[00:00:00] So today's a quickie episode, because we know it's holy week.
[00:00:04] To just want to just do a quick checklist of last minute Easter details that I think really matter
[00:00:11] and can be tweaked or adjusted as you prep and plan for Easter Sunday.
[00:00:17] Welcome to episode 332.
[00:00:19] Easter may not be as big an outreach as Christmas but it's a much bigger in-reach.
[00:00:24] People on your roles as well as some guests often come out with a big church holiday.
[00:00:29] Here's a quick checklist to make sure you're ready.
[00:00:32] That's today on The Reclaimed Leader.
[00:00:41] Hey everyone, welcome to episode 332 of The Reclaimed Leader.
[00:00:45] I'm Jason Tucker back with Jesse Skiffington in real time.
[00:00:48] It is holy week.
[00:00:50] Man, it's here.
[00:00:51] It's upon us.
[00:00:53] Yeah, whether we like it or not, ready or not, where it's game on.
[00:00:57] And so, you know, I don't know.
[00:01:00] At the same time, what a cool time where we get to stop and reflect on really what's at the heart of our faith.
[00:01:07] We were thinking about what is the meaning of the cross?
[00:01:10] What does it mean that Jesus suffered and died for us and took the center of the world on himself?
[00:01:15] I mean, it's a powerful, it's what we need to be doing as Christians.
[00:01:20] To remind ourselves of the gospel that Jesus died and rose again.
[00:01:23] But there's a lot of moving pieces this time of year that sometimes as a pastor, I go,
[00:01:27] if we could just like open the Bible up and read the stories and reflect on it and then just be done.
[00:01:33] And all the production of Easter and Holy Week, it's a lot.
[00:01:36] It's a lot to tackle and a lot of logistics that we have to keep in mind even as we're trying to be faithful to proclaim this good news.
[00:01:43] Yeah, you know, it's funny.
[00:01:44] It's it's a time that is very life giving and at the same time, life draining.
[00:01:48] There's a lot of stress involved in making sure all the pieces are together as some pastors like myself,
[00:01:54] writing multiple sermons because you have some Holy Week services that you're doing.
[00:01:58] So, you know, it's it's a lot and Easter, of course, is a big deal.
[00:02:03] It's not as big an outreach as Christmas anymore.
[00:02:07] It maybe was once but it's not as big an outreach as Christmas.
[00:02:12] But here's what I think. I actually think it packs a bigger punch because the cross, the empty tomb,
[00:02:20] the hope of the gospel is unveiled, made plain.
[00:02:24] And there's sort of no cultural Easter bunny really doesn't have as much pull as Santa Claus, right?
[00:02:30] So there's not as much to cut through to get to the gospel.
[00:02:34] So you won't get as many visitors but I feel like the receptive,
[00:02:38] the visitors you have to the gospel is much higher.
[00:02:41] Yeah, well and it's getting to the core, some of the core fundamental questions of human existence.
[00:02:45] Why am I here? What happens when I die? Is there a reason to believe there's something more?
[00:02:50] I mean all of it that the resurrection really is the center piece of the Christian faith.
[00:02:54] And so it is, it's great and it's exciting and and and a good time.
[00:02:59] I think you're you're also right that it's not the time when maybe you have the most people come.
[00:03:04] But it is that time that for those who are there, there's an opportunity to hear the gospel in its holy.
[00:03:11] Yes. And I think that's that's what you're getting at.
[00:03:14] In some ways Christmas is the beginning of the good news about Jesus, the Messiah, the son of Abraham, the son of David, right?
[00:03:20] Back in the beginning of Matthew or whatever.
[00:03:22] But here we get the full story of Jesus' life death and resurrection.
[00:03:27] Yeah, Christmas is the promise Easter is the proof as it said.
[00:03:32] Okay, so today we are just and by the way, I think maybe another way to say it is that Easter is more about in reach that outreach.
[00:03:40] I think there's a lot of folks on your roles that show it for Easter even more than people that you know.
[00:03:44] Yeah, I think that spot on. I find that tracks with me, you know, you get you get less of the let's come and light the candles.
[00:03:50] Christmas Eve, you know, that just because it feels good to do that versus people who are coming because it's Easter and it's what they do.
[00:03:56] But they maybe it sparks the gospel story in their hearts again.
[00:03:59] Yeah, okay. Hey, so today's a quickie episode because we know it's holy week obviously and you got plenty of things to do.
