038: Reading, Response, & Reflection Find Their Place In Modern Worship | Worship & Tech Series Part 4

Episode 038: Where Reading, Response, & Reflection Find Their Place In Modern Worship | Part 4 Worship & Tech Series For Small Churches

Intro 0:01
Hey, this is Laurie Graham. Welcome to The Small Church Ministry Podcast.

Laurie Graham 0:15
Hey, welcome back as we continue in our series for Worship and Tech for Small Churches! You know, we humans have a reputation of throwing away some really good stuff in favor of the next, newest thing, but sometimes getting rid of the old in favor of the new loses some really great value. There’s a little bit of that trend in modern worship leading, and by modern, I don’t just mean today, I mean, maybe the past decade or even two. If you’re in a worship setting that mostly equates worship to singing, this is kind of what I want to talk about, and I’d like to make a case for readings, responses, and times of reflection as part of modern worship. If you’re in a more traditional setting, and you already include elements like readings and responses, I hope to give you a few tips too for deeper engagement as well. 

Now, many worship services these days start with a chunk of songs and music. Sometimes there’s an offering, prayer, or maybe a reading mixed in, but the emphasis really is the music. And then there’s a sermon, message, or homily, and often a closing song. In a more traditional service, you may have a few more responsive readings or collective prayers, even projected on a screen or printed in a book of worship, but it’s a pretty standard flow. In recent years, people have really begun equating worship with singing, and singing mostly or even just singing. Think about it. If a church today hires a worship leader or a worship director, the top skills they’re looking for are usually music proficiency, being able to lead songs or play an instrument. Some churches are definitely also looking for people who can grow a worship team, who can lead and recruit people, but again, what that usually equates to are musicians and tech people. And this is all good! 

Music is really important. However, there’s a whole lot more potential in worship leading that goes way beyond songs. As we’ve already mentioned, in this podcast series is we’re talking about worship and tech, there are a lot of people on the planet who actually don’t like singing, and for them, worship time on Sundays is awkward, at best. They might think the music is even tacky, or maybe they believe they’re terrible singers themselves, or maybe they’re just not in the mood to sing. And this is all very valid, but here’s the thing, worship does not equal music!

Laurie Graham 2:43
Worship is about showing reverence and adoration to the God of the universe, and music can definitely be a part of that. It can be a big part, and I love it, but what I want to talk about today is it’s not the whole of it. So I’m really excited to broaden out the definition, to talk about worship elements that have no connection to singing, about worship elements that not only engage non-singers, but me too, the spoken and silent worship elements that have greatly impacted my life, and I hope you’ll consider them in your worship setting too. And if you already do them, I hope you consider adding a little bit of fresh breath to them as well, because we’re not just talking about engaging the people who might not like to sing, but also deepening and broadening our own personal experience of God in worship for all your singers too.

Now, if you’re newer to these types of worship elements, we are not talking about what the worship leader is saying like as transitions between the songs, we’re talking about larger pieces that the congregation is actively involved in. So, I’m talking about stand-alone elements of worship, elements that could be led by people who aren’t already on the stage, by people who are not gifted in music, elements of worship that can be utilized not just in a Sunday service, but at a retreat or in a small group or youth group. And for small churches, we’ll talk about how they can be especially impactful. So here we go. Podcast Episode 38: Reading, Response and Reflection Find Their Place in Modern Worship. 

So, most would agree that we want to go deeper in worship, we want to engage more fully with God. We want to help others connect to the living God too, and I know for me, my desire is to walk into worship one way and to walk out changed. I really do desire to be changed, but the reality is, that doesn’t happen every Sunday. Sometimes I’m totally distracted. Sometimes I don’t like the song choice. Sometimes I just can’t get myself into the right headspace or heartspace, and I gotta tell you, for a lot of people, maybe the majority of, that’s how they feel often. Now, we can totally say, well, you get in what you put out, or if you really want to worship, you could worship God anywhere, or if you really love Jesus, your focus should be on Him and not the distractions or the songs. And I just want to say, I get it, I’ve heard it. In fact, I’ve said it, and yet, I still struggle with it myself personally. 

