Saturate the City with the Gospel

As the new African American Evangelism Specialist for Texas Baptists, Oza Jones is excited about the opportunity to equip churches with tools and resources to reach their communities with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Last fall, Jones connected with numerous African American churches to share evangelism, outreach and leadership strategies. When Pastor Delvin Mack of Cathedral of Faith Baptist Church in Beaumont heard Jones present evangelism strategies at another church, he invited Jones to come to his church to train more than 400 leaders in the strategies. 

Jones was encouraged by the church’s response to the evangelism training and the new connection he made with this congregation.

“The church is beautiful, the people are beautiful,” Jones said. “They are doing great work for the Kingdom in Beaumont.”

Following the training, Mack and his congregation expressed a desire to affiliate with Texas Baptists. “Texas Baptists is doing awesome work,” he said. “Our church is joining immediately and I have several other churches that will be joining also!” 

When Jones visits churches, he shares evangelism strategies such as 4xFour, Three-Circles or Who’s Your One? He also talks about how churches should seek to “saturate the city” with the Gospel, a strategy he developed when he served as a pastor in Grand Prairie. Using this strategy, Jones led his congregation to build relationships across the community with law enforcement, the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in local junior high and high schools, domestic violence groups and many others. Churches should be essential components of their communities, actively helping those in their area.

“I ask church leaders to consider ‘If your church ceases to exist, would anyone miss you?

What type of impact are you making in your community? Does your community feel your presence?’” he said.

Jones shares that God has called believers to saturate a specific place, and if each person takes care of their city or their corner of the world, more people will hear about Jesus. Many churches have been very responsive to this relational evangelism strategy and desire to implement similar plans in their neighborhoods. 

At the heart of each of Jones’ trainings is the Great Commission. Statistics from Barna Research indicated that 76% of churchgoers were not aware of the Great Commission. Jones was compelled by those numbers to teach this imperative scripture from Matthew 28 and to relay Jesus’s command to go and make disciples. 

“We need to give those tools to believers,” Jones said. “Many people can be intimidated to share their faith, or they do not have a plan or strategy to do so. We share strategies that can be used by the church to do what it is called to do—to share the Gospel!” 

To learn more about African American Evangelism, contact Oza Jones at oza.jones@txb.org or call 214.828.5321.