How Churches are Using Their Facilities to Serve Their Communities

Church buildings used to be the cornerstone of every small town. In fact, if you drive through a small town, still to this day, it’s likely there is a church building near the center of all the action. 

Church buildings are often a busy place to be on any given Sunday but what about the rest of the days of the week? Does your church building sit empty and quiet 6 days a week?

Maybe it’s time to get back to the church being the center of your community. Maybe your church building could be used to bless and serve the community it sits in. 

Countless churches are doing just that through many different charitable initiatives and even getting creative with some new ideas!

Why Does This Matter?

You may be wondering, why is this necessary. Well, it’s not. But at the end of the day, Christians are called to make disciples and reach the lost and hurting people of this world with the gospel message of Christ. 

If God has blessed your congregation with a beautiful church building, have you thought about how you are stewarding this blessing? If your building sits empty 6 days a week, it may be time to get a bit creative. 

Ultimately by inviting your community into your building and meeting their needs outside of Sunday service, you can hope that when life happens and people have questions about God, they’ll come to your building because they’ll already feel at home!

Let’s take a look at some of the ways your church building can be used 7 days a week to serve the community you are in. 

Meal Ministry

Serving a community meal out of a church is not a novel idea, however, it’s harder to come by these days. One of the most successful meal ministries nationwide is Loaves and Fishes. This program partners with churches to provide free meals for their communities. 

St. John’s Lutheran Church in Shakopee, Minnesota is a church that has opened its doors to serve Loaves and Fishes meals. They provide a free community meal on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. 

While St. Johns hosts this meal in their location, the work doesn’t fall solely on their shoulders. Other churches and groups within the community also have the opportunity to volunteer to help purchase, prepare, and serve these meals. It truly is a group effort from the entire community. 

Education

Church buildings are excellent locations to help support the education of those in their community. Churches have been hosting preschools and other schooling options for a long time. Lately, however, with the increase in those choosing to homeschool, we have also seen churches providing space for homeschool co-op meetings, as well. 

Small Group Meetings

Many times location can be a barrier for people to start or join a small group. With a greater desire for an in-person community, your church can help facilitate this by offering your building, meeting rooms, classrooms, or lobby space for small groups to meet. Your building could be a blessing to moms in the community who are looking to get out of the house with their children and get in the community with other moms. Or a group of newlyweds who want to do a marriage study but don’t have the space to facilitate a small group meeting in their home. 

Recovery Groups

Another type of group that has long been meeting within the walls of the church are recovery groups. This could include groups such as AA, NA, Al-anon, and more. The truth is, almost every community could benefit from offering a group like this. Will your church be the one who answers the call to provide a place of refuge for those participating in these groups? 

What better place to seek recovery than within the walls of a church?

Recreation

Lastly, your church could get a little creative. Many churches have started to create recreational spaces within their building to gather their community for fellowship. New Life Christina Church in Virginia has done an excellent job at this. They opted to transform their building into an 83,000-square-foot sports complex, called the nZone. 

According to New Life Christian Church

“We sacrificed our own needs (an auditorium with comfy seats) and built what a community survey told us you needed: a safe place for our kids to hang out. A place to play after school, a place to build friendships, and a safe place for them to learn some good old-fashioned values. Besides… sports are fun. Lots of churches do seriously well (and that’s a good thing), but at New Life Christian church we also do fun well and believe that God appreciates fun and games as much as we do.”

Torchable Expands Your Reach Within Your Community

When you decide it’s time to open your building to your community, Torchable is here to help. The Torchable app is a place where you can make sure your community knows what programs, groups, and events are available to them all week long. 

Expand your outreach and draw people into your building by downloading the Torchable app today.