SPEAKER_00 0:11

Welcome back to the Build a Church podcast, where we help you gain momentum, grow your church, and go the distance in ministry. I'm your host, Josh Rovery. In this episode, I get the opportunity to speak with Pastor Dave Thomas about 101 simple, mostly free outreach ideas your church can use to love your city and show people the heart of Jesus before they ever walk through your doors. Dave and his wife Saz are the lead pastors of Courageous Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Dave planted his first church back in 2011 at just 27 years old. And he's one of the most passionate, fun, and generous church planners I know. It's always a good time when an episode includes a story of a pastor who had to once flee the police because of his zeal for outreach. Before we get to Dave though, I have a question for you. If your church disappeared tomorrow, would your city even miss you? Outreach is one of the very best ways to make sure the answer is yes. And it's also one of the best ways to engage people and identify leaders in your church. That's why I want to tell you about your team.church. When outreach gets people off the sidelines and into the mission, your team.church helps you connect them to a team so they can actually thrive. It gives people in your church the opportunity to see how God created them, what he's created them to do, and how they work on a team in an innovative and enjoyable way. If you like to help your people discover their design and their place on your church's team, try your team pro tier free for 30 days now at your team.church. Now let's jump into 101 Simple Outreach Ideas with my friend, Pastor Dave Thomas. Dave, thank you for joining us from beautiful South Carolina. How are you doing today?

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Come on, my brother. Yeah, I'm doing great. We are fully in summer sweat season, but we absolutely love it. It's beautiful down here.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

I can't wait to get into our topic 101 simple outreach ideas for churches. Many of them are free. We're going to talk about that in just a second. But you are such a joy to be around. I'm so happy that I'll get to possibly introduce you to some new people today on this episode. I'd love for them just to know a little bit about your history, the stuff you've done globally with Freedom Church and your journey planting courageous church.

SPEAKER_01 2:29

Yeah, mate. So obviously we're based now here in Charleston, South Carolina, but originally from the UK. Most people think I'm either Australian or South African. I almost never get British, so I don't know what is up with my accent. But yeah, we've been uh in ministry, I think it's over 21 years now, which is kind of crazy. And for the last 20 have been part of Freedom Church, which is a it's a global kind of family of churches that originated out of the UK. When we joined the church, it was just 65 people in a school hall at the time. Um, but we just saw God do some incredible things in the UK, and then that led us to planting. And so 2011, uh, we started planting. Saz and I were the first plant pastors, 27 years old, fresh-faced. Didn't have as much of a clue as what we needed to, but we had a lot of passion. And basically, God has done some amazing things, and so now we've got 25 churches all over the world, and Saz and I, as part of that movement, launched a courageous church here in February of 2024, and in the year prior, that's where we got connected and we became part of the ARC family. And honestly, uh, the combination of the ARC playbook, the community, the teaching, it's just taken everything church planting that we've done and actually the rest of our church to a whole other level. So, um, yeah, we're excitable, we're passionate people, grateful for what God's doing here in Charleston, excited for what he's doing in America and around the world as well.

SPEAKER_00 3:57

And I love that we get to partner with you guys. So it's been such a joy, especially uh you and SAT has been a highlight of that. So today we're going to talk about 101 simple outreach ideas for churches. And I love outreach, I'm passionate about it. I always have been. Uh, I grew up in Baton Rouge, right down the street from Healing Place Church, where Pastor Dino and his church was doing outreach like crazy in our city before it was even called Servolution and all of that. I I got to experience that generosity uh from their team and they were doing crazy things. But I just have always been passionate about outreach and it's had a massive impact on my life. I've seen it engage people in the church that otherwise would never get on board. And so I know how helpful and how beneficial it can be. Why are you passionate about outreach?

