|TOP|Richard Dawson and his Nottingham Youth For Christ (YFC) team have been using their imagination in their local evangelism efforts.

Dawson outlined part of his evangelism scheme as follows: “As part of our evangelism training work here in Nottingham during the run up to Christmas we gave each of our young people £10 to spend on evangelism. They could spend it on anything to do with sharing the Gospel. We had some of them taking a friend out for a Christmas meal and sharing their story of what God was doing in their lives: others put on a carol service at their college”.

However some of those involved in the project attempted to take it a few steps further. Dawson described the actions of a pair of schoolgirls in his team:

“Two of the girls, as part of their Christian Union decided that £10 wasn’t enough for what they wanted to do, so they went to their Churches and raised some more money. They then went out and bought more than 700 chocolate bars, enough for every person in their school. They wrapped a ribbon around each one with a message saying ‘Have a great Christmas from the Christian Union’.”

The result was that their Christian Union increased in number after Christmas, from five to around thirty members, a 600% increase. However the pair did not stop at this. In Easter they decided to take things even further.

|AD|Dawson says: “Just recently as part of their Easter celebrations and as a final push (they are now in year 11) they decided to do a similar thing, this time with Crème eggs. Instead of just passing them around the school they decided to go into every class and as they were handing them out they stood up and told the class about the real meaning of Easter and how it was for each one of them”.

They also did the same thing in the school staffroom and spoke a lot to the staff. The profile of the Christian Union was raised significantly by their actions, but more importantly the profile of Jesus soared at the school, according to Youth for Christ.

A few of those now attending the CU as a result of the Christmas campaign are now attending a local church.

A mission has occurred in the school and a Youth Alpha course took place with 15 young attendants, over half of whom subsequently became Christians. The full effect of the Easter campaign has yet to be seen.

Dawson concluded saying, “These two girls have a clear love for God and a desire to share that love with others. What they have done is simple and hugely effective. I’m sure that they have been greatly blessed and encouraged by the fruits of their labour”.