5 Ways To Engage Your Church's Community This Summer

5 Ways To Engage Your Church's Community This Summer

Aaron Buer

Digital giving apps and tools

I’ve been writing a lot lately on the need for our churches to become more active and engaged in our communities. This is important for a variety of reasons.

The early church was known for kindness and love. Millennials and Gen Z want to be part of churches that care about the community and actively serve.

And, of course, there are thousands of people who live in our communities who don’t attend our churches and don’t know Jesus.

So, with summer fast approaching, let’s talk about 5 ways to engage your community this summer.

1. Serve

Remember the early 2000's when churches everywhere were naming themselves and their various ministries with Greek words? Koinonia, Kainos, Kurios, Charis...you know what I’m talking about.

Anyway, in the early days of my career as a youth pastor, my favorite event was something we called splagxnon which basically means, “guts.”

Yes, I was also naming everything with random Greek words.

Splagxnon is a version of the word that the Gospel writers used to describe the compassion Jesus felt toward those in need. In the ancient near east, compassion was described as coming from your guts.

I just love that image. It’s so visceral.

For us, Splagxnon was an event where our entire student ministry joined together in serving our community in a variety of simple ways: yard work for the elderly and shut-ins, roadside cleanup, etc.

Basically, we would look around at our community for something that bothered us and spend a day doing something about it.

If you’re looking for a way to engage your community this summer, a community service day like this could be a great idea.

Inevitably, people will ask you:

“Why are you doing this?”

And, this is a great opportunity to share about your church.

2. Throw Parties

One of my main objectives in our student ministry is to have fun together. Why? Because fun and laughter break down barriers.

When I see a new small group laughing together with their small group leader, I know something good is in the works.

There are a lot of people in our communities who don’t attend a church.

Why?

There are barriers that are keeping them away. Maybe it has to do with beliefs. It could be because of a negative experience they had with church. There are a number of possibilities.

The point is, they aren’t coming because of some kind of barrier.

Fun breaks down barriers.

If we are able to create environments in which we can have fun with the people of our community, they might come to see that we are more normal than they were thinking. They might come to see that we can relate on a human level. They might even enjoy being around us.

If you’re looking for a way to engage your community this summer, throw a few parties. Create environments where the people of your community could have fun with people from your church in non-religious ways.

Here are a couple of ideas:

  • Do free movie nights
  • Do free car washes
  • Throw a block party
  • Rent a bunch of bounce houses
  • Do a pig roast (this only makes sense if you are rural...all you city slickers don’t even know what this is!)
  • The point is: If you want to engage your community this summer, create environments for your community to have fun.

    3. Show Up Where People Show Up

    Another great way to engage your community is to show up where everyone else is showing up.

    The obvious example of this is the 4th of July.

    My guess is that your town or city throws a big celebration complete with fireworks. My suggestion would be to show up and serve.

    To be clear, I don’t mean show up and hand out Gospel tracts or show up and advertise your upcoming sermon series. I’m talking about showing up in ways that actually help and serve people or that are fun.

    For example, if your church owns property that is a great spot to watch the fireworks show, consider hosting that event really well.

    What if you cooked hotdogs for everyone or handed out free blankets, mosquito spray, or glow sticks for the kids?

    Another idea is to show up at the parade with water bottles or extra candy for those kids whose parents didn’t want them running out in front of astronomically loud firetrucks.

    Why do they have to be so loud!?!

    If you want to engage your community this summer, look for ways to show up where everyone else is showing up.

    It might be the 4th of July Celebration, a county fair, or a festival your town hosts every summer. These are great opportunities to serve your community and show people that you care.

    4. Neighborhood VBS

    Here’s the thing: parents love VBS.

    About halfway through the summer, I’m putting together a schedule for my kids to attend a VBS at every available church, every week.

    Maybe it has something to do with having five kids but halfway through the summer, I’d even consider a Mormon VBS.

    Ok. I’m exaggerating a bit but I think you know what I mean.

    Putting on a VBS or backyard Bible Clubs are a great way to serve local families and introduce their kids to Jesus.

    I think we all know that non-Christian parents are far more likely to send their son or daughter to a VBS than to actually bring them to church on a Sunday morning. We also know that parents are often roped into church when their kid falls in love with the childrens ministry.

    Most of our churches put on some sort of VBS.

    I also know that these things are a huge investment in terms of staff and volunteer hours.

    I’m not exactly sure how effective VBS is in spiritual formation, but I do believe that it might be one of the best evangelistic tools available to us.

    If you’re looking for ways to engage your community this summer, an evangelistically focused VBS might be a great idea.

