When the Engel scale moves on to Reaping (becoming
a Christian) you need to look at where in your programme you are giving people the
opportunity to respond to the gospel.
Where is that point?
At King’s it used to be
the Alpha Saturday and at baptisms. Alpha Saturday still remains for us a major
event in this respect but now we would provide that opportunity more frequently
– it could be at almost any Sunday meeting.
The statistics go something like this.
Before Lex Loizides started to come to King’s 2% of the people who were
saved at King’s were saved through our preaching on a Sunday. After Lex came and equipped us that became
20%. Suddenly we had the ability and the
confidence to make an appeal more often and see people respond to the
gospel. On other occasions we would get a
guest evangelist to come along.
We run a New Christians
group on a Sunday. It’s not unusual for
people who have done Alpha are not yet Christians to then join our New
Christians group - but then they become Christians at the New Christians group! We are sometimes aware that people have not
yet made a commitment but we let them go into that group and as a result we’ve seen
a number of people that have come to faith there! The important thing is to provide
opportunities for reaping the harvest.