According to the most recent census, San Diego has about 3.3 million people and is the second largest county in California. This population consists of a rich mix of people from around the world speaking a myriad of different languages. San Diego has about 1000 Christian churches with memberships ranging from under 50 to 6000 with the average church claiming about 100 people. This means that of the 3.3 million people approximately 100,000 attend church. That is only 4% of the population, which leaves 96% unchurched and presumably unsaved. Even if we stretch these figures in our favor we only touch a very small portion of the people. These are embarrassing statistics, which testify of our inability to reach our county.

To reach these people we must follow the pattern shown to us in the Bible through the early New Testament church and not the Christian philosophy that we’ve adopted. Theologians from every denomination unilaterally agree that the church was birthed on the day of Pentecost. On the first day of Jesus’ disciples won 3,000 people and continued to preach the good news of Jesus Christ’s resurrection with Pentecostal power. Their meetings were marked by miraculous healings and manifestations of God’s supernatural power and multitudes were converted. A model New Testament prayer is found in Acts 4:29 where those Christians asked God for “signs and wonders” in Jesus’ name. Their prayer was answered. The apostle Paul declared his own mission statement in 1 Corinthians chapter 2 where he said, I determined not to know any thing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified…and my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom but with the demonstration of the Spirit and with power.” In chapter 4 he confronted the Christian philosophers of his day by saying when I come there I don’t want to hear your speech but I want to see your power.

What we are doing to reach this city is bringing in people from around the world who have impacted their cities and nations through preaching the power gospel as outlined in the New Testament. These preachers believe that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. They heard the great commission “to go into all the world and these signs will follow…” and they obeyed it. The results are irrefutable. This is especially true with a man like Carlos Annacondia who has been instrumental, in changing the spiritual condition of his entire country through casting devils out of people and healing their diseases on a grand scale. We hope that San Diego’s spiritual leaders will learn from men like this and model their ministries after them. We are calling every pastor to unite around the call to reach this county.

The churches of San Diego have mostly operated on an independent basis and not as a unified force. We shouldn’t forsake our individual purposes but, in addition, find a collective purpose. As lone rangers we are weak but if we can bring our resources together we can impact our county. One can see that power a unified group of people can have by looking at the business world. Lots of small companies have little power on their own but when they merge into one large union they can throw their weight around and accomplish things. If we desegregate ourselves and act as a body to blanket this county with gospel billboards, television commercials and other forms of evangelism we can reach our entire county. We are responsible for every soul in San Diego and God will hold us accountable for them.

It is not the government’s responsibility to heal the social and moral ills of our city or nation  - it is the body of Christ’s. Our model is Jesus Christ who God anointed with power to do good and heal all that were oppressed of the devil. It was His mission to bind up the broken hearted and set the captives free form their chains of sin and sickness. When Jesus left the earth, He left us with the commission to continue His work and gave us the power to do it. We must begin to follow God’s explicit plans for evangelism so we can win the people of this county.  ~  Pastor Mark Spitsbergen