Every Sunday, I see commentary on Twitter about the joys at serving as a church greeter, complaints about experiences with rude church greeters, sarcasm aimed at unprepared greeters at church, and nervous greeters announcing how nervous they are. But if you can help your new church greeters know what to aim for, it might help them to rise to the occasion.
I asked some peers in some of my networking groups: Is there something more Church greeters can say than “Good morning?” What are some of your suggestions? Please comment on site and join the discussion. This was a response to a prior article: What do you say greeting church visitors?
Videos can make for great discussion starters at your gatherings for hospitality workers or church greeters. Use as a discussion starter for your next church greeter training or hospitality training meeting. I enjoyed the humor and the painfully true characterizations.
Imagine that you are a lay person in your congregation (many of you are). Your pastor calls you on Thursday and says We are preparing the church bulletin. Would you like to be our liturgist and give the welcome speech on Sunday? Would you like to be person who says “Welcome to our church?” Your …
How a church greeter left a wrong first impression on our family as we visited a local church for the second and third time. I felt myself making a mental note to not use that entry door. Yet, we continue to push through this and explore if this is a church we are called to serve in this stage of life.
Several months ago, a church greeter kissed my wife. Other church greeters failed to make eye contact. We startled a church greeter by asking her a simple question “Where is the middle school Sunday school class meeting?” She didn’t know the answer and we created an awkward moment.
I know first hand the uncomfortable awkwardness when church visitors show up 10 minutes early to get a seat and the sanctuary is empty except for a few musicians finishing a review rehearsal, and church members arriving up to 30 minutes late. Recently, a reader submitted a question via Ask EvangelismCoach, concerning a Sunday School …
You know that churches make all sorts of hospitality mistakes. You’ve probably experienced a few church hospitality errors first hand. Over the last few months, I’ve compiled this list of 20 complaints shared on Twitter. Read them and cringe.
A Easter cartoon I shared on my Facebook Page and Pinterest has gone haywire. It’s not my cartoon, but it certainly generated likes, tweets, and repins and reshares. I laughed a little too hard when I saw this cartoon from Tim Davis (leadershipJournal.net/cartoons). If you like it, share it.
It was our third visit to a local church in the last 102 weeks. We love visiting that church when we are in that city. In fact, whenever we go, we try to invite a friend to that church. Even through we have not ever experienced followup from filling out their visitor contact card, we …
I’ve never attended a major golf championship until last week’s Honda Classic I was a first time guest in an environment I had never visited. We were invited guests of a golf fanatic who secured 2 tickets for our family (plus tickets for the 2 reluctant kids were free). I do play golf (about 1 …
I’ve updated the free church greeter training videos for 2014. Some of the videos I first recorded in 2009 now look awful by today’s standards.
Here are some of the top articles on church greeters and church greeter training. Some of these articles poke fun at the silly things greeters say and do. Others provide training tips, church greeting tips and more. Dig around and learn.
How can you prepare your church greeters for an unexpected visitor with a therapeautic dog? Rev. Susan and I talk about an experience of the unexpected that occurred during a church visit. She took a therapeutic dog to church and experienced different kinds of reactions to the presence of a dog. From the pastor From …
Looking back over the past year, some particular blog posts rose to the top for 2013. Please consider sharing this post, or some of these with other believers in your network. In this post you’ll see some of the most popular posts of 2013 in Personal Evangelism Church Greeters First Impressions EvangelismCoach Products
During a recent church visitor assimilation webinar (available now for purchase), we discussed some excellent resources on the assimilation process. One participant recommended a short book on hospitality ministry that was helpful to them. See You Next Week is a short text crammed full of ideas that could help your church get started in improving …
Some days, your church greeter volunteer will wake up in the morning with a not so helpful attitude. Check out these tweets:
I received a good question via email the other day. (Ask your question here). If you have a suggestion to help our reader, please add it to the comments below. How do I approach an usher who smokes and it smells on her? I am not the President of the usher board but would like …
If you are involved in recruiting and training of church greeters, you will likely run into a church greeter who says But I don’t know who the first time visitors are!!!! They may use that to avoid answering your call to recruit them for a given Sunday or for a given rotation on your schedule. …
A holy life will make the deepest impression. Lighthouses blow no horns, they just shine. “It is a great deal better to live a holy life than to talk about it. We are told to let our light shine, and if it does we won’t need to tell anybody it does. The light will be …
A Prayer for Church Greeters Jesus, You are the Good Shepherd. You are kind. You welcome those who seek you with a kindness and gentleness that wins souls. You welcomed conversation with the Samaritan woman. You welcomed the lame, the blind, the broken. You were a friend of sinners that the religious people rejected. You …
Over 6 years of teaching on church greeters, I’ve assembled many church greeter resources of my own. Here is a quick list of how to get it all and where to find it.
Church greeter ministry is a vital part of welcoming visitors to your church. Sadly, this aspecct of welcome ministry gets neglected, overlooked, or relegated to auto-pilot, ending up with church leaders begging for unmotivated volunteers who fill a space. Introducing Chuch Greeters 101 Church Greeters 101 leads you forward in starting or relaunching the greeter …
I would love for you to have success in church greeter recruiting and for you to have more volunteers for church greeters ministry than spaces you could fill. However, I’m not sure there are churches where people fight to be volunteer church greeters. If you find yourself struggling to recruit volunteers for your greeting ministry, …
