I hope you’re busy today following up on all of your new believers and first time guests from yesterday!

Two items for you on this Easter Monday:

1 – Thank you to all of you who prayed for The Journey’s services at all of our campuses yesterday!

We saw record attendance at ALL locations (including 599 at our two-and-a-half month old Boca Raton, Florida, location).

Go God!

2 – You’ve got less than 48 hours to take advantage of the Church Leader Insights Easter Sale.

Click the link below to see all the special opportunities to save up to 50% on Over 65 of our practical training resources.

CLI Easter Sale – Save Up To 50%!

With Easter fast approaching (about three weeks away now), hopefully you’ve got some well-designed, clear promotion pieces in the works.  This could be direct mail, door hangers, invite cards, newspaper ads… any number of different media are available to help you invite your community to your Easter service(s).

And with that attention – if you’ve thought through your promotion – comes hits on your church’s website.

So here’s my question…

How are you following up on people who find you on the web?

At The Journey, we have two types of “leads” from our website:

One is a Newsletter Sign-Up. Someone who signs up for our weekly email newsletter.  We add those people to our distribution list.  They get an email from me confirming their subscription and letting them know service times and information about podcasts on our website.

The other online lead is a Free Book Request. We offer a free book to anyone in our area who finds us on the web.  For them, we send the free book with an invite letter from me and add them to our database, so they’ll get our e-newsletter and mailers. They also get a similar email to the one referenced above, but stating that their free book is on the way.

So what’s your plan?  How do people let you know through your email that they’re interested?  A newsletter sign-up?  By sending you an email?  Requesting more information?

I encourage you to take a few minutes this week to plan out your follow up plan for these people.

Remember – God is most likely to send people to the church that is most prepared to be good stewards of them!

P.S. Will you join me Tomorrow (Tuesday, March 29) at 2:00pm Eastern Time for a FREE Webinar called “The Top 3 Assimilation Mistakes (and How to Avoid Them)“?

It’s a 60-minute online training – all you need to participate is a computer with internet access – and you can Register Now for FREE here:

www.ChurchLeaderInsights.com/assimmistakes

Easter Sunday, April 24, provides a once-a-year opportunity to reach the people of your community on a scale that is unequaled the rest of the year.

How do you plan to you take advantage of this God-provided open door at your church?

I’m committed to helping you and your church make the greatest possible Kingdom impact this Easter.

So today I’m releasing the very latest version of of my Maximizing Easter E-Book and giving you Up To $214.00 in Bonuses just for downloading it – THIS WEEK ONLY!

This brand new nuts-and-bolts publication and Over $39.00 in Bonus Resources are all FREE to you.

Plus, download your E-Book this week and Receive 25% OFF Easter Sermons (up to $175.00 Value)!

In this 30-page PDF E-Book, you will:

• Decide to preach on Easter Sunday (and what NOT to preach)
• Spiritually prepare yourself and your church for a life-changing Easter
• Plan and prepare for the most powerful service possible
• Capture the opportunities that only come once a year with Easter
• Encourage your first-time Easter guests to return the next week
• Have an effective plan to follow-up with everyone who attends
• Plus so much more!

P.S. Download your FREE E-Book this week to get your FREE Bonuses!  Here’s the link again:

http://www.churchleaderinsights.com/easter

Did you read your February Church Leader Insights Newsletter?

Each month I send out the latest and best thinking on Church Growth, Evangelism, Leadership, Church Planting, and more – the best church leadership content I can find - designed to help you lead your church to greater health and growth.

And the best part…. It’s absolutely FREE! (click here to sign-up now).

Just in case you missed this month’s edition, here’s a sneak peek at a great article about engaging New Believers to share their new faith:

SEVEN TIPS FOR ENCOURAGING NEW BELIEVERS IN EVANGELISM

“Be an example-people are watching what you do, and they tend to pay more attention to what you do than what you say. When new believers see other believers evangelizing, it encourages them to do the same . . . Remind them that fear is normal-it is an experience that everyone deals with. The Apostle Paul even asked for prayer for boldness, something he would not have needed to ask for if he didn’t have fear.” - Read More

The Church Leader Insights Newsletter is designed to bring you the best available church leadership content each and every month – and all you have to do is check your email!

If you’re not already subscribed, you can click this link to sign up right now.

I love seeing New Believers in our church . . . and I bet you do too, right?

