This is part of a series of interviews with pastors of churches whose attendance has grown 20% or more in 5 years. We hope this series will be a resource of ideas to help increase worship attendance at your church.

In reflecting on the increase in worship attendance of First United Methodist Church of Kearney, Nebraska, Rev. Gary Main lifts up several aspects, describing the style of evangelism as relational.

“These are not in order of importance, because none of them stand alone”.

We have created a “Come as You Are” worship service on Wednesday evenings. Our church has always had a strong Wednesday night ministry with children’s and youth ministries, adult studies and musical groups.  We now start with a meal provided by a church group, move into an informal half-hour worship service built around media, contemporary messages, and music. We worship around 150 people, many of whom we do not see on Sunday morning.  This seems to be a gateway service, as many who do start on Wednesday evenings do move to participation on Sundays. This gives us 6 distinct worship services.  Our Sunday services are intentionally different, with 8:15 being a blended service with a variety of music; 9:30 consisting of contemporary worship led by our praise team; and 11:00 being a very traditional service, featuring our chancel choir. Our Saturday evening service is very informal and seems to appeal to people who grew up in smaller churches.  We also have experimented with a Thursday night service, built around sensory worship, with our target being college age and young adults.  I am confident that offering a variety of worship experiences is an important factor in our worship attendance increase, because all of the services have enjoyed increased attendance.  We also strive to make our services positive and uplifting.

We noticed that few families were worshipping together at our 9:30 contemporary service. Parents were in worship and their children were in Sunday school at the same time. We added a 2^nd session of Sunday school at 11:00, with offerings for every age. We have seen the number of children at the 9:30 worship increase significantly without a drop in Sunday school attendance.

We have increased our efforts at follow-up of first time visitors. We created guest bags, which include a survey for our guests to return about their experience.

First time local visitors get a visit from the senior pastor, a post-card and a phone call from a staff member. Out-of town visitors receive a postcard. We are also starting a lay ministry of baking bread for first time visitors.  If a first time visitor does not return, they are sent a “miss you letter” with an addressed stamped postcard for them to return to us, indicating if they were visiting with a family or friend, if they will come back, and asking for any special comments about their experience.

We have started to train our ushers and greeters in the importance of hospitality, and emphasize to our members how vital it is to be warm, welcoming, and friendly.  We have increased signage, posted maps of the church, and added video kiosks in the hall ways that scroll announcements and church information.
The senior pastor has made a commitment to visit every church-member home within 3 years. Although this has been time-consuming, many in-active members who re-activated have reported that this has been instrumental in their return to worship.  We also target in-actives with a special contact via phone or postcard prior to Easter and Christmas.

We are also a heavily involved mission congregation.  We pay our mission shares in full each year.  Every worship service features a 2-3 minute video, just prior to the offering highlighting either a local ministry or a denominational ministry.  People know that they have walked into a church that works hard to make a difference in the lives of others.

I would describe our style of evangelism as relational. We try to meet people where they are spiritually, love them in the name of Christ, and to show them the joy of being a part of a church family, and of being in God’s kingdom.  It is not about theology, it is about creating a climate that reflects the love, grace, mercy, and call of Jesus Christ…  It is realizing that everyone who walks in the door of our church is loved by God and should be loved by us, and that every person is on the path to discipleship or deeper discipleship, whether we know it or not.

Gary Main, Pastor
Garym@kearneyfirstumc.org

FUMC Kearney NE
http://kearneyfirstumc.org