Welcome to Our Church


Book Description

When is the best time to seat a latecomer? How can you be friendly to visitors without overwhelming them? What should you do if someone faints during the worship service? It's natural to have these questions as an usher or greeter. You can find the answer to these questions and more in Welcome to Our Church. This book will help ushers and greeters learn how to make visitors and members feel welcome, handle large crowds of people and noisy children, prepare for emergencies and problem situations, and usher special services like weddings and funerals.




Welcome to a Life of Faith in the Episcopal Church


Book Description

Perfect for newcomers and confirmation classes The Episcopal Church has a language and a practice all its own. For a newcomer, these can seem intimidating at first glance. This book takes readers through a Sunday worship experience, and explains the what, the why, and the how of what they might encounter. Worship is explained, with a quick survey of the Book of Common Prayer, along with frequently encountered vocabulary. How we read the Bible and what we believe about core points of theology are also discussed, especially as these points may differ from what many people assume to be Christian norms. How faith is practiced and its connection to our social and moral lives is discussed. What is the Jesus Movement and how can the Way of Love be lived every day? Finally, a short overview of Episcopal history is included, for the visitor who wonders how we came to be here. The book concludes with a few of the most frequently asked questions by adults who join the Episcopal Church.




Becoming a Welcoming Church


Book Description

Most church members don't see their churches clearly. In almost all of Thom S. Rainer's consultations, church members perceive their church to be friendly. But as he surveyed guests, he found that the guests typically saw church members as unfriendly. The perception chasm existed because the members were indeed friendly . . . to one another. The guests felt like they crashed a private party. Bestselling author Thom Rainer (I Am a Church Member, Autopsy of a Deceased Church) has a game plan for churches to become more hospitable. In a format that is suitable for church members to read individually or study together, Rainer guides readers toward a practical framework for making a difference for those who visit their church. Churches may use Becoming a Welcoming Church to assess and audit where they are on a spectrum between welcoming and wanting. Additionally, churches can use the companion book We Want You Here to send guests home with a compelling vision for what pastors want every guest to know when they visit.




Welcome to the Episcopal Church


Book Description

The perfect book for inquirers and new members, as well as current Church members who may be unfamiliar with some of the Church s history, beliefs, and practices. This new introduction to the history, polity, spirituality, worship, and outreach of the Episcopal Church is written in an easy-to-read conversational tone, and includes study questions at the end of each chapter, making it an excellent resource for adult parish study and inquirers' classes."




Radical Welcome


Book Description

A theological, inspirational, and practical guide for congregations that want to move beyond diversity and inclusion to present a vision for the church of the future: one where the transforming gifts, voices, and power of marginalized cultures and groups bring new life to the mainline church.




Wide Welcome


Book Description

Jessicah Krey Duckworth presents the stark differences between the established congregation, which cares for current members and congregational identity, and the disestablished one, which gains purpose and identity in the task of relating to the newcomer. By allowing the questions, insights, and experiences of newcomers to reverberate through the entire congregation, both they and the church are changed. Wide Welcome does far more than point out the faults and weaknesses in current practice. Duckworth intentionally lays out possible designs for newcomer welcome that are local and particular. Book jacket.




Welcome to a Reformed Church


Book Description

Daniel Hyde traces the historical roots of the Reformed churches, their key beliefs, and the ways in which those beliefs are expressed. The result is a roadmap for those newly encountering the Reformed world and a primer for those seeking to know more about their Reformed heritage.




Welcome to the Christian Faith


Book Description

A foundational volume for seekers in formation programs and a “refresher” study volume for individuals and congregational study groups. We live in a world increasingly separated from the Christian tradition and the basic understanding of the faith that previous ages might have taken for granted. The voices of faith seem increasingly strident and off-putting to many. There is a need for a calmer, basic introduction to faith that recognizes the value of doubt and the questions raised in a secular society. A systematic introduction to Christianity for newcomers needs to begin with a discussion of faith itself and then move on to a discussion of such Christian basics as God, Trinity, Church, sin, atonement, prayer, and Christian living.




Welcome to the Orthodox Church


Book Description

Welcome to the Orthodox Church—its history, theology, worship, spirituality, and daily life. This friendly guide provides a comprehensive introduction to Orthodoxy, but with a twist: readers learn by making a series of visits to a fictitious church, and get to know the faith as new Christians did for most of history, by immersion. Mathews-Green provides commentary and explanations on everything from how to “venerate” an icon, the Orthodox understanding of the atonement, to the Lenten significance of tofu. It’s the perfect book for inquirers and newcomers, but even readers who have been Orthodox all their lives say they learned things they never knew before. Enjoyable, easy-to-read, and leavened with humor, Welcome to the Orthodox Church is a gracious guide to the ancient faith of the Christian East.




Weird Church


Book Description

A wake-up call to anyone who still thinks church revitalization is simply a matter of doing better the things that used to come so easily. However, for the innovators whose ministries cannot fully be measured or understood by the old paradigms of members and money, Weird Church offers compelling vindication and encouragement that may cause them to stand and cheer