposition the local church for evangelism. This script aims at discussing reasons for preaching the gospel, challenges within the local Church for preaching the gospel and to recommend practical ways for repositioning the local church members to do aggressive evangelism as a daily way of life. 

2. EVANGELISM 

Evangelism is the act of spreading the message of salvation in Jesus Christ alone (solus Christus) which is the Gospel. As summarized by J. Mack Stiles in plain language, “evangelism is teaching (heralding, proclaiming, preaching) the gospel (the message from God that leads us to salvation) with the aim (hope, desire, goal) to persuade (convince, convert)”. 

 Evangelism simply means “Evangelizare” (Latin). That is “to spread or preach the Gospel of Christ or “Euangelizesthai” (Greek) “to bring good news”. There is only one good news in the world today, which is, salvation through Jesus Christ (Jh. 3:16, 1 Jh. 5:12). “We must proclaim this good news every day without fail, 24 hours non-stop. 

“Proclaim his salvation day by day” (Ps. 96:2-5). 

Repositioning in evangelism simply means moving from where we are in the local church’s evangelism to where God wants us to be – where all of us are witnesses (Acts 5:32), for God has committed unto us the Word (or ministry) of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ (2 Cor. 5:19-20). 

The fact that evangelism needs to be repositioned in the local Church’s agenda is an undisputable fact when we take cognizance of fact that our Church has not doubled in membership over some decades whilst the early church doubled in membership some few years after it started. This is what the LORD wants to do, a new thing through the Holy Spirit in the end time harvest. 

Salvation and evangelism can simply be summed up as Jesus calling us out of the world and sending us out to the world – “come” (Mt. 11:28) and “go” (Mt. 28:19) 

1. Simple Presentation of the Gospel 

John 3:16 – “God so loved the world that He gave His Only Son to give us eternal life if we believe in Him.” 

1 John 5:12 – “God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son Jesus Christ. He who has the Son has life. He who has not the son of God has no life.” 

The Roman Road 

Romans 3:23 – “All have sinned and falling short of God’s glory.” 

Romans 5:8 – “God demonstrated His love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” 

Romans 6:23 – “The wages of sin is death but the free gift of God to us is eternal life through Christ Jesus.” 

Romans 10:13 – “When we call upon Jesus we will be saved”. 

Romans 10:9-10 – “If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved”. 

3. WHY SHOULD THE LOCAL CHURCH/ALL BELIEVERS PREACH THE GOSPEL 

1. The general covenant of God with believers (Is. 59:21) and specific covenant with the Church of Pentecost, contains evangelism, discipling and possessing the nations. We must fulfill our part of this divine contract. 

2. Jesus was a soul winner, and we must follow in His steps – 1 Timothy 1:15; Luke 19:10; Luke 4:18; Acts 10:38. 

3. The harvest is great, the labourers are few – Matthew 9:37-38; Isaiah 6:8; John 4:35. 

4. We must obey the Great Commission. His last Command must be our first priority – Mark 16:15; Matthew 28:18-19; Luke 5:32. 

5. Everyone must hear the gospel before Jesus’ Second coming – Matthew 24:14; Romans 10:14. Our main task in the end time like John the Baptist, is to prepare ourselves and prepare the way for His second coming by preaching the gospel to all creation. 

6. The blood of the unconverted will be demanded from us – Ezekiel 3:17-18; Ezekiel 33:6-8. 

7. Our testimony must be shared 1 John 1:3; Psalms 103:1-5; 2 Corinthians 5:17. 

8. He has given us the power to be witnesses. Power which is not used is useless – Acts 1:8. 

9. The value of a soul. Gaining the whole world is less than the value of one soul. (Mk. 8:36-38). Countless angels in Heaven rejoice over one sinner who gets converted – Luke 15:10, Daniel 7:10. 

10. The lost and the horrors of hell – Luke 19:10; Luke 13:5; Luke 16:19-31 the rich man and Lazarus Luke 16:19-31; hell was prepared for the devil and his angels. Nobody should go to hell. It was not prepared for us – Matthew 25:41. 

11. False prophets and false teachings Matthew 24:11. 

12. Rewards and crowns for the soul winner both in this life and in the life to come – Daniel 12:3; John 4:36; 1 Corinthians 15:58. 

13. People are dying and going to hell daily. 500 people die every day in Ghana. In the USA, 7,452 deaths are recorded daily, 34 people die every 12 seconds. In the world, 6,316 deaths are recorded every hour. 44,000 people die every day without hearing the gospel. Over 34,000 Muslims die every day without the chance of receiving Christ. Every 40 seconds someone commits suicide in the world (World Health Organisation). 