[00:04:08] So we thought what would be the most helpful thing to do?
[00:04:11] To just want me to do a quick checklist of last minute, Easter details that I think really matter and can be tweaked or adjusted as you prep and plan for Easter Sunday.
[00:04:23] All right. How's that sound? Okay.
[00:04:25] Okay. So five areas because we always have five, I think but no, it just sort of worked out to five.
[00:04:33] So I'm going to talk about each of the following things first impressions which we've been on a role with guest services the last few episodes so good logistics.
[00:04:43] Right? Who's doing what when preaching is preaching is really, really critical all the time, but particularly on Easter music.
[00:04:53] And then last impressions what we hope they'll take with them as they walk out the door.
[00:04:58] All right, so here we go first impressions.
[00:05:01] Let's start with your physical campus, your physical environments.
[00:05:07] Just making sure that you, your staff or your custodian or somebody goes around some volunteers can go around and just have eyes on the property.
[00:05:17] Look, I mean on it, it's really not that, you know, earth shattering of advice.
[00:05:23] But guests are coming over to your house. Are you ready to receive them? Does it look like you're preparing for them to come is the grass cut some of you maybe have to get the grass already went out there yet, but you know is or all the leaves kind of raked out.
[00:05:39] And then you know, I mean, I think it's really good to look at the looking looking good. It's like, you know, when I was a kid and have.
[00:05:46] You know mom, mom makes it clean every part of the house right whether people are going to be in there or not so.
[00:05:52] How does it look? It doesn't mean like oh my gosh we got a paint the nursery this week that's a little too much pressure but can you clean it?
[00:05:59] Can you get some magic erase on some walls? So again, it's just making sure that you are putting your best foot forward as you're receiving company.
[00:06:07] So it creates a welcoming environment. It puts people at ease if they're to walk in and see just like a huge mess, it would stress them out and we don't want to do that unnecessarily.
[00:06:17] We want them to be feel comfortable as they're walking the door.
[00:06:20] Well, and I think there's also a sense of pride of place when people take care of this. You know, you're it's a good excuse Easter is a good excuse to get people to work on the church and clean things up.
[00:06:30] You know, you can do a spring clean up that we do always the week before Easter because it's sort of an excuse to work on the grounds, pull some weeds maybe things that kind of went haywire over the winter months and just kind of make it look.
[00:06:42] Presented and like someone lives here and you care about it and you were glad you're here too and so I think that's just wise advice first impressions.
[00:06:50] Maybe walk around and if there's you know something that got stacked up in a corner during the winter months and you're like okay it's a good excuse to deal with some of that stuff so beyond first impressions.
[00:07:00] It gives you a reason just to do things that maybe have been getting put off or whatever so.
[00:07:05] And just do what we all do in our own houses to shove it in the closet.
[00:07:08] You have guests coming over it's time to get ready so I don't know about you Jason but we're not very good at having guests over in a dirty house and like just stressful so clean it up make it look good it's going to be better.
[00:07:21] It's good excuse again it's it sounds like something really simple and small and it sort of is but it really does make a big difference when you're welcoming people into your church okay first impressions long those lines is in addition to that listen to what we've been talking about the last weeks about having people at the door to welcome and create and create a hospital.
[00:07:37] And create a hospital environment and there are going to be a lot of newer people who may not know where to go or what to do or how to do it so be ready to welcome.
[00:07:45] Yeah and if you missed our last few episodes starting with Stan Ott and Lee Zemer and then we didn't episode on starting a guest services team and then we just hot off the press came off Greg Atkinson's conversation which was fantastic.
[00:07:59] Pay attention to your guest services even if you don't have a guest services team right now it can you identify at least one person in your church to be your special Easter.
[00:08:10] Consigliary like can they be the welcomeer and can they just make sure that people know where to go and where to be.
[00:08:18] And the goal is from parking lots of you right are parking lot to chair what does that look like to welcome people so we don't always have parking lot attendance we make sure we have some volunteers on Easter.
[00:08:30] Or help and people to find a parking place but you know it's not really just about that it's about.
[00:08:35] A smiling face waving them welcoming them from the moment they enter our driveway yeah yeah because as Greg said seven minutes in their deciding if they want to come back or not.
[00:08:47] Yeah well and for me I was kind of think in terms of like man maybe people don't want to be bothered on Easter like they just want to be with their family i'm talking about our people like so don't ask them to help with stuff I find more often than not people want to be helpful to have other people experience.
