I’ve written posts for this site and my own that describe some of the negatives our church consulting teams and “spies” have found in churches. The goal of this post is to show some of the positives we’ve seen in different churches. The topics vary, but perhaps something will help you in your church.
1. Greeters at every door. It doesn’t happen often, but occasionally every one of our team members is greeted when each of us intentionally enters a different door. Those churches are ready for guests.
2. Strong security in the preschool/children’s areas. Sometimes our team members gain entrance to these areas much too easily, but we’ve been in churches that physically halted our team from going beyond the boundaries. I’m pleased to report to the church that their security system worked in those cases.
3. Name tags for everyone. Several folks disagreed with my suggestion about this topic in previous posts, but our team appreciates it when everyone can quickly learn names. Name tags simply make it easier for folks to have conversations with people they don’t know.
4. Assurances about visitor’s cards. Again, I’ve written about why I likely would not complete a visitor’s card at your church. On the other hand, some churches have made it very clear up front—by saying, “We won’t bombard you with visits, phone calls and emails, and we won’t embarrass you”—that they won’t put us on the spot. I’m willing to complete a card for those churches.
5. Knowledge of the community. We do a demographic study of the church’s ministry area, but we don’t give that information to the church at first. Instead, we now first ask church leaders what they think the demographics will show about their community. Most leaders don’t know their community that well—but occasionally we meet leaders who clearly have already focused externally.
