Some 9,000 Teens 'Go Wide' with Dare 2 Share
Dare 2 Share Ministries founder Greg Stier returned to St. Louis, Mo., last week with a new buzz cut, meeting a crowd of 9,000 teenagers.
The Game Day Student Conference Tour hit St. Louis' Scottrade Center over the weekend and left with 1,500 teens renewed in their decisions for Christ and 415 churches equipped with the "Go Wide" outreach strategy – an evangelism effort to make disciples of all nations.
The average church in America, Dare 2 Share cites, sees only two people come to Christ per year. More than 50 percent of evangelical churches in America recorded no one coming to Christ in the past year, according to Evangelism Explosion President John Sorensen. And churches are losing the young people with youth leaders saying more than half are dropping out of their faith during college years.
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Dare 2 Share preaches a Go Wide Strategy to get churches back on track to transforming teens. The strategy centers on prayer for spiritually apathetic youth; pursuing friends with spiritual talk; persuading friends (in a friendly way) toward acceptance of the gospel; and launching an e-team (evangelism team) to keep evangelism and outreach ongoing.
The process of transformation: from apathetic teens to interested teens, excited teens, and in a matter of weeks, passionate teens.
The outreach strategy was tested in such prominent evangelical churches as Mosaic in Los Angeles, Grace Church in Denver, and McLean Bible Church in McLean, Va., among others in April 2006.
"This e-team is the most selfless thing you will indulge yourself into," said Mike Reid of McLean Bible Church. "You can no longer approach friendships and conversations thinking about yourself."
From 241 teens nine years ago to 9,000 in 2007, Stier sees the potential of 90 million people being impacted by those that made it to this year's GameDay in St. Louis.
"The arch in St. Louis has been nicknamed ‘The Gateway to the West,’” said Stier in his blog. "May it be the gospel gateway to the north, south, east and west as these 9,000 or so teens go far and wide and high and low with the good news of Jesus ringing forth from their lives and their lips!"
Some 55,000 teens have signed up for Dare 2 Share's 2006-2007 GameDay conferences, themed "Go! Fight! Win!" GameDay is part of a five-year training strategy, and St. Louis is the ministry's sixth stop since this year's tour kicked off in September of 2006 and Dare 2 Share's ninth year in the city.
Over the two-day conference, 26 tons of canned food were collected through the thousands of teens for Sunshine Ministries, adding to collections made since September and given to local organizations. Dare 2 Share's next stop is Lincoln, Neb., on Feb. 23.
