Natural Church Development
What we could and should be doing
Just my personal views and thoughts on what could be done within our own church and how we could achieve it.
Sunday Worship.
First of all the times of the meetings. Are these best suited to the needs of the community we are seeking to reach? If not, could we look at changing them to attract more people?
We also need to promote these locally. Let people know that they are held and when. Make sure they know they are welcome to come along. There seems to be a feeling that we are in some way a closed club. This is a misconception that we need to actively change. We need to be actually inviting people to come along through whatever medium we can, be that verbal, written, online or via other media.
Another area to look at here is our style and form of worship, and what would be most effective in spreading the Gospel. Clearly the status quo as it stands is not working. Dwindling numbers confirm that. Our present worship style has little or no appeal for younger people, or those new to church. This is not helped by the fact that much our music, however uplifting it should be, comes over like the death march from Saul.
We need to apply the Army Mother's old principle of adaptation to our worship style and be prepared to serve up the Gospel on any dish that will get people to eat it. Either one, or both, of our Sunday worship meetings needs to change to incorporate a style that will appeal to younger people and people new to our church.
We also need to be looking to reach out more with our worship services. Public transport limitations mean that many people are unable to get to the Corps on a Sunday. There are, I believe, a great many people in Cleethorpes who would worship with us if they could. I suggest we look at some kind of outreach work in that town. Perhaps hire a suitable hall and have a meeting there, say, once a month. Effectively publicised, this could prove to be very successful.
Cafe Church.
This has proven successful at Barton and could also do the same here. My feeling is that the best time to hold this would be Friday evening. It serves as a way for people new to the Army to get a feel for worshiping with us. My suggestion would be to hold this on alternate Fridays, with a more directly youth based activity on the other Friday evenings. Lack of leaders for a youth activity would be a problem, at least initially. We may need to look at ‘importing’ these until such times as we can develop our own leaders.
One of the things that has made Cafe Church so successful in Barton is that they actively go out onto the streets during the day of the service and invite people to come along that evening. I suggest that we should do the same and back this up with leaflets that can be handed out.
House Groups.
The importance of these cannot, and should not, be underestimated. At the present time it seems we have two established groups within the Corps, as well as a couple of other potential groups.
It is envisaged that, following the current series of studies, we will split the main group in two, adding people to each of the two halves. If we continue to divide in this way, then by the time of the third NCD survey in 30 months we could have eight groups within the church, each with 8-10 people. As this would be a greater number than we currently have in our congregation it allows for growth and new people can be added to existing groups where they will be better nurtured and mentored.
We also need to ensure that group leaders have the correct support and training they need. Indeed, we need to ensure that we HAVE group leaders, rather than it just being yet another job for the officers to do.
House groups are central and crucial to the health of the church and must not be neglected or overlooked in any way. Almost all (if not all) of the eight NCD quality charictaristics can be significantly boosted by close and effective small groups, which then in turn pass on these benefits to the church as a whole.
Developing and growing the groups will have an impact on Empowered Leadership(we will have eight group leaders). As the groups grow and divide, natural leaders will emerge, so our area of Gift based Ministry will be enhanced. In terms of improvong and promoting Effective Structures (our current minimum factor) this process speaks for itself, and the same can be said for the area of Holistic Small Groups. Small group environments are also the best places for growing and developing Loving Relationships.
The benefits that these groups bring back to the wider church family will have positive impacts upon the area’s of Passionate Sprituality and Inspiring Worship Services. Even the final area of Need Orientated Evangelism will be boosted because people will be working better together and at a more local level.
Midweek Activities.
These are fairly well established at present, although directed mainly towards the older generations. We need to utilise these more effectively from an evangelistic standpoint. We also need to make these groups and activities much more widely known and accessable to the local community. Local media and leaflets can be used quite effectively for this. Attention also needs to be paid to what people in the community actually want and need from us as a church, in terms of groups, activities and services. This area of our ministry has huge potential for growth as the NCD process develops and allows us to grow as a church.
Coffee Morning and Clothing sale.
This is, at present, our best link into the local community and one that can be utilised more effectively in terms of evangelism. We could look at having some kind of eccumenical activity running in parallel in the main hall, or simply have people availbale for councelling, advice and prayer. As with the midweek activities, this is another area with excellent growth potential.
