Reaching the Church’s Local Neighborhood
Including Prayer Walks with Invitations to Local Neighborhoods
– The pastor does not need to spearhead this initiative but should be kept apprised of its direction and timetable by key intercessors.
– If the church is planning a musical or play in the near future, church leaders should seriously consider inviting the local residents. The event should be well planned in advance and not thrown together at the last moment. First impressions are important.
– Choose the neighborhood areas that you would like to invite.
– The invitations should be generic and can be typed on church letterhead. A real signature should appear under the pastor’s name and title. Volunteers can help to sign the invitations. Each signed invitation should be enclosed in an envelope & sealed. The outer envelope should be rubber stamped indicating “Invitation” on the face of the envelope. The rubber stamp’s print should be in color and large.
– The invitations will be hand delivered.
– Before hand delivering the generic invitations to neighborhood residents, the intercessors might want to consider doing a prayer walk. This is a quiet walk where intercessors take turns praying for each home as they walk through the neighborhood. The method can be decided in advance by the prayer group.
– If inclement weather makes a prayer walk impossible, you can obtain a list of resident names per street at your local town hall. The intercessors can determine a timetable to pray over the individual names of each resident by house number and street as they are led by the Holy Spirit.
– Once the initial prayer walk or indoor intercessory prayer meeting has taken place, the intercessors should return to the neighborhood homes to hand deliver the invitations. Most residents appreciate a hand delivered invitation. The intercessors can break into teams of two each. Individual teams can knock on doors to hand deliver the invitations.
– Once contact is made, you should also ask the resident if he would like to have someone pray for either him or a family member. Prayer request forms should be readily accessible.
– If the resident is not available or does not answer the door bell, the invitation can be left safely as a doorknob hanger. The doorknob hanger should be prepared in advance. This is accomplished by placing the envelope in a large zip-lock bag and pulling a ribbon through a tiny hole in the bag. The ribbon can be used as the hanger. This way the invitation is clearly visible to the resident and remains safe from inclement weather.
– Do not leave the invitation in the mailbox. This is against post office regulations.
– Scheduling the distribution of the invitations should be given serious thought. You don’t want to distribute the invitations so far in advance that people forget about the event. Nor do you want to distribute the invitation at the last moment so that people can’t properly plan their time to attend the event.
– On the day of the church event, ushers should be aware of anyone from the neighborhood attending the event. A pleasant and cordial greeting should always be offered the visitor. An usher’s cheerfulness is the first impression that a new visitor receives and it can make an enormous difference in the church’s atmosphere. The pastor should make a point of personally greeting anyone in the pews that he/she hasn’t seen before. The pastor should always indicate that his door is always open to their inquiries.
– It’s important to note that even if a church event is not planned or proves unlikely, intercessors can still do prayer walks throughout the church’s surrounding neighborhoods. Prayer requests can still be taken on a door to door basis. A list of resident names per street can still be acquired by visiting your local town hall. These prayer activities don’t always have to be premised on a church event taking place. Back To Top
