Back in 2007, I exited a smoke-filled bar in Livno, Bosnia and got a vision from God. This was my first trip overseas, and we were there to rebuild a classroom. At night, however, we would go out to sample the culture.
This was a Friday night, and our destination was a dance club. I don’t dance much, I don’t like dance music, but when in Rome—or Bosnia …
So we are standing around in the smokiest room I’ve even been in, not sure if smoking is Bosnia’s national pastime or what, but they do love their cigarettes. I’m standing there, surrounded by hundreds of twentysomethings from this small town in Bosnia, and it dawns on me: “This same thing is happening in every city in America and, evidently, around the world!” The twentysomethings are the “lost generation” in churches, but I had just found them!
As I left the club, gasping for fresh air, this idea came to me: “If we could go back to the States and find a way to own the room in local bars, we could really make an impact.”
But how do you “own a room”? How do you set it up so everyone in the bar has to listen to what you have to say?
You provide the entertainment! You become the house band, and whatever you say now has a couple thousand watts of amplification behind it! You now “own the room.”
And that is just what we did! Now, more than three years later, Pub Theology is a thriving ministry in the city of Indianapolis. Every week, in five bars across the northeast corner of Indy, Pub Theology brings faith, hope, love and beer together, and it is changing people’s lives.
Each night brings together a live band, a local charity, an offering, a short sermon, a segment of text questions sent in from the audience and various giveaways. We call it a “party with a purpose.”
Over the last three years, we have reached more than 10,000 people, given away close to 500 Bibles, donated more than $13,000 to charities and seen many people choose to follow Christ. And everyone who has come to Christ has been over the age of 21!