Laurie Graham 5:23
So we absolutely have the personal responsibility to grow into our own maturity, of being able to worship God in any circumstance. However, leadership really does matter, and can make an incredible difference, and while we can’t guarantee anyone’s connection with God on any particular Sunday, we really could do a better job facilitating the journey. And one of those ways, is by having a variety of ways to connect, a variety of ways to engage people, and even to keep it fresh, so it doesn’t become rote, or totally predictable. One of the limiting things that I’ve seen, when leaders think about making worship better, they often think we need a new song, a better song, or the right song, and they spend hours and hours searching for this perfect song that’s going to take people to a new place. And this isn’t all bad.

Like, I totally agree that song choice matters and matters a lot, especially, especially, please hear this, in small churches, but we have a whole other episode on that and a few blog posts as well. But, there really isn’t a perfect song and it’s not even always easy to find a great song, but what I can tell you is if you want to help people go deeper in worship, there are a few elements I’ll be sharing today that don’t cost any money, they don’t need an app, and you already have all the resources you need right now and you could try one this very next Sunday! None of the things I’m going to talk about require special training in worship leading or being proficient on a certain musical instrument or even being a great singer. It doesn’t take tons of practice and you can utilize other people to implement these elements quite easily, and that’s actually part of the beauty. 

Leading people not only in singing, but in readings, responses, and reflections. Now, before we totally jump into the details of all the different elements and where to find them, and how to do them really well, I want to talk about who loves them. Because for some people, when I mentioned responsive readings, the words ‘old’ and ‘boring’, come to mind, and if that’s you, please toss that thought right out of your mind because it’s not true, or it doesn’t have to be true. A few years back, I introduced some responsive readings into our modern worship setting when I was worship leading. I immediately got some really positive comments from many who grew up in those settings. It wasn’t just nostalgic or comfortable, but it was deeply meaningful.

Laurie Graham 7:17
However, the surprising comments, and to me, they were surprising at the time, they’re not anymore, but the surprising comments back then, for me, came from people in their early 20’s, people who had not grown up in a traditional setting, and what they were saying is they really appreciated the thoughtfulness behind it. They really liked the responsive readings, these young people. Now,I’ve had those comments many times since by people of all ages and all different traditions as they grew up. Returning to some older traditional hymns, having more quiet space in a service for reflection, can I say even a little bit less noise, people find it refreshing, meaningful, and even needed in our day and age, not just older people, but younger people as well! 

Because here’s the thing, the world really doesn’t need more noise. We don’t have to keep the volume up or the pace fast to connect people to Jesus. I read an article not too long ago by Thom Rainer, and he was talking about millennials. The gist of the article was that churches were wondering why all the hip new music of the day wasn’t drawing in the millennials like they thought it would. But the thing was this, millennials care less about worship style and more about depth, authenticity, and quality. For many people, this is a game changer. The millennials are looking for the real thing, not the fluff, not the noise, not the lights, not the colors.

They are people who care about the world, and they want to be with people who care about the world and about them. They’re looking for churches who are outward focused, churches who are making an impact in the community, that’s the trend. And by the way, is that not a great trend? Because it so fits what small churches have the potential to offer, a real, deep, authentic place that’s outward focused? Like, that’s our thing! So please hear this. This is what small churches can offer: authenticity, embracing who we are, offering quality, not quantity. It’s all really pretty beautiful. 

