Yes, the creation of the Evangelistic Calendar is one of the most important activities we engage in all year.
What is an Evangelistic Calendar?
Everything we do is planned out carefully, weekend by weekend, to help us accomplish the mission. We do our best to plan “stuff” at times of the year that help us to create momentum, taking advantage of and recognizing the reality that the year has a “natural flow.”
We do big events such as the Easter Eggstravaganza (an Easter egg hunt on steroids), Kids’ Camp, Stretch (our summer camp for middle school students). We also plan out quarterly small group pushes, and volunteer recruitment and recognition efforts.
We plan “Kids Sing” Sundays strategically at times during the year when we really need people to show up for something. For example, we’ll almost always do a Kids Sing as part of our annual stewardship series. We plan Child Dedications on holiday weekends to help boost attendance when it would otherwise be lower than normal.
Of course, we plan sermon series (usually 3-week series) for the year. Don’t get me wrong, we don’t have everything about the series planned more than 6 to 9 weeks in advance, but we do have the “type” of series planned. For example, we know that on Kids’ Camp Sunday we will kick off a new series, probably on parenting or some other topic that is most likely to meet the needs of the new parents that will be attending to see a video of the camp their child experienced and to get their free camp t-shirt.
We put everything in a simple Word document that is continuously revised and updated as the year progresses.
The idea is to plan and execute. At the beginning of the year, stand back and look at the big picture. What is the best plan for the year in terms of creating momentum and reaching as many people as possible?