RIDGECREST, N.C. (BP) — Motorcycle sales, like gas prices, are soaring — and in the process churches and believers are discovering opportunities for witness and ministry.
While gasoline prices have dropped from the $4 per gallon this summer, motorcycle dealers say sales have leaped — anywhere from 20 percent at a Triumph motorcycle dealership in Anchorage, Alaska, to 27 percent at a Harley-Davidson shop in East Hartford, Conn. Motorcycle enthusiasts today not only include Hells Angels and wheelie-popping sport bikers but also middle-aged recreational riders and businessmen who ride motorcycles to work.
At the same time, chapters of the F.A.I.T.H. Riders motorcycle ministry are popping up all over the country.
BP/Photo by James Yates
More than 300 motorcycle enthusiasts attended the third annual Rally to Ridgecrest over Memorial Day weekend. Between challenging speakers and workshops, riders enjoyed day-rides on the scenic Blue Ridge Parkway.
“It's incredible the number of motorcycles you see on the road this year, and God has just been phenomenal in the way he is orchestrating the growth of F.A.I.T.H. Riders,” said Danny Moats, national chaplain for the ministry based at First Baptist Church at the Mall in Lakeland, Fla. “Oklahoma has just blown wide open. We'll probably have 14 chapters there before the end of the summer.”
Excitement about motorcycle ministries was evident at this year's Rally to Ridgecrest motorcycle rally, which drew 319 participants — a 50 percent jump over the inaugural rally just 18 months earlier. Under the banner “Eternal Vigilance,” bikers from 14 states gathered over the Memorial Day weekend for worship and workshops at the LifeWay Ridgecrest Conference Center in North Carolina — and exhilarating rides through the Blue Ridge Mountains.
A F.A.I.T.H. Riders chapter gives churches an opportunity to involve more people in witness and ministry and, at the same time, engage lost men and women with the gospel, noted Ron Pratt, national event planner for LifeWay Conference Centers.
“There are a lot of people who enjoy riding motorcycles and a lot of churches have connected that passion to local church motorcycle riding groups, as well as many state conventions that have motorcycle ministries that seek to reach both believers and unbelievers,” Pratt said.
“An event like Rally to Ridgecrest affords a believer an opportunity to bring someone with them, to laugh, to ride, to hear the gospel and encounter other believers who also love to ride,” he said. “So there is an affinity through which people are encouraged in their faith and can learn ways to share their faith with unbelievers.”
The upswing in popularity of motorcycle ministries reflects a broader realization by church leaders that men are more interested in church when the church is more interested in doing things men enjoy, said Gene Williams, men's ministry consultant for the Tennessee Baptist Convention.
“A lot of churches are figuring out that if they want men to come to church, they have to do man things,” Williams noted. “If you wrap a Kingdom agenda around things men want to do, men will come to church.
“Evangelism is more than sharing the plan of salvation,” Williams said. “It's building relationships that earn you the right to share the plan of salvation.”
Relationships like that bore fruit Saturday evening, May 24, as Dave Burton, evangelism director for the Florida Baptist Convention, challenged rally participants to lead lives of significance by letting Jesus take charge. Men and women crowded to the front of the auditorium — seven of them inviting Christ into their hearts for the first time. One of them was there with a friend who purchased his motorcycle five years ago for the express purpose of sharing Christ with this individual.
Riding a motorcycle opens doors for witness in ways almost impossible to believe, said Robert Warren, a lifelong motorcycle enthusiast from Epps, La.
“You get opportunities to meet people and talk to people you wouldn't have any other way,” Warren said. “We can stop somewhere and get gas and someone in a car will pull up and say, ‘Hey, you ride a bike,' and you get to talking about motorcycles. It is a wonderful tool. You just strike up a conversation and one thing leads to another.”
Sammy Gilbreath, evangelism director for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions, recalled standing outside a biker bar in Madison County, Ala., that had an unsavory reputation as a center of drug and illegal alcohol sales. Because Gilbreath rode in on a motorcycle, he had an opportunity to engage the bar owner in conversation — and lead him to Christ. Then, as they stood outside the bar, a car pulled up. The driver needed directions and was obviously frightened by the sight of Gilbreath standing by his bike, clad in leather.
“After I told him where to find Country Club Drive, I said, ‘You see this Harley? I'm getting ready to ride from here to Montgomery, Ala., and I could get killed before I get there,' ” Gilbreath recounted. “I said, ‘If you get killed before you get back home, do you know where you are going to spend eternity?' He said, ‘No sir. I've never been to church before,' so I shared the gospel with him and he knelt on that blacktop parking lot and invited Christ into his heart.
“That came about because of that motorcycle and it happens over and over and over.”
Mark Kelly is an assistant editor with Baptist Press.