[00:09:02] The church that they love and they want to help people to do that so don't be shy about kind of ramping up your team for this you know really important week in the life of the church.
[00:09:13] Yeah so first impressions matter second logistics this is often overlooked in a lot of our preparation because I don't know Jesse.
[00:09:23] I know you got into being a pastor so that you can run logistics on everything because that's you know that's just.
[00:09:29] No sure exactly what I felt called to this was just nuts and bolts give me spreadsheets nothing but spreadsheets.
[00:09:35] But you just want to make sure that it's you have some clarity around who is responsible for what right and when and and this is to do with volunteer expectations and or if you have a staff.
[00:09:48] You know clarity around your staff what's everybody doing does everybody know their role what is it going to take for us to make sure that we have the best possible experience for our worshipers.
[00:10:01] And again this is ordination if you do have a volunteer in the parking lot if you got someone behind a desk or or guest services person.
[00:10:09] If you are going to offer Sunday school not everybody does we actually don't offer Sunday school on Easter Sunday we encourage kids to sit with their families.
[00:10:17] We have I think for the little little's we offer something we offer some care but you know what does that look like for you and just make sure don't take for granted everybody knows exactly what they're supposed to be doing.
[00:10:28] Do you have some sort of special snack on Easter I know old school churches would do like hot cross buns or some cool thing like that.
[00:10:35] Do you know who's doing what and when how is everything how is the coffee getting set up and made and delivered is it any different than usual.
[00:10:43] Just take one more look at the logistics so that something doesn't fall through the cracks.
[00:10:48] Yeah I think and a really good way to do that is you know if you're using something like planning center on a regular basis or you have a worship planning software or just you write it out.
[00:10:56] What the word of service is going to be add to that the additional logistics for Easter Sunday if you have a giveaway like we have these little activity bags that we give the kids on Easter so there's little coloring pages and there's different things who's doing that who's responsible for for what and getting it out of paper.
[00:11:14] I think more than anything for me I really trust our team to pull off stuff but what it does for me is it gives me peace of mind and confidence that we we have it all covered.
[00:11:24] And we're and if there is something that jumps off the page that is kind of slipping through the cracks we can address it before we get to Sunday.
[00:11:31] And I think that's just important so good reminder logistics maybe take a few more minutes to think through the whole day what do you need to get down on paper who do you need to fall up with and make sure everything's in place.
[00:11:42] So that as a leader or as the preacher or whoever you can have some peace of mind and enjoy that day too and not be chasing cats on Easter morning.
[00:11:50] Yeah because you want to be present right you want to be present to people in Easter morning and that's really hard to do when you're just thinking in the back your head.
[00:11:57] Yeah we sometimes add different kinds of things maybe you add a video or you do different things that you don't normally do on a Sunday or like activity bags we don't do those every week right so but
[00:12:08] when you have things that are unique that's where the ball gets dropped sometimes because it's not the usual routine so just warrants a little extra time and attention to make sure it comes off seamlessly gives a good impression and creates a great experience for not only for the new people but for your church people as well.
[00:12:27] Yeah okay first impressions logistics number three preaching.
[00:12:32] Jesse what am I going to say about preaching you know what I say every Christmas in Easter right you just play a video from a sermon that you liked from before is what you do right.
[00:12:41] I just find a good one and then put it on the screen I think is what you're going to tell us to do no as I say give the mac and cheese.
[00:12:49] Yeah that's the mac and cheese don't throw jalapenos in there it's not that kind of Sunday listen this is the opportunity preachers and I remind myself of this every single time given the gospel especially on Easter.
[00:13:03] It sometimes because you're reading the gospel narratives and you read them every year there's a sense that because you're so familiar with them you feel like oh my gosh we just preached on this you know or we just did this and it's it's not the same for the people in the room they don't remember your sermon from a year ago I'm sorry they they just don't it's not it's not too often to hear you if you did the same gospel for a few years in a row nobody really knows what I'm saying.
[00:13:32] So nobody would notice here's so don't worry about getting cute that's the temptation right is like you know maybe now is not the time Easter Sunday's not the time for in for lapsarian or super laparian break death.
[00:13:47] Is there any time for that Jason.
[00:13:51] Right you want to you want to make sure that that you're preaching is accessible and think about it this way just like you would address a room of people you need to know what do I need to know about this from people my speaking to non Christians well then it changes how I deliver my message Christians or cultural Christians or right so think about who's in the room think about those guests think about how can I engage people's hearts in something that's really easy to understand.
