Stretching out for the health of the body

This isn’t about reaching down and touching your toes of course, though keeping the physical body in shape is part of God’s plan for each of us. What I am talking about here is stretching your church to reach beyond the walls of your building. For many years, churches across our country seem to have had the attitude that they were there in their buildings waiting for sinners to come through the doors to get saved. Maybe once a year they hold a week of “revival” services and once in a while a potluck dinner and feel that people should come to those events. I heard a quote recently that challenged our church. “If your church went under today, would anyone outside the staff and membership notice it was gone?” I want to challenge you to reach out to your community. You might say, “How? Our church isn’t very big.” OK, it is true that a church of 35 cannot reach its community in ALL the same ways a church of ten thousand can reach its community, but that is not to say that it cannot have an impact. Your church, starting with you, can pick one thing that it thinks it can do well. Here are some ideas for you, but feel free to add comments to this blog to add more ideas as I am but one man with a computer.

1. Block party – A midsize church in my area recently piggy backed onto the city’s 4^th of July festival. The church parking lot was on the edge of what the city was doing, so they set up their parking lot with blow up toys, a climbing wall, trampoline, Thomas the Train ride etc. They gave golf cart rides for people from the parking lots that were farther out. (Golf carts provided by members of the church who golf.) They gave away free hotdogs, cotton candy, snow cones, water, sodas etc. (Those things were mostly donated by people in the church.) The result was that thousands and thousands of people came through their parking lot and now know that the church exists in the community. An added bonus is that the next Sunday, there were three or four new families that attended that church.

2. Cleaning something up – maybe there is an elderly person in your area who can’t seem to get the tree cleaned up that fell in the last storm. Instead of griping about why they don’t take care of that tree, volunteer to go cut it up and haul it off for them. Or see if a local city park or an empty lot needs some clean up. (Make sure to track down the right person to get permission from on the empty lot one.) This doesn’t take a huge church, but it can make a huge impact in a person’s life or in the life a community.

3. Find another organization to serve in your community -- One Sunday School class in a church began taking Saturday morning breakfast to a boy’s home to help the staff there have a day off from cooking. What began as simple breakfast led to the members of that class getting more and more involved in the lives of those young men. The class continued to grow closer through the bonds they created through serving. Soon, they were putting together outings to baseball games, days at the farm or the lake, etc. They built a solid reputation with those young men and the people who worked at the boy’s home. (Side note disclaimer: Years ago, I was the Sunday School teacher for that class. Since then, I have gotten married and moved to a new city and new church. They have continued with the ministry without me. Recently one of the boys whose lives they touched walked into the church I am now a part of. The boy who we spent time with is now a young man who is serving the Lord.)

What can your church do? The sky is the limit. These were just three quick ideas. I am sure with some quick brainstorming; you can come up with many more.Have fun!