Today we are going to look at why in-person welcoming is so important to your online ministry pathway and ways to incorporate technology into it, but first, the story of how one extraordinary welcome paved the way for my career in ministry…
There was a time during my teens that I largely dropped out of church. My parents had planted a huge church, which was great, but somewhere along the way I became another Gen-X statistic and stopped attending. Fast forward to my university days and I’m now wrestling with symbolic interactionism, postmodernism, and the search for absolute truth. I know that I need to try church again, but which one?
I go back to the huge nondenominational church my parents had planted, but it just didn’t click. I tried going back to a previous AoG church where I grew up, and gave it the ol’ college try, but I was largely an outsider among the young adults. The sociologist in me guesses they were what was left-over after the other Gen-X statistics had also left and so they formed a peculiar sub-culture centered around Brendan Fraser movies to survive. 🤔🤷
Finally, I decided to go visit a new church plant… the moment I walked in the door, they had me!
What was it about that church? Was it relevant? Yeah. Was it on a mission? Most definitely. To be honest though, I may not have given it enough of a chance to discover all of that though had it not been for Lydia Grubb at the front door.
Who is Lydia Grubb?
So who is Lydia Grubb? Well, these days she’s my sister’s mother-in-law and grandmother to my nieces, but that’s a whole other story… back when this story takes place she was one of the church planters and could always be found right at the front door welcoming people. Now, the welcomes she was notorious for were giving hugs! Not something I knew about nor was ready for. 😱
So, as I walked into the movie theater where the church met, not knowing anybody and being a massive introvert, my first experience was this petite woman, short brown hair with a huge smile, saying something along the lines of “welcome, I’m so glad you are here,” as she wrapped her arms around me… and as she recounts and I can attest: I stood in shock, horror, and as stiff as a board! 🤣
To this day, and despite my initial moment of shock and horror, it remains the only time I’ve ever entered a church and immediately known and felt like that church cared about me. As for Lydia, it’s been 20 years and she’s still known to change lives through hugs:
Strong welcoming is vital to the online to IRL transition
So what can we take home from that? Should we hug everybody that enters the church? Well, maybe not hugs, but it does mean that we need to make a great impression the moment people transition to our on-premise church activities. Imagine doing fantastic online ministry, inspiring people to move into IRL connection with your church, and then having it all flop the moment they walk into the door! 🤦
Making welcoming seamless
Now, how can we make welcoming and transitioning people into in-person IRL a seamless and pleasant transition? I would argue for a few things we can do:
- Encourage greeters to serve for at least a few weeks in a row and if they don’t recognize someone to say “hi, I don’t think we’ve met yet” when they don’t recognize someone. It isn’t offensive to people who consider themselves regulars and the message is “you are more than just a number to us.”
- Set the expectations for people who visit in-person by having a page on your website called “plan a visit” or something along those lines. It should include details like parking, what most people wear, what to expect when they enter, where to register kids for kids church, seating, the order of service, and how to get connected after service. This is especially important for introverts or those who are socially anxious, of which you will invariably have quite a few in your online ministry pathway.
- Part of your visit page should provide a registration to have a service buddy. You can call it whatever you like, but the point is the same: “this church cares about you as a person and we don’t want to force you to try and figure it all out by yourself.”
You can read more about these methods in my post on preparing for Easter.
One additional note: don’t fall into the “hi, if you are new here, please raise your hand/stand up” trap. It’s weird because we don’t do that in any other social context, it’s straight up cringe if nobody stands up and the host is like “anybody… any newcomers…,” and it’s super uncomfortable for a newcomer whose first thought is “whoa… I’m about to be singled out in front of all these people” and may even kick into mental fight/flight mode as a result. DO NOT DO IT. Just say “if you are new here, we are so glad to have you with us today and I’d love a chance to personally meet you after the service at our welcome area.”
Closing thoughts
Inevitably, digital/online ministry supports IRL connections to your church. It’s just how online community always flows. That’s why the important bridge is getting welcoming right in your church because it will benefit both the old-school in-person walk-ins and those who follow an online to in-person or hybrid/”phygital” pathway.