[00:14:20] It doesn't mean that it has to be like so simple that it's all that can also be boring right I mean you're going to offer your thoughts as a preacher but just accessibility I think is the key even more so than a elaborate precise theological construction.
[00:14:38] Yeah there's no need to get fancy and in some ways what our philosophy has turned into is as much as Easter is a unique day and important and we do some additional things.
[00:14:47] We also wanted to feel a lot like what happens on a regular basis yeah so that when come people come back they go oh this it wasn't just some special day and they did this different kind of thing so you know be yourself preach how you would normally preach but don't get fancy is what I hear you say you don't need to do anything crazy with the gospel present the gospel and it's kind of like
[00:15:10] so go with me on this it's like a team that has gotten to the Super Bowl with one strategy and then all of a sudden they try to be something they're not on Super Bowl Sunday and it doesn't track and they blow up and so be who you are do a really great version of the sort of the worshiping life of the church that you are and your preaching style and all that and trust the gospel.
[00:15:33] So you know more than anything say say say the good news and let people digest that and I think that's a winning strategy so as Jason says give them the mac and cheese nothing fancy nothing nothing crazy like helping you so I like it.
[00:15:49] And then the other piece about preaching that is both practical for us in my context and also designed for the guest and mine is aim for a shorter sermon art.
[00:16:02] Aim for just a little bit shorter if your arcs 25 minutes aim aim for 20 try and see if you can cut five minutes off that longer isn't necessarily better we have a real practical reason as well is that because of our parking lot situation in our service timing.
[00:16:18] We need to get people in and out we actually shoot for a little bit of a shorter service on Easter.
[00:16:22] And I remember Ted talks are 18 minutes I mean there's a reason that that's sort of the optimal attention span so if you can just shorten your arc because we all have our arc and preaching it and we're just we're so used to it that we don't even think about it.
[00:16:38] And our if you go back and look at your sermons are probably consistently around the same time if you could shorten the arc a little I think that will help as far as its effectiveness I think especially for guests or people who may not be able to do that.
[00:16:52] And it's not even be used to listening to sermons all that often it's it's something just to keep in mind it's something I definitely keep in mind.
[00:16:59] Yeah you can tighten it up and in some ways when you go and you write your sermon maybe it's going back through and going okay what can I pull out of here to make sure that it condenses because you're right you it's amazing how it works when you're a preacher you end up landing just about the same spot every time it is one of those crazy things so being a little more intentional about that I think is honoring those that I've gathered that day and
[00:17:22] representing the gospel you're not taking any shortcuts or taking anything away just kind of tightening it up set them in and yourself up for success.
[00:17:31] I would add this for preaching one more thing quick thing is that if you have a really compelling visual even as just one slide that will really help it will help people remember what you were talking about in the experience on Easter Sunday especially if you don't usually use slides it will be really memorable.
[00:17:49] So think about it you got away that with you know how much complaining is this going to create I get I get it but if you can if you have a way to do it I think it's a nice thing to do as a special on Easter.
[00:18:01] Yeah I like it okay so couple last thing you wanted to talk a little bit about music music music number four let's talk about music because there's lots of Easter songs I mean the Christian faith is all about you know Jesus rose again and the life we have with him so what's our what are we what's our thinking.
[00:18:19] And we're talking about music on Easter Sunday one word accessible here's what I mean now it's not the time for your worship team to teach a new song.
[00:18:32] You don't want to teach a song you want to teach a song that your congregation knows by heart this is same with him pick a hand that they don't even need to look in the him no for they just know it by heart if if you're choir is doing an anthem if it's if the anthems in another language it's not accessible.
[00:18:49] I don't let him sing a Latin or a German anthem on Easter i'm sure it's beautiful but that's not accessible even if you put the words in the bulletin or again you know if you have a contemporary service a worship team pick something tried and true that is a history.
[00:19:06] And that people that has a lot of anthem qualities to it that are really easy to sing and the sort of song that you walk out the door and you're thinking about it all week right but accessibility is the key in my opinion when it comes to music on Easter exactly accessibility and then getting your congregation singing so if you're a lot of your usual folks are singing out because they know it so well that also helps the environment and makes it makes it more accessible to people so you know thinking in terms of those kinds of things.
