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Our model starts with the actions of the Holy Spirit and the saving of souls that occurred on the day of Pentecost. A day when, "They were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." This action led to the saving of many souls, regardless of their beliefs up to this point. What they really sought and was supplied by the Apostles was teaching. They did not seem to want to recreate the experience of Pentecost so much as they simply wanted to learn the ways of a living God. Miracles and signs and wonders certainly have their place within the scope of evangelizing, but the main ingredients we can take from our early model is teaching, worship, prayer and fellowship. Anything else is just gravy.
Within the scope of my personal experience it seems that the Holy Spirit and Prayer have always proven to be most effective. From my earliest memories I have been a praying person. Sometimes intervals between prayers have amounted to years, and God's help usually was sought during times of great strife and fear. Yet even during the so called good times, I have always been aware to the presence of God's Spirit beside me. And with the Scripture as a guide I have come to trust and have complete confidence that I can always rely on the Word of God, irregardless of the size or type of problems that seem to materialize. .
How wonderful this newfound spirit must have seemed to the disciples and to the early converts of the Apostolic Church. Making guesses about this is not required, all we must do is read concerning the day of Pentecost, "And those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them." .
We know from the books of Acts and from early church historical sources the church grew at a phenomenal rate. What were the factors that caused this extreme growth? Not only did they follow the basic pattern in accordance with the teaching of the Apostles, they also had the benefit of one on one teaching that is such a wonderful part of home type churches and the evangelizing that just had to occur within this new found way of worshipping God.