14. The power of God is demonstrated during evangelism – Romans 1:16; Mark 16:17; Psalms 96:3. 

15. Jesus is the only way to Heaven. He alone can take us to Heaven because He came from Heaven – John 14:6. Over 4,200 religions and more than 500 cults in the world yet only Christianity has a redeemer – Acts 4:12. 

16. Compassion for the lost just as Jesus had for the fainting and scattered sheep without a shepherd – Matthew 9:36. 

17. Because that is the main reason why Jesus came on earth – Luke 19:10, John 10:10. 

18. That is the armour for our feet, the Gospel of Peace which makes our feet beautiful. Ephesians 6:15; Romans 10:15. 

19. Because the Gospel must be published in all nations Mark 13:10. 

20. God adds to the church through evangelism. The Church grows through evangelism – Acts 2:47. 

21. In 2021, the Christian population in Ghana increased by 0.1% while other religions increased by 3.7%. Worldwide only one third of the world population are Christians and conversion to other religions is on the increase. 

4. CHALLENGES OF EVANGELISM IN THE LOCAL CHURCH 

1. Financial: lack of adequate funding for evangelism. 

2. Waning passion due to preoccupation with other things other than evangelism. 

3. Low commitment of ministers and officers. The concept of ‘every member is a witness’ used to be very strong and so fueled the passion for evangelism.  

4. Relaxation of teaching and preaching on eschatology/the second coming of Christ has affected the urgency of evangelism. The zeal to snatch souls from hell has gone down (jud. 23) 

5. Lack of effective follow up systems.  

6.  Inability to effectively employ modern technology to reach out to people as the whole world is moving into cyber space.  

7. The postmodernity lifestyle and the cares of this world.  

8. Misplacement of priority of our calling as Christians. 

9. Inability of the local church to retain the converts won by the few who are into evangelism leads to discouragement and loss of zeal to win souls. 

10. Apostasy and wrong theology. For example, there is no hell or heaven. Secular humanism teachings. 

11. Occultism, cults and false prophets which create spiritual opposition to the preaching of the gospel. 

12. Other religions. The wrong concept that we are all serving one God so there is no need for conversion to Jesus Christ and the Christian faith. 

13. Difficulty in preaching to the unreached people groups. There are about 19 unreached people groups in Ghana alone according to the Ghana evangelism committee. 

5. REPOSITIONING THE LOCAL CHURCH FOR EVANGELISM 

With profound appreciation to God and the COP leadership under our current Chairman and previous leaders, the necessary structures, and ministries for effective evangelism in the church have been established. These structures and Ministries include the Women’s Ministry, Evangelism Ministry, PEMEM, Youth Ministry, Children’s Ministry, Home and Urban Missions, Ministry to Person’s with Disability, Schools Outreach Ministry, Chaplaincy, Chieftaincy Ministry, Counselling Ministry and Workers Guilds. 

For effective and productive /fruitful utilization of these organs in evangelism the following should be considered: 

1. District Pastors, presiding elders, and local ministry leaders must play major leadership roles in facilitating and leading evangelism at the local church. They are the team leaders. Regular training, motivation and evaluation must be employed, to keep them on their toes. Presiding elders who are not interested in evangelism could be reviewed. Active involvement of presbytery members in all evangelistic activities should be encouraged. “Unemployed presbyters” in terms of local church evangelism and ministry should be discouraged. 

2. Proper Coordination of the evangelistic activities should be carried out by appointing one evangelism coordinator from each executive committee to coordinate each Ministry’s Evangelistic programmes and report to the Executive Committees. 

3. Appointment of a full-time Minister under the office of the Evangelism Directorate as an administrator to coordinate, monitor and evaluate the evangelism activities of the various ministries. 

4. Teamwork as illustrated in Mark 2:1-5 by the four friends who brought their unsaved colleague to Jesus to receive “forgiveness of sins”, which represents salvation and healing, should be encouraged among the different ministries as demonstrated during the Gospel Sundays. 

1. Re-Prioritizing for the Great Commission 

“Some men’s passion is for gold. Some men’s passion is for fame. My passion is for souls” (William Booth, Founder, Salvation Army) 

The Great Commission is a Great Command issued by the Lord to the local church. It involves three main activities: soul winning, discipleship and church planting. The critical activity that should underpin evangelism and discipleship is retention of new converts. 

