Auburndale Baptist Church

Auburndale Baptist Church desires to worship and obey God by lovingly and clearly presenting the gospel to our neighbors (Matt. 28:19-20; Gal. 5:14). Here are six central strategies to the evangelistic efforts of our church. It is our conviction that they are profoundly biblical and effective.

1) Preach

We boldly preach the whole, true gospel in our public gatherings to encourage the saints, to clearly communicate the gospel, and to motivate them to evangelize. The biblical ideal is that personal evangelism is the responsibility of all members of the congregation. We have found that training does not create a zeal to evangelize, but recognizing that we have been rescued from God's wrath and judgment, freed from sin, and united by repentance and faith with Christ does. Our church has covenanted together to be deliberate about loving our non-Christian neighbors and to prayerfully seek opportunities to share the gospel with them. This includes an open invitation to our public gatherings to hear the gospel preached and to see the gospel displayed in our fellowship.

2) Equip

We equip ourselves for evangelism with the Word of God through expositional preaching. We recognize the helpful process of many training programs in teaching what to share with unbelievers. The problems arise when a question is asked or an issue is raised that was not in the training program. Therefore, we equip and train ourselves primarily with God's Word, which not only provides us with eternal truth that addresses all kinds of issues that could be raised, but also changes and prepares our hearts and minds by the Spirit in the process.

3) Model

We believe a healthy local church is the greatest tool for evangelism. Therefore, we commit and covenant together to love, care, support, encourage, and hold each other accountable in such a way that the witness of our church is a display of the gospel to the world-especially to non-Christians visiting the church.

4) Testify

We strongly encourage evangelism by providing time on Wednesday evenings to share specifically the opportunities that God has provided for each of us to proclaim the gospel by loving our non-Christian neighbors at work, school, home, and in the larger community. These public testimonies also provide the accountability for the congregation as we pray together for the specific situations, ask about updates, and discuss helpful directions to take these conversations.

5) Act

We have community outreach events primarily in the form of cookouts and fellowships. The purpose in these events is to provide an opportunity for us to bring our non-Christian co-workers, neighbors, and friends and to church, so that they can experience the fellowship of our church. Even though these events become rich and fruitful times of fellowship with the members of our church, their primary purpose is to have an outlet for us to expose our non-Christian friends to the joyful fellowship that only Christians who have covenanted together in a local church can experience.

6) Go

Coming from a type of Acts 1:8 model, we try to send members from our church on mission trips both, foreign and domestic. As resources become more available, our yearly goal is to have several mission events in the community, send members on mission trips within the United States, and offer at least one international mission trip a year. In the fall of 2005, a team went to East Africa to work with our adopted missionaries, John and Rebecca Barnett, while our youth in the summer of 2006 served in South Carolina.

Our prayer is that this short synopsis will not only inform you of ABC's deliberate efforts to faithfully proclaim the gospel as a church, but that it would stir within you the desire for every transformed believer in Christ to embrace the great commission as our responsibility as a local church. May our Triune God find us and our church faithful when we each stand in account on that day for our part in this glorious task of spreading the gospel to the ends of the earth.