TeleTouch
Ministry
Reach out and touch someone," the ad urges. The message is that telephoning
can be a personal, sensitive way to contact family and friends. With
a telephone in nearly every American household, churches are discovering
the telephone as a tool for ministry in the congregation and community.
A phone ministry can provide several benefits.
- It offers a ministry opportunity to more people. Shut-ins can be
involved in a telephone ministry.
- It raises the morale of the congregation.
- It elevates the sense of community in the church.
- It provides opportunities for people to build relationships.
- It increases visitor flow and retention.
- It provides better care to the congregation.
- It decreases the number of dropouts.
- It increases overall attendance.
General Guidelines for
TeleTOUCH Ministry
You first need to determine your objectives. Do you want: an
ongoing visitor follow-up program, a care ministry for your members,
to start a branch Sunday school, or to discover new prospects?
Then you must develop a strategy that is compatible with the ministry
objectives. (Several plans are included in the new TeleTOUCH Ministry
Manual [order number 714-899, $2.95] from the Sunday
School Promotion and Training Department.)
Prepare your materials. If you want to discover prospects or
follow up on visitors, put together information packets about your church
and ministries. If you are doing a community survey, design the survey
instrument. If you are advertising an event, prepare the promotional
piece(s).
Enlist and train your TeleTOUCH ministers. Communicate the ministry's
mission, its value, and the caller's responsibilities. Role play the
approach before making calls.
Keep accurate records such as the number of calls made, number
of positive responses, number of rejections, those who attend another
church, those who accept information, those who don't want information.
Structuring TeleTOUCH Ministry
for Member Care and Visitor Follow-up
The following structure can be used for the Sunday School, youth, singles----all
ministries of the church. This approach fosters increased lay participation,
visitor retention, and member attendance.
Divide the church into groups of five households. Over each group place
a TeleTOUCH minister. Over every five ministers, place an area minister,
and over every five area ministers, place a regional minister. (It is
possible to expand each level from five to ten if necessary.)
For follow-up, assign each visitor to a TeleTOUCH minister on a rotating
basis, or set up a TeleTOUCH team to follow up on visitors/guests.
The reasons for TeleTOUCH ministries for members vary somewhat from
those for visitors. For members your goals are to: provide love and
care, discover and pray about needs, encourage involvement in Sunday
School and other ministries, and recruit volunteers for service.
With visitors your goals are to: give love and encouragement, pray
for needs, watch for evangelism opportunities, encourage attendance
in the pastor's Welcome Class, and provide information about specific
ministries to meet needs.
Enlisting and Training
a TeleTOUCH Ministry Team
The team's purpose is to call homes in the church's ministry area and
ask those who do not attend another local church regularly whether they
would like to have information about your church and its ministries.
Two weeks later call back to ask follow-up questions.
When you recruit your team, go over the following responsibilities
with each one. A TeleTOUCH minister is expected to:
- Sign up for a specific time to make calls during prime time hours.
These are 5 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to
1 p.m. Saturday.
- Send packets of information to interested prospects.
- Call prospects 2 weeks later to ask if they have received the information,
if they have any questions, or if someone from the church may come
by for 10 or 15 minutes to meet them.
- Keep a record of all calls and responses, channeling reports to
appropriate people. On the records note specifically those who regularly
attend other local churches, those who adamantly don't want information,
and those who don't want information but don't seem adamant. This
last group might be called again in 2 or 3 months.
Is the phone for you? If you are looking for a great way to reach out
and touch people in a busy world, it may be. Why not give it a try?
The new TeleTOUCH Ministry manual from the Sunday School Promotion
and Training Department includes sample scripts for the calls, complete
ministry descriptions, information for training TeleTOUCH ministers,
and TeleTOUCH ministry forms.
Other resources
- Touch and Keep. R.L. Whitworth, GPH (less than $15).
- Reap and Keep. Jonathan Wakefield (Call Growth/Evangelism
consultant in the Sunday School Promotion and Training Department.)
- Telereach. Convention Press (less than $10).
- Get In Touch - Keep In Touch, Convention Press (less than
$10).