SPEAKER_01 4:47

Honestly, because I think not to sound too Christian about it, but it's the mission as much as the gospel as well. I was reading recently in Galatians 2, I love it, when you got Paul and Peter, and they're there and they're kind of meeting, they're talking about all the things they're passionate about, and they're kind of checking each other out and checking doctrine. And then at the end of it, he, you know, Paul writes and says, the only thing they impressed upon us that we would serve and look after those in need. And he says, and that was the very thing I had a heart for from the beginning. And so I just think it's something that needs to be integral to what we're doing. I think it's an incredible way not just to make a difference in our communities, but it's actually a brilliant way to grow our churches, leadership opportunities, culture, you know, even just discipleship opportunities for people to step out of their comfort zone, all of those things, as well as the incredible joy of knowing that our church is literally making a difference. I will never forget Pastor Dino saying this statement at an ARC training, at the ARC training we were at. He said, The thing that I dream for your church is that if your church wasn't there, your city would miss you. And I think it's in the areas of outreach that that really like the rubber hits the road there. Because we can have great services, we can have incredible preaching, worship, creativity, all that kind of stuff, but that all happens inside. What happens outside is really where it starts to matter for our city first and foremost before they even come through the war. So yeah, I I think it's it's an incredible part of not just launching a church but building a church as well.

SPEAKER_00 6:23

Well, I I love serving because people can doubt your faith, they can disagree with your theology, but they can't deny when you're serving them.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

They can't turn that down because it's undeniable when you serve. As a matter of fact, Jesus commands us in Mark 10 45, it says, for even the Son of Man to not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life for ransom for many. And so maybe just take a second and tell us uh some of your experience doing outreach, even if uh things didn't go right.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

Well, yeah, so we so I mentioned earlier, Saz and I got to Plant a Church back in 2011. And uh in the first summer of that, we decided that we were gonna do our like first serve events, and and we did a bunch of different things. We found that found some kind of big citywide events. We went and uh I think we did a handout, balloons and ice creams and all these kind of things, and it was really great. But then one of my genius ideas was that do you know what we we want people to know who's like who's serving them. So let's load our band into the back of a van with a generator, and everywhere we go, we'll just like impromptu set up the band, and then we can like make it people will love it, it'll be fantastic. Only problem was is people didn't love it, and actually we were um we were getting complaints from the police that we were being a noise nuisance. I was stood on top of a of a van singing, uh, because that's kind of a bit of my background as well. Drummers going for it, and I can see the police running across the parking lot to come and chase us out, and I was like, pack it up, pack it up. And then me being me, it was like maybe we should stop. And I was like, nah, let's just keep doing it. So we just went round the city, managed to stay out of trouble in that way. We've grown a lot from then, and I think, you know, particularly in the last two and a half years of um launching and building courageous here in Charleston, I think that's where some of our serving opportunities have really uh, I think come alive in the mission of the church, but also just the fruitfulness of making an impact in our city. One of the things that um has been amazing for us is we have really partnered with our local school. Originally it was very hard to get in through the doors, uh, and we sort of managed to just about get in there. And through the first year, the school was really, really standoffish, didn't want to engage, I think partly because they didn't really want us there. And so I just kept knocking the door, I was knocking the door. We're here to bless you, we're here to serve, we're not we're not here to use this on a Sunday, and finally get a connection with the principal, and I was like, what can we do? And he was like, Okay, well, I think the teachers might appreciate a breakfast. And I'm thinking initially, I'm like, oh come on, we could do more than that. I know that the the playground needs work, I know this is okay, we'll start there. And it's just opened the door for us to be able to do so many different projects with them now, blessing the teachers, but also they then came to us last Christmas and basically brought to us there was 30 families that were at risk of not having basic needs over Christmas. We were able to put together all these care packages, which was absolutely incredible. This summer, they brought a list of 70 families they were worried about, not having like the bare essentials over the summer break. And what's incredible is that, and I guess this is just an example, is that serving the school has completely transformed our relationship with it. We now have uh families that have come in through the school, we've got teachers that come to church off the back of that, and it's just been amazing to see how that has not just shifted, obviously, within our city, but even just within our school. And so, kind of going from these random events that I mean, honestly, I can't tell you one person that came to church from me stood up on the top of a van. But now I can tell you about families, I can tell you about people, and I can tell you, and it's really interesting. I just finished with this a couple of months ago, we we were kind of hitting some capacity issues with the school because of the way that we were using it. And originally that was because we weren't allowed to use certain spaces, weren't kind of allowed to use certain rooms, and through that, through this shift of relationship, the sk the relationship's completely changed. We now are able to, we can double the capacity. We did it for Easter Sunday, biggest service ever. And so it's just been amazing to see the local impact, but then also the kingdom shifts and changes that that's been for us. It's become such a big part of who we are and what we're doing.

