Rethinking hospitality: Churches find inventive ways to say Yall come back now!
08-12-2009HEATHER HAHN
Editor
Sunday visitors to First United Methodist Church in Corning can look forward in the coming week to the delivery of a yummy treat— a fresh-baked pecan pie that smells simply heavenly.
More often than not, those pies originate in the kitchen of 89-year-old Haley Price, who bakes each pie with love and prayer from scratch.
“When I first started coming to church here, I lived out in the country and they brought me a pie,” Price recalled. “I just enjoyed it, and everyone seems to enjoy it. I thank the good Lord that I’ve come this far, and I enjoy baking pies for the church.”
For nearly 20 years, the Corning congregation has offered its PIE ministry in its northeastern Arkansas farming community. The name stands for Personal Invitation Evangelism.
Longtime member Regina Pillow delivers the toothsome invitations along with a pamphlet about the United Methodist Church. The pastor follows up later in the week.
“I tell them how glad we were they came and hope they will go back,” Pillow said. “People are usually just thrilled to death. Some say, ‘We plan to come back.’ I took one not long ago to a young couple who had three young children — one a baby that’s crawling — and they’ve started coming.”
United Methodist churches across the state have embraced a variety of creative ways to make newcomers feel welcome and invite them into a deeper relationship with Christ.
Some congregations, like First UMC in Springdale, “mug” their visitors — giving away coffee cups with the church’s name on it. Others offer free DVDs that showcase the church’s ministries. And many others do what hostesses have done for centuries: Make sure no guest goes away hungry.
Linda Sides bakes 18 rolls each Saturday for any new worshippers who come the next morning to Wesley UMC in Fort Smith.
The ministry began when the pastor suggested the church give away a bread along with information about the congregation.
“I was praying there would be something I could do,” Sides said, “and when he said that I knew that was me.”
Sides’ rolls never go to waste, and feed more than just guests in the pews.
“If we have no visitors, then I’ve told the preacher to use them however he can,” she said. “Maybe someone is down on their luck and needs something to brighten their day or maybe he is visiting a shut-in.”
That’s the kind of initiative Ken Sloane likes to hear. Sloane, director of the denomination’s communications ministries, said part of United Methodist Communications’ recently launched “Rethink Church” campaign is to help churches rethink their hospitality ministries.
“Every church has more doors than the door that leads to Sunday morning worship,” he said.
“What we’re trying to encourage churches to do is think about what are some of the other doors to your church — what are some of the ways that people connect with your church.”
When she was a local pastor at Quitman UMC, Susan Miles found a new way to open doors to children in her community.
“I wanted these kids to have an identity of who they were in Jesus,” she said. “The idea is that if Jesus is the King of Kings and God the Father is the King of Kings, then it’s very sound for us to treat our children as royalty.”
So she started King’s Kids Club for children ages “birth to embarrassment.” She provided each child with a regally decorated Christ-centered activity box that they could pick up in the narthex.
Every Sunday they attended, the children received something new in their box, like a notebook or stickers or a small cross. The box also contained a punch card to mark each Sunday a child was there. When a child got up 10 punches in their card, the child was crowned in front of the church. In the three years Miles pastored the Quitman congregation, the children’s ministry grew from two to 20.
Miles brought the ministry with her to First UMC in Jonesboro when her husband, John Miles II, was appointed to be the congregation’s senior pastor. Now, she said the King’s Kids Club has more than 100 young members.
Wendy Jones says because of the program, her 6-year-old daughter, Allie, can’t wait to get to church.
“She is the one who gets up on Sunday morning and is ready to go,” Jones said. “She has her outfit picked out the night before.”
To open a door to your church on the Internet, visit www.find-a-church.org.
