Posts
by Reba Collins
Have you started thinking about your
New Year’s resolutions? Many highly proactive types have, so this is for all of
you church searchers who've already resolved to find a new church home next year. It also
is for you church leader friends who’ve resolved to become better, healthier
church choices in the New Year. (And yeah, church leaders, I know you think you’re
too busy now to worry about next year, but it’s not that far away!)
On the Church Guide Website we have
several tools to help you church searchers evaluate the organizational and
relational health of a church during each phase of your search process. Use
these tools as you seek a new church community. Church leaders, you can use
these tools as well to evaluate your own community’s health and to set some new
goals to become even a better expression of Jesus’ presence in our world.
·
Use the Spiritual Style Inventory to discover
your own spiritual needs before you go looking for a church community that can
meet them.
·
Use the Website Insights and Onsite
Insight tools for a preliminary assessment of a church’s theological and
outwardly relational compatibility before and during a first visit.
·
Use the First Visit Impressions tool plus
the Good Choice Checklist to prepare
for your first visit and then put it in context.
·
Finally, as you begin to explore a
longer-term relationship with a church community, use the Healthy
Church Choice Tools to determine when a “feels good”
church might actually become a good church choice.
Church leaders, start your year off
with some internal assessment. Evaluate EVERYTHING that an outside might
experience and hear about your church community to see if you are sending a
clear and consistent message that says you are a good church choice:
·
Use the Six Must-Ask First Visit Questions
with a random group of members to see how your own people view your church
community. These messages get passed along to outsiders. Are they messages you
want communicated? What’s missing in these conversations? Who’s missing in
these conversations? What are you doing well? What needs work? Do you like how
you are portrayed?
·
Use Six Essentials for Finding a Healthy Church
and Six Essential Questions for a “Healthy” Church
Relationship to evaluate your vision, mission,
and ministry alignment. These tools help you discover what you don’t know and
need to know to move forward in your unique calling as a community. They
challenge you to examine your discipleship process, and challenge you to
clearly communicate why you would be a good church choice and for whom.
Over this past year, we have seen
lives made whole, families healed, and divisions bridged as people have found
new places and purposes in healthy church communities. We have seen groups of
Christ-followers make significant, life-bettering impact in the lives of people
in their communities and this world, because these churches did the hard work
to identify their clear focus and calling.
When the right people find the
church communities that are right for them, miracles happen and lives are
changed for the good.
As we celebrate the amazing presence
of Christ in this world, we pray more and more that good church choices rise up
to capture the imagination, heart, head, and hands of the people in the
communities they serve. And we pray that more people will have the courage to
partner with a good, healthy church choice to do some amazing things in the New
Year.
Merry Christmas, and we will see you
next year!
No comments:
Post a Comment