Why People Choose (Fill In The Blank) Over Attending Your Church
It’s a new year and many people came back to your church on Sunday. They will be there for a few more weeks before they quit church and the gym simultaneously. But not EVERYBODY you invited attended church, did they?
You’ve invited them over and over and they still refuse to come.
You’ve offered to buy them lunch after the service, but they still don’t show.
You know they need help with … marriage, parenting, purpose, grace, salvation, et. al. AND your church could be the answer, but they still have excuses to miss every Sunday.
You have tried everything.
Why won’t your unchurched friends just come with you to church ONE TIME? Why won’t they accept your invitation just ONCE?
While there is no “one-size-fits-all” answer, there are certainly some common reasons unchurched people resist church invitations and solutions we as church leaders and attenders can implement.
I recently experienced one of the most prominent reasons to miss church. The last Sunday of the year, our church is closed. We take the day off to give our staff and volunteer base a day to relax, recharge, and spend with their family and friends. So as I woke up on 10:00 a.m. Sunday morning, I caught a glimpse of what most of the world experiences on a Sunday – rest. No alarm. No rushing to get ready. No yelling at the kids. I eased into the day, and it was great. Life is so busy. We are all over-committed. We are all tired. Most families are just as busy on Saturday as during the week. So Sunday becomes the ONE day to actually rest. To sleep in.
But that’s just one reason. Here are a few more you know to be true:
Tip 1. Relationships Matter (Shutting The Back Door in Your Church, Blog Series)
In the previous post, I identified 9 tips to help keep people from leaving your church (i.e., shutting the back door). I believe all 9 are important, but in this post, I want to address one of the more critical back door shutting mechanisms.
TIP 1 – Prioritize relationships.
Consider for a moment the power of relationships. How many churches have you seen (or attended) where people stay in spite of bad preaching and lack of leadership? Why do people stay? I’ll tell you – relationships. While an engaging, relevant environment might attract people, it’s ultimately a relationship that makes them stick.