Recently, a local church here in Bowling Green held a weekend gospel meeting. The announcement that appeared on the front page of their website inviting people to attend also contained an invitation to an “Ice Cream Meet n’ Eat” that would be held at the home of one of the members.

Incorporating this invitation into the announcement on the church’s website for the gospel meeting makes it easy for one to get the impression that this ice cream party was an official event sponsored and paid for by the church. The fact that it was located at a member’s house would not necessarily indicate that the church was uninvolved. A church might decide to host a social event at such a location in order to provide a more casual environment or because they church does not (yet) have a fellowship hall or similar facility in which to host the event on-site. Denominations host social events on their property and off-site all of the time. People are accustomed to these things happening. So even though social events have no place in the work of the church (cf. 1 Corinthians 11:22, 34), many people would not think twice about it.

Though I do not know this for a fact, I assume that this particular ice cream party was paid for by individual members and not by the congregation (even though the announcement somehow ended up on the church’s website embedded within the invitation to the gospel meeting). However, this does beg the question: Is it appropriate to use social events (like ice cream parties) as a means of enticing people to come listen to the gospel?
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