Ten Tips for Reconnecting

By Paul Richardson, Reconnecting Ministries coordinator for the Seventh-Day Adventist Church in North America.

Would you like your church to become a magnet for missing members and others who have stopped attending? Here are some suggestions to help you make it a reality.

  1. Make a list of people you know who are not presently attending church. Pray specifically for each of them, asking god to bless their lives abundantly.
  2. Select three friends from the list and identify things you used to do with them that you could do again to create a renewed connection.
  3. Contact each person as the Spirit of God prompts you that the timing is right. Let your initial conversation revolve around how much you have enjoyed that person’s friendship and that you’re looking for a way to reconnect. Don’t recoil if your experience initial reticence or rejection.
  4. Communicate in every way that you and the others at church are no better than they (we are all in need of grace) and that you and the others at church are diminished because you are not together.
  5. Find a way to meet on neutral ground. Go back to your list of things in common and do them together now, or find new activities that currently resonate with your friend.
  6. Let friendship be enough. Ask God to calm your heart and mind about their lack of church attendance. This will happen as Providence provides. You are not responsible for the timing.
  7. Be real with your friends as you reconnect. Admit your struggles with God and other Christians, if that is your experience. Presenting yourself as a perfect person will not help you reconnect.
  8. Listen to what they tell you about their lives. When appropriate, ask about their family, work or spiritual experience. Notice where they have relational pain.
  9. Apologize for pain that has been caused by church people. Ask them to give a small group of authentic inclusive friends a chance to make amends through meeting with them for fellowship.
  10. Advocate for them (especially when they are not around) with church people. Let the regular members know how spiritual these inactive members are and how much their friendship means to you and a number of others. Ask active members to withhold unfounded judgments of people they really don’t understand or regularly connect with.