BBQ & Bible Study at the Falls

In the early days of summer 2023, members of The Salvation Army Niagara Falls Citadel Corps knocked on over 2,000 doors to invite the community to a series of weekly summer BBQs. They also asked everyone if there was anything in their lives that they wanted the Salvationists to pray for.

“We made it a point to follow up with them on what we had prayed for. There were over 100 people who said ‘yes’ to our prayers,” says Major Andrew Murray, corps officer (pastor) at the Niagara Falls Citadel Corps. “If all we’re doing is offering food, we’re not doing enough as an Army. We have to feed them the Word of God too.”

As corps members cooked and served food every Monday, Army volunteers sat with the guests at picnic tables and talked with them about The Salvation Army while enjoying burgers and hot dogs. The volunteers mentioned that there would be Bible study afterward and asked if their meal companion would stay with them for it.

Each Bible study session featured a different parable of Jesus; if someone came for just one week, they would still take a full lesson home. More than 2,600 people were served food during 13 weeks of barbecues, and half of them stayed for Bible study.

“Niagara Falls is very similar to Atlantic City. Both of these cities have two different worlds within them,” says Murray. “Niagara Falls is home to its famous waterfalls, but it also has casinos, boardwalks, and expensive hotels. And just like Atlantic City, once you look past the tourist attractions, you’ll find a community struggling economically.

“Our corps soup kitchen sees good numbers, but we wanted to remove the stigma that can come with coming to a soup kitchen,” he says. “Stigmas build internal labels that can make someone negatively say to themselves, ‘This is all I am.’ Some of the same people at the BBQ came to our soup kitchen. But the BBQ removes those labels; there’s no stigma about going to a community cookout. That’s a fun social event for everyone and their families, food insecure or not.

“We didn’t even want to put labels on our Bible study. It wasn’t evangelism. It was enjoying a meal, meeting our community, and then inviting them to stay after. We didn’t even mention Bible study when we knocked on doors, but our events would not have been a success without those visitations to our neighbors.”

One of the neighbors who accepted the invitation was an employee of a nearby Indian restaurant. He later approached Major Murray to say he was fascinated by the teachings of Christ —and he asked for a Bible translated to Hindi.

Murray remembered that, 400 miles away, The Salvation Army in Philadelphia served many Hindu families. The next week, he had a Hindi Bible delivered from the Philadelphia Citadel Corps.

“I don’t know what will ultimately come out of that engagement, but I do know that I gave a gentleman a Bible in his own language because he wanted to learn more about Jesus,” Murray says. “Would that connection have happened at an indoor soup kitchen? Probably not, because he came to our barbecue, a community event that was open and approachable for him.”