SPEAKER_00 10:45

I love that your church is reaping the benefits of putting people first uh just by obeying what Jesus commanded your church to do and be in the hands and feet of Jesus in your community. Let's take a second and go through some of the best practices that churches can apply before doing outreach, especially if you're in that pre-launch phase and you really haven't done outreach before. These things I think will be really helpful. One of the things that I always think is important and that it's pretty ubiquitous now, is everyone needs to wear church branding when you go out there and serve. Have your team members wear shirts with the church's logo while serving. It makes a huge statement to everyone that you love them even before they meet you.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

100%. And I think one of the things you've always got to do is you've got to empower your serve team with invite cards. You know, you're there to make a practical difference, but it's gonna open up an opportunity to connect with people. So have invite cards, whether that's to the launch, whether that's to an upcoming series, whether that's to uh Easter, Christmas, or anything like that, and make it accessible and give the guys, your team, those cards so that they can connect with people is such an important thing.

SPEAKER_00 11:50

One of the best things you can do also is to capture the moment. Have someone ready to take photos. You'll use those photos throughout the year. You need to show them in church that Sunday, you need to put them on your website, in your bulletin. It sends a great message and it's something you can use throughout the year.

SPEAKER_01 12:06

Also, it's really important to keep it simple and keep it scalable. You know, when we start to look at the need, sometimes it can be overwhelming, particularly for church plants. But just start to look at who you are, what you can achieve, and building something that you can come good on that and keep outreaches and to match the size and the capacity of your church and your team at the moment.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

Along with that is be a blessing, not a burden. Uh, I think sometimes church planners get so excited and pastors get so excited about serving it that they don't think through how it's impacting those around them. And uh, for example, don't serve coffee outside of a coffee shop. Instead, get gift cards to the coffee shop and hand them to people as they go in the door and get permission to do those type of things. So you don't get chased by the police, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:52

Yeah, I've got another funny story on that. When we were doing some serve things, we gave our team these posters for a big church event coming out, and one of my team went and stuck them all over the wall of another church, and they didn't look around the corner to see there was a church. I was like, that's a terror, don't do that, don't do that. Be a blessing, not a burden. And I think one of the best ways we can do that is also leave it better than you found it. You know, even just if you're in a parking lot, if you're on the street, leave it better than you found it. People notice that way more than we think. Those small acts actually have significant impact. It's such an important thing of it.

SPEAKER_00 13:27

And the last thing is I think people need to always be sensitive to the opportunity to lead someone to Christ, to pray with them. But the idea is not that this is I scratch your back, you scratch mine. You serve with no strings attached, and there's no expectation that they're gonna do something for you because you've served them. So don't pressure anyone into a conversation, but begin a conversation and let the Holy Spirit begin to work on their heart. And of course, if God opens the door, go for it. So yeah, so there's some practical ways to get started. Now let's jump into the 101 ideas. Do you think we can get through all this? 101. Come on, let's go. Okay, so this area is simple giveaways that make an impact. And I think doing giveaways is huge. It doesn't have to be that big a deal, but people will remember it and think about it for years to come. One of the cheapest and easiest things that we started doing in Louisiana is just hand out bottled water on a hot day. It is so cheap to hand out a bottle of water, but it means so much to someone on a hot day. Um, you can hand out bottles of water at a local race, sign up to volunteer for a 5K, offer to bring a cheer team to a local race. And by cheer team, I mean you don't go pick up cheerleaders and bring them. Your church is the cheer team and you cheer on people at a local race. Hand out hot chocolate or coffee on a cold day. Provide free snacks at a hospital waiting room. Man, that that could be so huge. Pass out $5 gift cards outside of a grocery store. Give away McDonald's gift cards for free dessert, which are about a dollar each, I believe. And you can give everyone that comes in a free ice cream cone. Set up a free car wash, but say no tips accepted. Sponsor a food truck for a community event, which is, I think you could do that for about $500. Leave goodie bags for teachers in your host school. Pass out LED flashlight key change after an event. Hand out free popsicles at a busy part. By the way, kids love flashlights. My daughters are, you know, boys love them. I love them. I remember one time uh for Christmas, I have a bunch of boy nephews, and I told Amy, I'm gonna buy them a bunch of flashlights. And she's like, What are you talking about? Like, they don't want a flashlight. I'm like, I'm telling you, they're gonna go nuts. And I bought them flashlights and they love them. They ran around the house the whole rest of the weekend with those flashlights.