There’s nothing more heart-touching and encouraging than seeing people make first time decisions for Christ.

Even if I’m not the one leading the service – even if it’s not my church, I’m thrilled to hear stories about new believers.

But more and more lately, I find myself asking:

• I wonder what the follow-up process will be for this new believer?
• Is it clear to them what their next steps are?
• Has this process been effective in the past?

There’s nothing more exciting and valuable in ministry than new believers and our proper follow-up with them.

So, here’s my question for you today:

How clear and strong is your process for following up with New Believers?

Do you have a clear, “written down” process prepared for New Believers at your church?

I’ve been asking that question to hundreds of pastors who have completed my coaching networks (over 1000 pastors have now gone through my hands-on-coaching networks since 2004) and I’ve discovered that we all SAY we love new believers but we don’t SHOW we love them by taking the time to lay out a follow-up process.

Call it New Believer Follow-up, Beginning Discipleship or whatever, the first few days and weeks after someone turns to Christ is VERY IMPORTANT, true?

Well, here’s why I’m telling you this. . .

1) I want to challenge you to develop a written, clear New Believer process at your church.

Why?  Because doing so will put you in a position where God can better ‘trust’ you with new believers.

I mean, are you ready for twice as many new believers this year as you had last year (anyone else besides me praying for this)?

Think about it – every Sunday, God is changing lives, tons of people are saved every week in churches across the world – but why do some churches see more life change than others?   Here’s one hint: they are BETTER PREPARED.

By preparing your church to cultivate, nurture and grow New Believers . . . before you even have New Believers. .  . you are putting yourself in a position for God to bless your church (I call this the Principle of Spiritual Readiness).

2) I want to help you develop a clear, Spirit-dependent, biblical and strategic plan to cultivate, nurture and grow New Believers.

What if I could give you a NEW BELIEVER ROADMAP that you could modify for your church that would allow you to BETTER follow-up on the New Believers that God is currently sending you and position you for even more?

I would like to teach you this “new believer roadmap” in my Brand New Resource entitled THE NEW BELIEVER SEMINAR . . . I know, I know, I’m very creative with titles.  But the power of this seminar is not in the title; it’s in the process I teach you in this nuts-and-bolts resource.

You see, I want to teach you the exact process we use to follow-up on the thousands of new believers we’ve seen at The Journey Church (in fact, last year was a record year for us . . .and after seeing what God did in our church through this process and after being pushed and cajoled by my coaching alumni to make this RoadMap available to them, I recently went in the studio and gathered the documents and put together the same powerful, proven training for you).

Here’s how this resource works for you: When you invest in the resource you will receive the EXACT New Believers Checklist we use for every New Believer at The Journey  .  . . this checklist has been in the works for many years and is the fruition of our commitment to new believers.

Then, with the check list in hand, you listen to my almost two hours of teaching where I walk you through step by step how to use and easily modify the check list for your church.

In as few as two hours with me, you’ll walk away with your CUSTOMIZED NEW BELIEVER PROCESS for your church.

Make sense?

Here are just a few reasons to develop a clear New Believer Follow-Up Process:

• A clear process leads to greater blessing (see the Principle of Spiritual Readiness above).
• A clear process insures that NO ONE FALLS THROUGH THE CRACKS – do you want to be held accountable by God for failing to follow-up properly with new believers?  I don’t!
• A clear process allows you to engage others to help you with follow-up.  When you develop the RoadMap, you can then easily ask others to help you with follow and know that it will be done properly.
• You know you’ve always needed to do it, so let me give you a HEAD START!  Remember the first rule of engineering… don’t re-invent the wheel.

I could go on and probably give you a dozen reasons, but you know you need this in your church.

So let’s get started, here’s the link to this new resource:

THE NEW BELIEVER SEMINAR: A COMPLETE FOLLOW-UP SYSTEM

Download before January 31st and you will receive over $119.00 in BONUS RESOURCES (see the P.S. below for a full list).

