Planning in Pencil and Prayer
The phrase “planning in pencil and prayer” is borrowed from a pastor who serves in of all places, Corona, California. The sentiment rings true. It’s hard to know how or what to plan at this point.
Back in March when our church, NewSpring, announced that worship services, KidSpring, and Fuse (student ministries) would be opened in mid-July, I felt they were operating out of abundance of caution and wisely chose to regather once the pandemic was well behind us. Well, that’s next weekend, and the fact that they are persisting makes we question their wisdom at this point. But, it’s not just my church.
Considering the uptick in Coronavirus cases since Memorial Day, I can’t imagine the number of cases that will appear in the 14 days following the Independence Day weekend. Someone online questioned the validity of all of this precaution. He asked his followers, “Have you seen anything different this year than during a normal flu season?” I have. I know of more people in the hospital and more people who have died than during a typical flu season. These aren’t statistics: a friend’s 35-year-old healthy co-worker and others have died.
So, how do you plan during a pandemic? Are we looking at online Christmas services? (Honestly, I was surprised by the idea of online Easter services at one point). It seems nearly impossible to plan during such a continuously ambivalent period. What does planning in pencil and prayer look like?
Your people will be worshipping somewhere.
Imagine your congregation was forced to meet at a different physical location. What would you do? Would you wait for them to return to your building before ministry could resume? Of course not! You would follow them to the new location and conduct services in the building that is currently housing them. Well, your congregation moved.
They moved online. They may or may not be able to regather in the remainder of 2020. Either way, they need a place to worship. The good news is that more people will participate in your online services than will ever join your on-campus services. When your congregation eventually regathers will you slam the door on your online followers?
The future will be a hybrid off online and on-campus services — but hear this — these are two different kinds of services. Streaming a regular worship service doesn’t work, but ignoring the people in the room to speak directly to the camera doesn’t work either. Two services are necessary just like you might have a traditional worship service and a contemporary service. The message is the same but the method is different.
The only true loser in all of this is the multisite campus. If people can watch the service online at home or even with friends, why would they need to watch online at a building the church rents? Streaming is streaming, right
Small groups are essential for your church’s continuity.
Again, in the vein of planning in pencil and prayer, we don’t know if small groups will be online, offline, on-campus, or off-campus. Groups are important for a variety of reasons as you can review in the Senior Pastor’s Guide to Groups. Groups are normally important because it’s a great format for disciples to make disciples.
During the pandemic, groups are especially important because in addition to content people also need conversation. They need a place to process what they’re dealing with. They need to discuss what was presented in the weekend service. Groups have always been a great means of taking your weekend into your week, but this is more important now than ever.
In order to start as many groups as you possibly can, you need to recruit as many people to start them as you possibly can. I don’t say “leader” here because I do not believe you need a leader in order to start a group. I do believe that if you give people permission and opportunity they will they will gather a group. To get you started with online small groups: Leading Online Small Groups: Embracing the Church’s Digital Future.
Unleash your people to serve.
Since churches have been unable to gather, many of the entry-level service roles such as ushers, greeters, parking lot attendants, guest services, coffee station workers, and so forth have disappeared. For churches who are depending on serving opportunities to assimilate their guests, that strategy just went out the window. But just because the church isn’t meeting in the building doesn’t mean the church has closed.
Again by giving your people permission and opportunity, you can empower them to do something about the needs that they are discovering. How can they love their neighbor when they have to social distance? What needs are they seeing in the community, what can they do about it? The more you get people engaged in ministry instead of arguing on Facebook, the better off everyone will be.
Personalized your ministry.
Closing church buildings resulted in the shift from centralized to decentralized ministry. You are well aware by now that people will only tolerate a certain number of zoom meetings in a day. But there are a lot of other ways to connect with people and help them other than more online videos and more zoom meetings.
With your smart phone, you can connect with more people in a more personal way than at any other time in history. You can call them, text them, message them, sing them a TikTok song (Maybe not that last one). In a previous post, I showed how you can accomplish all of the one another’s of the Bible with a smart phone. You just can’t greet one another with a holy kiss.
When the church doors closed, ministries got smaller and larger at the same time. We’ve already talked about the larger part with online services. But the smaller part is focusing on a select group to disciple personally. The smaller part is connecting regularly with the top 25% of your givers. The smaller part is focusing on the committed core of your church, serving for the crowd through online worship services, and caring for them through small groups. Your ministry priority should be clearer now and than ever been.
Concluding Thoughts
Many pastors have greatly overestimated what the weekend service could accomplish. Buildings closed and the church marched on. The church’s mission was never dependent on a building anyway.
On-campus worship services got a bunch of people in the room, but they were deceiving in two ways. First, sermons don’t make disciples, and second, the shoe was limiting the size of the foot. There are far more people to serve “out there” than could ever fit “in here” (or would even darken the door of a church).
In your planning, plan for necessities, but also plan for opportunities. The normal you are longing to see return won’t be the normal you remember. That’s okay. As long as your open to learn new things, you’re future is brighter than it might seem.
This is a season to try new things. This is the time to hit play while the rest of the world is hitting pause. What opportunities do you see? What are you doing to make the most of those opportunities? I’d like to hear what you’re thinking. Respond in the comments.
For more information on church online and online small groups, visit onlinegroups.US.