Now, if you’re saying millennials, well, those people are old now. Well, they’re not old, but they are in their 20”s and 30s. If you’re trying to get even a younger generation, do you know what the Gen Z’s are looking for? They’re looking for simple and focused. Simple and focused. I’m not kidding. Gen Z’s won’t even consider a church, according to Thom Rainer, and other studies, and people who do these polls and stuff, Gen Z’s don’t even consider a church that’s negative, or has any kind of in-fighting, they’re over it. So, if you are squabbling over worship styles, or your teams aren’t unified, you have unproductive meetings, or you’re fighting over volunteers, that has a much bigger impact on the younger generations then the music you’re choosing. Is that not crazy? So let’s be real, authentic, kind, outward focused. Let’s focus on unity, and growing in those gifts of the Spirit, which all have to do with being focused on Jesus, and that is the best place to start. But let’s get back to some spoken and silent worship elements that I promised you could put in place this Sunday. 

Laurie Graham 11:36
The quick ones to think about are, of course, readings and silent reflections because many of us have seen that in church. We’ve seen maybe at the holidays, when somebody stands up and reads the Scripture, or if you’re in a traditional setting, this possibly happens every single Sunday, but there are so many creative ways to put these into action. Nothing needs to become rote, or boring, or predictable. There are millions of ways to be creative, and to add variety and to mix it up, and why that matters, is because when things do get rote, and boring ,and predictable, we start to kind of clock out. We don’t notice them as much. So, it is important to keep things fresh. You can keep things fresh, even by placing things in a different place in the worship order.

But readings themselves, the public reading of Scripture is powerful, and it is timeless. Does this happen in your church? If so, how? How often? How many ways? Is the public reading of Scripture done with emotion or is it flat? And by the way, there’s ways to help people do this well! Of course, you might be reading a verse or a passage, but it could even be an entire chapter read in pieces throughout the entire service. Passages could be read collectively, like everyone reads it, it is either you know projected on the screen, or it’s in their hands printed, and the congregation reads it together, or one of my favorites is actually responsive readings. 

Now, a lot of worship leaders when they start looking into responsive readings, they start researching and spend hours trying to find good responsive readings. Do you know where the best response of readings come from? Just straight out of Psalms, and not even just Psalms, it could be many different books of the Bible! There’s no magic formula to a responsive reading. The point is, in a responsive reading, is one person, whether it is a worship leader or a pastor or another person, reads part of the, you know, one or two verses, and then the congregation responds with the next two verses. It’s actually pretty powerful when it’s done well. Have you ever done readings where you’ve scattered the readers throughout the congregation instead of having them up front on the platform, where somebody pops up and reads a passage from their seat, and maybe somebody on the other side of the room follows with another passage?

We’ve done some really beautiful readings when a person was actually in a back room, unseen, but mic’d and it sounded like a voice from heaven! So you can do many things to make readings very special, and even set up your readers to become better readers. We’ll talk about that in a little bit. Sometimes, if the readings feel a little out of place, or not as relevant, it’s actually even really beautiful to add the backstory, paraphrase a little bit, or even add personal testimony, but these readings can become a powerful part of the worship service, not just something that’s an add-in or something in the service that is just on the schedule, but they can become a really powerful interactive piece of connecting people to Jesus. 

Laurie Graham 14:56
The other edge that I’ve already mentioned is silence. Now for many people, when I say times of silence, it just already feels awkward or maybe you’re the kind of person who loves silence, but there’s ways to do silence in a worship service that are really impactful and transformative. You can do silence with directed silence, like, actually tell people, contemplate on this or let’s take a moment to think about this. You also can have undirected times of silence, where it’s just, let’s take a minute to take whatever you have before the Lord, or not even that, but just, let’s just breathe and be thankful right now in this moment. Moments of silence could be directed toward art, or a photograph, or a beautiful image of nature. Have you used art, or poetry, or these beautiful creative gifts in your service before? Because when you can attach some silence with that, it can be even more impactful.

