Being Invitational is a habit
When I first started to take out the idea of Back to Church Sunday to church leaders I was shocked that many of them didn’t want to do an invitation Sunday. I soon discovered for every church leader with whom I spoke, only one in ten would engage with the message I brought. You may be surprised at such a low response. Some church leaders were too busy running their present programmes. Some church leaders didn’t think it was worth inviting people until they got their church right. Some church leaders just didn’t respond and so on and so on. So how did we get from the first church agreeing to do an Invitation Sunday to some nine years later 15,000 churches. You have to keep inviting. So everyday I would try and contact ten church leaders, get turned down nine times but find the one. Still to this day, eight to nine out of ten are not interested. But to become invitational you keep inviting and it becomes a habit.
The same is true for inviting our friends and neighbours. As you keep on inviting your capacity to invite increases and you develop the habit, and in doing so God’s Holy Spirit transform us with the fruits of the Spirit. In delay we produce patience. Facing fear we produce courage, and in offence we develop forgiveness.