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Come on.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

Give out gas gift cards at a local gas station. I know Mark Poland has done that. Others have done that, especially with gas prices today. Offer to pay for people's laundry at a laundromat. Think about the type of person using a laundromat and how that can make a difference. Purchase a Starbucks gift card and post the barcode on Instagram for the community to use. I love that because people see that who don't even use it, and it gives a huge message to them that you love them with no strings attached. Provide free bottles of water outside busy gyms. Pass out study snacks to college students before exams. Huge. Give away reusable shopping bags with your church logo at a grocery store. That might work more in the Pacific Northwest than it does here in the South. Offer free dog walking for local neighborhoods. It's something you can do in a wealthier area if you want to serve them. Sponsor free dessert night at a restaurant and hand out church invite cards. Okay, any thoughts on those first 20?

SPEAKER_01 16:43

I think one of the things that I love about all of them is that they're simple and we can so overplay it. We had a guy come to church literally from being given a bottle of water on the beach. He's given his life to Jesus, he's transformed, he's now leading in an area. It's absolutely incredible just how simple those things can be, and yet they make a difference and they open doors.

SPEAKER_00 17:03

Okay, great. Why don't you take the next turn?

SPEAKER_01 17:06

Okay, cool. Let's talk about serving at community events. Two quick thoughts before we get into these ideas. One, it's a great question to ask. What does your city need? Not just what do you want to give to it? One of the easiest ways to find out is look at the community events that are already going. And the second thought is half the work's already done for you because people are going to be there and it's something that people need. So here's the first thing: offer to volunteer to clean up after a local sporting event. We've all seen it in our cities. We know it's a mess. It's one of those jobs that we can come in and literally help immediately. Offer to help with a festival setup or tear down, participate in a community parade and give out church swag. You know, whether it's, I don't know, uh July 4th, we've got lots of golf cart parades, different things like that. I love that about America golf cart parades. We do not have that in the UK. We have tractor parades in the UK in the rain. Run a booth at a school festival with fun prizes. Offer to help at a city-sponsored event, provide free coffee at a train or a bus station on a cold morning. Again, in that rush, people are going to be there. You're going to where people already are and you're meeting them in the thing that they need or that they want. Offer to help to clean up after a school carnival or festival. Sponsor an ice cream truck at a summer event. Everybody loves ice cream trucks. I love this one. Set up a prayer station at a community festival. I've got a friend who passes a church quite close to us, and it is mind-blowing the engagement they get up, they get just for offering prayer to people. Might be different in some of our cultures and communities, but a great opportunity. And the final one, provide a bounce house for a neighborhood block party. Such a simple, easy win, but it will make a big impact on people.

