The room was cold. Too cold. It's not uncommon for there to be a certain level of discomfort in the early morning hours on a Sunday morning when we turn the lights on at 6:30 AM. In many ways, the old church building doesn't want to stir from its slumber on a chilly day anymore then it's congregation does. But this was different. The room wasn't chilly. The room was worse than that. It was... frigid. I had been warned the night before that the temperature seemed below normal inside our facility, but it seemed like water was still moving through the radiator pipes, and a simple reset in the morning should do the trick. Long story short, it didn't. The church sanctuary was 48°, and our boiler wasn't going to be fixable by our staff or our key volunteers.

After gathering and assigning every space heater we could find for our children's ministry department, our team made the decision to move our Sunday worship gathering from our sanctuary space to our dining hall. It was a balmy 58° in that room, and with lower ceilings throughout it could be warmed up with body heat if we were particularly energetic worshippers. This meant we would need to cancel our early morning electives, and get the word out to our congregation with very little notice. This meant that our sound and media team(s) would have to arrive early to a cold building, unplug and move all of their equipment, and still not have it work correctly. This meant that we would need every available chair in the dining hall, every movable piece of signage relocated, and every available volunteer repositioned. 

Sunday was a beautiful and special time for our church. It's not often that we require 30-40% of our people to actively engage in a weekly service. Often, a few people can come in early and everyone else trickles in later. As the old saying goes, "many hands make light work." Our people were much also more aware of new guests, and the need to direct them to a different location. Finally, what could be heard over and over again was how good it was to sit in a new location with a different group of people. We heard how nice it was to be bunched together for a change, and how good it was to work together to pull it off. Yes, when the boiler failed, we won!
                                                                           

- Pastor Milo
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At Randall Church, we intentionally plan out our preaching calendar to include a quarterly rotation of speakers with varying teaching styles, and diversity in ministry focuses. While we all work within the same sermon series and texts, we find that changing things up periodically is not only healthy for us, but good for the congregation as well. Internally, we refer to the specific individual giving the sermon as the "communicator." We use this term, because the mandate of the pastor is to share the truth of God's Word Sunday after Sunday. The pastor's sermon must be clear, concise, and compelling in a way that communicates that truth from theory into action.

There are 3 common mistakes that EVERY PASTOR MAKES when communicating his message(s).  

1. We say too much. I have yet to hear someone tell me that my sermon was too short.
2. We assume people are listening. I know as well as you do; that you didn't catch my 7th bullet point.
3. We share details with no heart. I rarely get feedback on content. I usually get it from personal stories.

There are 3 common mistakes that EVERY CHURCH MAKES when communicating its message(s). 

1. We say too much. When we throw everything at people, we find that nothing sticks.
2. We assume people are listening. People aren't always attending / attentive, and we aren't responsive.
3. We share details with no heart. It's not what we want from people, it's what we want for people. 

This is what we at Randall Church are working on. Constantly. We continue to work at it in our sermons, and we continue to work on it with our general communication strategy. Why? Because once I am disengaged, then I begin to process the information as: this is irrelevant; church is irrelevant; God is irrelevant; the Bible is irrelevant. And all of a sudden I am learning the opposite lesson. Instead, let me share with you that the Gospel is alive! Let it ring out clearly that there is a place for you here. Find your place: Upward in Christ. Inward at the Church, and Outward in the Community.

 - Pastor Milo
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