Six Ways to Engage the Unchurched at Your Church

What would happen if the unchurched in your community suddenly attended this Sunday? Would you be ready?

Hopefully that sounds like a dream come true. Let’s pretend your attendance doubled – or tripled. And it’s the good kind of attendance increase, not the kind where you add disgruntled churchgoers who will soon find reasons to be disgruntled with your church!

At Watermarke Church, that is basically our story. When I first arrived to lead our church, we were stagnant at best. Watermarke was losing families weekly. This presented an obvious problem and distinct opportunity. We had to change and reframe our culture and collectively recommit to our vision – creating a church unchurched people would love to attend.

In our case, the hard work paid off. God led us to make many changes and our church began to grow quickly. As exciting as the new growth was, though, creating a church that attracted unchurched people has a disadvantage I never considered: unchurched people don’t know how to be church people. More specifically, they do not serve or give or participate, they only consume. Of course we were grateful to have their consumption, but I quickly realized encouraging and equipping our unchurched friends to participate IN the mission rather than consume FROM the mission was critical to our mission. More importantly, it was critical to their growing relationship with Jesus.

Can Your Church Parking Lot Be An Experience?

In your mind, when does the sermon begin?

If you said “The parking lot,” I think you’re dead on. While we as pastors might prepare all week to communicate a message with passion and energy, if our audience is frustrated, annoyed, or just confused before the enter the building, we are working out of a deficit.

We should consider it a given that families will argue on the way to church. They most likely left late. A child will be wearing mismatched shoes. And a parent will yell at some point. In many ways, the odds are stacked against us before they are even with us. But we have the potential to create a better experience the minute they drive on our property if we will just plan ahead.

At Watermarke Church, our parking lot is one of our biggest challenges. We currently meet in a school, so parking around the building is scarce. To help make room for our cars, we lease and shuttle attendees in from two satellite parking lots. But while we could look at our parking situation as a negative, our team has decided to make it part of the Watermarke experience. I think you can do the same – regardless of your circumstance.

Here are ten specific ways you can turn your parking lot into a parking experience:

Video Preaching Can’t Work In Every Church, Right?

How much time per day do you look at a screen?

I know you don’t track your screen time, but if you had to guess? I would say between the laptop I’m starring at now, the TV, my iPad, Candy Crush, and my iPhone … 28 hours a day. Maybe more. We all spend A LOT of time in front of screens. Our actual life is moving more and more towards digital life. For better or worse, the next generation is experiencing almost everything through digital media. Just go to a concert and watch how many people experience the show through their phone as they record. Life through a screen is becoming the norm. As I type this, my son is “liking” photos on Instragram, my other son is playing XBOX, and one daughter is watching Netflix. Please don’t tell their mom!

It’s safe to say, in culture, the digital ship has sailed. Which is why, when pastors and church leaders dismiss video preaching, I’m perplexed.

Stop Saying “Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin.”

“Love the sinner, hate the sin.”

As a Christian, I know what you mean. But I’m telling you – no non-Christian believes you. Their experience has taught them well.

Christians have spent so many years rallying against “sin” that most people who have been told they are “sinners” cannot fathom finding love or acceptance from the Christian community today. Who can blame them? It seems everywhere we turn Christian are fighting against this and complaining about that. Even though “those fanatical Christians” may only represent a small portion of Christendom, they’re voices are loud and the media eats it up. Unfortunately, they represent more than just themselves.

But while we cannot make EVERY Christian behave, you and I should stop using terms and phrases that accidentally communicate something we never intend.

Do you know the ONE answer for EVERY faith question?

Have you ever shared your faith?

It can be terrifying. I grew up in a church where every Monday night we had “Visitation.” That term is used for an alien invasion. And it happens in funeral homes. And that’s exactly what Monday night looked like to the people who unfortunately were at home when we knocked.

Visitation was an interesting event. In case you have not had the luxury to “visit” or be “visited,” let me give you an overview of the night. The church would gather together, names and addresses of recent church visitors would be distributed, and groups of people would leave to “visit” with these people – uninvited, of course. Basically, church people would knock on stranger’s doors, interrupt their evening, and invite them back to church or share something about Jesus. You can guess how successful it was.

I only participated a few times. Honestly, once was enough. I’m not sure who had the worst experience – me or the person I “visited.”

My biggest hesitation with visitation was how to respond to faith questions. I wasn’t a biblical scholar. I had not been to seminary. I hadn’t even read the entire Bible! So the thought of anyone asking me questions about faith, God, Jesus, creation, sanctification (I would not have even known that was a real word!) or the like just freaked me out. I was afraid to share what I did know, because I firmly believed what I didn’t know would come up and my lack of knowledge would make me look like a fake. Worse, my stammering could lead people further away from God.

But you should not be afraid to share our faith, because I believe we actually have an answer to every question that could be asked. Do you know the ONE answer for EVERY faith question?

Here’s it is:

Could Your Success Today Kill Your Innovation Tomorrow?

