Have you ever heard the term “sea change?”

The term first appeared for me in church books on renewal and transformation years ago.

When a church does something that fundamentally changes how they go about their mission, that could be called a “sea change.”

We are in a whole new territory or have moved from the Atlantic to the Pacific, or something like that.

I believe we are at the beginning of a “sea change” in the life of our church. Now, I am not talking about radical change that will cause you to cover your ears in worship or begin asking the question, “What happened to my church?”

The sea change I am talking about revolves around two basic decisions that will be presented to the Board in August.

The first is an effort to use worship teams to plan our Sunday experiences and to begin that planning six months in advance.

I proposed this and this is not the way I operate. This will be a sea change for me. But imagine the possibilities for enriched and meaningful worship if we begin planning six months ahead.

The second sea change is something we should have been doing all along.

This is from the Evangelism and Outreach Sub team (and everyone else who showed up). This is a detailed plan from welcoming the guest to full inclusion in the life of the church.

For example, some churches have parking lot greeters and some churches train their inside greeters.

Churches do a notoriously bad job of following the progress of guests, thus guests are not invited to Sunday School or to help with projects and may eventually drift away from involvement like they drifted into the church. Soon they are gone and we are all left scratching our heads as to why.

Our new effort will help us pay attention to and include those who come hoping to serve alongside us.

Both of these changes will require a lot of work, but they potentially have a great benefit for us as a church.

Please prayerfully consider serving in each of these two areas when presented the  opportunity.

Moving to the deeper places,
Jeff