2008 is turning out to be a big year for Doable Evangelism. I checked in with Randy and Jim to find out the latest news.

Randy, what’s Doable Evangelism been up to in recent months? What’s coming up later this year?

We’ve been pretty busy presenting (and preparing for upcoming) DE Seminars, plus a few workshops at the Conversational Evangelism Conferences. We’ll be doing the day-long Seminar in Richmond, VA in August, Baltimore, MD in September, and Tuscaloosa, AL in October. I’ll be presenting a one-hour workshop at the National Outreach Convention in San Diego in November, and will be doing a “webinar” in preparation for that, which is a one-hour live webcast that people can sign into in advance in order to get a taste of what I’ll be presenting. It looks like I’ll be sharing that hour with Mark Mittelberg, who I got to meet at the CEC in Minneapolis.

Jim, tell us about the organizational change that’s happening with Off The Map and Doable Evangelism.

Off The Map started as a counter intuitive (some say subversive) evangelism movement almost 10 years ago. We developed new approaches to provide ordinary Christians a way to participate in the spiritual practice formerly known as evangelism. We somehow convinced them that small acts of kindness like; noticing people, praying for people behind their backs and asking someone “how are you” actually counted as evangelism. Consequently many of them began to naturally connect with the people Jesus misses most – the people formerly known as lost. We eventually began to call this Doable Evangelism (DE) – we wanted to answer the question – what if evangelism meant just being yourself? – and DE was the closest we could come to capturing the idea in a simple phrase.

With the help of the Internet DE began to spread and soon people were sending us their DE stories and offering us new practices (rear view mirror prayers while stuck in traffic).

A few years ago Dave Richards and I were teaching DE in Nashville where we met Randy Siever. Randy asked if we had a curriculum he could use to train his church and I said no but why don’t you write one and let us use it too!

Since that time Randy has come on full time to lead Doable Evangelism and done an outstanding job training churches, hosting the blog and consulting with leaders from a wide variety of denominations. In 2007 Off The Map developed a strategic plan. Our top priority was to take Doable Evangelism national. While DE is not the only evangelism training approach out there on the market, we know that we have expertise in training Ordinary Christians how to get started in connecting with their non Christian friends. To our knowledge when it comes to evangelism – no other Christian organization is focused on Ordinary Christians (about 90% of the church).

Following Jesus greatly influences how an organization thinks about itself, especially when it comes to power. Following Jesus requires us to hold our sense of ownership loosely – I think those who are more spiritual than I use the word stewardship when describing this phenomenon. I think of it as power management Off The Map does not own Doable Evangelism- we have been given DE as a gift, a project and passion to develop, manage and ultimately give away – into the hands of the person or people God smiles on. If we are going to stick with our strategic plan, if we want to see DE flourish into what God has his heart set on – then we need to send it off into more capable and focused hands.

That is why Off The Maps Board of Directors recently made the decision to ask Randy Siever to launch the development of a new organization that is solely focused on taking Doable Evangelism national so that more Ordinary Christians can discover the sheer joy of connecting with the people Jesus misses most.

Is there anything else underlying this decision? Are you giving Doable Evangelism away because you don’t believe in it as much as you used to?

No other issues, hidden agendas or unresolved relational difficulties (Randy?)

Well…I’m pretty sure Jim believes in this still. It’s his baby. I don’t think we’ve ever had a relational difficulty, which is unusual in my professional experience. Love is still in the air.

Why Off The Map wants to hand this off to me is somewhat beyond my comprehension, but I’m grateful for the trust and see it as an opportunity for both organizations to focus even more. Off The Maps overarching mission of helping Christians see themselves through the eyes of outsiders will continue to guide both organizations.

Plus, we’ll still party together, for sure. It’s also likely that we’ll work together just as often as we have this past year. I’ll just have a team in the Reno/Sparks area (and some others who will serve from a distance) that will partner with me to take DE to the next level. I’m pretty excited about that. The interest level is really high from churches across America right now, and the mission of mobilizing the ordinary Christian in evangelism, in ways they can really enjoy and keep doing, seems worthy of my life (what’s left of it, anyway).

Off The Map will continue to accelerate Doable Evangelism’s expansion. However rather than being organizationally joined at the hip we will form a symbiotic, non-exclusive partnership similar to the one Ebay and PayPal enjoy. On a personal level I will continue to speak about Doable Evangelism because I love evangelism. Evangelism is probably the largest sociological and (I think) theological elephant in the Evangelical church’s living room. Until Christian leaders return the right to Ordinary Christians to partner with God in his desire to connect with the people He misses most we cannot rest. For too long we leaders have covered our strategic laziness and failure to innovate by convincing Ordinary Christians that they’re the problem when in fact just the opposite is true. We have failed. We have failed to do the hard work of figuring out how to make evangelism human, doable and fun. Doable Evangelism intends to contribute to seeing that change in our lifetime.

Randy, what went through your mind when Jim offered you Doable Evangelism? Were you ready to say yes right away?

I remember thinking, “What the…???” I thought maybe something was wrong. Maybe I messed up. He quickly assured me all was well. But even after he explained what he wanted to do and why, I found myself unable to react to it much. This was just not on the radar for me. I figured I’d do this for a year and then evaluate. It took me a few weeks, actually, to seek counsel, pray, and consider before I was able to say yes. I don’t think I have ever heard of someone starting something this cool and then handing it off to someone else. I am still a bit stunned by that level of generosity…and by the faith and confidence Off The Map has in me. I’m so very honored. And a little freaked out.

Anything else either of you want to say?

Thank you Randy

No, thank YOU, Jim! This past year has truly been amazing,. I’ve learned a lot from the Off The Map team. I think I’ve actually become a gentler, kinder version of me as a result (many thought that was unlikely to ever happen). This next year is nearly impossible to imagine, but I think it would be fair to say that at the very least it will be a hair-raising, breath-taking, grab-your-seat adventure. Oh…and really, really fun.