Podcast Episode #275
SUBSCRIBE: iTunes • RSS • Stitcher • TuneIn Radio • Google Play
Christmas is right around the corner for churches, so today we discuss 10 ways your church can better reach those in your community this Christmas.
Some highlights from today’s episode include:
- Christmastime evokes feelings of tradition values that even secularists experience.
- Nearly seven out of ten churches will have a Christmas Eve service this year.
- Nearly two-thirds of churches will have Christmas Eve and Christmas Day services this year.
- Christmas Eve is a time to go traditional with the service: candles, carols, etc.
- Be sure to use your church Facebook page to promote all that’s going on at your church during Christmas.
- Set your Christmas Eve service times to work for the majority of your congregation and community.
- Attendees expect candles at the Christmas Eve service.
- Christmas services should be all-hands-on-deck for church staff.
The 10 Christmas keys we discussed are:
- Christmas Eve is the time when the unchurched are most receptive to attending church.
- Traditions are key: traditional hymns and carols, candlelight with Silent Night, etc.
- The service should be brief, 30-minutes max.
- Begin promotion the first week in December.
- Maximize your church Facebook page
- Have a very simple registration card: first name, email, guest or member, prayer request. Ask everyone to complete it.
- Combine Invite Your One with Christmas Eve services
- Prepare for multiple services in most churches, at the very least for greater attendance.
- Informal is usually the best approach.
- Plan for staff to have time off post-Christmas.
Episode Sponsors
Are you getting prepared for the changing ministry landscape? Get your Master of Divinity degree at Midwestern Seminary. The M.Div—Midwestern’s flagship degree program—is their primary track for ministry preparation. At just 81 hours, the Midwestern M.Div offers a complete foundation for full-time ministry leaders, offering everything you need, and nothing you don’t. Join other students in vibrant Kansas City as you train in a unique collaborative environment focused on the local church or study online in your current ministry context. Midwestern Seminary is developing a new culture of discipleship devoted to the local church and committed to taking God’s unchanging Word into a rapidly changing world. Join the movement today.
Find out more at mbts.edu/mdiv.
Vanderbloemen Search Group is the premier pastor search firm dedicated to helping churches and ministries build great teams. They’ve helped hundreds of churches just like yours find their church staff and are uniquely geared to help you discern who God is calling to lead your church.
Find out more about Vanderbloemen Search Group by visiting WeStaffTheChurch.com.
Feedback
If you have a question you would like answered on the show, fill out the form on the podcast page here at ThomRainer.com. If we use your question, you’ll receive a free copy of Who Moved My Pulpit?
Resources Mentioned in Today’s Podcast
- Five Ways for Churches to Utilize Facebook This Christmas
- Candles and Candle Holders
- Invite Your One
30 minutes max? Is that a typo? Seems like that would not be worth people’s time.
Ours is 20-30 minutes and we find that we have regulars and visitors every year.
Personally, I think it’s a good idea to keep it short so people can spend the rest of the evening with their families. If you plan it well, a 30-minute Christmas Eve service can be very meaningful.
Thank you for your love of people’s souls and their salvation. But I’m not sure of the concept that we should make any part of our church services ‘for them.’ Yes be evangelistic – of course. But let us make it all about God and our worship of Him, let them see what we as God’s people are all about. Church should be all about God and our worship of Him, and not about the unchurched and those outside.
Another stellar, info packed and most importantly, concise article.
Thank you, Kevin.
Celebrate advent first. Use the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah to lead up to it as well as The last prophet, John.
More churches are indeed doing just that.
We started the “tradition” of a .Eve service 10 years ago when the new pastor (me) wanted to have one. The first year I was told not to expect too many people so we planned for about 30. Had to remove the ropes cordoning off the back pews twenty minutes before start time (6:00) because we already had 80 there.
As for Sunday Christmas, we still have our Eve service at 6, and then only one service at 10 am on Christmas Day. Always both are well-attended.
I grieve when so very little thought and effort is put into a Christmas Eve service. This should be one of the BEST planned and most meaningful events of the local church year. And the same can be said for the Advent Season.
For the first time in many years, I’m part of a congregation that will not observe the “Advent” season…simply because (in the words of a leader) it takes a lot of work.
I’m grieving this attitude, and this loss. I’m grieving the “dumbing down” of the Church–especially when we celebrate the Birth of our Lord.
With all due respect, would anyone elaborate on how is it that attracting uncurhed/unknown folks to a yearly holiday seasonal gathering to listen to a 30 minutes dramatically musical presentation becomes equal to reaching out?
Getting people that don’t know anybody in the congregation, to attend a service, is incredibly rare.
For some of those unchurched people — probably most true for the pre-boomer generation — memories of Christmas Eve, or Midnight services, is a draw card. As such, this is the only service (^1) of the year, that an unchurched person darkens the door, without a specific invitation from somebody in the congregation to do so.
Getting people that don’t know any church members to walk into a church is incredibly rare. Getting people that don’t go to church, to walk into a church, is even more rare. As such, treating Christmas Eve as an outreach events, makes perfect sense.
^1: No doubt somebody is going to call me on Sunrise Service on Easter, or at least an Easter Sunday service. This service attracts those with some connection, however fleeting, with at least one person in the congregation. (The exception being somebody looking for a congregation to call home.)
Yes and most of these churches will have a special Christmas eve service just because of tradition. The most majestic service and total focus should be Christmas Day. Christmas eve service just shows how tradition has gone a muck. Didn’t anyone in committee go, hey “Christmas is on Sunday this year forget Christmas eve”, let’s actually celebrate the birth. I guess we didn’t want to attract non-believers to the real service. How about having a special Christmas Candlelight Service at a special time on Christmas Day. So the family can enjoy Christmas, and Christmas dinner, and instead of the traditional football game or movie, go worship the Savior who is born in a manger. I guess you can’t mess up the traditional Sunday morning.
More unchurched have time to attend a service on Christmas Eve than on Christmas Day. With travel and opening presents, fewer unchurched are simply not available on Christmas Day. By the time exhaustion has set in on Christmas Day, the unchurched are not willing to attend an evening service. We’re having both, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Both will be well attended, but Christmas Day will be 95% members. Christmas Eve will be 50/50.