Here are the three magic steps to having a successful Hispanic ministry…

[cricket, cricket]

OK, so there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all approach to Hispanic ministry. If I only communicate one concept about Hispanic ministry, that’s the most important one I’ve got to share. I hear too many people say, “This worked where we are, it will work anywhere.”

We have to remember that Hispanic is an ethnicity. It’s not a nationality. It’s not a race. It’s not even a culture. It is a multiplicity of nationalities, races, and cultures. It’s even a mix of languages to some degree, for some Hispanics speak only Spanish, some speak only English and some are bilingual.

There are areas where most of the Hispanics are immigrants. There are other areas where it is the Anglos who are the newcomers, where Hispanic families were living before the United States came to them. There are places where most of the Hispanics are minimum-wage workers. There are others where Hispanics are leaders in the community. Some consider themselves outsiders, foreigners; others are fully integrated.

Because of this, the fact that one church in Georgia has had tremendous success with a Guatemalan preacher doing outreach to immigrants, doesn’t mean that same model would work in San Antonio. Where some churches have grown while doing services all in Spanish, others need to be bilingual, while others should be doing everything in English. [Dan Rodriguez from Pepperdine did studies of successful Hispanic evangelical churches; the fastest growing ones had English-only services.]

I’ve got thoughts, ideas and opinions to share about how churches can best serve a multicultural community. But the most important concept is: we must be flexible. We can’t use a cookie cutter approach.