One of the best tools that I used while pastoring was “The Pastor’s Letter.” I decided that I would write OUR OWN STORY. It creates a great spirit of unity and momentum when you provide people with positive talking points. The pastor’s letter was a powerful tool that clearly articulated exactly what it was that we were doing as a church. Below are the components I used in the Pastor’s Letter:
GLANCE BACK – I did a glance back on the previous month saying this is what just happened with the feeling of, “Look what the Lord has done!” I would recap events, fundraisers, selected stories of praise reports of Christian growth.
WHAT’S NEXT – Each letter also had a WHAT’S NEXT section that gave a feeling of the upcoming month. This would list key dates buy also clear descriptions of what was ahead.
PASTOR’S VISION – This gave me an opportunity to share my heart beat of the up coming months. This was more than just dates and events but my passion for what God was doing in our local assembly.
ADD INS – Along with our pastors letter we also included a two-month calendar along with postcards of key events. We would purchase our postcards as full glossy pictures from Walgreens for 10 cents a piece.
THE PROCESS: We would mail these out to the homes of each of our members. We also sent the Pastor’s letters to our entire data base of friends and guests of our church. We received many strong connections with past members from them being able to see what was happening at our church. In addition we would send copies of the letter to sponsors of the church. This was a list of about 20 people that had close ties to the church and the pastor, that would take the letter and pray of the vision of the church. Some of these were even financial sponsors that had bought into the vision.
I would keep copies of the Pastor’s Letter around the office and throughout the church. It was always good to be able to refer guest and members of the church to the things taking place in the church.
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