Outreach through the Sunday School Still Works if Worked

As the State Sunday School Director for Tennessee, each year I compile a list of Tennessee’s 100 Fastest Growing Sunday Schools for 2010. These churches continue to prove that Outreach through the Sunday School Still Works if Worked! Here’s a few quotes from the pastors of four of these churches.

David Haynes
Pastor, Lake Drive BC, Sale Creek

At Lake Drive Baptist, we use Sunday School as our main strategy for growth….Members are encouraged to invite lost friends and family members to their Sunday School class and activities….we have many ministries which include Upward Basketball and Cheerleading, Awana, Middle and High School groups, VBS, and Children Church…Sunday School is the one ministry that connect all these ministries and assimilates them (participants) into the Church… Through this strategy we have seen many accept Jesus as their Savior.

Brad Warren
Associate Pastor, Covenant Baptist Church, Nolensville

Our story begins with our Pastor (Randall Jackson) and his vision and value for Sunday School. He led everyone at Covenant Baptist Church (then Concord-Grandview) to understand that the Sunday School ministry would be the most important ministry of the church. …The Power-Up! Your Sunday School Emphasis helped strengthen our existing classes and showed us how to start new classes and put together class outreach projects – all of which served to harness prospects and energize our existing base of class members.

Ken Duggan
Pastor, Dallas Bay Baptist Church, Chattanooga

Our vision and purpose for our Sunday School is to offer the opportunity for Bible study in an interactive situation and to offer opportunity for people to connect. We regularly announce from the pulpit that the worship service is to connect to God and not each other. Small groups, whether at home or at church, are the venue for growing relationships with other believers. The greatest percentages of those who leave our fellowship in a year or less are those who are not connected to a small group.

Chuck Morris
Pastor of Education and Discipleship, Chilhowee Hills Baptist Church, Knoxville

At Chilhowee Hills Baptist Church, we use the term “Bible Fellowship” for our Sunday School ministry. We believe that those two elements – the Bible and the gathering of a small group – are fundamental to the success of Bible study. In addition, it allows for us to hold Sunday School classes at other times during the week than just Sunday. We believe that BF is the best way to have a small church experience within a large church, and that individuals can be more easily assimilated into the body when they are engaged in regular Bible study with a small group. We have a combination of age-graded classes or departments and various target areas, such as Newlyweds and Engaged couples. It is our desire to see people gather to examine God’s word in an environment of fellowship, accountability, and caring.

My dad was the Sunday School Director

of the church that I was a member of as a child. When I felt called to the vocation of Minister of Education, he instructed me, “Son, Sunday School works if worked.” My dad taught me what it takes to grow a Sunday School, but when you boil it down, it takes work. These churches and hundreds of others across Tennessee and thousands of others in our nation have chosen to not just have a Sunday School but to use Sunday School to reach men, women, boys, and girls for the gospel.

Outreach through the Sunday School will work for you if you work it.
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Mark Miller
State Sunday School Director for the Tennessee Baptist Convention