How to find partnerships for community outreach ministry
Often, churches get involved in community outreach ministries by observing the landscape and asking a couple of questions:
- Who is doing great ministry in the community?
- Can we join them?
Given our location, leadership, people and the concerns of our community, how can we best make an eternal impact for God’s kingdom in our local area? How can we make the name of Jesus more known?
Here is the process I have used in choosing partnerships with community outreach ministries:
1. Pray.
When thinking about what the Lord would have you do in your community, you must wait on Him through prayer. It can be easy to rush into our plans and then ask God to bless them. Or develop strategies and initiatives that are void of God’s Spirit. Spend time praying over community outreach during staff meetings and your personal prayer time. Consider recruiting a team who pray weekly for community outreach and place prayer requests on your church’s social media platforms.
2. Consider the location.
You can’t serve everywhere in your community. Therefore, it is important to determine where you will serve as a church body.
I have two recommendations: First, stay close to where your members/attendees live. They will only consistently serve at locations close to them. Active involvement is a goal. I have found that the overwhelming majority of church folks will only serve consistently in a small radius. Then, determine where there is a felt need.
3. Talk to your church leadership.
If you are not the senior leader at your church, talk with the senior pastor and those in leadership above you. Discover their vision for community outreach, the current strengths and weaknesses (as they see them), their history of partnerships, cultural considerations of those who attend their campus, etc. Discussions with senior leadership often help others buy into the vision.
4. Research demographics.
Research community demographics, such as population trends, census data, lifestyles, faith involvement and household concerns. I often use research information from the U.S .Census Bureau website, government/town websites, local nonprofit websites and the Chamber of Commerce and Community Foundations to discover these unmet community needs.
5. Conduct a survey.
Create a survey that is designed to assess community needs. This tool will help uncover community needs as well as potential community outreach partnerships. This may help you identify the characteristics of different target groups as well as help you to act (and not react) to community needs.
6. Assess what you have to meet potential needs.
What gifts, skills and other resources does your church have to meet potential needs? How has God “wired” your church? What skillsets, passion areas, church programming and facilities exist and could be utilized to meet unmet community needs?
7. Choose a strategic impact area.
Identify key unmet needs in your community and choose one or two areas to pursue. Once you have identified an impact area, write out a problem or need statement. Then, establish a goal or vision that solves the stated problem. Finally, choose strategies on how to accomplish this vision.
8. Determine partnership criteria.
What is important in community partnerships? Choose partners that are aligned with your priorities. For example, is creating an opportunity for your church body to serve important? If so, you will want to choose partnerships with ample serving opportunities.
Other questions to consider:
- Is the potential partner aligned doctrinally?
- Will they allow you to share the gospel?
- Is the partnership one that could go long-term?
- Does the ministry/organization have a sustainable funding and/or growth model?
- Do they have strong leadership in place?
- Do they seem to be effective in their ministry?
What about you? What other things have you done to choose a community outreach ministry partnership?
Photo source: istock
 | Kris Eldridge lives in Louisville, Kentucky and is the Local Outreach Pastor at Northeast Christian Church. He is also the founder of Outreach Ministry Solutions, where his focus is consulting with churches to help them reach their communities. Learn More » |
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