Great Soul-Winning Churches - Elmer Towns

weeks a 500-seat steel building and moved into it until the auditorium was restored. The steel
building today is used for Sunday School.
In the future, the church is going to add a balcony to its auditorium, making it possible to
seat 1,100.
Next, they plan a large Sunday School building that will enable them to move into a day
school ministry. The church expects to begin kindergarten this fall, then add two years the
following fall, gradually moving up through the entire grade school.
Kelley hopes to go on TV in the future out of Nashville. He does not want to televise the
Sunday morning service but to present the gospel through the church music groups and the
preached ministry of the Word of God.
This Easter the church plans to reach 1,201 in Sunday School, which would break a
record, and then to continue its growth in every area of ministry.
Chapter Twenty
The Call to the Ministry
The ministry is more than an occupation or a job, it is a call from God. The salary is
lower than any other position of equal responsibility. The demands are great, the hours are long,
the burdens are almost unbearable. Ministers are gossiped about and lied about. They are
criticized to their faces, and carnal church members connive behind their backs. The pastorate is
one of the most demanding positions and no one man could remain as pastor without the inner
assurance that the Almighty God has called him to that office.
What makes a preacher get on his knees and pray till tears come? the call of God. What
motivates a preacher to spend all day knocking on doors instead of getting a better-paying job,
when he knows his family doesn’t have as nice clothes as the neighbors or his house is old and
run down? the call of God. What grips a man’s heart to lay brick on a church, to paint old pews,
to run a mimeograph, to get on the radio and preach the gospel? the call of God.
When considering the reasons for the growth of a church, we must begin at God’s call. A
man at the assembly line hears something none others perceive—it is God’s call. He begins to
march to a different drumbeat: it is God’s command to go and build a church, even when his
friends think he is crazy. A man attempts to do what seems impossible. He speaks in public when
his grammar is shoddy; he knocks on doors, knowing he cannot sell. He attempts to teach the
Bible when he has little formal education. He tried to build huge auditoriums, not knowing
construction or architecture. He manages a large corporation, though ignorant of financing or
advertising. Why does a man dream the unthinkable and attempt the impossible? He feels God
has called him and all he can do is to obey. This minister knows that with God’s calling is God’s
enablement and that if God has called him, he can build a great church.