Make People Feel Special

Come On Church – Let’s Make People Feel Special          

         Our 10-year-old granddaughter Amelia recently asked her mom about getting a new dress because they were having a picture taking day at the school. To the store’s credit they treated Amelia with kindness and patience and not like some 10-year-old that was wasting their time. Amelia picked out a beautiful dress. She told her mother when they were leaving the store that loved coming to shop at this store because the people there treated her special.

          I thought about this situation a lot. The church could learn a lot about the way that we treat people. Many times, we make it difficult for people to even get into our churches. We do all kinds of promotions and advertising to get people to come to our church and then we don’t always treat the visitors like they are special.

      Let’s start with the parking lot. All of the regular church attenders (Including leadership) usually take up the best parking places nearest the building(s). That means that the visitor has to search for a place to park and then walk a farther distance just to get to the building. Strike one.          

     Next when they do make it into the building instead of greeting them and directing them to the classrooms, nursery etc. the supposedly friendly Christians will gawk at them like they have 2heads and six eyes. Strike two. And Heaven forbids if these nice folks sit in “MY SEAT” that I have been sitting in for 20 years and singing, “I shall not be moved”. It doesn’t matter that the new folks didn’t know that was “your seat”. It’s still my seat and by God I ain’t giving it up for any of them "new people". Strike three.          

The visitors seem to enjoy the music and the preaching and as soon as the service is over all of the regulars go to their cliques of familiar people and leave the visitors standing alone like they have the plague. No one invites them to take them to lunch or invites them to come back and worship again. Strike four.          

My 10 -year- old granddaughter likes to go back to this store because they treat her special – even though she is only 10 this store is making a customer for life. You may say, “Yes but they are trying to sell something, so they have to be nice.” Come on church. We can do better in treating people special. We do not own God’s church or His love. We need to share it with everyone freely. We are not “selling” anything but are giving away the free gift of salvation and God’s love. So as His ambassadors we should be loving people into the Kingdom instead of running them away. We can do better. 
​In love with Jesus – Gary Mimbs