In today’s society with all the pressure, all the noise, constant interruptions, notifications, instant access to news and updates, I truly believe one of the biggest gifts we can give people in worship is a little bit of quiet, some space away from the noise. Because as much as God is in the volume of worship, whether you have singers or instruments, or both, God is also in the midst of silence. Now, if silence is a new thing in your church culture, you may want to take some baby steps into it like one minute of quiet, but I really want to encourage you to work up to extending it into maybe extended places of silence or prayer, especially if you celebrate Lent or Advent, and we’re gonna have another podcast coming up on that in case you don’t, because there are certain times in the church year in the church culture where adding more silence as a special, I don’t know, a special element or a special emphasis can really have some beautiful transformation along with it. 

So, a beautiful thing about adding these other types of elements like reading or silence, is they don’t need to be led by the worship leader or by someone on the worship team. This is a great way to involve others in the worship leading to elevate those in the congregation as worship leaders too because we are all supposed to be leading in worship, because it’s personal. It’s it’s our connection with Jesus, and the more you involve others in worship, in these elements of worship leadership, the more people are engaged instead of watching, the more people feel part of it. A lot of times in churches, a lot, especially small churches, we work at ways to get people off the stage or connect the leaders up front with the people in the seats. It’s really important for church unity, right? So, having people leading up front or reading from the back, as in anytime volunteers are involved, I also want to beg you to please set them up to succeed, and setting them up for success really does matter. 

Laurie Graham 18:19
One of the first things to consider is choosing right, and then setting them up with some really good tips and a little bit of training, but I just want to highlight what usually happens, is we usually just say “Hey, can you read this passage” Honestly, that is it, we may hand them the passage, we may hand them a sheet of paper. but most churches that I have ever been in, ever seen, and ever related with, do not actually help people be successful or be dynamic, and they don’t even elevate it as part of worship! So, if you are going to recruit somebody to read or develop somebody to help lead these elements in worship, please take it seriously. Because it can not only enhance your worship and draw people to worship God in brand new ways, but it can build that volunteer as a significant part of your church body, and hopefully, there’ll be more than one.

Because readers and people who are leading these elements can be developed. Like, so much that we share, you don’t have to find experts, or the best readers, or those who’ve participated in drama in the past. In fact, I hope you include, intentionally, the overlooked and the people who it might be surprising that they did this, that they wanted to do this. Don’t ask people who are already serving in a whole bunch of places. Please don’t do that. That’s when we start focusing on the 20%, we get them all burned out. Instead, start developing the people who aren’t stepping up to serve as much or maybe never have, or maybe the first time you ask them their eyes get wide like deer in the headlights, right? Like, I would never do that, but you encourage them and walk with them and help them be successful and take baby steps so that they end up really coming into their own influence. 

So a couple thoughts on helping people to be successful. First off, please choose people right. So, you’ve got to consider personality, volume, passion, and I don’t mean that there’s no place for them if they don’t have the personality you’re looking for. What I’m saying is that different elements actually would be enhanced with different personalities. If you’re looking for somebody to lead people into silent reflection, you don’t want the joker in the congregation, the one who’s always making jokes and making people laugh, you want somebody who is sensitive and has a sweetness to them. Even in particular passages, be intentional about who you would ask to read a passage about Jesus going to the cross, and the impact that has on the women who are watching, versus the declarations or, you know, the the verses in the Old Testament that are very declarative about God’s power and authority. Do you see the difference? So, consider people’s personalities in the different elements. Consider how much volume they have in their voice, their tone, their passion, their very Spirit, because you want somebody who is leading people into things that they have experienced, into things that also connect them to Jesus. 

