1st Church of the Funnel Cake

If you are visiting our blog because you happened across a friendly face next to a truck giving away delicious funnel cakes while going about your business in Oneonta NY, then welcome! Mmmmm, funnel cake...

...mmm, that was a good one. So, yes, this April and May we are packing the truck, firing up the fryer, and canvassing the town to give away funnel cakes! We have a twofold purpose to this: One, we love going out into our community and showing people the love of God in practical ways, such as serving needs and giving away goodies. We call this our Acts of Kindness Ministry. It is a fun way to serve, and we have been doing a variety of AOK projects ever since 2010. The funnel cake outreach has been particularly fun, watching people walk by our "Free Funnel Cake" sign, do a double take, and say "Seriously!" ...mmm, everybody seems to enjoy biting into a crisp, sugary...

...oh, sorry. Where was I? Right. The second purpose with our funnel cake outreach is to meet people and tell them about God and our church. This outreach works out especially well for this purpose because it takes a few minutes to fry up a funnel cake; time we use to engage in conversation. Nine times out of ten we get the opportunity to talk about God's love and the church because people are always a bit skeptical as to, "What's the catch?" We've found the conversational route to be non-intrusive, and if someone doesn't feel like talking about religion, they don't have to.

This simple funnel cake outreach is important to us in regards to launching the church. Before we launch the church, we want to develop a launch team. Hopefully, this team will come from people that we'll meet while doing outreach activities, like giving away funnel cakes. The plan is to "funnel" interested people to information meetings where they can learn more about the vision and the plan of the church. When it comes down to it, using our God-entrusted resources to give away funnel cakes and talk to people face-to-face seems like a smarter, healthier, and more enjoyable way to meet people, spread God's love, and promote the church than traditional marketing techniques.

So keep your eyes peeled Oneonta, and be on the look out for our 1977 two-tone blue "Mobile Ministry Machine" and fryer. Or, simply follow your nose! Mmm....