Illustration 1:        Evangelism/                               Planting a 

Witnessing                                Local Church 

                                      Discipleship 

Illustration 2: 

Souls winning 

                                                                                                                                                                                         Planting home 

                                                                                              churches to retain 

                                                                                              and disciple the  

                                                                                                new converts 

Retaining Converts 

to establish them 

By the above illustrations, the local church should prioritize evangelism to reach out to all peoples which should result in growth in numbers and lead to planting of churches. 

2. Reviving Zeal for Evangelism 

“We must talk to God about people before we talk to people about God” D.L. Moody 

The local church should take evangelism seriously. We therefore need to go on our knees before the Lord of the harvest for souls and for workers (Lk. 10:2). This should be by intensive prayer and fasting to break every barrier and opposition (Acts 4:24-31; 24:49) 

3. Digitization and Use of Modern Technology 

Leadership of the Church is highly commended for the digital terrestrial television installed for Pent TV, and the Youth Ministry for their use of apps and social media initiatives. Children Ministry is adopting the Theovision concept where the message of the gospel is translated into the local dialects. The local church can explore ways to reach out to the high population of people on the cyberspace, especially, the Worship Centres and PIWCs. 

4. Financing Evangelism at the Local Church 

The Local Church should be able to generate funds to support their evangelistic activities by 

1. Encouraging and motivating members to give towards evangelism. 

2. Forming evangelism financiers’ groups for those who want to give towards evangelism. 

3. Utilising the offerings generated on Gospel Sundays (apart from tithes) to finance evangelism and discipleship programmes by the local churches. 

4. The well-resourced assemblies should be encouraged to support the internal mission Areas, HUM and MPWD outreaches. 

5. Apologetics 

Contemporary topics should be addressed by setting up a National Committee on apologetics and contemporary issues to publish small booklets on relevant issues to be used for evangelism at the local assemblies, youth and tertiary institutions outreaches. 

6. Youth Centres and School Outreaches 

57% of the estimated 32,372,889 people in Ghana are under 25 years (0-14 years represents 37.44%, 15-24 years represent 18.64%) (2021 Population Census). 

1. School outreaches programmes in the basic and Senior High Schools should be revitalized in all local assemblies.  

2. PENSA Ghana and PENSA International evangelistic activities should be assessed and revamped and supported in all the tertiary institutions with the large PIWC adopting some of these institutions to support and encourage them. 

3. The Concept of Multipurpose Youth centres with sports, games, recreational and counselling amenities should be piloted in the large PIWC’s to redirect the youth from “betting centres” and “spots” and “Pubs” to encounter Christ. 

7. Gospel Sundays and One-Member-One-Discipled-Soul  

To the glory of God, these two initiatives have yielded thousands of souls. They should be continued and improved upon at the local assemblies to yield more fruitful results. Members of the local Church should invite unbelievers to Church during the week for Gospel Sundays. Where practicable, special invitation flyers should be designed to help members to prayerfully invite people to church. 

8. Specialised Ministries  

All the specialized ministries should be revitalized in all local Assemblies. 

9. Children’s Ministry Evangelism 

The proposals by the Children’s Ministry for evangelism among children should be implemented. 

1.  Mindset Change – Over the past years, most churches (local churches) have not given the requisite attention to children or the children’s ministry (CM) The Children should be involved in Evangelistic activities and recognised as future leaders. 

2. Re-branding of the Local Church – Create an environment which is children friendly so as to attract and win more children to Christ and the church.  

3. The Child is a Soul to be won – Many at times, we do not consider children as key and important to be won for Christ and thus do not even make them a feature in our evangelistic activities. When they come forward during an altar-call they should be received and accounted for. 

4. Adopt a school initiative (One Church One School) –It encourages the local church to adopt a school. By this, they visit, have devotions with them and sometimes work towards providing for the needs of the school. Through this process they win some of the children to Christ and they are able to have access to the school to share the word of God. 

5. Own the Community Children’s Club (CCC) – The CCC is an initiative focused on winning children within our communities to the Lord. It uses various approaches such as games (colts’ football) extra classes, cooking etc.) to bring the children together and through these avenues introduce the gospel to them.  

6. Touch a life program (“I care for you” initiative) Children visiting orphanages and Care Centres and institutions to share the Gospel.  

