How welcome do you make visitors feel at your church?

Tom Crenshaw Aug. 11, 2024

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Rather than attending my home church this past Sunday, I decided to visit another church that was having a special family service, and since the pastor leading the service was a good friend of mine, I wanted to support him and his ministry.

When I visit other churches, I am always anxious to note how I am greeted. Am I ignored or will people notice me and make the effort to introduce themselves and make me feel welcome?

I am happy to say I gave the church an A+. Before the service, I was welcomed by several people who recognized I was new, and after the service, I was stopped three different times by members who wanted to welcome me and encourage me to come back and visit again.

Since the service I attended was an early one, I decided to attend another service in our area. Now that I am retired, I get to experience what its like to be a church shopper.

The worship team began the service singing Gratitude, one of my favorite songs, and one which I played again and again during the time of Jean's illness. It almost always brings tears to my eyes whenever I hear it sung.

As the worship team began singing, the tears began to fall, and as they did, I felt an arm on my shoulder from a person in the pew behind me who realized what was happening and who sought to console and comfort me.

After leaving that service and while on my way home, I thought to myself how blessed I was to attend two services where I truly felt cared for and ministered to.

I wonder if people who visit your church enjoy the same experience in visiting these two different churches. Do you and the people in your church make visitors feel welcome? Do you go out of go out of your way to make people feel special? Do you help those visiting have an unforgettable experience?

In a former church I served, I would ask the elders to take a Sunday off from attending our church and visit different churches in our area. They were to report back on what they saw and experienced. This assignment always brought back a lot of good ideas on how we could improve our church services.

One of the questions they were asked to consider was "How did they feel as visitors?" Were they ignored or were they warmly welcomed and made to feel special?

The byproduct of this exercise was to make our leadership more aware of the importance of going out of their way to make people feel welcome in their church. Once you visit a cold church, you want to do everything you can to ensure that those visiting your church never feel the same way you did.

I often remind people that ministry takes place from the pulpit to the pew and from the pew to the pulpit (yes, yawning and falling asleep in the service are not conducive to pastoral encouragement) but often the most important part of ministry that takes place is from the pew to the pew as those in the congregation minister to one another, and especially as they reach out and care for those who are visitors.

You may not feel like you have much to offer the church, but let me remind you that welcoming others, especially visitors, may be your most important and significant ministry on Sunday mornings.

Whether or not you wear an official greeter's badge, does not exempt you from finding someone who is present and taking the initiative to make them feel glad they came. Yes, you hold the key to making someone feel welcome, valued, and accepted.

It has been said, "You may never have a second chance to make a first impression," so don't miss the first opportunity to make someone feel special.

The next time you see someone new at church, walk up and introduce yourself and imagine they have a sign hanging around their neck that says, "Please help me feel important."

Don't miss your Sunday ministry, as it may be the most important ministry you will ever have.

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Tom Crenshaw serves as Connections Pastor of the New Monmouth Baptist Church (non denominational) where he previously served as a three year interim.He has been married to Jean for almost 50 years, and they have four children, all of whom are teachers.Tom loves perennial gardening, umpiring high school baseball, coaching baseball and football, fishing for small mouth bass, rooting for his favorite team, the Cleveland Indians, and listening to ‘real’ country music, the classic kind. Learn More »

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