ACTION
Ask
to interview three married couples in your church who have family in the community. Work with them in designing a
map of their respective family networks (those who live in your city or town). Also,
map any other networks (friends and colleagues) that illustrate additional
primary or secondary relationships in their lives. This process can be repeated
over and over again with other people.
a.
Include both the husband and wife in your study.
b.
Before the interview, draw up a chart and include
for both husband and wife:
i.
Each of their parents, if alive,
ii.
Each of their children,
iii.
Each of their children’s friends and their parents
iv.
Each or their siblings, their children and in-laws,
v.
Each of the work colleagues with whom they are
comfortable conversing,
vi.
Each of their friends and neighbors with whom they
have cordial contact
This exercise can also be used to help single congregants to discover how much potential influence they have through their friendships, their relationships at work, and their neighbors.
REFLECTION
Based on your findings,
what might be the potential for outreach in your congregation? You might do
this networking exercise with all the adults in your church. More importantly,
do some brainstorming about what you might do to reach these people with the
gospel. For example:
- Have parties in the homes of the respective members and have them invite their networks and their friends at church. This idea is not intended as an evangelistic, but as an introduction to relationships with church friends.
- Plan events in neutral venues, like banquets, and invite to them.
- Have an open house for the community.
- Plan a picnic in the park where all the people in the networks of your church are invited.
- Plan interest groups to which people from the networks can be invited.
- Put
a softball team, soccer team, or a basketball team together and enter a
league. Invite those in the collective networks who play that particular
sport to participate.
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