7. Digitization – Use of Cartoons, Digital Bibles and Videos appropriate for children. 

10. Chaplaincy 

The Local Church must reposition itself as an important agent in mobilising members to do this ministry in their areas of jurisdiction through:  

1. Awareness creation on the nature and importance of the chaplaincy ministry. 

2. Recruitment of members who have a passion to do chaplaincy ministry. 

3. Training members on how to do chaplaincy ministry. 

4. Assessing of institutions and spheres where members can do the ministry. 

5. Placement of equipped members as Lay Chaplains in institutions. 

11. Youth Ministry 

From the Youth ministry Directorate, the following recommendations were made: 

1. Revitalizing evangelism coordinating teams at all levels:  

2. Encouraging the operationalization of follow-up teams.  

3. Training and equipping officers and other leaders: Dedicating aspects of the yearly Lay Leadership School or officers retreat to the core values of the Church, especially evangelism will be helpful.  

4. Exemplary leadership: Encouraging leadership involvement in the evangelistic activities of the local church.   

5. Good use of small groups and Home Cells for evangelism 

6. Training and equipping the membership: 

7. Accountability to the congregation: Making presiding elders/leaders present progress reports to the congregations on soulwinning, follow-up, and discipleship will ginger some members to do more.  

8. Use of Modern Gadgets and ICT 

9. Encouraging and resourcing the use of media for evangelism, follow-up, and discipleship. 

10. Adopting an intergenerational approach in evangelism:  

11. Prayerful preparation: Prayer must remain an uncompromisable sustained component of evangelism.  

12. Encouraging inter-Ministries activities in evangelism, follow-up, and discipleship at the local assembly level. 

13. Posting of willing and trained national service persons who are potential leaders to deprived areas should be fully utilized to enhance church growth and evangelism. 

14. Collaboration with parachurch groups for example Theovision for Audio Bibles and formation of Bible clubs and the Great Commission for evangelistic materials should be deepened.    

15. Film evangelism must be utilized regularly and effectively by the local church for evangelism among children, youth and adults. The media unit of the Church and drama groups in the youth ministry and PENSA should develop relevant cartoons, films and documentaries for this type of evangelism. 

16. The effective use of the youth during holidays, especially the gospel heralds of the Evangelism Ministry, to evangelise and plant churches should be adopted at the local church level to train the next generation to take over the Great Commission. 

5.12 Developing a Culture of Evangelism 

“The biggest obstacle to evangelism is Christians who don’t share the Gospel” Albert Mohler 

 ” If you had the cure for cancer, wouldn’t you share it? you have the cure to death, get out there and share it” Rick Warren 

In 2021 membership of the Church was quoted as 10% of Ghana’s population. If every member win one soul a year, the membership of the Church will hit 50% of Ghana’s population in three years. This can be achieved when the local church develops a culture of evangelism through knowledge, change of attitude and practice. A “culture of evangelism,” simply means living a “gospel-centred life”.   

A “culture of evangelism” in the local church should manifest in the following ten daily ways of life. A culture: 

1. motivated by love for Jesus and His Gospel (2 Cor. 5:14–15).  

2. of Confidence in the Gospel and its power (Rom. 1:16). 

3. that understands the times and utilizes appropriate methods to preach the Gospel 

4. that makes us appreciate, respect, and encourage those we preach to (1 Cor 9:22b). 

5. which unites us as partners for evangelism (Php. 1:3–5). 

6. in which people who are sharing their faith are celebrated and acknowledged (Php. 2:19-22). 

7. that knows how to affirm and celebrate and value new converts (Col. 1:3–4, 7).  

8. that is ready to suffer for the Gospel and for Christ. 

9. that models evangelism based on intensive prayer, dependance upon the Holy Spirit, the Word of God and giving. 

10. in which people train current and future generations to evangelise. 

6. STRATEGIES FOR EFFECTIVE EVANGELISM AT THE LOCAL CHURCH 

The following outline summarizes the key and broad strategies to adopt for evangelistic activities. 

12. The Three Tasks in Evangelism 

The evangelism task can be simply and basically divided into three:  

1. firstly, a simple gospel message in everybody’s language that is easy to understand and preach and disciple.  

2. secondly motivating and mobilizing the church today to evangelise  

3. thirdly training the future generation to carry on with evangelism.   

13. Seven Ps Plus M&E 

1. PRAY: Most important human factor in evangelism is prayer (1 Tim. 2:1, 2 Cor. 10:4-5). 

2. PLAN: Failure to plan means planning to fail. 

3. PREPARE: Training programmes and teachings are essential  

4. PAY: Financing evangelism is a very important aspect of the strategy. Do your best to raise enough money and budget for your evangelistic programmes. 