What we could and should be doing
Just my personal views and thoughts on what could be done within our own church and how we could achieve it.
Sunday Worship.
First of all the times of the meetings. Are these best suited to the needs of the community we are seeking to reach? If not, could we look at changing them to attract more people?
We also need to promote these locally. Let people know that they are held and when. Make sure they know they are welcome to come along. There seems to be a feeling that we are in some way a closed club. This is a misconception that we need to actively change. We need to be actually inviting people to come along through whatever medium we can, be that verbal, written, online or via other media.
Another area to look at here is our style and form of worship, and what would be most effective in spreading the Gospel. Clearly the status quo as it stands is not working. Dwindling numbers confirm that. Our present worship style has little or no appeal for younger people, or those new to church. This is not helped by the fact that much our music, however uplifting it should be, comes over like the death march from Saul.
We need to apply the Army Mother's old principle of adaptation to our worship style and be prepared to serve up the Gospel on any dish that will get people to eat it. Either one, or both, of our Sunday worship meetings needs to change to incorporate a style that will appeal to younger people and people new to our church.
We also need to be looking to reach out more with our worship services. Public transport limitations mean that many people are unable to get to the Corps on a Sunday. There are, I believe, a great many people in Cleethorpes who would worship with us if they could. I suggest we look at some kind of outreach work in that town. Perhaps hire a suitable hall and have a meeting there, say, once a month. Effectively publicised, this could prove to be very successful.
Cafe Church.
This has proven successful at Barton and could also do the same here. My feeling is that the best time to hold this would be Friday evening. It serves as a way for people new to the Army to get a feel for worshiping with us. My suggestion would be to hold this on alternate Fridays, with a more directly youth based activity on the other Friday evenings. Lack of leaders for a youth activity would be a problem, at least initially. We may need to look at ‘importing’ these until such times as we can develop our own leaders.
One of the things that has made Cafe Church so successful in Barton is that they actively go out onto the streets during the day of the service and invite people to come along that evening. I suggest that we should do the same and back this up with leaflets that can be handed out.
House Groups.
The importance of these cannot, and should not, be underestimated. At the present time it seems we have two established groups within the Corps, as well as a couple of other potential groups.
It is envisaged that, following the current series of studies, we will split the main group in two, adding people to each of the two halves. If we continue to divide in this way, then by the time of the third NCD survey in 30 months we could have eight groups within the church, each with 8-10 people. As this would be a greater number than we currently have in our congregation it allows for growth and new people can be added to existing groups where they will be better nurtured and mentored.
We also need to ensure that group leaders have the correct support and training they need. Indeed, we need to ensure that we HAVE group leaders, rather than it just being yet another job for the officers to do.
House groups are central and crucial to the health of the church and must not be neglected or overlooked in any way. Almost all (if not all) of the eight NCD quality charictaristics can be significantly boosted by close and effective small groups, which then in turn pass on these benefits to the church as a whole.
Developing and growing the groups will have an impact on Empowered Leadership(we will have eight group leaders). As the groups grow and divide, natural leaders will emerge, so our area of Gift based Ministry will be enhanced. In terms of improvong and promoting Effective Structures (our current minimum factor) this process speaks for itself, and the same can be said for the area of Holistic Small Groups. Small group environments are also the best places for growing and developing Loving Relationships.
The benefits that these groups bring back to the wider church family will have positive impacts upon the area’s of Passionate Sprituality and Inspiring Worship Services. Even the final area of Need Orientated Evangelism will be boosted because people will be working better together and at a more local level.
Midweek Activities.
These are fairly well established at present, although directed mainly towards the older generations. We need to utilise these more effectively from an evangelistic standpoint. We also need to make these groups and activities much more widely known and accessable to the local community. Local media and leaflets can be used quite effectively for this. Attention also needs to be paid to what people in the community actually want and need from us as a church, in terms of groups, activities and services. This area of our ministry has huge potential for growth as the NCD process develops and allows us to grow as a church.
Coffee Morning and Clothing sale.
This is, at present, our best link into the local community and one that can be utilised more effectively in terms of evangelism. We could look at having some kind of eccumenical activity running in parallel in the main hall, or simply have people availbale for councelling, advice and prayer. As with the midweek activities, this is another area with excellent growth potential.
