Key Methods of Sunday School Evangelism
Elmer Towns

Use Front Door Evangelism
Evangelism is communicating the Gospel to people in an understandable way and motivating people to respond to Christ and become a member of His church. There are several ways in which churches have expressed evangelism in recent years. Perhaps the most common of these is “Front Door Evangelism,” also called “Inviting Evangelism” because it centers around inviting people to enter through the front door of the church where they can hear the Gospel in an event and be saved. This is also called “Event Evangelism.” The event can be a Sunday morning preaching service or an evangelistic service where evangelism happens. One problem with event evangelism is that the stained-glass barrier will keep many from entering the building so they can be evangelized. In spite of its limitations, Front Door Evangelism is where most evangelism happens.

Use Saturation Evangelism
A second type of evangelism is “Saturation Evangelism” or “Media Evangelism.” This kind of evangelism has been defined as, lousing every available means to reach every available person at every available time.” The biblical basis of saturation evangelism is described where the early church had saturated Jerusalem with the Gospel as a lawn is saturated with water. They had gone house to house and preached publicly in the temple (Acts 5:42). As a result the opposition said, “Look, you have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this Man’s blood on us!” (Acts 5:28)

Use Media for Evangelism
While many will do evangelism only as described in the Bible, one pastor said he would go a step farther and use any evangelistic method not expressly forbidden in Scripture so he could reach people with the Gospel. This includes (a) busing, (b) campaigns, (c) advertising, (d) cassettes, (e) newspapers, (f) newsletters, (g) radio announcements, (h) television, (i) flyers, and (o) billboards. In 1971, I was Sunday School Superintendent at Thomas Road Baptist Church, Lynchburg, Virginia when Sunday School attendance averaged approximately 4,000 a week.

Pastor Jerry Falwell set an attendance goal of 10,000, an unheard of record attendance. The goal was to saturate the city and surrounding counties. First, all 103 pages of the telephone book were distributed to 103 volunteers with the instruction to phone everyone and invite them to Sunday School. Twelve billboards surrounding the city invited visitors to the service. Sixty radio announcements were played on every station and 10 announcements on the I television station invited people to Sunday School. A flyer was placed under the windshield wiper of every automobile in town and 5,000 posters were tacked on trees, light poles, etc. Three mailings (a letter, flyer, and post card) were sent to every home in a 5 county area. Finally, 200 workers went door to door on the Saturday before the big day to invite visitors to Sunday School.

As a result of saturating our “Jerusalem,” 10,154 attended Harvest Day, 1972. But by 1987, Dr. Falwell was qualifying his opinion on every phase of Saturation Evangelism. He said it didn’t work as it used to work because of the high price of media. Falwell was exhorting “Back to Basics,” which included visiting, contacting friends, working through Sunday School teachers, etc.

Be Superaggressive in Outreach
“Superaggressive Evangelism” is not a method, it is an attitude that the Christian should have in being energetic and innovative in giving the Gospel to every person. Often the terms “superaggressive evangelism” and “saturation evangelism” are used interchangeably. However, they do have different emphases. When speaking of saturation evangelism, we are emphasizing the means by which the Great Commission is accomplished. Superaggressive refers more to the attitude of faith and obedience with which the task is done. If everyone is lost and needs Christ as Savior, and if the Great Commission demands that the Gospel be given to everyone, then the church should be aggressive in obedience, aggressive in faith, and superaggressive in method. The key to understanding superaggressive evangelism is to possess, or rather be possessed by a vision of what God can do.

The above article, “Key Methods of Sunday School Evangelism” was written by Elmer Towns. The article was excerpted from 154 Steps to Revitalize Your Sunday School by Elmer Towns. Liberty University Press. 1988. Used by permission.

The material is copyrighted and should not be reprinted under any other name or author. However, this material may be freely used for personal study or research purposes.

This article may not be written by an Apostolic author, but it contains many excellent principles and concepts that can be adapted to most churches. As the old saying goes, “Eat the meat. Throw away the bones.”