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Yet, are you maximizing the use and impact of your space as your church connects with and serves your congregation and the community?

Many of the churches we work with are taking a strategic and fresh look at their space and property!

They are looking to see who is around them, what their community needs and how they can support and bless more people through their facilities, property and any related resources.

For example, do you have vacant rooms or spaces that are being utilized just one or two days a week? 

Do you have recreational space, fields or outdoor space that often is unused?

We encourage you to take a look around at what God has given you and consider the possibilities of how that space could be maximized to welcome and help others between Sundays.

To learn more, one of our church clients is bringing together local community leaders—in what they call a Community Leadership Council—every other month to encourage networking, idea sharing and more collaboration to serve their local community. This group of about 12-14 people meets to talk about who their community is and what their needs are (they’ve been sharing research/data points and anecdotal stories as well). Then, they explore how the church and these leaders/their organizations and others can serve people together with even more impact.

In the end, this church is aiming to collaborate more with others to serve. They are offering up their space and planning to fill their space with more activity and services to bless the families and people of their community. They are continually looking at research, talking to others and considering how they can utilize their space differently and more often.

Here are a few questions this church and Community Leadership Council has been asking throughout this process that might help kick-start a similar process for your church:

• “Who are the individuals/organizations in our community who want to serve our community?” ... “How might we partner with them to learn together, impact our community and evolve the use of our space/resources?”

Who is part of your congregation? Who else do you know or who else can you build a relationship with? Developing a team of trusted community leaders who want to learn, serve and lead together could be a great first step to take.

• “Who is in our community?” … “And what are the present and future needs of the people living in and near our community?”

We are guessing there are a number of needs that you are thinking of at this very moment. We would encourage you to cast the net even wider, look at some community/market research, and lean on your group of community leaders who likely know of a variety of needs and could offer valuable insight. 

• “Of those needs, which intersect best with the space and resources we have to offer?”

The needs in each community reach far and wide. It will be important to consider which ones are at the heart of your church and that your church is best leveraged to meet. Considering these factors will be important steps in the discernment process. 

How is your church making the most of your opportunities to connect with others, serve and maximize the use of your space?

We encourage you to pause, consider the possibilities, collaborate with others and dream about what this could look like for you. 

Our team at Fishhook would love to help you do this! We’d love to connect and partner with you in making connections with your community to love and serve the people in each of them.