Laurie Graham 21:34
You will also want to find some people who are willing to practice not the ones who are just okay winging it, because that’s the one thing I would love to change in all of our church cultures, is this feeling that we can just wing it. Oh, yeah, I can read. Well, the point isn’t reading. The point is helping people connect to the God of the universe, which is actually a really cool responsibility and you can add value to it or you can minimize it. Now when you, can when it comes to setting them up for success, when you invite people to try it, to taste and see, to consider it, treat this like it means something, because it does. Ask them ahead of time, not last minute, and give them tips to succeed, as I mentioned earlier, develop them as readers and leaders. Most people are nervous, even those of us who like publicly speaking, I get nervous all the time! So, make it easier by training them, by telling them precisely when to walk up, by helping them practice talking slower than they think they should because honestly, when we’re nervous, we talk faster. Practice ahead of time, whether it’s with them or give them instructions to practice ahead of time, and let them know how much practice can actually impact what they bring to the congregation. And best practice is actually even to have them come ahead of time before the service begins and practice with the actual mic that they are going to be using. 

And here is your most important tip for the day if you have readers, or if you want readers, or if you do this, there’s a certain equipment microphone called a lectern mic. You may have seen these at, like, memorial service settings. You may have one of your church. If you do, awesome. If you don’t, I highly recommend you get one. A lectern mic, which can be freestanding or it can be, like, a clippable onto like a podium or something, it’s made, it’s created, so you can be 8 to 16 inches away from that lectern mic. You don’t hold it up to your mouth. If you pull it away by three inches, you know, like regular mics, this can be one of the most distracting things ever.

If you are going to work into more elements of reading or, you know, leading people into reflection or silence or responses, having a lectern mic can save so much hassle, because you actually instruct people, don’t touch it. Don’t lean toward it, you just go and stand behind it. You can be this far away and we will work with the volume. Never ever touch it. It just sits there. And these lectern mics, by the way, you can get a decent one for $100 or even a little less. So please, please, if you’re going to be utilizing these elements, here’s your tech tip for the day, get a lectern mic and have a good setup. Some sort of stand where people can just walk behind it. It honestly takes a lot of nerves out and takes a lot of distraction out when, is it on? It is on, okay. Is it on? Am I holding it right? Do I have to touch this? People get really flipped out when they have to hold a mic. So please get a lectern mic. 

Laurie Graham 24:47
Okay, let’s keep going. Another thing that I do to help set people up for success in these types of experiences is I do hand them a paper copy, but I also have an extra copy that I print and I have ready for them at church on the stand, in case they forget their own, and I let them know what’s going to be there. Again, this is just about taking the nerves out, helping people be more successful than they are, and setting them up well! And please, last tip is be super specific if you’re putting readings or responses or reflections into your order of worship. Be super specific about when they should come up. This, again, is probably the second biggest distraction after the microphone issues, is the looks, the gaps in time when people aren’t sure when to come up. And again, this is another reason to practice or give them an order of worship and make sure they are very, very clear on when to come up and also when to sit down so there’s no awkwardness.

If you want them to pause for a minute while you go into a song before they sit, or if you just want them to finish and go sit down, just make sure it’s clear because for you, it might seem really clear, for other people, it’s really not. Specifics are so much better, but involve other people. Now, by the way, yes, if you’re thinking this is so much more work, I can barely get my stuff done. Yes, it is more work, it is a little more time, you’re coordinating it, but your results are going to be incredible and you’re also going to save a lot of other issues along the way, because you’re developing people to be amazing readers and leaders, and that is going to serve you so well in so many areas and serve them well as they’re coming into their influence. You’re building people to come into their own influence that God’s already given them. So thank and support more people and plan ahead, because you’re going to love the results. 

The last thing I want to mention is the importance of engaging people with more specific responses in worship. Now, here, I’m not talking about responsive readings, although that certainly is a type of response, there’s quite a few things that could fall under responses in worship. And the best way to think of it is just making it a habit or a norm, that there’s always a time in your worship time, what calls people to a specific response, not just at the end of the service or at the end of the sermon, but before then. This has to do with applying the words we hear or sing, or the message there, applying it to our lives with solutions that, that fit my unique situation that are about me, and not just about other people connecting with God, and doing something creative and specific each Sunday, just one thing, is quite amazing!