Here’s a sample of what I cover in this brand new resource:

• How to better preach for decisions.
• How you can increase the number of people who indicate their decision for Christ (Hint: you probably have more people coming to Christ than you realize…they’re just not telling you)
• How to better collect info on those making decisions
• How to make it easier for people in your church to make decisions (whether you use a decision card or a come forward invitation – or both)
• How to ensure that every person is discipled and that “No New Believer Gets Left Behind”
• What to do and NOT do in the first hour after someone becomes a Christian
• The four opportunities you have to follow up with new believers, and the importance of each opportunity
• Why your preaching calendar is crucial to your new believer follow-up
• The one thing you MUST do in order to see new believers grow
• How to involve others to help you with follow-up
• How to cultivate the connection between prayer and new believers
• Plus much more!

I think you’ll find that I deliver much more than I promise in this resource as I’ll cover ideas and give you New Believer resources that you may never have thought of.

Click Below to Secure Your Copy Now:

THE NEW BELIEVERS SEMINAR: A COMPLETE FOLLOW-UP SYSTEM

Available for a limited time for only $99 as a Download

P.S. Order before January 31^st and receive over $119.00 in these BONUS RESOURCES:

• The Top 5 Evangelism Invite Tools Audio ($19.95 Value)
• Maximizing Summer Audio ($19.95 Value)
• Maximizing Easter Audio ($19.95 Value
• Overcoming the Barriers to Baptism Audio ($19.95 Value)
• The Decision Dilemma Audio ($19.95 Value)
• O.C. Church Leaders ($19.95 Value)

Click Below to Secure Your Copy Now:

THE NEW BELIEVERS SEMINAR: A COMPLETE FOLLOW-UP SYSTEM

Available for a limited time for only $99 as a Download

Wow! I just received a great report from our team about our Servant Evangelism efforts last week at The Journey.

Each semester, all of our Small Groups participate in one week of Servant Evangelism (SE).

Here’s how it works…

All of the groups that meet in a certain part of the city on Tuesday night come together at a central location for a Servant Evangelism project (e.g. handing out granola bars or bottles of water with invite cards to the church) instead of going to their regular group.

The same is true for the groups that meet on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, etc.

Basically, the group meets at their normal time but in a different location and, instead of the usual study, they do an outreach project together.

It works great because it’s at an already scheduled time and it’s fun to do SE as a team.

And last week was the biggest week we’ve had all year.

We had 364 people participate and together they made…. 37,656 touches!

I’m so excited that I’m going to offer you a FREE Resource to celebrate (and to help your church reach the people of your community).

So, I’ve asked the CLI team to set aside 100 copies of my downloadable resource, “Reaching Your Community Through Servant Evangelism” to give away for FREE (a $23.95 Value).

Reaching Your Community Through Servant Evangelism will teach you how to use simple acts of service to spread the gospel in your community.

With this downloadable resource, you’ll learn what Servant Evangelism is, how to plan effective projects for your community, and how to impact your community with the love of Christ.

This downloadable resource includes:

• What is Servant Evangelism?
• Why Servant Evangelism works
• How to get started doing Servant Evangelism
• Principles for effective Servant Evangelism
• 10 Servant Evangelism ideas
• BONUS – Sample PDF Invite Cards

And it’s FREE to you , but don’t delay – This is only available to the first 100 people to download!

Click Here to See if a Copy is Still Available

Did you get this month’s Church Leader Insights Newsletter?

Each month I send out the latest and best thinking on Church Growth, Evangelism, Leadership, Church Planting, and more – the best church leadership content I can find - designed to help you lead your church to greater health and growth.

And the best part…. It’s absolutely FREE! (click here to sign-up now).

Just in case you missed this month’s edition, here’s a sneak peek at a great article from my friend and former boss Rick Warren:

DON’T LET THE ECONOMY SHORT CHANGE YOUR EVANGELISM EFFORTS

“Despite a tough economy, we need to keep asking the right question when it comes to evangelism; rather than ask, “How much will it cost?” we must ask, “Who will it reach?” . . . money spent on evangelism is an investment. Rather than seeing your evangelism budget as an expense, see it as an investment. The people you reach will more than repay the cost you invested to reach them.”
Read More…

The Church Leader Insights Newsletter is designed to bring you the best available church leadership content each and every month – and all you have to do is check your email!

If you’re not already subscribed, you can click this link to sign up right now.

by Nelson Searcy and Tommy Duke

Evangelism is one of the purposes of the church that we recognize as a high priority – I rarely hear from a Pastor who isn’t trying to reach more people for Christ.

But sometimes, Pastors and their churches appear to be doing and saying all the right things, but they’re seeing little (if any) fruit.

