Last week I talked about Chick-Fil-A’s Cow Appreciation Day and how we can use similar tactics to get our name out on campus and reach more students. At the end of that post I promised I would share some unique ideas with you this week. So, without any further ado, here they are!
Love is coming. Love is here.
This is a service project idea with the main objective to love as many people on your campus as possible. First, you plaster the campus with bright red posters that simply say “Love is coming” and the dates that you plan to do this event. You’ll want to give as few details as possible to increase people’s curiosity.
Leading up to the event students can post about the event on social media like Facebook and Twitter using a hashtag like #loveiscoming. The days of the event you give everyone involved red t-shirts with the same design as the posters, but with the words “Love is here” printed on them. The idea is to really brand the event so everyone on campus knows it’s all connected and is wondering what it all means.
Then, students go out of their way to love people as much as possible the days of the event. It could be anything from holding doors for people, giving out free food, cleaning bathrooms, offering to help a professor, taking prayer requests, taking student’s garbage to the garbage room for them, etc. Some of the love projects would be organized, but students could also do acts of love on their own at any point. You could even hold some fun contests for the most creative ways students show love.
Not only would this get your group some great attention, but it also would open student’s eyes to see the needs around them every day. I think the key here is focusing on loving people, not strictly promoting your ministry or looking to evangelize. When people ask questions then you’ll have the opportunity to talk about BASIC and get into spiritual conversations, but you’ll need to make loving people the first priority so it doesn’t seem like you have ulterior motives.
Hear my story.
This event idea is a simple way to share the Gospel without using tracts, special evangelistic techniques, or other things that can be seen as gimmicks. Recruit some brave students in your ministry to share their testimonies for this event.
Put posters all over campus with the event title, “Hear my story,” the event dates and location, and head shots of students. If you have students who have skills at making professional looking videos you could even have them make a short video with these students for sharing on Facebook to promote the event.
Encourage students to invite as many unsaved friends as possible and when the time comes keep the event simple. Have students who were recruited share their testimonies one after another on a microphone. They may want to practice them ahead of time so they don’t stumble too much, but you want them to come across as real too, so make sure not to over rehearse.
At the end give people the opportunity to receive Christ and let them know if they have more questions before making a decision that they can talk with the students who spoke afterwards. Overall, you want this event to come across professional, but also laid back. The goal is for unsaved students to associate with those sharing their testimonies and be drawn to Christ.
These are two ideas I came up with after thinking about nontraditional ways of reaching students. I’d love to hear your ideas or things you’ve done in the past that have been successful. Please share in the comments below.