5. POWER: gifts and unction of the Holy Spirit confirms the word and makes the outreach successful (Acts 1:8). 

6. PARTICIPATE: The Evangelism team must be carefully and prayerfully assigned for various roles according to gifts, talents and abilities and availability. Every member as a witness principle must also be pursued. 

7. PRESERVE the harvest: Effective and efficient, committed well-trained team should be set up for follow-up, discipleship and new convert care and classes. 

8. MONITORING AND EVALUATION: It is essential to evaluate how effective your local evangelistic activities are faring quarterly, half-yearly and annually to improve upon them. 

14. Methods of Evangelism available  

1. Proclamation (crusades, rallies, campaigns, ministries joint rally) 

2. Apologetics: response to current issues and intellectual debates in defense of the Gospel 

3. Relational or interpersonal evangelism 

4. Lifestyle evangelism 

5. Service and social intervention evangelism 

6. Power Evangelism: Miracles, healings, Signs and Wonders and Spectacular Events 

7. Media evangelism: printed and electronic 

8. Child evangelism/community children’s clubs 

9. Specialised and targeted ministries e.g., HUM, MPWDs, SOM, Chaplaincy, Workers’ Guilds, etc. 

10. Street and Placard Evangelism 

11. Festival and Events Evangelism 

12. One member one discipled soul 

13. Films, cartoons and documentaries 

14. Musical concerts and drama evangelism  

15. Schools’ evangelism 

16. Medical outreaches and hospital evangelism to communities, the sick, relatives and staff  

17. Gospel Sundays and other invitational evangelism like Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner Meetings. 

18. Sports Evangelism 

7. AGGRESSIVE DISCIPLESHIP 

In this post-modern era, it is becoming quite complicated to retain new converts.  Without effective measures to keep and retain new converts, there cannot be efficient discipleship. Without discipleship there cannot be church planting. Without church planting, the evangelistic cycle of the Great Commission is not complete.  One creative way to the local church to reposition herself for the Great Commission is the Home Church Concept. 

1. What is a Home Church? 

A home or house church is a small gathering of new converts who meet primarily in homes to share fellowship together and normally have unpaid lay leaders.  They may meet in coffee shops, restaurants, or on university campuses, under trees, in houses or any other convenient places. The home church is decentralized in structure just like the home cell concept of The Church of Pentecost. The difference between the Home Cell and the Home Church is that the Home Church gathers together new converts like a shepherd provides a pen for the sheep. The intention is to keep the new converts together, to retain them, for aggressive follow up and intentional discipleship to establish them in the faith, to develop them into a nursery assembly and eventually turn them into a fully-fledged local Church. Retention of new converts and the need for a robust discipleship to produce Christ-like believers remains the leading reason for the Home Church Concept.  

2. Early Apostles’ Approach  

In terms of operations, governance and growth, the church is organised at three main levels in the New Testament:  

1. a gathering of believers in someone’s home, for example, Gaius, Lydia, Aquila & Prisciilla (Acts 16:40;1Cor 16:19). 

2. a gathering of believers in a town or city (Acts 16:12;) 

3. a gathering of believers within a province, regional or area (1 Cor 16:19) 

The early Apostles relied heavily on home meetings (Home Churches) to keep the local churches strong and effective. A study of the New Testament shows that on the Day of Pentecost three thousand converts were won for the Church. On another outreach, five thousand souls were added to the Church. Though they met regularly in the temple courts, the twelve Apostles maintained home meetings (Home Churches) to take care and to disciple the new believers.  

Some examples in the New Testament are:  

1. Acts 2:46 “… They broke bread in their homes and ate together in their homes with glad and sincere hearts”.  

2. Acts 5:42 “Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching….”  

3. Acts 10:24,48 Apostle Peter established a Home Church in Cornelius’ house at Caesarea.  

4. Acts 12:12 “… he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying.”  

3. Pauline Approach 

Apostle Paul magnified the Great Commission in gentile communities and provinces through converting many souls, discipling them and planting churches in every community. One distinct method Apostle Paul relied upon was the Home Church. Apostle Paul regularly gathered new converts into private homes for fellowship. For instance,  

1. Acts 20:20 “And how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but shewed you, and have taught you publicly, and from house to house…” 

2. Lydia’s house in Philippi may have been Europe’s first church (Acts 16:14-15, 40). 

3. In Corinth, some believers evidently met in the homes of Gaius (Rom. 16:23), of Stephanus (I Cor. 16: 5, 15), and of Chloe (I Cor. 1:11).  