Their frustration is often voiced in questions like:

• What are we doing wrong?
• How can I get my people to invite their friends to church?
• Why can’t we seem to reach the people of this community?

To check for one (unfortunately common) bottleneck, I’ve learned to ask a few key questions of Senior Pastors who are struggling with this situation:

• What are the names of 3-5 unchurched friends that you are praying will come to know Christ?
• Who have you personally invited to come to your church this week?
• When was the last time you prayerwalked through your own neighborhood?

See, in Coaching over 800 Pastors, I have observed this truth:

Evangelistic Churches are Led by Evangelistic Pastors

The Pastor is a huge piece of the Evangelism puzzle (and more important than we often realize).

It’s true across the board – evangelism has to flow down from leadership if the people of your church are ever going to reach out effectively.

Notice, I didn’t say “Evangelistic Churches are Led by Pastors with the Gift of Evangelism” – because that’s not always the case.

In fact, some of the healthiest, most fruitful churches I know are led by Godly Pastors who understand that Evangelism is a vital function of every believer – and just preaching about it on Sunday doesn’t exempt them from living it out the rest of the week.

So, how about you Pastor…

• Who’s on your “needs to know Christ” list?
• What are you going to do this week to reach out to them?

P.S. To learn more about the essential pieces of your church’s Evangelism System and a proven strategy to Double Your Church in a Day, check out The Ignite Seminar.

Most of you long-time readers know that I am a contrarian when it comes to summer.  I happen to believe that summer is a great time to grow your church.

And one of the best things about summer-time is that it offers you opportunities that aren’t available during the rest of the year.

One great example of a “summer-only” outreach opportunity is Vacation Bible School (VBS).

The danger when talking about outreach activities like VBS is to focus more on the program than you do on your goal – which should be reaching people and make disciples.

I recently read a great article about VBS Strategy from my friend Hal Seed, and he gave me permission to share it here for you today:

Eight Ideas for Reaping the Fruit of Your Vacation Bible School
By Hal Seed

How do you measure the success of your children’s ministry outreach events?

Lots of churches sponsor programs that are at least partly designed to attract children who are not currently part of their fellowship. Vacation Bible School is a prime example. Churches put herculean efforts into drawing unchurched kids to their VBS programs. If that’s one of the purposes of your VBS, how do you measure whether you accomplished the goal?

At New Song, we have four distinct goals for our summer Bible camp:
1. Disciple the children of our church in an intensive, week-long program.
2. Develop leadership and ministry skills in our youth and adult volunteers.
3. Deepen our unity by asking members of every generation to serve together that week.
4. Attract unchurched families and enfold them into the family of God.

We accomplish our discipleship goal by holding a great VBS. We accomplish our leadership development goal through a good VBS staff training program, coupled with the on-the-job experience gained during the week of camp.

We accomplish our intergenerational goal by recruiting teens, twenties, thirties, parents and retirees to serve. But how do we retain the unchurched families who attend our VBS? This requires multiple capture strategies.

The Key: Building Relationships
In my experience, many churches put on stellar VBS weeks and hope that the fourth goal (of retaining the unchurched) will take care of itself. The truth is, most unchurched families aren’t thinking about attending your church when they enroll their kids in VBS. They’re either looking for an enriching place to send their kids during a busy summer, or they’re letting their kids hang out with their friends at your church for the week.

Church attendance may not be the last thing on their minds, but it’s close to the bottom for most of them. So wooing the unchurched back after the VBS is over will take more than a great summer program. Here’s the key: The majority of your unchurched VBS attendees will only return if you build a relationship with them.

Building relationships requires multiple contacts. Here are eight strategies we use to capture as many unchurched visitors as possible:

1. Greet parents every morning.
As parents arrive to drop off and pick up their children each morning, we station staff members in the lobby to casually introduce themselves and make parents feel welcome.

2. Give them an excuse to stick around.
We set up coffee carts and refreshment tables out front, so parents who want to linger can do so.

3. Give them a reason to attend your church.
We combine one of our weekend services with the final session of VBS. At this session (which, for us, is our Saturday night service), we have the children perform songs they learned during the week. Then as I get up to speak, the children are dismissed for one last “special time” with their VBS leaders.

