Eggstravaganza

Our church has an Easter Eggstravaganza every year. They send out thousands of flyers as advertisement in the hopes of reaching lots of families in the area who do not have a church - or who are not Christians. Its a huge event. I mean HUGE. They have six different easter egg hunts: three different age categories with two hunts for each category.

We have pony rides.
We have a moon walk.
We have raffle drawings.
We have blaring contemporary Christian music.
We have a duck pond.
We have a hoop toss.
We have people dressed up in costumes: Buzz Lightyear, Snow White, Woody, Jasmine, The Easter Bunny, Sleeping Beauty

There were lots of volunteers from our church helping in every imaginable way. We had a shuttle going from a far away parking lot to our church. We had people cooking hot dogs, snow cones, popcorn and beverages.

Now - you might ask. What is this telling people about Jesus Christ and how he died on the cross for our sins? Its not telling that story to anybody. Not yet. Its showing them the love of Jesus. Its telling them that the church doesn't have to be a stuffy place where everybody has to wear a suit and where your smiles have to be checked at the door.

It is not saying that we believe in the Easter Bunny and it is not saying that we are substituting anything for our belief in the resurrection of Jesus.

When we woke up today, there was snow on the ground. The wind was blowing and it was 32 degrees. Not a good day for an easter egg hunt. Not a good day to expect people to come outside. But they did. We had over 300 children from the area that do not go to our church. They came out because it sounded like a lot of fun. We know that there are a lot of hungry people out there. This is one of our attempts to reach hungry people. Its not about adding numbers - it is about connecting with people. It worked today. It was an Eggstravanganza.