Bring a Friend Sunday changesideas in
George West about outreach

By Claudia M. Williams
Staff Writer
Bring a Friend Sunday helped change attitudes among United Methodists in George West about inviting people to church.
First UMC, George West, saw worship attendance jump to 150—up from the average 100—April 2, the date designated as Bring a Friend Sunday across Southwest Texas.
United Methodists were encouraged to bring unchurched friends to worship that Sunday.
The Rev. Douglas A. Hinchcliff, pastor of the 199-member George West congregation, said that Bring a Friend Sunday was part of the church’s Welcoming Congregation initiative.
“In this rural community, we had not been doing the Welcoming Congregation program because we thought everybody knew who we are,” he said. But when the church decided to seek certification, he said, members decided to “almost literally follow the rule book about what it takes for a process—prayer, forming committees, delegating, follow-up.”
That process, he said, helped make Bring a Friend Sunday successful.
The following Sunday, Palm Sunday, more than 100 people worshiped, and the next Sunday, Easter, 140 attended—even though many of the church’s members were away.
“It (Bring a Friend Sunday) was not a blip on the radar screen,” Hinchcliff said. “When you see it happen two Sundays after, it’s a pattern, and you go, ‘That’s not bad.’ People feel like they really have something to offer. There’s a new vitality. There’s the feeling of ‘you the man (or woman)!’”