In today’s episode, Sandra Peoples talks about the challenges small to normative-sized churches face in disability ministry and shares how the churches she’s been a part of have overcome these challenges.
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I’m Sandra Peoples, and this is episode 124 of Key Ministry: The Podcast. Today we’re talking about Strategies for Small and Normative Sized Churches. I’m currently editing a book that will come out in July on church accessibility, and the publisher’s editor leaves me notes like “Does this work for a small-normative sized church?” What’s funny about that question is that I’ve only served at small to medium or what we call normative sized churches. So yes, the suggestions I make work for us and they can work for you-no matter your church size!
My son James was diagnosed with autism in 2010. At the time, my husband pastored a small church in Pennsylvania. In the five years following James’s diagnosis, our church of about 150 people added new special-needs families, baptizing four adults from those families.
We included children with disabilities in every activity: Sunday school, worship time, Vacation Bible School, and sports camp. We also held quarterly respite nights and hosted our community’s autism support group.
When we moved to Texas, our goal was to church plant, and during that season we regularly visited four small churches in our area. And even though none of them had a disability ministry, they did all they could to welcome James and our family. James even had his own system for identifying them: there was “church with blocks” that met at a dance studio, “church at school” that met at his school, “church at church” that met at an actual church building, and “church with trains” that met at a movie theater.
Eight years ago my husband was interviewing for the pastor position at our current church that ran about 350 at the time. During that process we asked if they had a disability ministry. They said they didn’t. We said if they wanted to hire Lee, we would need a plan for James to be included because he and I weren’t going to stay home each week. They said great! We’ll do it.
Small and normative-sized churches don’t have to leave inclusion to the big guys. In fact, if we want to reach more families, we can’t limit accessibility to only the biggest churches.
According to a study by Faith Communities Today: 70% of churches in the U.S. have 100 or fewer weekly attendees. Only 10% of them have more than 250 in weekly services. The largest percentage, 44% of churches, run 1-50 people.
If we left disability ministry to the big churches, thousands of families would not be able to attend church.
So why aren’t more small churches doing disability ministry? They have four primary concerns:
Money - "How much money does it take to run a disability ministry?"
Facilities - "We are running low on space now. How much room will it take?”
People - "Who is going to serve in this ministry?”
Knowledge or Experience - "We just don't know where to start. How do we learn?"
These are real barriers, but they don’t have to stop us. There were barriers in Jesus’s day as well. People with disabilities were considered unclean, and didn’t have the same access as others to the synagogue or even to fellowship with others. One of Jesus’s last actions was to clear out the area of the temple that had been taken over by money changers and those selling animals to sacrifice. Matthew tells us in 21:14, that “the blind and the lame came to him” after he eliminated the barriers and made a path for accessibility.
If you are at a small or normative-sized church, and you wonder how to start, here are the first steps we took to launch a disability ministry:
We assessed the needs we had in the church.
We recruited leadership.
We explored curriculum options.
We offered an interest and training meeting for volunteers.
We scheduled a respite night and formed a plan to advertise it.
Paul tells us in 1st Corinthians 12 that the church body is made up of many members who are able to support each other when serving with their gifts. In the church we were part of when James was diagnosed, we had an occupational therapist, a special education teacher, and the grandmother of a child with autism who all worked together to include and support families like mine.
The small and normative-sized churches I’ve been a part of focus on an inclusion model, serving most kids and students in the typical classrooms with help from buddies. They also added specialized sensory rooms or areas in their existing rooms. After eight years at our current church, we now have classes for every age group that meet the needs of those attending.
Here’s the most important thing to remember when you feel overwhelmed by the idea of starting a disability ministry: We don't have to have a plan in place for every person we can imagine walking through our doors. We just have to love and serve the ones who do. And churches of every size can do that.
In fact, I think small-normatize sized churches churches can have the best disability ministries because:
The best disability ministries minister to the entire family
The best disability ministries minster beyond Sunday
The best disability ministries ask, “What can we do to keep you connected to Christ and to our church?”
It’s often easier for smaller churches to communicate as a staff and make decisions that support every member of a family on Sundays and beyond. And when a family misses a week or two, their church family notices and reaches out.
I hope that was encouraging for those of you serving at smaller churches! My prayer through my role as the disability ministry consultant for the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention is that every church across our state would be ready to welcome every family that wants to attend. In order to reach that goal, churches of every size will need to take steps of accessibility. I hear from churches every week that are doing just that, and it’s such an encouragement.
If you need help knowing what steps to take next, Key Ministry is ready to help you! Reach out to Beth at beth@keyministry.org with your questions and she’ll help you make a plan!
Thanks for listening today! Before you log out of your podcast app, make sure you’ve subscribed so you don’t miss a future episode! We’ll meet you back here next week.
