During the week most of the ‘youth’ from church were attending the youth conference organised by the Baptist Union, in partnership with SOS (Sanctity of Scriptures) ministries. There were over a thousand young people in attendance some of which had travelled all day from the various regions of Uganda to be part of it.
Many languages were spoken, so although the main meetings were in english (with Ugandan translators on stage), they also had several people mid way in the hall translating into the various local dialects (I’m told there is over 50, but we didn’t have quite that many catered for!)
I was able to be part of one evening, and then most of the third day which was a great opportunity to get to know the youth of the church (which I am of course, one off here), and to see how they run conferences here. I spoke to a young gentleman in the week, who felt that conferences were the best way to reach people with the Gospel. Now in the west, I would say he was completely off the mark. Non-christians do not attend christian conferences in general (they do get invited, but are unlikely to come along of their own accord). Here its very different, because so many people associate themselves with the christian faith, there is an appetite for conferences that isn’t there in the UK. So to answer the great question of “How to reach, the unreached, who don’t feel they need to be reached?”, seems to be, in one way certainly, through these big events.
This was confirmed again during my time at the university. For freshers outreach, they hold a crusade. Now my opinion of crusades was mixed, from a western view point. Certainly in the UK I felt that crusades were something the American’s come along and do in Africa, and perhaps they were good at getting people saved, but didn’t contribute towards them being discipled. Although this may be the case, with many people they are already in churches, getting people to understand who God really is, might be a bigger priority than trying to disciple people who don’t have a correct understanding of who he is.
Maybe a crusade is more fitting than I first thought, maybe its more effective than we might think and maybe it works well for Africa?
