Easter is over.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
You made it.
The single biggest Sunday of the year is over. All of those long meetings, extra hours, and sleepless nights paid off. People heard about Jesus in your church on Sunday. Well done.
We could talk for hours about all of the amazing that happened in your churches. And we could probably talk for hours about all of the funny things that happened, too.
That?s another conversation for another day. For now, though, we must pause and ask this question:
?Now what??
The biggest Sunday of the year is over. What next? Sure, you may be tempted to immerse yourself in Mother?s Day planning, VBS designs, or student camp prep. All of those are good things, but let?s hold off.
Before racing to the next thing, you need to review the last thing. In other words, take a few minutes to reflect on all of the work you did. You invested a ton into your weekend experience. Why not take time to discover what you can (and should) learn for all of your hard work?
If you don?t know where to start in that process, you are in the right place. Here are five things you should consider when recapping Easter weekend:
Take an honest look at the numbers.
Many churches think their enormous bump in attendance is all new people. Maybe, but more than likely that?s not the case. Some research indicates about 1/3 of churchgoers go just once or twice a month. What does that mean? Everyone who normally comes to your church with any frequency shows up on Easter Sunday. Yes, you have new folks. But many of those people are folks who attend at some point throughout the year.
Thank those who worked so hard.
Especially volunteers. Remember: your volunteers don?t get to take off Monday because they spent so much time working at the church on Easter Sunday. That massive time investment is important, and they need to know their work is critical to what happens in your church.
Consider what went well in?the service.
What new elements did you have in your Sunday service? How did it go? Make sure to celebrate wins and thank those who contributed to those wins. It?s easy to focus on what went wrong and what you learn from it. Yet you can learn as much from what went well as from what went wrong.
Review what could have been avoided.
Some things are unpredictable, like a lightning storm hitting right before you dump eggs from a helicopter. Other problems, though, arise from a planning error. If that happened to you, acknowledge what happened, figure out how to fix it, and make sure you consider it moving forward.
Decide what you can do consistently that was?special to Easter.
Many Easter services feature something new or different. If it worked or was well received, consider how you can add that into your services more often. For example, I once worked at a church that had one service with a choir and one with a band. We combined the two on Easter, and the result was incredible. Moving forward, that blended music style became a highlight for many on special Sundays.
All of these things, though, lead to one big idea:
Sunday?s coming.
We get all ramped up over Easter. Rightly so. It?s the day we celebrate the event that defines our faith.
Don?t forget, though, that this Sunday is a day to celebrate that, too. Early Christians moved corporate worship to Sundays as a way to remember Christ?s resurrection.
So as you prepare for this Sunday,
- Remember to get all of the details right like you did for Easter.
- Remember this Sunday could be someone?s first time hearing the gospel.
- Remember to celebrate Jesus and what He did for us.
Easter is a day of celebration. Don?t relegate that to once a year. Make it a weekly occurrence.
Photo by?freestocks.org?on?Unsplash
