Calvary Worship Center

Welcome sign at historic Seamen's Church, Newport, RI

A recent post on the Fresh Ministry Ideas blog is titled  15 reasons why people won’t return a second time to your church. Take a minute to click the link and read the 15 reasons, and you’ll see that most of them have to do with making visitors feel welcome.

I challenge you to make this not just a matter of prayer but of action. Our church does better than most in this area because of the generous amount of time we allow for personal greetings during the Sunday worship service, but there is still room for improvement. It’s all too easy to fall back into the habit of fellowshiping with those we know best — and it is important to reconnect with our church family each week.

But make the effort to include visitors in your greeting time. Ask how they found out about CWC. Invite them to come back. If we’re having a lunch or event afterward, ask them to join us, and make sure you sit with them and introduce them to others. You don’t have to do a “sales job” — no one wants to feel pressured — but do make them feel welcomed and included.

Whether that visitor ever returns to CWC or not, you will have briefly touched someone’s life and offered a bit of encouragement. Who knows how many people have been won for the Kingdom simply because church members practiced the ministry of welcoming.

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This entry was posted by Connie on Wednesday, April 21st, 2010 at 12:10 pm and is filed under encouragement. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.