4. Paul tells us his habit was to teach “publicly and from house to house” (Acts 20:20). 

5. Philemon 1:2 “And to our beloved Apphia, and Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in thy house…” 

6. Romans 16:5 “Likewise greet the church that is in their house. Salute my well-beloved Epenetus, who is the first fruits of Achaia unto Christ.” 

4. Contemporary American Practice 

George Barna estimates that, at least, one million Americans have shifted to small groups, worshiping primarily in homes or businesses. According to Barna, by 2025, 70% percent of Christians will be worshiping in homes, which he termed “alternative faith communities.” The recent COVID-19 pandemic made this prediction more fulfilling in our generation. Mega churches in Europe, America and around the world could not meet in cathedrals but rather utilized technology to reach out to families at their homes. In Ghana, leadership of the Church of Pentecost encouraged “family and friends’ meetings in homes” which effectively kept the local churches running effectively till the end of the pandemic.  

5. Strategic Approach 

1. Mobilisation of squads for aggressive evangelism. For example, one Area of the church (in Ghana) mobilized 1,000 strong Army Squad and equipped them as a prayer and evangelistic force. They were released to win souls and to open 347 Home Churches across the Area. 

2. Train and equip them to win souls and to ‘house’ them in homes close to them and give them leaders.  

3. During the training sessions, each local church should identify a location for the evangelistic outreach and to open a Home Church.  

4. Criteria for selecting a Home Church location should be a place or location quite distant from an existing local church or a village, cottage or hamlet where there is no Church of Pentecost assembly.  

5.  Each ministry can be encouraged to identify a location or a settlement for an outreach and to open a Home Church. In this case, the size of the community does not matter. As long as human beings live there, an outreach can be held there to win souls.  

6. Once a soul is won, a matured Christian should be sent to hold regular church meetings with the new convert(s) while evangelistic activities continue to win more souls at that location.  

7. In a short time, more souls will be won, and the Home Church can be upgraded to a nursery assembly and eventually a local church.  

8. By this strategy, every village, cottage or hamlet will have the presence of the Church of Pentecost. Big towns with new developing sites quite far from the chapel can also start meetings with the new converts and with time another local church is birthed from scratch.  

9. This concept is meant to stop loss of new converts and to make the Great Commission more effective leading to church growth numerically and spiritually.  

8.0 CONCLUSION 

Taking some inspiration from the CoP Cyprus’ approach to evangelism as recently shared by our dear Chairman, Apostle Eric Nyamekye, during a live broadcast to all PIWCs in Ghana, we can practicalise the local Church’s evangelism drive by answering the following questions: 

1. Who are we trying to evangelize? 

1. Where do we find them? 

2. How do we bring them in? 

3. How do we keep them? 

4. How do we grow them? 

5. How do we unleash them or send them? 

6. Networking and team working: can we learn from others or team up with them (my own addition)? 

It is time to open up to the Holy Spirit to do new things in the Church beginning from the local church. The local church should develop a culture of evangelism with the understanding that she is the chosen and best method for evangelism. Daily life of holiness, demonstration of love and sharing the gospel is required for the Lord to add more souls to the local church (Acts 2:46-47). 

REFERENCES  

1. All Bible references were taken from the New International Version unless otherwise stated. 

2. Barna, George, Millennials of America www.arizonachristian.edu. 

3. Berko, Samuel, Apostle Samuel Berko, Biblically Proven Strategies to Multiply your Church, Under Publication. 

4. Heward-Mills, Dag, Tell Them. London: Parchment House Publishers, 2011. 

5. Opoku Onyinah & Ntumy, Michael (Editors) God’s Faithfulness to the Church of Pentecost. Accra: Pentecost Press Limited, 2019. 

6. Osborne, T. L., Soul Winning. Tulsa: Harrison House Publishers, 2000. 

7. Stiles, Mack J., EVANGELISM – How the Whole Church Speaks of Jesus. Wheaton: Crossway Publishers, 2014. 

8. Ghana Evangelism Committee Unreached People Groups in Ghana 2020 

9. Population and Housing Census of Ghana 2021. 

10. The Church of Pentecost Evangelism Ministry: Study and Training Manual For Holistic Evangelism. The Church of Pentecost 2019.