Receive Free Monthly TeachingResponses (cont):
Pastor Doug Foutty – Parkersburg, WV
Our church is small, yet we have seen a lot of people saved in the last seven years. Less than 5% of those receiving salvation have been adults. We have had over 50 children, pre-teens, and teens saved. So, really, altar workers, per se have not been involved. We encourage the new convert to immediately tell someone that they have received the Lord. They need to make that confession out of their mouths as soon as possible. It strengthens them to say it and of course encourages them when others immediately want to rejoice with them. At times we have given out Kenneth E. Hagin’s book concerning the New Birth. It is an excellent resource and is simple to read and understand. We encourage other children and youth who have been saved for a while to keep in contact with the new convert between church meetings.
I had the privilege of attending the very first church service at Rhema Bible Church while I was a student at RBTC. I was an usher there for a couple of years. I always liked the fact that they had a separate room to take the new converts to after their salvation experience. They had people trained to answer their questions and had literature to hand them on the spot. I think that this is a wise way to do this if you are able.
I once served at a church of 700 people. I was an assistant pastor and there were two other assistants. The senior pastor always gave the altar calls and as people came forward. We assistants and our wives acted as the altar workers. It worked really well. We led many to the Lord in those days.
Pray and ask the Lord to send you people that have a great hunger to share the good news of Jesus. I believe that you will recognize them when they arrive. Train them with all the love and kindness that is found within you. Let them practice with saved people. Don’t be afraid to be real. The more comfortable they are when the time comes to make decision for eternity, the stronger your ministry will become.
Pastor Mark Garver – Madison, AL
I usually give a two-fold altar call for salvation and restoration back to God, and sometimes I give an altar call for the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. After I pray with those who have responded to an altar call, our altar care directors and their helpers will escort them to a designated place to minister to them more thoroughly. The altar care team leads them back to a prayer room where they will greet them and find out which part of the altar call caused them to respond. Everyone is personally ministered to and talked to about salvation and restoration and the Baptism of the Holy Spirit is introduced to them. We minister to each person quickly and effectively.
We have a packet that we give to each person who responds to an altar call. This packet includes an altar care form which they complete which has all the information we need to effectively minister to them. The Altar Care form is in triplicate: the white copy goes to church office for our database, the yellow one goes to our Faith Foundations leader, and the pink stays with the Altar Care worker for follow up. In the packet we also give them three different sheets of paper full of scripture references that will help solidify what the Lord has just done for them, one on salvation, one on restoration, and one on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. We give them four books, “The New Birth,” “Why Tongues,” and “In Him” (all by Kenneth E. Hagin), and “Welcome to the Family” (by Kenneth Copeland). They also have a personal letter from me congratulating them on their most important decision and encouraging them to take the next step and get established in church. I encourage them to read their Bible daily and become part our church if they live in our area. I then encourage them to become part of our Faith Foundations class. We include a brochure of our Faith Foundations class in their packet. Faith Foundations is basically our new believer’s class. This is a place they can get some very personal attention and meet some of the people from our church. We help them get acclimated to the Word of God by teaching five important but very basic classes. We offer these classes on a rotating basis so that no matter when they have answered the altar call they can immediately start the classes the next Sunday. These are the classes we teach: (1) What is a Pastor and Why Do I Need One?, (2) The Integrity of the Word, (3) The Holy Spirit, (4) Healing, and (5) Why God Wants You Blessed Financially.
We have found the follow-up to be the most important and the most frustrating for our workers. We have really encouraged those who invited the person who responded to the altar call to help us keep them in church and get them to the Faith Foundations classes. We also get our “Catch Team” involved. That is the group that follows up on first-time attendees. We are hopeful that with these three different groups (the friend who brought them, the Catch team, and the Altar Care worker) ministering to the new convert or those who came back to the Lord, we will get an opportunity to disciple them so they can fulfill the destiny on their individual lives.
As far as training the Altar Care team, many years ago, I personally trained our first Altar Care leaders. Since then, I have a staff person who oversees this area. I would say that the best way to get what you want is to train them to do it the way you would do it if you had the time and the ability to be in multiple places at once. I taught my altar care team to be warm and caring, not just clinical. I taught them to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit. I also taught them how to locate where a person is by getting them to talk to you. The leader has trained each worker that is currently helping, so the team is a cohesive unit. A book we have used in the past is, “Altar Work 101” by Rodney Lynch. I think this book will give you a lot of good ideas that you can adapt for your church.
