When you walk in most church worship services, you are typically handed some printed material. It goes by different names, but the most common and the longest standing name is “bulletin.”
There was a time that you could expect consistency in bulletins among many churches. Such is not the case today. There are differences of opinion and a variety of ideas about what should be in the church bulletin.
Rather than speculate, we conducted an informal survey among church members. We asked one simple and open-ended question: “What do you want in a church bulletin?” The respondents could give as many answers as they liked. There was much agreement on the first four items. Beyond the top four was considerably fragmented opinions.
Here are the top five responses. I list them in order of frequency of response.
- Quality. This one issue was a near unanimous response. Church members see the bulletin as a reflection on their church. They are embarrassed when the bulletin has incorrect facts or grammatical errors. They don’t want something in their bulletin to become the next “bulletin blooper.” They want the bulletin to reflect quality, not a gathering place for a collection of ancient clip art.
- Sermon notes/outline. Church members want a place to take notes on the sermon, even if the same material is on the projection screen. They want notes they can take home and study. They especially appreciate any helps, such as an outline or references.
- Order of service. Frankly, I heard some complaining about this matter. Apparently a number of churches once put the order of their worship services in the bulletin; but they don’t now. Church members miss that in the bulletin and they want it back.
- Attendance/stewardship statistics. I thought numbers were being deemphasized in churches. Well, maybe they are, but church members want them back. They want to see the giving patterns and attendance patterns each week.
- Announcements. There is a big gap between numbers four and five. If not for its brevity, I could have made this blog about the top four things church members want in a church bulletin. While church members do want some announcements in the church bulletin, they do not want it cluttered with announcements. They prefer for announcements to be on a screen before the services or on the church’s website.
Are you surprised by these top five? What would you add to the list?
Posted on April 8, 2013
With nearly 40 years of ministry experience, Thom Rainer has spent a lifetime committed to the growth and health of local churches across North America.
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144 Comments
Interesting Dr. Rainer. Our church, Springbrook Community is very intentional about changing the ” scoreboard” from attendance and offering envelope checkboxes to life change; so we don’t advertise numbers. Any church member can log on to our CCB account and see where giving stands if they desire. Our bulletin serves to inform and point ” outsiders” to the information they need most. Of course our church really isn’t like any other sbc church I’ve been in. I do wonder how demographics affect things. We are in the Cchicago area.
Before I respond, please know that I am not a minister, the wife of a minister, the child of a minister, the church secretary, on staff at church nor have I ever been any one of those. I am speaking as a “lay person”, one who attends services on a very regular basis and is actively involved in the congregation and has been all of her life. I am guilty of wanting all of these things and more and what I have to say, I am saying to myself as much as I am saying it to anyone else.
Not one statement surprises me and I I would say that I want at least 4 of the 5 on any given Sunday. However, I think what I am struggling with in this post is that it continues perpetuate the cycle of consumerism I/we have developed in our modern day westernized churches (it may happen in other cultures as well but I can only speak for the area I have been). There is a part of me that wants the ministers, leaders, church staff or whoever to have a response of something like this (obviously in much nicer way would be good):
“1) Quality – Okay, to help us maintain a high quality bulletin we will need 2 volunteers each week to spend an hour double checking all the grammar, punctuation, spelling and factual information in here for us. This will need to be done between 3 pm and 5 pm on Thursday. And remember for each bulletin we print it cost money so makes sure your giving continues to cover our expenses so we can print a high quality bulletin.
2) Sermon Notes/outlines – To help us with this, our preacher needs to have some hours available early during the week to really sit down and prepare his sermon without answering phone calls, counseling sessions, whining sessions about last week’s sermon/service/color of the carpet/poor quality bulletin, reading and answering emails on your time schedule or being expected to drop his life at moment’s notice to attend to yours. He also may need your permission to ignore said phone calls/emails to focus on his sermon without feeling guilty. Given he will still be available for the horrible circumstances you find yourself in, but unless it is a tragedy please consider if the call is necessary.
3) Order of service – To help us with this, please acknowledge that the Spirit doesn’t always work on our time schedule. Our worship minister, actually does plan these services out to the best of his ability so he too will need some time to be left alone at the beginning of the week to pick the songs and Scriptures (which probably should correlate with the sermon in some way) and to find the people who will serve so the calls about last weeks service/song selection/people who served need to be put on hold until the end of the week. Also please know that since the Spirit doesn’t work with our time schedule, if our worship minister feels led to stray from the plan or if someone is sick and there has to be a substitute, complaints can be directed to the Boss (read God) rather than to the worship minister/senior minister/elders/ person in the pew next to you/neighbor.
4) Attendance/stewardship – Please remember when those numbers change – either positively or negatively – it should not generate gossip, anger, excuses, or complaints. If, when you look at the numbers you can find a way to bring to glory to God, then you can talk about it. Otherwise, keep your opinion to yourself. Unless of course you have a life giving way to fix the problem then please, by all means come see us and be part of the solution.
