How To Write A Personal Invitation (Or Say One If Necessary)

-every year we like to sort of hit on some important topics. In December we will talk about Christmas, usually at least once in the year we will talk about our core values and how you can be living a life that allows you to be closer to God. One we like to do every year right around this time is talk about inviting people to church or to faith in Christ.

-because let’s just be honest, we do a bad job of inviting people to know Jesus. We rarely invite people to church, we’ve turned knowing Christ into a repeat-after-me thirty second prayer and that’s it.

-so today we’re going to talk a little about what it really takes to invite someone to be a part of our ministry here. Next week is the Back to School Bash, it’s a great event to invite someone to because it’s not as “churchy” and hopefully people will want to come back and visit us and learn more about who we are and who Jesus is.

-but for us to be inviting people well, we need to be doing a few things. So tonight, we’re going to be talking about how to give someone a personal invitation to church. And it all starts with:

1. INFORMATION

-before anyone will ever want to come to church, we need to actually tell them about church. People aren’t going to drive by the building and magically know when we meet. They might guess Sunday morning we have a worship gathering of some sort, but that’s about it. And they probably aren’t going to visit the website, especially if they don’t know the web address.

-so we have to give people some sort of information. If you invite someone to church, letting them know where the church is, probably good information.

-in giving information there are two things you need to remember:

BE EXCITED

-there’s an age old saying for people who lead, no one is going to be as excited about what you are leading as you. You set the level of what to expect.

-think of it this way. If I were to invite you to a Colts game, and I said it like this [BE VERY BLAH]. “I’m going to the football game, you can come if you want. I mean, it’s alright. The food isn't that good and our seats are horrible, I think you can make out the players. Every time we go some drunk guy behind us spills beer on us. But my dad told me to ask if you want to come with us.” Oo, Oo, please, take me!

-you can make anything sound boring. You really can. Or you can make anything sound exciting. I’m not saying lie to the person, “Our seats are so good they’re actually on the bench. You can smell Peyton’s sweat.” But you can be excited about it. Obviously there’s a reason why you would go to the game, tell that.

-and as much as you need to be excited. You need to:

BE CORRECT

-there is nothing worse than incorrect information.

-do you ever watch The Apprentice? I don’t watch it that often but I saw one year it was near the end and the three finalists needed to make a press package. Three left, next challenge is to win. And this one team made an incredible package. It looked incredibly professional, it had a folder with matching paperwork, a video that really stood out. Donald Trump said it was the best one of the night. This person had a sure shot to the finals. Until the guy sitting next to Trump asked a question. He was looking through the packet and asked, “Why are the phone numbers different on these two sheets?”

-That started a look at the numbers and he was right, there were two 800 numbers. So Trump started asking which one is right. The contestant didn’t know, so Trump asked for a phone and called them both. One was a wrong number, one was disconnected. Both numbers was wrong. So what happened? Trump fired them on the spot. They were for sure in the final until they saw that number. And why? Because even a crappy looking brochure is better than one with the wrong phone number on it.

-let’s use tonight as an example. If you were to invite someone to Drink Deep, would you give the right information? Do you know where the church is? If someone wanted to know more, do you know the Fire & Water Website address?

-what time do we start? You might say we start at 5:30. That’s kind of true. Really, we start at 6:00, the doors open at 5:30 and you don’t show up until ten to 6. That’s more true. Which would help a new person more, to show up at 5:30, maybe a little earlier and then hang out with people they don’t know, or to give them the real information about where and when to meet you?