BUILDING COMMUNITY
18
HELLO CHURCH
BC churches band together for the cause of Christ arch 2020 brought great change to almost all Canadians due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many businesses shut down, weddings and events cancelled, and churches moved their services to online platforms instead of meeting in person. Communities came face to face with the importance of supporting one another, and reaching out to those in need. For a group of churches in the Surrey and Langley areas of British Columbia, the challenge of not meeting together brought way for a new idea to help the local community. Brad Sumner, pastor for 15 years at Jericho Ridge Community Church in Surrey, was very interested in keeping his community together while reaching beyond the walls of the church and fulfilling the needs of others. “I thought, everybody is telling us what we can’t do. I’m not really interested in what we can’t do. I’m more interested in what we can do,” Sumner recalls. Sumner began to have conversations with his team. “We can do things like meet needs. How should we go about doing that now?” became the question on Jericho Ridge’s mind. The answer was quite literally right around the corner. Pastor Matthew Price of North Langley Community Church was one of the first on board. “I quickly called Brad about an idea to bring all the churches in the area I T H O U G H T, together. The way that E V E RY B O DY I S things immediately came T E L L I N G U S W H AT together was incredible,” WE CAN’T DO. Price recalls. I ’ M N O T R E A L LY Price presented the INTERESTED IN idea to create an online W H AT W E C A N ’ T portal to act as a doorway DO. I’M MORE for all congregants and INTERESTED IN community members to W H AT W E C A N D O . walk through when there was a need to be met. The – BRAD SUMNER idea was for churches to use their regular
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DECEMBER 2020
M B H E R A L D.C O M
benevolence fund in a different way, though an online platform. This door became Hello Church. In total, sixteen churches in the local area joined the cause. They had maintained positive relationships with each other over the years, and were ready to join together to do community work. “I was watching my email inbox explode with churches wanting to get involved. It was like a mini viral experience.” Price remembers, “It was the church unified.” Let’s Get Going In the early stages, four of the churches in Hello Church invested and did research into how to get the message out to the public; one even donated their media, and graphics staff to get the ball rolling. Price also used his other connections to create a website and promote Hello Church on Instagram, Facebook and other social media by using geofencing technology in select areas that they wanted to get their message to. Their efforts were successful. “It was so fun to watch the creativity happen!” Price says. Hello Church was quickly becoming a recognized brand of its own. The community knew it was the church reaching, and people were paying close attention. Congregants living in the neighborhood surrounding the church put up signs in their yards that they were part of Hello Church, which matched signs on the church’s property. Members of the churches were ready to spring into action. “People were almost disappointed when there wasn’t a floodgate of need building up at first,” Sumner recalls, “There is still need, it’s just not coming to us in the same way.” In the early stages of Hello Church, the program grew beyond fulfilling basic immediate needs like grocery deliveries, and shopping for others. “We became engaged quite quickly in conversation with social services and the school district. The school district sent out a survey asking what the needs of families