5) Announcements – Read them. If you don’t read them, don’t complain about not knowing anything going on. If you have something that needs to go in the bulletin, we need it by 12 pm on Wednesday because we have to proof it and edit it (which will take the rest of Wednesday afternoon) work on the layout on Thursday (which will take a few hours to work it all in) and then we print and fold on Friday (again this takes quite a few hours as well) . And of course, we still have to do all this while answering the phone, responding to emails, and helping those who might come to the church for help. And a note about getting announcements into the bulletin, please make sure we have all the pertinent information when you first submit it: who, what, when, where, why, and how. Having this information initially without having to call and leave messages or send numerous emails to get this information will ensure that your announcement (and thus the bulletin in general) will be of good quality. Also, related to number #2 and #3 in this matter, these men//women must also meet a similar deadlines so keep that in mind when you pick up the phone to call them or open up that email or stop by the office for a small chat at the beginning of the week.
And finally, we ask that if you don’t want to keep your bulletin for any reason, which we are fine with, please drop them in the recycle bin so that we can defray a small bit of the cost.”
Again, I am guilty on all fronts: being a consumer at worship service and thinking it is about my likes/wants/desires; complaining about and mocking wrong information, misspelled names, poor quality of work; expecting the ministers to be available at my every beck and call; complaining about the attendance changes (positive AND negative); disparaging over the contribution without changing my own giving; not reading the bulletin; not getting my requests in on time; leaving my bulletin on the pew/chair after services. But again, this is exactly what was going through my mind as I read it and felt it was good to share.
WOW – Amen and Amen!!!!
As a pastor’s wife and worship leader of 30+ years I stand and applaud. You have eloquently put in writing my thoughts over the years of the incongruity and sometime laughable inconsistencies that spring up in church life. Best rant, ever.
None of these surprise me, but I can see how #3 and #4 would be especially wanted by church members who want to have a sense of control of the church. If a church member gets bent out of shape if the printed order of service is not followed, or if a church member wants to use the attendance and giving numbers as a weapon against the pastor or staff, there are bigger issues that need to be addressed.
Seems to me there’s a disconnect between what people say they want in a bulletin, and what is actually effective.
In my experience there is always a disconnect between what people want and what people need. I think that’s he reason Jesus started His most famous sermon “Happy are those who…”?
If I’ve read correctly, this is what church members want. Do we know what visitors, or people who don’t usually go to church want us to give them? It’d be interesting to see if they’re similar or different.
Jason
Good question Jason. Perhaps we can look at that in the future.
Dr Rainer
Is it possible in our efforts to reach the “unchurched” that we lose the “churched”?? Should one demographic suffer for the benefit of the other? How do we balance this, such as in worship music, communication tools, etc?? This is the greatest challenge to ministers in all size congregations!!
Thoughts….
That is a good question. I would be interested in seeing the response.
I would be interested if you ask if people would be upset if their bulletin went away all together? What if it were just sermon notes?
All of these make sense. Since our order of service can change from week to week, that is not included in ours.
As always, consider the culture/demographic you are ministering to. If you are reaching out to young unchurched people, you may want to replace the term bulletin with flyer. The younger demo will also use the QR code tied to YouVersion to gain immediate access to sermon notes, passages, and quotes using their smart phone.
Space with an outline will allow those with different learning styles to interact/engage with the speaker. I know people that doodle, writing down key points; and others that take copious notes.
We took the Order of Worhsip out of ours a couple of years. I was surprised how many people commented. The big issue that they the like to know what’s next. It was mostly the older generation that like things done the same way every week. When you change things up it really upsets the apple cart.
Number 1 is extremely important with any written communication whether it is a Sunday morning bulletin or webpage information. I am surprised that people want a outline to follow along. I know of only one person in my small congregation who takes notes. My wife has always said I should provide a outline, so I will put one together to pass out on Sunday morning. I surmise, when they get home they place them someplace to never review again. I have never been one to make announcements, I seem to always forget something, we don’t have overhead projection.
I do a bulletin but mail it every Thursday or Friday. It contains everything the church member needs to know and I also post it on our webpage under “bulletin.” Within that mailing I include a personal note, offering envelope(special offerings when applicable) so that everyone is reminded of their obligation to tithe and give an offering. When there is a mission emphasis, etc. they are personally informed.
I would appreciate it if some of you would review our webpage and the bulletin. We get lots of hits but very little response from people in attendance. I need some clues as to how to improve. Maybe someday Dr. Rainer will make a survey on webpages effectiveness and productivity.
Hi Les, the website opened very quickly, very important. Was easy to find information; I was wanting to see the bulletin and the link was easy to see. Buletin was good, am assuming the list of names at the top left were in need of prayer?
Thanks Paul for the feedback and interest. I appreciate that very much. Yes, the list was a prayer list, instead of printing prayer list I have the little girl on her knees praying, now I am wondering if I need to put “prayer list” there.
I enjoy reading our fully colored, professionally done bulletin each week. We have even put in a separate sheet to take church attendance, so we know who was there, and if there are new visitors, and you can also list prayer requests on it. Our bulletins are packed full of useful information for the entire church family to use, and even those first timers as well. It lists the order of worship, but doesn’t list the number of people from last week, I don’t think that is relevant. If the numbers are higher than the last week, our Pastor will mention it in his Monday Reflections email he sends out those that are signed up to receive it. The bulletin has a very important tool in the church, so lets not talk about taking it away….as in some posts I have heard. It helps families find out whats going on in the church. .
Even though announcements are on the screen, many people arrive last minute (or even after the service has started) so they don’t see them. Printing important information in the bulletin is the best way to ensure everyone sees it.