This weekend, our family attended a church down the street. I share the story of our visit as a first time visitor.
Our family was not part of this denomination, and not a part of this local community. This was our first time ever in this building, and first time ever in that particular denomination.
We went uninvited, with no pre-exisiting social connections. We were out of towners, looking for a church to join in Sunday celebrations.
How did we find the church?
My parents live about 5 miles off the main highway. There is only one road that goes to their house. This church is located on that main road. We have driven by the church over many a family visit. Every time we go to the house, and every time we leave the house, we see that it’s there.
This weekend was our first chance to go.
Church website
We looked up the church’s website in Google. For the church name, came up first. Clicking around the pages, we saw only 1 picture of the congregation. The rest was text. Sometimes the text was way over the top and flowery, full of Christian lingo about contemporary hymns and responding in worship.
Some of the links were broken, but at least the service time and directions were on the home page.
Under the ministries tab, they had a link for evangelism, but it was broken.
Parking Lot
Approaching the building, we entered the parking lot.
We didn’t know where the front door was (it wasn’t facing the one and only parking lot entrance).
We did find that they had spaces marked for visitors — they were all empty. We chose to park with the normal people, even though we were visitors. Most of the cars were parked towards the rear of the building.
The campus was clean and landscaped well. There didn’t appear to be any signage indicating where the front door was. We arrived at the same time other people did, so we watched where people went to enter the building.
Entering the church
An usher held the door open for us, and politely shook our hand. He even volunteered his name, which prompted both of us to offer ours.
We entered the main lobby (some people still call it a narthex), on our own.
Here I noticed my emotions were stirring– we were in a crowded room, not knowing where to go, not knowing a soul. People were around us talking, smiling, and greeting each other, but we were feeling a little insecure in a strange crowded space.
We had no bearing on the physical space, no map in our head of where everything was. Anxiety?
I glanced around and noticed a table. The sign said visitor table, but no person standing around it. What were we supposed to do? We ignored it.
We found our way to the sanctuary. An usher gave us a program, but we had to interrupt her conversation with other people in order to get one.
Once we entered the sanctuary, we eventually found our own seats, wondering if we were sitting in someone else’s seat. People filed in and out, greeting each other with smiles and conversation, along with the "How’s your wife, how’s aunt Suzy doing?" type small talk.
People sat in front of us, and actually talked to the people behind us,
The service
Even though I’ve been a visitor in many services, I found that I was disconnected from this one.
The songs and tunes were unfamiliar. Rich in their theology, and probably very accurate in this theological tradition, we didn’t connect.
The leader of the service said something to the effect of "Visitors, we welcome you and invite you to stop by the visitor table on the way out for a free gift."
I knew where the visitor table was, because I had seen it, but no one was there. Did other visitors know where the table was?
The worship bulletin said "Attention visitors, glad you are here."
The preaching was fine. The music was good.
The benediction was given, and church dismissed.
We exited the sanctuary, in an orderly process with the crowd, and went to the lobby where some coffee was served.
We stood around a few minutes, observing people talking and laughing and carrying on. My wife browsed the ministry board that had the flyers on all the ministries of the church.
We eventually left, since no one was talking to us, or perhaps even noticing that we exist. They were all engaged in their own friendly conversations.
I don’t even recall eye contact with people.
Reflections on a fist time visit
The social circles in this church seem really strong. In fact, it seems like it would take an extrovert to put himself or herself out there to break into those social circles and feel a sense of home.
We left feeling like we’d never fit into that church.
They said 2x that they were glad we visitors were here, but made no effort to notice us. The people around us truly talked around us.
My wife said, "I find it nice when the pastor or leader says, Take a moment and say hello to someone you haven’t met yet." That can at least allow us to briefly feel welcome, even if its a cursory greeting.
Perhaps this chuch’s philosopy is to ignore the visitor or let the visitor remain totally anonymous until the visitor makes themselves known in some way, like parking in the visitor spot, or visiting the visitor table.
There is no one in that church that noticed we were first time visitors. The church administration or ministry team have no idea that we were even there. We left as anonymous as we arrived.
Let me ask you this?
When was the last time you were a 1st time visitor in a church where you
- showed up uninvited
- knew absolutely no one,
- had never been in the building before?
Did you notice the 1st time visitor in your church last weekend?
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