Do you have the resources necessary for your job?

What about your department or organization? At our church, we challenge the leadership to ask that question frequently. The thought is simple and logical – if you don’t have the resources you need to succeed, we want to help fill in the gaps – within reason, of course.

When I first arrived at Watermarke Church, we were FAR from resourced. We existed as a hand-to-mouth organization. Every dollar we received left as it arrived. Every offering was critical. Every check was necessary. For two years, we scratched and clawed our way. It was a difficult season, but it was also a season full of fun and challenge … and innovation.

Then, after two years, we converted our church partnership into a campus location of North Point Ministries. Many things changed. And by many, I mean nearly everything. But our resources changed the most. Overnight, we went from being under-resourced to winning the church resource lottery (not really, but it felt that way). There were no blank checks, but we immediately improved financially. Within weeks our church began to take on new staff and new equipment. Our services improved. Our technology improved. Our leadership bench improved.

But… our innovative spirit began to wane.

So We Sang “Let It Go” From Disney’s Frozen in Church!

As a pastor, I hear it all the time – “Why did we play THAT song?” Maybe you do, too. Or maybe you ask it. Every time we begin our church service with a song from a non-Christian radio station, I know it’s coming.

I understand. We recently began our church service by singing these lyrics: “A singer in a smokey room, a smell of wine and cheap perfume. For a smile they can share the night, it goes on and on and on and on.” Okay – seeing it in written form feels a little sketchy (or a ton sketchy!). I may have a few questions for myself, now!

But let me ask you a question: What song is that lyric from? Did you smile as you read them? Or sang them? Are you still singing?

Here’s why we occasionally begin our services with music from Journey or Disney – because people like it. I know, that’s not profound. And I realize it’s certainly not theologically sound, but it is powerful. People like fun, familiar music. And that’s extremely important, because I’m convinced if people don’t like how their church experience begins, odds are they will not like how it progresses or ends.

To say it another way: If we hope to influence people toward their Heavenly Father, we must engage them emotionally in the beginning of our service to engage them spiritually during the service.

So here are five things to consider if we hope to create a church experience that leads people from where they are to where we want them to be an hour later:

Why Are You Hiding?

Have you ever met someone who was truly authentic and transparent? A person who didn’t mind admitting their mistakes, failures, or personal deficiencies? A person who didn’t just KNOW they have gaps, but were open to admitting they have gaps. Take a second and think of someone … I’ll wait. It’s harder to find people like this, isn’t it? There aren’t too many people in our world who are authentic. Sure, we all have a friend or a spouse with whom we can share SOME of who we are, but complete transparency is typically not our default posture.

If you have trouble being transparent, here’s some great news – you are in good company. In fact, from the beginning of time, our defense to being found out was to hide out. The same holds true today.

Genesis 3:10 (NIV); [Adam] answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”

The first thing Adam and Eve did after disobeying God was to hide from God. Unfortunately, we’ve been hiding ever since. There is just something in you and me (and apparently in Adam and Eve) that automatically desires to hide from others rather than be honest with others. We so desperately desire to look good that we pretend we are good.

The real irony is pretending and hiding prevents us from experiencing what we are trying to find by pretending and hiding.

He Knew Everybody’s Name. Personalize Your Values, Part 6

There was much to be learned watching Dan Cathy’s surprise visit to a local Chick-fil-A location, but for me personally, this last observation might be the most important:

Leaders connect relationally.
It was quite astounding, but before Dan left the store, he knew everyone’s name. Literally. He personally engaged and learned something about every single customer in the restaurant. Whether this is his natural gifting or not, Dan has cultivated the act of service personalization. It was impressive, to say the least.

Be Careful HOW You Make It Better. Personalize Your Values, Part 5

When I watched the President of Chick-fil-A, Dan Cathy, make a surprise visit to one of their locations, there was a lot to learn. Watching him work the room, serve every customer in the restaurant, refill drinks, and more, was a site to behold. But what I might have loved the most was watching him pick up a napkin from the floor, walk to the nearest trash, throw it away … and move on.

Seems simple. But think about it. How many times have you seen a leader (not you of course, but another leader) see a problem and decide to NOT address it immediately? Sure, some issues need immediate attention, but that bucket is much smaller than many of us tend to think.

I learned this the hard way. As a Lead Pastor, I care immensely about our Sunday morning service experience. When something is not right, I want it fixed. You guessed it – immediately! Early in my time as a leader, I would text staff members incessantly during the Sunday morning experience, pointing out problems, issues, trash, and whatever else I could find wrong. I reasoned they wanted things done with excellence, too, so I was actually helping them.

What I discovered was that my constant evaluation was not winning any points with the team. We all wanted to make it better, but not every moment needed to be a “make it better RIGHT NOW moment.”

Dan reminded me: Leaders make it better … over time.

In this post, I’d love to share three simple ways you and I can makes things better without losing influence and support of our teams.

Thanks for reading!