Nelson Mandela Bay evangelism campaign sets goal of ’10 000 souls’

About 40 churches scattered throughout Nelson Mandela Bay will work together to execute the Great Commission during the Jesus 2022 Citywide Crusade from September 7 to 11, said the campaign visionary, Pastor Jimmy Davis.

Working together as the Body of Christ they hope to harvest 10 000 souls for Jesus during an authentic citywide evangelism campaign with a 100% local team of evangelists and co-workers reaching out across the metropole, he said.

The Jesus 2022 campaign was actually birthed in 2019 when he became aware of believers falling away during a time that church gatherings were disrupted as a result of Covid regulations, said Davis.

“One morning I woke up and God just laid it on my heart that we need to reach out again and churches need to implement the Matthew 28:19 principle again,” he said.

Pastors that he spoke to agreed with what he proposed. He also had a sense that they should aim to reach 10 000 souls. But then his son committed suicide and he put aside the crusade vision as he dealt with the tragedy.

“Then this year I woke up again and had the same vision to reach out — the same fire. I felt this compassion again and began to follow up with pastors,” he said.

He said pastors prayed about the vision and all of a sudden an organisation came together “and we decided we are going to do this thing.

“It seems as if it will happen on an annual basis. People I spoke to say it should happen every year,” he said.

Davis said the mission team has been busy mobilising evangelists, training believers, preparing publicity posters and leaflets for partnering churches, securing evangelism and discipling resources and arranging radio and other media partners.

On the first three nights of the campaign evangelists will lead simultaneous crusade meetings at all the participating churches. On the third — Friday — night, they will screen the Jesus Film. On the Saturday afternoon everybody will come together at St George’s Cricket Stadium for a time of thanksgiving and praise. On Sunday morning evangelists will conduct their final services at the churches and there will be a final mass crusade at St George’s Park on Sunday afternoon.

Each church will also be free to carry out street evangelism or any other type of outreach they wish, during other time slots during the crusade week, he said.

Pastor Joan Keeling, who leads a church which meets in Laubscher Park East, a retirement home in Walmer, said they plan to reach out to seven retirement homes in the Walmer area.

“We have booked four village halls on the three different days: 7th to 9th September, and will be inviting the residents from all the villages to all the meetings.

“Cecil Peasley, a well-known international evangelist, who is 78-years old, has agreed to be the evangelist for all four retirement village events,” she said.

Davis said that Peasley has also been invited to lead the final crusade event at St George’s Park stadium on Sunday September 11.

He said that to date they have received thousands of free booklets for distribution to new believers from World Hope Ministries International and Every Home for Christ. They have also been promised 10 000 New Testament Bibles by another sponsor.

“We will be having a final meeting in August when we will distribute evangelistic material and the posters for the campaign.

“Our motto is ‘Reaching the lost at all cost’. It’s a massive task. But we are getting there,” he said.

Pastor Jimmy Davis can be contacted at 084 464 0456.

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