Home Visitation: It Can Be Effective
Marshall Shelley
No other single factor makes a greater difference in improving annual membership additions than an immediate visit to the homes of first-time worshipers.
Herb Miller
Visitation: the image that immediately comes to mind is of knocking on a stranger's door as the glow from a television leaks through the front drapes. What's this person going to think of me? you're likely to worry in such a situation. Am I going to interrupt a favorite program? Will they want to talk, or will they resent my visit? And perhaps most troubling of all, Is it really going to make any difference?
To find out, Leadership surveyed nearly seven hundred people who had been contacted in the course of a year by the calling programs of three diverse churches. Marshall Shelley, managing editor of Leadership, studied the results and reports on what people think about being visited in their homes. Besides describing how people respond, he explains what approaches led to the best results.
What do they really think — those people we call on? Do they associate church visitation teams with the assorted cultists who go door knocking and pamphlet peddling? How many people are glad to see us, and how many feel we're invading their privacy?
They're normally civil, perhaps even polite — but pastor and lay volunteers wonder, What do they say after we've left? And more important, What effect, if any, did this visit have?
To find out, Leadership surveyed nearly seven hundred people who had been contacted in the past year by the calling programs of three diverse congregations: Galilee Baptist Church in Denver, Colorado; Bismark Reformed Church in Bismarck, North Dakota; and Big Valley Grace Community Church in Modesto, California.
Each of these churches has weekly visitation ...
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