After the recent church shooting in Texas, we wanted to talk about church security. As leaders and shepherds in our church, we are responsible for protecting our flock, but we don't want to be motivated by fear. We've taken some steps toward securing our building a couple years ago and have continued talking about other ways we can protect our people.

We talk about an article from the Gospel Coalition titled 7 Ways to Prepare Your Church Against Violence. The first step is to communicate with your congregation. We have recently informed our congregation that we are praying about how to further protect our church and communicated that we are open to suggestions and comments from our members.

We talk about how we deal with weapons in our church building. We allow concealed carry guns, though we realize that some churches ban all weapons or have differing opinions. As elders, we want to communicate with those people that carry to make sure that there would be an ordered response in the event of a threat.

How do you protect your children? Do you know what is going on in the homes of your members? Are you helping people work through their anxiety? We briefly talk through all of these points and share some of the things we are trying at our own church.

What plans for church security have you implemented to protect your congregation? Let us know!