Baptists put twist on evangelism

Cameron Sweet will give up the comforts of home this week to fix other people’s houses.

Along with 130 other Southern Baptist youth from all over the Northwest, the 15-year-old will spend the week in Airway Heights – painting walls, cleaning, doing landscape work and other jobs to help the elderly, disabled and others who can’t afford to pay for home repair. Instead of returning to his own house in Medical Lake at night, Sweet will be sleeping on the floor at Cheney Middle School along with other teens who paid for their own travel and food expenses to come to Airway Heights and help the needy.

By volunteering through World Changers – a hands-on mission program sponsored by the Southern Baptist Convention – Sweet is practicing the core mission of his denomination: to preach the Gospel through action and to bring people to Jesus.

With nearly 17 million members nationwide, the Southern Baptist Convention is the country’s largest Protestant denomination. Although it wields a significant amount of political influence, a recent report indicates that the Southern Baptists may be experiencing an “evangelistic crisis.” Baptism rates are in decline, according to a study by Thom S. Rainer, a scholar and founding dean of the Billy Graham School of Missions, Evangelism and Church Growth at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Rainer’s report also shows that nearly a third of Southern Baptist churches reported no baptisms in 2003.

“The Southern Baptist Convention is less evangelistic today than it was in the years preceding the conservative resurgence,” he wrote.

In response to the alarming report, Southern Baptist leaders set a nationwide goal during last week’s annual convention in Tennessee: 1 million baptisms for the coming year beginning in October.

“Evangelism has always been a concern of ours – that’s what we’re called to do,” said the Rev. Gary Bass, pastor of Dishman Baptist Church in Spokane Valley.

The baptism rate for the 43 churches in the Inland Empire Baptist Association has increased slightly – from 296 in 2000 to 329 last year. Sunday morning worship attendance, however, has decreased by about 180 during the same time period.

Bass, who attended last week’s national meeting in Nashville, has been praying with his congregation as they discern a realistic goal for their church. His congregation of about 300 averages about 30 new baptisms a year, said Bass.

While many Southern Baptists still knock on doors, conduct prayer walks in various neighborhoods and other more “traditional” ways of evangelizing, some say the most effective way of reaching people is by slowly building relationships. That’s especially the case here in the Pacific Northwest, which has been identified as one the nation’s most unchurched regions. The U.S. Census, which is conducted every 10 years, shows that roughly 64 percent of people around Spokane – and as many as 78 percent of people in Bonner County, Idaho – claimed no affiliation to any church in the year 2000.

Reaching people who don’t go to church at all or have no experience with the Bible takes a far more subtle approach than preaching about salvation and the afterlife, local pastors say.

“Before we can talk to them spiritually, we need to meet their physical needs,” said Brian Jenkins, the youth pastor at Airway Heights Baptist Church, which is hosting the 130 youths for World Changers. Instead of simply talking about Jesus, “a gentler, more acceptable approach is to show Christ’s love.”

That’s the idea behind World Changers and other mission work, said Sweet, a member of Airway Heights Baptist Church. By assisting those in need, they establish relationships, which ultimately can lead to more baptisms in the church.

“I like helping people,” said the teen. “If I can do that and show them Jesus at the same time, then it serves two purposes.”

Jenkins, who works with a youth group of about 40 middle-school and high-school kids, often reminds the students to refrain from using words such as “redemption” and “sin” whenever they engage in conversations with non-Christians. It’s important to understand these concepts, he said, but using the vocabulary of the Bible isn’t always effective when talking about God to people who have never attended church.

While last week’s convention and the challenge of 1 million baptisms have inevitably inspired the evangelistic efforts of Southern Baptists nationwide, some local pastors caution against the recent emphasis on numbers.

“Rather than let it be the engine that drives the train, evangelism should be the result,” said the Rev. Terry Little, pastor of Crossover Baptist Church in Mead. “We’re not trying to see how many we can pack in on Sundays. By building our ministry on numerical goals, we could lose the essence of who we are.”

Little said he’s not very innovative, nor does he pay attention to marketing and other trends that could lead to church growth. As a Southern Baptist, his mission is “to stick to the basics of God’s word” through belief, prayer and the Bible.

Although numbers have never been his focus, Little has helped Crossover Baptist grow from 30 members to well over 550 in less than 10 years. Today, Crossover is one of the largest congregations in the entire Inland Empire Baptist Association, according to Diane Hein, the association’s ministry assistant. Every Sunday, at least one or two people ask to be baptized at the church.

“When people come our way, our primary goal is to help them come to know Christ and grow in God’s word” – not necessarily to convert them into Southern Baptists, said Little. “What we really seek to do is see lives change.”

Rather than count the number of baptisms that take place at their church, the members of Crossover and other local churches want to support each other and strengthen their beliefs as Christians. “Baptism is an expression of a person’s faith,” said the Rev. Dale Jenkins, pastor of Airway Heights Baptist Church. “Our church just wants to help people and lead them to a relationship with the Lord.”

Despite all the marketing advice out there for pastors, there’s no real strategy to reaching the “unchurched,” Little said. When people experience a transformation in their lives, that’s when they bring others who don’t know God to church. Little also believes that the denomination would see an evangelistic revival “if we would continue to hold on to our conservative Bible-based roots,” he said.

“The Lord has blessed us, and we’re grateful for the numbers,” Little said. “But we’re not out to build a large church; we seek a strong church.”