Effective Church Communications

Effective Church Communications provides Timeless Strategy and Biblical Inspiration to help churches create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission

Effective Church Communications provides Timeless Strategy and a Biblical Perspective to help churches create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission. Our tools constantly change; our task doesn’t; Effective Church Communications can help.

Easy, 2-Page Senior Newsletter Template in MS Publisher

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This newsletter in a MS Publisher template for a newsletter for Seniors.
This newsletter in a MS Publisher template for a newsletter for Seniors.

In expanding our TEMPLATE section, I found this very useful template for a 2-page Senior Newsletter in our archives. Below is the template, plus a short video on how I put it together. The video is several years old and uses an older version of MS Publisher. I opened the template in MS Publisher 2016 and saved it in that version and that worked great.

Many senior adults in churches still prefer print and creating a newsletter for them is not difficult to do. Many seniors today are fit and active and can contribute a lot to the church if they know what is going on. A print newsletter can greatly help.

This newsletter template has typeface size, line-spacing, line length and boxed materials all optimized for seniors. Though the layout here is designed for seniors, it could work well for many other types of newsletters. When designing publications for seniors, a few small changes can make it much more readable and is very easy to do, as the video shows.

Following are the two pages of the Template, then a video that shows how and why it was created and below them the link to download the Template.

The video below shows an older version of MS Publisher, but the basic tasks are the same.

To download the Template for a Newsletter for Seniors, click the following link: MS Pub Template for Senior Newsletter

For a revised and updated version of this template: CLICK HERE

Make the most of your Father’s Day Connection Cards

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Make the most of Father's Day Connection Cards by including options for information on ministries related to men.

The selection of Connection cards that follow for Father's Day includes some cards that not only have the standard information on them, but that give men the opportunity to request information about ministries that may be of interest to them.

These include: Service Projects, Men's Group, Habitat for Humanity Build, and Children's Ministries. Having these on the card is one way of advertising these ministries that men may not even know go on at the church. In addition, asking on a card directed primarily to men on this Father's Day that includes asking for information about children's ministries, lets men know that the church is aware that many men today participate actively in child-rearing. More men than many churches are aware are single dads and greatly appreciate it when a church is aware of this and actively works to minister to them.

Below the gallery of Connection Cards for Father's Day below is a link to download a ZIP file that has ready-to-print PDFs and editable MS Publisher files.

To download the ZIP files that contain the MS Publisher and PDF files, click on the following link: Fathers Day Connection Cards

Men’s Ministry Business Cards you can modify and adapt

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Men's Ministry Business Cards
One of the business cards you can use to launch or advertise your Men's Ministry.

Father's Day is a great time to kick-off or start a Men's Ministry and the following cards may be useful for inspiration if you are just starting or want to try something new.

On the opposite side of the card you can have your meeting times and work or service projects listed. These are business card size and are great for you to make up enough of them to give them to the men of your church to use as invitations to neighbors or the men they work with.

Below are pictures of the cards and below that is a link for a ZIP file that has both ready-to-print PDFs and editable MS Publisher files. CLICK HERE for more about the Templates and to see others available.

To download the ZIP files that contain the MS Publisher and PDF files, click on the following link: Men's Ministry Business Cards

For a very useful and challenging article on starting a Men's Ministry, please read this: Dos and Don'ts to a successful launch of a men's ministry

 

Dos and Don’ts for a successful launch of a men’s ministry

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Men's Ministry Do's and Don't
Father's Day is a great time to launch a Men's Ministry and here are some tips to help you do it effectively.

Father’s Day is a great time to focus on and do PR to grow a Men’s Ministry. Growing a Men’s Ministry is one of the most challenging tasks for church communicators, but it can be done and Father's Day is a great time to work on it. Below is advice that goes through the true story of what an otherwise large and successful church tried and didn't work and what they needed to do to make a Men's Ministry launch successful.

The following excerpt is from my book, Ministry Marketing Made Easy.

Real life story about the limitations of prayers and good intentions

True story here: a church, in a town which shall remain unnamed, was experiencing great numerical growth. It had grown from 600 to over 1800 in attendance in three years. The Sunday service was spectacular, with seeker-sensitive music, drama, and powerful need-centered preaching. Individuals were making decisions to become a Christian every week and the church was growing in numbers. They were doing many things right. Though grateful for the growth, the church staff was concerned because the growth was primarily in the Sunday morning service.

The leadership realized that people also needed to grow in Christian maturity as well as their primarily passive involvement in the Sunday service. The staff decided to address this issue by beginning a men’s ministry, where they could intentionally work to develop the men into mature disciples. They decided that the kick-off event for the men’s ministry would an evening when they would start a new men’s Bible study group. They felt that getting the men of the church into an in-depth Bible study was an important foundation for discipleship. So far, so good. Now, how to get them there?

The staff prayed about the kick-off event. They advertised it for four weeks in the bulletin and newsletter, on PowerPoint and through lively announcements from the pulpit every Sunday. After all their promotion and prayer, the staff expected at least 100-200 men to show up. The night came for the event. The twelve men from the church staff and the planning leaders enthusiastically set-up tables and chairs for 200, expecting a great response. Three men came. What went wrong? The staff did all the right things, spiritually. They followed a biblically sound ministry model, they planned and prayed, and then they prayed some more. They held more meetings and prayed more. They advertised the way they advertised other events in the church, but admittedly the church was doing little else other than Sunday morning. [Read more...]