Spicing Up Outreach

Chips & Salsa Ministry

I came home from podcasting Sunday night to find a brown paperbag on my doorstep.  Relieved that it wasn’t a flaming bag of poo, I brought it into the house where I found that it was from the big – dare I say ‘mega’ – church down the road, Fielder Road Baptist Church. The first item of note within was a large bag of tortilla chips alongside a jar of salsa.  On the jar, the label proclaimed: “Spice up your life, go to church.”

Oh man, this is how you bring sinners to Christ.  Seriously.  Whoever thought this up is brilliant.

I am not the Lone Ranger amongst my fellow Texans when I confess my abiding affection for chips and salsa.  Most of us feel pretty strongly that these two items should be offered at all restaurants no matter the hour or the cuisine.  We go for Chinese?  We wonder where the chips and salsa are.  Sure those eggrolls are nice, but…

Waiting for our pancakes, why can’t we have a little hot sauce and a tortilla? The Mexican places that’ll bring a basket of chips and a cup of red to the table at six a.m. are where the angels eat, I tell you!

I digress.

Usually when a missionary or outreach representative comes a-knocking, I’m annoyed.  Sad to say, but it’s true.  I’m not a fan of the uninvited church folk proselytizing on my doorstep anymore than I am of the door-to-door salesman.  First – in the case of Christians, anyway – I’ve already got what they’re selling.  Second, I can inevitably count on them interrupting what I was doing with a rather uninspired sales pitch.

When I’m not there, or on occasions when I don’t answer the door (yeah, I’m that guy), I’ll find materials jammed into or taped onto the door.  Some of that stuff looks like it came off a mimeograph machine, the experience leaving me none too pleased for the visit.

That’s what is so wonderful about this program.

I like chips.  I like salsa.  So already they’ve got my attention.  Grabbing me there, I read the message attached to the sack with a chip clip (another useful item) written in both English and Spanish inviting us to worship services on Sunday.  A DVD, a full color postcard inviting us to Christmas Eve services, and a magazine professionally produced by the church with articles about the many different programs and ministries offered were all included.

The package landed at our door because we recently moved to the neighborhood.

What a wonderful welcome.

So often in our outreach efforts we forget that people don’t respond well to cold-calls.  Few in this day and age are prepared to understand at the front door that our risen Lord is a miraculous gift provided each of us.  For that kind of contact to be successful, it takes more than a friendly face and a pamphlet to win that soul for Jesus.  As much as we may be loathe to admit it, it takes some salesmanship.

We cringe at that term, but Christ and His apostles were salesmen.  Honest salesmen to be sure.  They were selling salvation for the low, low price of abiding faith in and adoration of the Most High.

The imaginative folks at Fielder Road Baptist Church realize that, masterfully breaking the ice, making the visit memorable.  Worthwhile.  Long after the chips and salsa are gone, I will remember them by their chip clip and how pleased I was at the gift.

Truly, an excellent idea expertly implemented.  I will be sharing this with the next Outreach committee I work on.

I can’t help but notice that the salsa provided was labeled “medium” in its heat.  I’d recommend amending the label thus: So hot it’ll burn the sin right out of you!

If I wasn’t a hard and fast Episcopalian, I would totally visit this church. I bet they have salsa and a basket of chips right there in the pew!