Laurie Graham 27:29
In our society, we are so often spectators, like, think about how much we watch around us. We watch the news. We watch other people’s lives on TV. We read the stories of other people in books. Again, on TV, we see it and so much more. We have a habit, these days, of getting more engaged in the lives of other people, that we’re not always living our own lives, and this is true even in the Christian world. We’re looking at other people’s testimonies and we’re celebrating with them, but we’re not always applying the teaching, and even the convictions of God into our own spirits and our own lives. 

So, this is what I’m talking about in response, where instead of just singing loudly and enjoying worship, or being moved by what other people say, we’re moved to change and to apply it to our lives. So, asking for a response in worship is a way to challenge us to apply something. You’re probably familiar with how vast the percentage of information is that we forget. The vast majority of all the information we ever hear or see or experience gets completely forgotten for every single one of us. The last thing we want is for this to be the norm in worship too, where people come and listen and enjoy and are even moved, but they’re not really changed. Now, this isn’t always a conscious choice. Oftentimes, it’s just we forget. One way to help make things stick is when we encourage response and personal application right away. Do you know that the quicker you apply something, the more likely you are to make it a habit or to even try it again? 

So, if you encourage somebody to read their Bible, and you say, “Hey, this is so important, we need to read our Bibles,” and they go home and have lunch and get busy and tomorrow comes. They’re not even thinking about what you said to them the day before. This happens with sermons and classes and small groups and everything. Now, if you can sit with a person and show them, and have them open their Bible and experience it, there’s a much better chance they’re going to do it again. And the thing is, is that we can do this in worship, too. Instead of talking about the importance of praying for our neighbors, we could take the time to pray now even individually, but together, or instead of a worship leader just sharing their own story and how this song impacted them, they say to everyone present, identify one thing that this speaks to in your life, one thing you are thankful for. Share it, write it, or speak it right now! That is adding a response in worship. It’s very simple and it also has incredible impact. 

Laurie Graham 30:12
You can think of responses in a few different categories like movement or motion, imagination, and then decision or will. So let me just give you a few examples in these different categories. If you want a response in movement, or motion, or sometimes you can even think of muscle like muscle memory. If your church has a culture or tradition where people bring Bibles or journals, engaging people’s muscle or movement could be as simple as “Hey, write something down that you’re thankful for.” Yes, in the middle of worship, in the middle of the song time. You could take a moment to pray right there in the middle of the singing time. Another way to engage movement or muscle is the whole stand up, sit down, kneel, or posture.

Now, I’m not telling you to command them to stand or sit or kneel, especially if that’s not in your church culture, but to offer them the option, to speak about how our posture makes a difference, to invite people, if you want, to hold out your hands to receive. You can absolutely get fancy with motion and movement and set up some cool response stations with candles, or a place to leave a prayer request, or burn something or pick something up, or a tactile thing they could touch and take home. These are all great ways of involving movement and muscle, but it doesn’t have to be that fancy. It could be as simple as write down or even turn to a person next to you and speak something, just something that engages our bodies.

The other type of response I mentioned to you is imagination, engaging our imaginations. This doesn’t happen naturally for most people. Let’s say you’re singing a song about sorrow and how God meets us in our sorrow, and people are singing a song about sorrow, but they haven’t actually applied it to their lives. Perhaps there’s an invitation after the song to imagine somebody in your life who could use some support right now? Can you see them? Maybe they’re experiencing grief or loss? Maybe it’s you. So imagine them, and ask God what you could do to support them, or if it’s you, imagine Jesus walking up to you. And what would He be saying? You may have just pictured that right now, I want to tell you, our imaginations are super powerful. You know your mind can’t tell the difference between what is vividly imagined and reality.

So, imagination, because of that, becomes doing. It is a response, but we often have to invite people to engage their imagination. Because again, we’re very used to being spectators. If you sing a song, or read a scripture about fighting battles, or enemies, many people clock out of that, but you know, what will help them clock back in? Is if you say something like, “If you think you don’t have enemies, consider what holds you back from moving forward in your life.” Maybe it’s a boss, a work environment, maybe it’s depression. Let’s bring those enemies before God and ask Him to intervene for us. So invite God in. That’s another way of engaging the imagination. 

