Episode 9: Neighborhood Church Pt. 1
In this episode we define house churches, neighborhood churches, and community churches. We detail why each are distinctly different, and all have an ongoing place in our church context.
Tweetable Quotes:
Say, yes! Don’t look back and wonder what could have been. God has something for you right now. So why not take a chance. What’s the worst thing that could happen? - Robert CortesClick To Tweet
Have IC in YOU conversations that allow people to set up and serve. – Mingo PalaciosClick To Tweet
Our hope is you create spaces where people feel welcomed, they feel seen, and walk away feeling valued and known. – Mingo PalaciosClick To Tweet
About Episode 9:
00:01 > introduction of Mingo Palacios & Robert Cortes
3:25 > beginning for people already connected to our network.
7:51 > Neighborhood church defined.
12:10 > 3 Phases explained.
14:50 > Roles Explained. (Venue Host, Service Host, Hospitality)
21:00 > Service formats
option 1: plug and play
option 2: part live - part video
option 3: all live (teaching and/or worship)
25:56 > short recap
Last one: 27:00 > Proximity and geography
What do we do at this moment when they are speaking to churches to “regather”? I’m sure you’ve been more missional and open to pivoting during this time.
What’s the best route? Do we open, do we not?
Robert and Mingo use the microsite experience.
What is a neighborhood church verse a home church?
What’s the WHY behind the WHAT of a neighborhood church?
The past three months have been a blur. We’ve been doing a shelter in place church experiences with growth groups meeting over Zoom and youth meetings over Instagram and Tik Tok. We’ve been honoring the not coming together to respect our community and government.
Imagine gathering 3-5 families or households, and we are calling this a neighborhood church. The microsite model is being retooled into a neighborhood church to build it uniquely for your community.
Some benefits of microsites are to gather people who live in the neighborhood. You get to know your neighbor and get to know people who frequent the area.
Now in this season, people are concerned about their physical health…
A neighborhood church is “an open community that gathers by the dozens, connecting in homes, apartments, dorms, parks, and backyards to host particular services and churches.”
You aren’t getting together more than 20 folks.
You could also do this in a local business or a beach.
Right now, we are considering neighborhood churches and dealing with heavy restrictions here in California.
Make sure:
Everyone is masked
Everyone is 6 feet apart in all directions
You are only allowed up to 25% of that room’s capacity
Then you have to cap it at 100 individuals
Do you have a CONCERN? And are you saying “Hey, I want to run a church, but I don’t’ want to deal with all the things of running a service”...
Here are the essential components of running a microsite/neighborhood church. There will be three main roles, plus helping hands.
3 Roles of a Neighborhood Church:
Venue Host - they come to your condo or home, and you communicate with the team how many people we can have couches for.
Service Host - the logistics of what will go into an actual service. Be ready with a quick devo even if it doesn’t match the message, and you won’t fail. You need to know how the service will go...like two songs of worship, announcements, and we are studying the book of James, an opportunity to pray for people and discussion questions.
Service hosts, you just need to watch the YouTube video to prepare for the Sunday service.