Seeker-Friendly Services
AN AVERAGE FAMILY walks in our auditorium on any given Sunday and finds a seat. Mama and the kids scoot into the pew, and daddy sits on the end, by the aisle. They look around at all the unfamiliar faces, and shift in their seats wondering what they’re supposed to do. The help them, a good church keeps a well-organized, structured, and, while not stale, reasonably predictable worship service so that they can soon catch on to what they ought to be doing.
A YOUNG WOMAN seeking the Lord comes to our services with her two little children, a four-year-old little boy, and a two-and-a-half-year-old sweet little girl. She twists, and wrestles, and corrects, trying to keep quiet, wondering all along if she’s causing a distraction, or if others are irritated by the children and her. We especially need to make her feel comfortable and welcome, and provide a good attended nursery so that she can learn how to worship God. She can’t teach her children how until she knows how. If she’s familiar with Christian worship she’d greatly benefit from a training room with a view of the pulpit and speakers so that the children can be trained in relative peace. We must keep the training room free from those not training children so that she can easily access it. The training room isn’t supposed to be a safe place to duck in late to services!
A NEWLY CONVERTED FAMILY comes to us from a charismatic church background. Used to an overly casual environment where almost anything goes, they don’t understand our traditions, and in many cases don’t know what it means to do all things decently and in order, and are unaware there’s any issue with it. We regularly have to teach how to behave in the worship assembly for their learning and growth. We also have to be a seeker-friendly church that doesn’t give dirty looks to those among us who’ve not yet assimilated into our ways of doing things. Give them grace and time to grow!
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