Laurie Graham 33:23
And the third thing I mentioned was engaging decision or will. This type of response goes beyond inviting and imagining, to making a decision to, encouraging people to decide, to engage in their will. The word reflection itself means serious thought or consideration. How often do we do that in the middle of a song time? Because serious thought or consideration, needs space, and time. While many songs are filled with incredible theology, do we ever give time to reflect after that theology, to consider, give it serious thought, to reflect on the concepts we just samg? It’s much more common to sing five amazing songs and give zero reflection, to apply it, to take the time and consideration to apply the words to impact my life.

One of the simplest ways to do this is just to take a minute after a song, not every song, just one song, and simply ask, “What will you do?” And give people the time and space to think. Now, as we talk about these responses, from movement and imagination and decision or will, of course, you don’t want to sit and respond and apply to every single song, every single reading, every single, you know, moment of silence or whatever during your Sundays, because it would be too much and we don’t have enough time in the day. But I would encourage you to add one each Sunday, just to have one way each Sunday, to exercise these things to engage muscle or imagination or decision. And by the way, if you do this once before a sermon, people are much more primed to apply the sermon to their lives. 

Can you imagine each Sunday, if we just were called to apply one thing actively during the song time, or what was traditionally song time, to take other worship elements and intentionally choose to go deeper? I truly believe readings and responses and reflections have a amazing place in small churches because of the intimacy we can enjoy in our spaces, where everyone is seen and known, and hopefully everyone feels loved and belonging. This clears up a lot of insecurity so people really can go deeper with Jesus! It’s in spaces like these, that we are more likely to apply, to feel safe enough to be intimate with God, to soak in a scripture to its core to enjoy silent reflection. I think it’s also amazing to keep in mind that the younger people don’t care as much about the worship choice and songs, as they do about authenticity and loving people and being accepted, and depth of spirituality, that people, when they visit your church, are more impressed with your church unity than having the lights and the fog machines. This is where small churches have yet another opportunity to shine really brightly. Authentic worship and focus on the living God, that can totally be us! 

Laurie Graham 36:28
As we wrap up this episode, I just want to thank you for hanging out with me today. I know a lot of people loved last week’s podcast interview with Zarc Porter from the UK. If you haven’t heard that one yet, make sure to check it out, and I want to encourage you to subscribe to the show so you don’t miss any upcoming episodes. If you were able to be with us live last week in the Facebook, on the Facebook page, we had an incredible workshop series, over 500 people reserved spots, have been watching replays, popping in and sending emails, it was all about more volunteers. It included 4 mindset shifts that we need to grab on to to do ministry more like Jesus, plus a specific strategy that I know a lot of people are already finding crazy helpful in growing more ownership and commitment with other people in their ministry areas, more volunteers.

And responding to the call for more shareable resources in your small churches, we just opened the doors for something brand new to help grow your teams and help get people in your church more excited about serving and on the same page with strategies that work! So, you definitely want to check out The Small Church Network. We’re going to drop a link in the show notes. This is going to be ongoing and forever and it’s totally gold, but I do want to give you a heads up if you happen to be listening live, we have a special deal for Founding Members this week only! So 2022, in the middle of September, we’ve got a special deal for those joining the very first wave of The Small Church Network. So, whether you stick with us for all the free stuff, or jump into The Small Church Network for greater impact, I am so grateful you’re here.

We are changing small churches all over the planet, and by we I mean we, like, you and me and everyone else who’s part of this community, giving more hope and help and you’re such a big part of it. So, thank you for listening, for sharing, and for serving right where you’re planted! Your church is blessed to have you. So again, go check out The Small Church Network at smallchurchministry.com/network. Again, the link is also in the show notes and we’ll talk again next week. Be a light!