William Temple, who was Archbishop of Canterbury in the middle of the 20th Century, is reported to have said, “Church is only society on earth that exists for the benefit of non-members.” That said, many, if not most, churches could do more to reach out to, and serve, their communities. In the Alban Roundtable Blog, Wayne Floyd reflects on a recent “webinar” that took on “High Impact Community Ministry.” Check it out:
High Impact Community Ministry
From the Alban Roundtable Blog of the Alban Institute
By Wayne Floyd
Yesterday afternoon I had quite a fulfilling time hosting AlbanLearning’s webinar, led by independent consultant Joy Skjegstad, entitled “Outreach Isn’t Optional: Why Community Ministry is Essential to Your Congregation’s Future.” We had a total of 96 computer connections for this first of four webinars on the theme, “High Impact Community Ministry.”
They asked Joy, who spoke from a moderate evangelical Christian perspective, thoughtful and honest questions like the following, which exemplify the diversity and eagerness of contemporary congregational leaders wanting to explore community ministry. I wanted to post these, just as they were asked, both to give our presenter the chance to respond to questions that didn’t get addressed in the time we had, and to give you the chance both to ask more questions by commenting here and to answer each others’ questions and share insights.
Q: You’ve mentioned evangelizing the gospel of Jesus Christ as an emphasis in community ministry. How about Jewish congregations or Unitarian Universalist congregations that have members who are not Christian?
Q: What objections might congregants have regarding participating in community outreach? What are some positive responses?
Q: can you something about outreach in a community that does not have diversity or much of a transient population?
Q: our congregation is totally against community ministry-what can I do?