How to Effectively Operate
a Parade Ministry

Up-Dated - Friday, April 04, 2014

Use your help
If you are the only one, then do it yourself.  We have done it, just my wife and I, even just me on some occasions. 
Once others hear about how well it works, they will want to know more. 

Illustration
We know a pastor in Guymon, OK, who has a Bar B Q after their local parade, at the church for all who help.  He has a large number, plus, help from other churches in neighboring towns.  Nobody was doing parades, until he determined he would.

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Bag your tracts
If you have a lot of helpers, put two to four hundred tracts to the bag.  If you put more, workers will begin to complain and make excuses before you even start.
If it is just you, put about one thousand in one bag. If you walk fast, don't stop to visit along the way and there is a good crowd, you can easily get out one thousand tracts. Depending on the type of tract given out, more than one thousand can become heavy for some workers.

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Place your helpers
Pair them up and stage them out along the parade route.  We like to put a couple on either side of the street and assign them 2 or 3 or 4 blocks or more, depending on the density of the crowd. As the parade comes to their area they can begin working the crowd. Since they do not start working the parade until the parade arrives in their area, the crowd seems to think they are part of it and they seem to be more willing to accept a tract. If you are very undermanned, begin as soon as the crowd arrives or else time will run out before you can distribute a good number of tracts.
Do not forget about the parade participants. Use several pairs to pass-out tracts to them starting a few minutes before the parade begins.  Remember to start at the beginning point of the parade participants and work towards the end. Once finished, these workers can go to a part of the parade of which you did not have workers.
The idea is to give everyone a tract.

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Stay out of the Parade
Don't waste your helpers to wave at the crowd from a float and throw candy at them.  Use them to put tracts in willing hands.
We realize that most preachers want to advertise their church. Leave advertisements to when and where a personal witness or tract witness is not possible. Do not substitute a any kind of witness with an advertisement.
Most Parade Committees will ask Parade Participants to sign a contract to be in the parade. Most of these contracts will bind the participants to either being on the float or walking along side the float. This will limit tract distribution to only those walking along side the float. They will miss hundreds who are deeper in the crowd than the first row, plus if the parade is long, they will tire and effectiveness is lost. Very few will listen to this advise and they will miss a great opportunity to touch a large portion of their community and surrounding communities with a Gospel tract.

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Reveal your Expectations
Let your helpers know that at a Parade you are not wanting to try to witness, just get the Word in receptive hands.  God's Word will not return void. 
* Expect to get rid of every tract
* Expect to flood the community with the Word
* Expect the Lord to take over when the tracts are
   gone
* Expect to see some results ...
   - Next Sunday morning
   - Shortly after the rapture of the Church
* Expect the tracts to convict ...
   - soften hearts, or
   - harden hearts
     either way you have done your job.

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Make Notes of Experiences
Tell everyone that you will be asking on Sunday for testimonies. Not bad experiences, but the good ones. Tell them to be ready to see people's reactions, their comments, reception, people from other churches reaction, etc. This will help people get started in a Tract Ministry and obtain more helpers for the next parade.
Make a note of your own experiences, if you are the pastor, and relate them first during the service, so others can see how it should go.

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Tracts Work
The Song Leader at our church for years, came to the church to begin with, because he had picked up a tract on the ground at our local Fair.

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G. Steven Andres
Psalms 45:17
Missionary Evangelist
Copyright - 1996 to 2010