[00:19:36] It may not be a one to one Easter song like it's not in that part of the book or something well if it's a great song that gets people's hearts engaged and worship and singing out go for it I think we're doing who you say I am you know i'm a child of God yeah I mean that's an implication of Easter right so it's not exactly like Christ the Lord is risen today but it's going to get our people singing out and singing loud even though it's the song that's you know been around for a long time.
[00:20:06] So I think that's the one that people built out yeah that's really off to say about music all right last impressions.
[00:20:13] Yeah this is important this is I think what takes Easter from being okay we did Easter and that was awesome we celebrated to something that maybe can turn into change in habits or behaviors for people or potentially cause them to take a step closer and to community so what last last impression.
[00:20:32] So the idea is you know just like a first impression is critical I also think last impressions are critical as far as how do I want people to be thinking feeling when they walk out the door or they are they already excited about coming back so how am I caring for them well and making them feel like wow that was a really great experience they even thought of this right so one thing is again if you have some sort of special food or you know some people do donuts and.
[00:21:01] If you are a subscriber to our newsletter you know I just wrote a whole article about donuts so.
[00:21:06] But if you have something like that to give them or give away something to send them home and it's just put a smile on their face and they're feeling good it's really that's you know that's kind of it with that and then the second is are you giving them a reason to return yeah so just yeah I know you do this too on holidays from time to time is sometimes you'll either start or tease a new sermon series with some.
[00:21:31] Some sort of really practical compelling headline or or you know sort of background so that people are thinking oh you know maybe I'll come back yeah that's interesting to me I wonder what that's about so even if it just as simple as that they get them thinking in terms of taking a step back so think feel and do what you know in those kinds of terms if you're like okay I want to leave this impression with them that where they feel satisfied or good or glad they came and then what something concrete that you can invite them to do is that you can.
[00:22:00] And invite them to do even if it's not super explicit well here's our new service series and we're going to be talking about and I can't wait to explore this with you would love for you to be a part of it you know you can do it in a way that doesn't you know it's not the next step application or sermon or whatever but maybe it's just something you highlight that gives them something that they could do.
[00:22:20] I think we've done the last couple of Christmases and Easter's is two or three weeks out from Easter or Christmas we do a service project as a church in our community one of them what after Christmas in the first part of January we built a whole bunch of lunches for one of our community partners that work with
[00:22:40] homelessness arena and so we I don't know made a couple hundred lunches to just to give something to the people to come back hey we're going to be building lunches in a couple of weeks we'd love for you to be a part of that if you want to show how you know let's love and serve people and so
[00:22:55] you can give them something like that so after Easter our invitation is to go to the Adam Street families shelter which is here in the Tacoma area and we're going to clean up the grounds and play some games with the kids about three weeks after Easter and so hey if you want to be a part of making a difference in our community come back we're going to do this as shows that church isn't just for church things it's also for the sake of loving and serving your community so sermon series service projects
[00:23:23] events for the kids those are the kinds of things that can be on ramps in to a next step for people yeah I was glad that you mentioned that something that was happening like three weeks after Easter I know a lot of pastors take off the week after Easter so it may not be the week after you see that you're inviting people to what we are going to do we're going to talk about the launch of our new round of small groups because we're hoping people find something interesting that they want to be a part of and then we're going to talk about our pancake breakfast which is towards the end of the month so yeah perfect again helping us
[00:23:53] some sort of call to action or reason to come back I think is important to include and and maybe you could just think of something if you hadn't planted already there's something coming up in a couple weeks that you can tease or talk about on Easter Sunday yeah I love it
[00:24:07] but other than that hey I hope that list helps you as your preparing for this coming Sunday and I feel like Jesse we should just we should pray for our pastors and you know all the
[00:24:22] things all the people they're going to be in their churches and hopefully that we'll all make much of the gospel so let me pray for us
[00:24:33] Heavenly Father I pray for all of our pastors and churches who are seeking to do your will this Easter we get to proclaim that
[00:24:43] Jesus has risen and it has changed everything
[00:24:46] and I pray God that you give our our leaders our churches our pastors everything that they need
[00:24:53] give them the energy and the excitement of the good news and I pray that people are receptive to it
[00:25:00] that people show up to our churches that we weren't expecting but Lord that they're just moved to show up and to hear
[00:25:08] to hear about what you have done and what that means and may our churches be filled with with the old faithful and with
[00:25:17] seekers and everyone in between and may we do our best to be as faithful as possible in Jesus name. Amen
[00:25:26] All right well hey everyone as we always say ministry is hard it is so much better we'll do it together we'll catch you next week
[00:25:37] you