For more than 20 years, Northcross Church in Auckland has hosted its ‘Christmas in Lights’ event for the local community. It’s a combination of lights, live characters, and warm hospitality that keeps visitors coming back year after year to celebrate the true meaning of Christmas.
This year, Northcross equipped volunteers with evangelism tools to help facilitate and encourage gospel conversations. Bianca and Shaan Yen (serving with Student Life) led two evangelism trainings on Sunday nights in the weeks leading up to the event.
Attendees learned how to use God Tools and prepared three key questions designed to spark conversations during Christmas in Lights.
“In total, 160–180 volunteers are involved in Christmas in Lights—from the kitchen team to people dressed in character—with 22 volunteers there specifically to engage in conversations,” says Northcross Staff and Ministry Enabler Debbie Bosse.
Engaging in intentional evangelism together was a key aspect of this year’s event. “Over three nights 1,014 cars drove through, with 3330 people experienced the lights. 1524 people came into the building, where our team engaged in hundreds of conversations. Encouragingly, 61 people shared they’d like a follow up call, with 41 people indicating they’d attend an Alpha course early next year.”
“As we were preparing for this event we were encouraged by the testimonies of a couple who had attended Christmas in Lights last year. This couple were new to the country and had never been to church. While at the event they spoke with an evangelism team member and later started attending. They both became Christians and were recently baptised—sharing that Christmas in Lights was a catalyst for them.”
In the months before the event, many Northcross Church whānau prepare the site by stringing lights or putting up structures. Everyone pitches in, sharing their gifts.
“I love seeing people form friendships with each other,” says Debbie. “In a church of our size people don’t necessarily get to know one other easily, but this event really brings people together.
“One of the questions we asked people was ‘What does Christmas mean to you?’ It was so interesting to see the different responses—people wrote their answers and pinned them to a cork board... this is a great opportunity for people to invite a friend or neighbour—one lady I caught up with today shared that she had brought along her neighbour who is not a believer, he’d told her ‘I really love being around Christians, and I loved Christmas in Lights’.”
