Come and See

Come and see what God has done: he is awesome in his deeds toward the children of man.   - Psalm 66:5

A while back, we had some friends invite us to dinner at a restaurant I had never been to before. Honestly, I had no desire to go to this place because, at face value, it just didn’t seem that appealing. However, because we trusted our friends and they were the ones that invited us, we went. And guess what? We loved it. In fact, it is a regular date night restaurant for Amy and I, and we have invited others to check it out as well. And to think, without the invitation of some dear friends, we probably never would have gone to this place and would have missed out on some great food.

I think we all can think of a time some friends invited us to a place we were skeptical of, but went because we were invited by those that we trusted. Church shouldn’t be any different. I would argue that we should be more eager to invite people we know to church than any other place. Here is why. The things found at the gathering of believers are unlike anything else. People from all walks of life gather together in a genuine community to share joys and failures, wins and struggles, and encourage one another. All of this is centered around the greatest certainty of hope that can be found, and that is redemption through the love and life of Jesus.

I read some statistics that said less than 10% of people come to church for the first time because of standard advertising. The stats showed that people are six times more likely to come to a church gathering over advertising simply because a friend invited them. Invite some friends and neighbors to “Come and see what God has done, He is awesome in His deeds toward the children of man”. Share with them what God is doing at and through your church and invite them to experience what you get to. And then invite them to lunch after to your favorite restaurant.