by Bob Whitesel D.Min, Ph.D., Church Revitalizer Magazine, June 29, 2021
Churches hire me to advise them on healthy growth. And one of the things I do with every church is to visit incognito, as a secret shopper so to speak. I come unannounced and analyze how they connect newcomers to their faith community. I do this before I have conducted any workshops, so almost everyone does not know who I am.
Over 30 years ago when I began doing this most churches had very minimal guest services. Ushers handing out bulletins at the back the sanctuary was about all most churches provided. Even in large churches, guest services had not yet developed.
Now some 30 years later I’ve seen remarkable change progress. Most churches have greeters, guest server tables/kiosks and newcomer classes. But is this enough? I don’t think so. Here’s why.
In Most Churches Guest Services Have the Wrong Goal
Today most churches have some degree of guest services ministry. In smaller churches it might just be a table in the back staffed by one or two people. In midsize and larger churches it often begins with a greeter in the parking lot. This is followed by people opening the doors and greeting you with a broad smile. Inside the foyer or narthex there is usually a booth that says “guest services.” And at the door to the auditorium another greeter welcomes people as they enter.
I would describe this as a “friendly” attitude, in which greeters smile, shake a hand and say “Welcome,” “We are glad you are here” or some other salutation. But newcomers have told me this is too customary and too insufficient.
After interviewing hundreds of non-churchgoers and newcomers, I’ve been told that most aren’t interested in being greeted in a friendly manner … instead they are interested in making friends. I would describe this as a desire “to be befriended.”
From Where Did Our Goal of Friendliness Emerge?
Greeters began in the business world. And now, whether at Walmart, Target or some other large box store, you will find people positioned at the front doors to greet you and say “Welcome.” Over time the church adopted this policy, without thinking through the different goals of a big box retailer and a community of faith. A big box store has greeters to put the guest at ease and help them make a purchase.
But the church is different. When people visit a church they are often seeking spiritual solace and/or answers to spiritual questions. At big box stores guests are not there to make friends with the employees or the owners. And so greeting goals are different.
When people visit a church they are seeking spiritual solace and spiritual answers. Everyone knows that best way to talk through your questions and quandaries is with someone you consider a friend. Therefore, befriending guest becomes the goal of guest ministries (a very different goal than greeters at a big box store).
And so the reader can see that greeting guests, even multiple times from the parking lot to the pew, is an insufficient goal for a church where newcomers are trying to make friends and to become part of a family. Friendliness is insufficient for making a friend. It must be followed by something more. And that is befriending.
Pivoting Your Guest Services from Being Friendly to Befriending
In guest services you have the ultimate goal to befriend, not just be friendly. Let’s define further the difference between friendliness and befriending. Friendliness is where people greet others in an approachable manner and demeanor. Such greeting requires the guest to not just reach back out to the greeter, but also for the guest to share their needs.
But should the responsibility of sharing needs be put upon the shoulders of the guest? After all, the guest has already reached out to us by entering our unfamiliar church environment. Therefore, our response to a visitor must go beyond greeting and initiate the befriending process. This includes tactfully getting to know the newcomer so we can help them with their needs. Because the church is a place of spiritual healing and growth, hospitality ministries must ask themselves, “How can I help this person with their spiritual needs?” And to help a person begins with becoming a friend. The scriptures remind us…
A family is how the Bible describes the church: “Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.” Gal. 6:10 NIV
A family is comprised of those who do more than greet you, they befriend you: “Friends come and friends go, but a true friend sticks by you like family.” Proverbs 18:24 MSG
A family member will generously meet your needs: “Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.” Rom. 12:13 NIV.
Let’s define friendliness and befriending with these verses in mind:
- Friendliness is being approachable and expecting a guest to reach out to you.
- Befriending is
- Tactfully taking the initiative to connect with guests,
- Beginning to make a friend (or helping them find some people who will befriend them)
- And getting to know their needs as your friendship develops.
Friendliness alone is inefficient in guest services.
In my incognito church visits for clients I’ve experienced this many times. At one church a tall gregarious gentleman greeted me on multiple occasions, mostly at church but once at a fast-food resturant. At the latter he handed me a small cross wooden cross with the service times imprinted. When I saw him the next time at the church I reminded him about the small cross and shared my appreciation. But he didn’t remember. He had handed out so many small crosses and greeted so many people every Sunday, that despite multiple visits I was no closer to making a new friend.
He was the very outgoing, gregarious person we typically tap to be greeters. But his job was friendliness. And he did it well. But as for remembering guest, getting to know some of their needs, etc. that wasn’t in his character.
Too often gregarious, friendly people become the lion’s share of our guest services’ volunteers. But the befrienders, those people who naturally make the time and take the effort to get to know a guest are usually not yet involved. But I believe they should be the majority of guest services people. Here are two negatives and four pluses to filling your guest services ministry with befrienders.