    5. What Do You Need?

    Lastly, one of the smartest things we can do as churches is to connect with local ministries, organizations, and township or city services and ask:

    “What do you need?”

    The bottom line is that these people know what our communities need much more clearly than we do.

    Most likely, they're also better at serving people with needs than we are.

    We might have ideas on how to serve our communities that truly aren’t that helpful. Or, maybe they are good ideas that with a slight refinement could become a great idea.

    What I’m learning is that when churches partner with local ministries, governments and businesses to serve the community, amazing things can happen.

    Maybe the best investment in your community that you can make this summer is to learn, to become more educated about what the actual needs are and the best ways to meet those needs.

    A summer spent this way could lead to a year or years of incredible impact in your community.

    Wrap Up

    I wonder what plans you have to engage your community this summer.

    We’d love to hear your thoughts and ideas in the comments below.

    Share this Article:

    Looking for an easy-to-use software to help manage your church?

    We'd love to show you what we built!

    Join 10,000+ happy churches using Breeze ChMS™.

    Name
    loves Breeze

    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Suspendisse varius enim in eros elementum tristique. Duis cursus, mi quis viverra ornare, eros dolor interdum nulla, ut commodo diam libero vitae erat. Aenean faucibus nibh et justo cursus id rutrum lorem imperdiet. Nunc ut sem vitae risus tristique posuere.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Name
    loves Breeze

    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Suspendisse varius enim in eros elementum tristique. Duis cursus, mi quis viverra ornare, eros dolor interdum nulla, ut commodo diam libero vitae erat. Aenean faucibus nibh et justo cursus id rutrum lorem imperdiet. Nunc ut sem vitae risus tristique posuere.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Name
    loves Breeze

    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Suspendisse varius enim in eros elementum tristique. Duis cursus, mi quis viverra ornare, eros dolor interdum nulla, ut commodo diam libero vitae erat. Aenean faucibus nibh et justo cursus id rutrum lorem imperdiet. Nunc ut sem vitae risus tristique posuere.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    David P.
    loves Breeze
    St. Pauls United Methodist Church

    Breeze has been incredible. Their customer service, commitment to innovation, and their product are top-notch. I love the features, the ease of use and the mobile applications.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Karen M.
    loves Breeze
    Hillcrest Church

    All of our database needs have been more than met, it's easier to use than the last database we had, and the price is amazing - what a value this has been to our church! All of our staff can use this software and they do regularly. We use it to track…literally anything a church could possibly need to track regarding it's attenders.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Chris K.
    loves Breeze
    Crossroads United Methodist Church

    Breeze has been a great asset to our church and congregation. Especially from an administrative standpoint, it has been the most adaptable and easiest church database I have ever used. The features from blast emails to giving on-line, and texting have been one of our greatest assets. Thank you!

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Ed R.
    loves Breeze
    Church Admin

    We switched from a major, web-based ChMS to Breeze and our decision is confirmed every day. We are a medium size church and we use Breeze for contributions, member management, event checkin and a few other applications custom to our church. I had trouble getting any staff to use our previous ChMS but almost all staff are using Breeze. The product is very well designed, extremely easy to learn and use and customer service is incredible.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Ellen G.
    loves Breeze
    Grace Church

    Breeze has opened the communication highway for our congregation and staff, with very little training. Because members can update their own records and search easily for other members - and map their locations, send emails and text right from Breeze, they love it and our data is more real-time accurate. Our ministries are stronger, because they can trust the data in Breeze, which is easily accessed anywhere, anytime.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Steve H.
    loves Breeze
    First Presbyterian Church of Ramsey

    Breeze is the first ChMS my volunteers have actually embraced. That's because it's so easy to use. The software is very flexible and gives us the opportunity to make decisions based on actual data we've collected and not just hunches or stories we believe to be true.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Allicia B.
    loves Breeze
    Ellel Ministries Canada

    I cannot say enough about Breeze. Their customer service is so friendly, you feel like you have friends and family helping you get started, they're prompt to reply and will do whatever they can to help you get things sorted out. It's been so easy to learn, our staff is loving it and best of all even our staff who are not computer savvy find it a breeze (pun intended). We are just thrilled by our choice.

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!
    Kevin D.
    loves Breeze
    Central Baptist Church

    From the start of our process looking for an online solution, Breeze has exceeded all our expectations. Fast data import, fast and friendly customer support, and we can’t say enough about how much we like the program itself. Very well designed and user friendly. On a scale of 1-10, Breeze gets a 15 from us!

    Try a demo of Breeze for yourself!

    Rated 4.9 stars – 560+ reviews on Capterra