MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) — Joining us this morning is Chris Williams with Yorktown Baptist Church. We wanted to talk about the summer slump. Give me an idea of what that means for churches.
Guest: Well, the summer slump, most of the time it’s because people are going on vacation. They’ve got barbecues, set up a baseball game, basketball, and different sports activities, and it draws them away from the church.
Anchor: All right. So why do people give less time or attention to their church during this time of year?
Guest: Well, it’s because of those activities. And they take a break sometimes. They say, well, this is a Sunday I can take off, but there’s really no sun that you should take off.
Anchor: So how do you turn around a summer? How do you get people to turn that around?
Guest: Well, you got to get into the mind. You’ve got to let them know that every Sunday is important, every worship service, and every Bible study is essential. And to stay connected to Christ, we’ve got to stay connected to one another.
Anchor: How do things like a VBS help?
Guest: It helps because it draws people, a lot of people that you haven’t seen before and you draw them in. And then the people that are normally regular there, you get to talk to them and share with them Christ on a weekly or the whole week and it brings them a little closer to Christ and they realize it’s important to do.
Anchor: How real of an issue is it for a congregation or certain members of the congregation to break away during the summer and maybe not come back?
Guest: Well, it happens. It happens. But it’s something that we try to change mindset to let people know that it’s important. It’s important to be there. And sometimes it happens that people find another church or they go somewhere and they see something different that they like and they want to be a part of that. But those type of things happen.