SPEAKER_00 18:51

Yeah, the bounce house thing in a neighborhood, you know, families will talk about that for years to come if you do that. One of my favorite things about outreach that you mentioned is being able to partner with schools and educators. We did that here. Amy and I did led a project in our neighborhood at the school that was in our subdivision, and it turned out to be such a massive blessing. There's there's no way the school benefited more than I did for doing this. It was a lot of work. We had about 150 people that would come out and do this serve day project each year at the school, and we would just kind of take over and blessing uh the school and the teachers. The teachers would come out and serve. The principal was there. It was such an amazing thing. That project is still going on, led by a friend of mine. And then another friend of mine came and said he wanted to learn, and now he's doing it at his kids' school. And I just think getting involved with the school is such a great way to tap into a community that already exists and really bless kids and bless teachers, people who are unappreciated, and people that I believe God's heart is for. And so let's go over some ways to partner with schools and educators. So we'll go through this and we'll be almost halfway there. We'll be to 50 when I'm finished with this. So one of the things you mentioned, buy lunch for teachers at a local school, even if you it's just pizza. Sponsor Phil Day at an elementary school, provide classroom supply gift cards for teachers. Huge. They often end up using their own money for supplies. Offer to clean and update the teachers' break room, hand out Pop Tarts and study snacks at colleges, pass out free school supplies. Uh, when I was at LSU, we'd get scantrons and the the right pencils to use. I was so huge as a college student to get that. Offer to carry trays at school's restaurant spirit nights. So whenever a restaurant like Chick-fil-A or McDonald's or whoever is doing a spirit night, offer to carry the trays to people to help the staff of the restaurant. Um, and then it's also a blessing to the people attending. Host a pizza and soda party for the first year college students. You know, I always say if you want to reach college students, you reach them through their stomach, right? You feed them bring gator to sports teams after practice, buy coffee for teachers on the first day of school, pack a school teacher's lounge with snacks and drinks, offered a babysit for single parents for free. Sponsor prom dresses for students in need, provide free back-to-school haircuts for kids, hand out free popsicles or snacks to the parents in school pickup lines. One of the things I saw a church do is they bought name brand shoes for kids going into the school year and allowed them to come and shop and pick up this the shoes so that every kid could go to school feeling confident and excited and not being afraid of being looked down upon because of the kind of shoes that they had on. Partner with a local university to provide free dorm movement help, be ready to sweat and you're back to hurt. I've done that before, but it is such a great way to make a connection to people who are away from home and feeling isolated. And then start a before school breakfast club for students. And that's simple as just bringing donuts uh once once a week or once a month.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

I love it. One of my favorite, personal favorite things to do. Is some of the community service projects. We've worked in one of the local areas here. We've helped renovate a home, fix fences, different things like that. I absolutely love it. And this is a great way to get involved. Particularly, I would say not exclusively, but this is a great way to engage some of the men of your church as well. And so here's a couple of community service project ideas. First, clean up at a local park with your launch team. Offer free lawn care for a neighborhood, organize a gutter cleaning day, help repaint an under-resourced church. Again, like it's so easy for us to overlook. We're there trying to build our church, but actually, we're trying to build the church, and that can be such a brilliant thing to do to serve an under-resourced church. Coordinate with the city to build a playground, pick up trash after a community event, paint over graffiti in the city, organize a fall leaf raking day. We don't really have that a lot in the South, but you know, if I'm back in the UK, then yes, that's what we're doing. Offer free oil changes for single mums, volunteer at a local food bank. We actually worked with uh a local farm that farms organic food for the food banks. And it was amazing for the families to go and actually get their hands on in the farm and then take the food to the food bank. It was such a cool thing, kind of that whole sauce to table type idea. Set up a community gardening project, offer to repaint a local community center, support a free community-wide barbecue event, provide fresh baked goods at a community event. Who doesn't like fresh baked goods? And offer a free bicycle service repair at local parks. Yeah, I don't know. Most of the parks here, they have those little stations where you can fill up the tires, you can do it around that, advertise for it. Such a cool idea.

SPEAKER_00 23:47

I just love the idea of a kid that can't ride its bike, getting it fixed and able to move around the neighborhood and enjoy a summer. The heart of outreach is helping people in needs in this next group of ideas. We're gonna focus on that. One of the things you can do is you can hand out sack lunches to homeless individuals, pass out warm socks to people in the winter that may not have them, provide free coffee in an emergency room waiting area, give away baby wipes and diapers to new moms, become a Samaritan Purse drop-off location, collect unused makeup for a woman's shelter, help at a community Thanksgiving meal, provide hygiene kits for people in need, whether in prison or without shelter, offer a free laundromat day for families in need, bring donuts and coffee to first responders, host a clothing drive for a local shelter, sponsor a free dental screening event, provide free vision screenings in partnership with a local optometrist, host a mental health awareness event and organize a toy drive during the holidays, which is so huge. I'm actually a child who benefited from that. And I will never forget having a Christmas. I live with a single mom. Most of my childhood, when I lived with my mom, she lived with my grandparents. So we did not have our own house. And uh, I remember the people that came in Jesus' name and brought me some of the best GI Joe toys you can imagine. It was incredible. I love G.I. Joes. And I remember opening those toys up, and it made such a difference for me to be able to have that that Christmas. And I never forgot the Christians who made that happen.

