Discover Why Small Groups Often Fall Short of Meeting Expectations I’ve been in small groups, I’ve led small groups, and I’ve overseen a church’s small group ministry. Small groups have the potential to connect people, helping them on their faith journey and better navigate life. Yet small group failure seems a more common outcome. Don’t […]
Churches Move and Things Change We started visiting fifty-two churches the Sunday after Easter. We celebrated the resurrection of Jesus at our home church and then slipped away for a year, visiting a different Christian church every Sunday for a year. At least that’s the quick way to explain our journey. We doubled up on […]
Seek Faith Connections to Form Spiritual Affinity God lives in community, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is why he created us to be in community, just like him. This means living in relationship with him and living in relationship with others. That’s why we must embraced Christian community. Why We Need Christian Community […]
The Third Time is the Charm It’s Memorial Day weekend. Holidays are a bad time to visit a church. Seldom is it a representative experience. The wise decision would be to attend our own church, but I know we usually have the B team on holiday weekends. We’ve already visited this church twice and know […]
Isaiah Tells the People that God Will Choose Them Again, but Did He Ever Stop? One phrase jumps out from today’s passage in Isaiah’s prophecy to God’s chosen people: once again he will pick Israel. God, through Isaiah, gives his people hope for a better tomorrow. At this particular time, however, God’s people are discouraged; […]
A Holiday Weekend, Light Attendance, and a Great Time I volunteer twice a month at our local food pantry. Staffed with people from area churches and service organizations, we serve those in need in our community. One Saturday, between clients, I have an opportunity to talk with a man who attends Church #2. I ask […]
Reform Sunday School as an Education Service to Your Community It may be strange to see Sunday school on this list of things we must change for our churches, but we should carefully reexamine it. Do you know the original mission of this Sunday program? It was to teach poor children how to read. And […]
Wrapping Up Our Year of Visiting Churches Our journey of visiting fifty-two churches is over, though the memories will last forever. With much to consider, this wrap-up pulls together key elements of our adventure. I hope this helps you and your church better interact with and respond to visitors, as well as find new ways […]
A Recap of Churches 27 through 44 The churches are starting to blur. Every week seems the same, offering only slight variations on a theme. I’m growing weary of our journey. I’ve realized this for a few weeks but didn’t want to admit it. Yes, I still notice kindnesses offered and innovations presented at the […]
Preparing to Visit Our Next 13 Churches Going forward in our journey of visiting 52 Churches, we may bypass more churches on our list to vary the scope of our adventure. So far, we’ve skipped one that wasn’t a Christian gathering and another because they were in limbo, pending a turnaround. The next thirteen churches […]