Leading people by baby steps to talk about their faith and inviting others to church.  We are handing out business cards each week with the instructions on them for the week.  If you would like to purchase the original word and publisher files for all 13 weeks, you can do that in the store.  However, the content and path to leading people is helpful.  

The person handing out the homework, or pointing it out in the bulletin should have one story or one answer for the question that helps people start thinking.  Also, people should be planted at fellowship hour to ask the questions for the week and get a conversation going.  

1/7/2018
Think of one story about how this church has affected your life.

1/14/2018
Tell the story of how this church has changed your life at coffee hour to ONE person.

1/21/2018
Think of one story that shows how your life is better because of Jesus.

1/28/2018
Tell the story of how Jesus matters in your life to ONE person at coffee hour.

2/4/2018
Name one thing that is scary about telling people about Jesus and one good thing.
 
2/11/2018
When you feel nervous about telling someone about church or Jesus, what is one thing you can tell yourself to help you do it?

2/18/2018
Think of a person who does not go to church and how Jesus might change their lives.
 
2/25/2018
Contact the person you thought of last week, and mention something about how Jesus changed your life in casual conversation.
 
3/4/2018
Pray for that person and whatever is going on in his or her life. You can share that you've done this, but don't have to.

 
3/11/2018
Hand a flyer with church information casually to TWO people in a one-on-one conversation at one event this week or next.

 
3/18/2018
What good news of Jesus will you invite at least TWO families to hear at Calvary Lutheran this Easter?  Which TWO families?

3/25/201
Invite at least TWO more families to come worship with us on Easter.  Including at least one sentence about why you think Easter matters.  What is the Good News for you, in one sentence?  How does Jesus change your life?

4/1/2018
Send a message or make a phone call to the four families on Saturday letting them know you’ll see them tomorrow for Easter.

I’m so excited!  I’m dust, and to dust I shall return.  Every year in the life of the church, we observe a Holy Day called Ash Wednesday.  Ash Wednesday is on Valentine’s Day this year, so I hope to see you at church at 7pm on February 14.  Somehow, we’ll include Love in all this.
Ash Wednesday is the day that starts us on a path to Easter.  This service begins the church season of Lent, the six weeks we use to prepare for Easter.  At this service, I will draw crosses on each person’s forehead while they kneel around the altar. 

Although some find this service “too real” and “too focused on death”, I find great meaning, great joy, and great life in it.  For it communicates so many things.  It lets me know that I belong to God, no matter what.  If I’m a tiny infant, or near death, we all have the same cross on our heads, and we all belong to God the same.  It equalizes the playing field to know that we are all going to die, and I love knowing that even though each of us are sinners (do things that cause separation and hurt), we are all in it together.  We are all made from the same dust, and we will return to the same dust, and we belong to the same God who sees us, knows us, and saves us anyway.

There is a healing aspect to this service, for it brings us together as a community.  We start our journey of six weeks knowing that we belong to God, that God made us, and that we’re all equally guilty, equally messy equally death-dealing, and equally saved.
This is a day when we get real about death, real about the pain we cause each other, God, ourselves, and the planet.  We acknowledge how much the same we are, how much God loves us, and how we are all in it together.