Without Befrienders – Greeters often enjoy saying hello more than they enjoy finding out how you’re doing.
People who like to greet and offer a heartfelt welcome are important volunteers. But they tend to be focused on the immediate experience rather than the underlying need. Yes, we need gregarious people. They are outgoing and enthusiastic. But we need befrienders too. Compare Moses and Paul’s leadership abilities. When God appoints Moses to deliver his people, Moses’ shows his unwillingness and insecurity of being God’s spokesman (Exodus 3:11-12). Paul on the other hand is enthusiastically outgoing and willing to stand before tribunals or mobs (2 Corinthians 11:16-33). Perhaps greeters are best comprised of extroverts, while befrienders are more circumspect and even introverted. We need both introverted leaders and extroverted leaders. But the latter may be more adept at greeting than taking the time to befriend and ascertain needs.
Without Befrienders – Guest services comprised of mostly friendly people can inadvertently give the impression a church is not interested in learning about deeper needs.
If your guest ministry is based mostly upon friendliness, people who visit your church may get the feeling of a superficial experience. Like my experience with the man who greeted me every Sunday, but couldn’t remember who I was; greeting is necessary, but it is only the first step in the befriending process.
Populating your guest services with mostly friendly people often creates a superficial spirit to the congregation too. Attendees get the feeling that you’re only interested in their presence rather than their needs. Even the way we greet people can contribute to this. Remember, guests are coming to an unfamiliar environment to connect with people and make a friend. When you customarily say, “We are glad you’re here,” or “I’m glad to see you,” your greeting is focused on you and what makes you happy. Instead, we want to find out how guests are doing, how we can help them make new friends and then let a friend can help them.
With Befrienders – You will get those with the biblical “gift of hospitality” more involved.
The Bible describes a “gift of hospitality” in various scriptures: Rom. 12:9-13, 16:23, Heb. 13:1-2. Fuller Seminary professor C. Peter Wagner describes the gift of hospitality as “Creating comfort and assistance for those in need.” But the Greek word in Rom. 12:13 and Heb. 13:2 goes deeper: philo-xenia. Philo means “brotherly or family love” and xenia means “love of strangers.” Therefore I would suggest that, “those with the gift of hospitality take in strangers like family by creating comfort and assistance.”
For example, consider how the root word in hospitality is also found in the word: hospital. Let’s say you went to an emergency room. And, there was a gregarious person who greeted you, smiled, helped you find a parking space, opened the door for you. Then you went in. But no one to asked how you were doing or tried to ascertain why you were there. You would feel like the hospitality had been insincere. In a similar fashion, populating your guest services with people who have the “gift of hospitality” is critical for reaching out to those needy souls whom the Holy Spirit is drawing to your congregation.
With Befrienders – Guest services will focus more around community and befriending, rather than herding people in and out of the facility.
When hospitality gifted people are involved, they will create opportunities to get to know the newcomers. One article I read described how hospitality volunteers set up tables in the foyer after the service with a sign above each describing different hobbies such as fishing, running, art, hiking, pickle ball, etc. After church people would gather at these tables and begin to make friends with people like themselves.
With Befrienders – Guest services filled with the gift of hospitality will stick with it until a newcomer makes friends.
Befrienders are:
- Often people who have been at the church for many years and know many people in the church.
- They are good at connecting people.
- In the business world they’re called connectors or networkers.
- When they meet newcomers they find out about their interests, their stage in life and their hobbies.
- Then they look for similar people with which to connect them.
- And, they just don’t hand newcomers off by introducing them to someone else. They write down their name and contact information to follow up with them and ensure they make new friends among the church attendees.
With Befrienders – Hospitality people in your guest services ministry create a balance that you can reduplicate in other ministries in the church.
Think of your small group ministries. Usually there is a leader/teacher, a hospitality person that set up the room and arranges refreshments, but that’s it. But what if you added a befriender, someone that actually had the “gift of hospitality (to) take in strangers like family by creating comfort and assistance.” Imaging someone who reached out to new people either in your small group, Sunday school class, Bible study, activity group, sport team, etc. and connected them with like-minded people within the group. This would eventually pivot your entire faith community into a refreshing balance of greeters and befrienders.
Summary
A list of needs that church guests most often cite when visiting a church are described in more detail in my other book (Spiritual Waypoints: Helping Other Navigate the Journey, Abingdon Press). But regardless of the need, we can see in this article that needs are best addressed by friends.
And, too often guests will seek to make the pastor or staff member their friend, because he or she is perceived as one that can help them with their needs. But the staff will soon be overwhelmed.
But in healthy churches the pastor and ministry staff find and recruit volunteers with the gift of hospitality to connect guests to friends who will befriend and meet the needs of others.
This is the most overlooked, yet crucial element, of every guest services ministry. Leader it’s time to pivot!
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