The kids receive a camp picture, a big hug, personal prayer, and encouragement to return for church the following week. (Note: Be sure to have the kids return and perform one more song at the end of the service. Otherwise, some of your unchurched parents will grab their kids after the performance and leave, and you’ll miss the opportunity to bring them the Word of God and fully sample your service.)

4. Preach a relevant message.
While the kids are with their VBS leaders, I preach a biblical message on parenting. I want our visiting parents to know that God, the Bible, and the church can provide them with practical help. Make sure to have everyone in the service complete your “Connection Card”; this will help you gain contact information for your guests without making them feel singled out.

5. Exceed their expectations.
At the end of the service, we offer a free copy of The God Questions Gift Edition to all newcomers as a way of saying “thank you” for coming and trusting their children to us. The God Questions Gift Edition is a simple, 45-minute read that answers the questions they may have about God.

The book is valuable to them, and at $1.99 per copy, it’s inexpensive for us. Since it’s a gift book, I offer to sign it on the gift page for them at the end of the service. This gives me a chance to meet each parent, get their name, look them in the eye and ask, “So, do you have questions about God?” I then say, “This is a really good place to get your questions answered. I hope you’ll come back next weekend.”

6. Exceed their expectations again.
Immediately following this service, we hold a party in the lobby. The tables full of finger-food slow the guests down and entice them to munch and mingle. We make sure plenty of staff and volunteers are there, graciously introducing themselves.

7. Add them to your newcomers list.
Since these new guests have filled out a Connection Card during the service, we are able to send them our usual first-time-guest letter and follow-up with them like we would our other weekend guests. Being part of our database means they’ll begin receiving weekly emails from me about what God is up to in our church—another step in helping them feel like part of the church family.

8. Provide a reason to return.
We offer an incentive to return a second time by scheduling a family-oriented event a few weeks after VBS ends. Then we’ll promote the event during the service and send them a personal invitation ten days ahead of time.

None of these steps happen by accident. They require thought, prayer and planning. VBS is such a fruitful harvesting opportunity for us that we ask our whole staff to participate in some way. We try to refine this process every year, and every time we do, we see a higher percentage of unchurched families return, give their lives to Christ and join the church.

A few guests begin attending the very next week. A larger number return two to four weeks later. Most unchurched people can’t fathom attending church every weekend, so this pattern is normal. Still others come the first time I do a series on family, marriage or parenting, which can be months later.

This spring, a family walked up to my wife and said, “We came for VBS last summer. Now we’re back for church!” It took them nine months, but today they are now fully engaged Christ-followers, growing in their faith and looking forward to inviting friends to this year’s VBS.

The Principle: Thinking on Two Levels
A gifted speaker can get dozens of children to raise their hands and pray a prayer at the end of a good week of camp, but that shouldn’t be the goal. Jesus desires fruit that remains. Therefore, whenever possible, build systems that attract people to not just attend your programs but to become fully participating members of your church.

To do this, you’ll need to think on two levels about your outreach events. Level One is coordinating and presenting the event itself; Level Two is capturing the unchurched who attend the event. You will change the paradigm and approach of all your church’s event-planning if you measure an event’s success not by how many pre-believers show up for it, but by how many of them become regularly attending members of your church six to nine months afterward.

Hal Seed
PastorMentor.com
HalSeed.typepad.com

That’s great stuff Hal!

So how about you?

What’s your plan to engage, build relationships with, and follow up on the unchurched people your church connects with this summer?

P.S. To learn more about harnessing the power of Big Days to reach more people and grow your church, check out The Ignite Seminar.

“I wish my people would invite their friends to church”

“We just need something to jump-start our evangelism”

“I want to mobilize the people in my church to reach their friends”

If you’ve ever let any of these sentences (or something similar) slip out of your lips, then welcome to church leadership.

In fact, all of us have – at one time or another – felt this same way.

I have good news for you today!

Over in the Church Leader Insights store today, we’re releasing a Brand New Sermon Series that’s designed to help you mobilize your people to reach others for Christ.

Here are the messages included in the Ignite Sermon Series:

• My Story Can Change the World
• My Worship Can Change the World
• My Readiness Can Change the World
• My Invitation Can Change the World

We originally taught this series at The Journey, and it’s proven to help teach and equip your church to be missional AND attractional.

You can order this new series in one of two ways:

Click here to Download this Full Church Resource Immediately

or

Click here to Secure Your 5 CD Set (four message CD’s + one resource CD)