On a typical weekend, Christ?s Church of the Valley has a huge number of volunteers working. On any given weekend, they have around 5,000 volunteers serving at the services. Considering they see about 23,000 people at their services each weekend, that?s a huge percentage.
On most big weekends, like Easter and Christmas, they see a 30-40% increase in attendance. This Easter was no different. So to prepare for this increase, they beefed up all areas where they needed volunteers. They matched the increase in people by adding an extra 30-40% of active volunteers for the Easter services.
The parking lot attendants saw the biggest increase. CCV calls the parking lot team Lifeguards. It?s probably on of the coolest parts of their church, because it?s a highly energetic, well-oiled machine. They direct traffic, monitor crosswalks, and keep people from getting run over. Their parking lots get crazy on the weekends.
They also selected their best volunteers for each role?knowing that this was their big chance to create an amazing experience for many first-time guests. They even (and usually do this on big weekends) encouraged all the staff spouses to plan on volunteering. They communicated early that they?d need more volunteers than normal, and the spouses were happy to fill in where needed.
Because the church gets so excited about the large numbers of new people they see on these big weekends, like Christmas and Easter, they have no problem getting volunteers to sign up for these valuable roles. There?s always a big buzz about these weekends. So people are eager to step up and serve.
Planning the Funnel
Their goal with this whole service was to reach both believers in their congregation and the guests they knew would attend. They accomplished this by creating a sort of funnel with their service. They began the service in a way that made it very accessible to guests. They didn?t have any intense spiritual things at the top of the service. They had fun, created elements?like a Queen medley, a video about Mohammed Ali, and a slam poet.
But as they got closer to the sermon, they began to narrow the funnel down to where their current attendees were. They guided the first-timers or uninitiated to a more spiritual focus.
The end goal was to make it easy for their congregation to invite their neighbors and friends. Their congregation knew they?d hear the gospel message, but their guests wouldn?t be beat over the head with that moment. The goal was to break down walls and bring everyone along for the journey.