SPEAKER_01 25:27

Man, that is so powerful and so significant, and it just shows the legacy that these things we do can have. Let's get this home all the way to 101 because we can also do just some things that are fun and creative outreaches to have a presence. Everybody loves to have a good time as well. And sometimes that's the biggest thing that people need. And some fun, creative community connection is brilliant. So here's a few ideas for you. Host a movies on the lawn night, organize a trunk or tree event, host a community Easter egg hunt, plan a fifth quarter hangout after a football game. I love that. That's such a cool idea. Pass out free movie tickets at a theater, buy lunch for city workers or police officers. We literally last week took dinner to one of the local fire stations, and one of the things that they said to us is that they constantly get given leftovers, and we just went and took them all fresh stuff, and they were just blown away by that. Just it makes such a big difference. Host a worship night at a local coffee shop, offer free family portraits in an underserved community, organize a sidewalk chalk art event for families. That's absolutely brilliant. Love that. Provide free babysitting for a parents' night out, sponsor a community game night with board games and snacks, offer to host a free community pet adoption day. My kids would love that. We we are pet veto at the moment, so I'm not gonna tell them that idea, but that's great. Hand out ice cream sandwiches on a hot day, organize a kindness rock painting event, provide free lunch for community volunteers, set up a free repair day. Again, you can talk about we talked about bicycles, but think about strollers, wheelchairs, different things like that. Final few, hand out umbrellas on a rainy day. If you're planning church in Europe, do that one, been there, we need it. Organize a thank you event for local community leaders, offer resume and job interview coaching for job seekers. That's amazing, huge for that. And finally, sponsor a CPR training day in the community. One of the things I'm sure many of us will have small offices, maybe you've got a church building. Simply opening your doors can be the biggest thing that you can do for people. And so there we go. 101 ideas for you.

SPEAKER_00 27:50

101 ideas. I know we've gone over 101 based on the different things that we shared. And some of you might be thinking, well, some of those ideas, Josh, they're they're kind of similar. I don't know if you really got to 101. Well, guess what? I have another 101 outreach ideas that I will send to you. We're not going to go over it on this podcast. I think we've covered plenty of ideas, but I have another 101 I'll send to you. Just email me, Josh, at buildthe.church, or send me a DM and just say outreach, and I'll send you another 101 outreach ideas. And I'll actually send you this 101 as well for you to have. And you know, the thing about outreach is it's not just about checking a box, it's about showing people the love of Jesus before they even meet you. You know, I love that scripture. I believe it's Romans 5, 8, but God demonstrates his own love for us in this while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He showed us his love before we even knew about him. He was already preparing a way for us to receive him. And that's what outreach does. It prepares a way for people to receive Christ by building trust, by building awareness. And then the side benefit is it creates great momentum for your church. I'm so glad, Dave, that you jumped on here and shared your ideas with us as well. And your experience has been so beneficial. You're going to join me for more episodes in the future, right?

SPEAKER_01 29:17

Yeah, 100%. Beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 29:22

I'm so grateful for Dave jumping on this episode with us and sharing not just his ideas, but his part for reaching people. I hope you walked away the list of things you can actually do this week. And on this episode, Dave and I actually went past the 101 ideas, and we've got another 101 ideas ready for you. So if you want both of those, just email me Josh at build the dotchurch or send me a DM with the word outreach, and I'll send both of those lists to you. This episode was brought to you by your team.church. Your team is a digital assessment platform churches use to connect volunteers to a team where they can thrive. What's different is that your church gets a unique URL with your own branding that volunteers can use right in your next step class, plus a volunteer dashboard that syncs the planning center that lets you easily customize the teams your people connect to. You can try the Pro Tier of Your Team Free for 30 days right now at your team.church. Thank you for joining me today. I can't wait for you to be with us next time. Until then, keep building and believing strong.