Connecting with Community Families

When new families appear, especially if they are new to faith, there is often an assumption that parents have the knowledge about the Christian faith to be supporting their kids at home. In my experience this isn't the case. While there is no alpha for family groups, there are other approaches we can take. Why not bring your church families and your community families to eat together, watch a short video on faith basics and a discussion. This can be a really good way to bridge this gap and to cater for families in the community that want to know more. Youth alpha could be a good course to use for this, but I also really like the videos from the bible project

Things to consider:

Credit: unsplash

. The people running it need to be very friendly and confident . Personal invites work better than advertising. Where are your people connecting with others in the community. . Advertising is important too. Schools, social media etc. . The space needs to be warm and inviting.

People need to be met at the door. . Don’t invite people to transition to your church service if it isn’t an appropriate space for newbies. Maybe this group becomes a new church community of it’s own? . A discipleship pathway needs to be considered carefully.

These things don’t happen on their own. . How will kids and teenagers be included and feel welcome? . Keep it super short and relational. . Simple programmes are sustainable programmes. . Pray as a team.

A few years ago, Amelia (9 years old at the time) from All Saints, Burwood started her own canned food collection on her street. She started by posting a photocopied letter in the letterboxes that introduced herself and asked if anyone would like to help her donate to the charity she was supporting. Anyone who wanted to help out was to leave a can or two in their letterbox for her to collect on a certain date. What a simple way to connect with your neighbours and include children in mission.

Credit: bible project

Credit: unsplash Credit: unsplash

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