Every week at my church, I’m asked to fill out a connections card.  It’s basically taking attendance.  I fill out my name and address then drop it in the offering plate.  There’s a place for prayer requests or boxes I can check to involved with various ministry groups.  Overall, it’s not my favorite thing to do, but I understand the church wanting to keep track of who’s there especially first time visitors.

What does your church do?  Do you fill something out every week?  Do you think these cards are useful?

We don’t call them connection cards but that’s what they are. They are “Celebration Registers” and they are envelopes that ask for all the info you have said except it is also for tithing. It’s an itty-bitty envelope and people keep adding check boxes and lines to it so it’s crammed full of stuff and getting confusing (which means it’s mostly uneffective). We do get many prayer requests each week and that’s probably the most effective part but there needs to be other ways of getting the info we want without asking for it all on the one envelope.

I agree.  I think those things can get cluttered for sure and then no one has any idea where to look for the information they’re trying to find.

I still wonder if it’s so important for my church to know I’m there every weekend.  I get kind of tired filling out the same card every week.  We use a check in system (Fellowship One) for children.  I’d be fine having some sort of bar code I could scan on the way in for attendance.  Although I doubt that would be very popular with a lot of folks.

We’ve just begun using a connection card during our services. We call them “Next Steps” cards. Each sermon, our pastor offers a list of next steps for people to take in response to the message. We initially started the cards to gather attendance information. However, we have been amazed with the results of the cards.

A few hundred are gathered each week. They contain contact information for each person who has filled out the card along with a check next to their intended “Next Step”. These cards are then entered into a database and names are divided among the pastoral staff. Each minister on staff will make a personal contact with the names they have been given. It’s a great encouragement to our members when we can let them know we are praying for their specific needs and also encouraging to us, as pastors, to hear back from the members when prayers are answered.

Regardless of what you call them, I would highly recommend defining a clear purpose for a card that you distribute. Then devise a system of response so that no one feels like it’s pointless to fill out the card.

We have a card called “Connecting With You” that is available all throughout our commons. It is where you register if you are a first time guest, accepted Christ, want to be baptized, have a prayer request, or want more info from a specific ministry area.

It is great that we only have one connection card and not multiple forms depending on what someone is looking for. However we don’t hand them out to everyone, they are just available for people to take and use so we don’t get a ton of them in. We are currently looking at that whole process to see how we can be more effective with it.

We also have Fellowship One and use it for check in in Children’s Ministry and I wish we did church wide check in. Maybe one day we will get there.

Adam Legg
www.adamlegg.com