The coronavirus, or COVID -19, has impacted the lives of all Americans.
Many are out of work or working from home. Children are being taught by their parents, online by their teachers, and sometimes a combination of both. Many businesses have been ordered to temporarily suspend some or all of the services they offer. Sporting events have been cancelled. Proms, graduations, and many special events have been rescheduled.
With restrictions on assembling and the desperate need for social distancing, many churches, including our church, Fellowship Christian Church in Luttrell, have temporarily suspended traditional services and sought other means to worship.
While thinking about a way to still be able to assemble together to worship our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, I stumbled across a social media post about a church in North Carolina that was having drive-in worship services. I thought this was something that we might be able to do.
So, I approached our Pastor (who happens to be my father) with the idea. I explained to him the details of how they had singing and preaching from the front porch of their sanctuary while the congregation stayed in their vehicles in the parking lot. I left the idea with him to think about.
Our answer to do this came soon. While thinking and praying about whether or not to have the drive-in service, a couple of phone calls made all the difference. A church member called my father and said, “Why don't we have a drive-in service."
He stated, "We are actually thinking about this."
The church member replied, "I think it would be a good idea."
Then while speaking to another church member on the phone, he told them of the idea and they said, "I love it. I think we should do it." And with that, the planning began.
When we were on vacation a few years ago, we found an old drive-in movie theater that actually had drive-in worship services every Sunday. So that Sunday morning, while we were on vacation, we decided to attend the service.
The cars lined up all facing the same direction, and where the movie screen would have been, they had a tall building with a porch that the preacher stood on. The sound was transmitted through the vehicle’s radio so that everyone could hear. They had singing and preaching and even took up an offering.
So, we knew that it could be done.
During the planning, we started gathering our resources to see what we needed. My father has a Christian co-worker that has a small home-use radio transmitter that he uses for a Christmas light show at his house. The co-worker offered to let him use this to transmit our sound so that everyone could hear from their vehicles.
Next, we moved on to coordinating with some special singers and planning the music to be played as people arrived at the service. We made flyers to be handed out, welcoming people and explaining about tuning their radio to the proper channel.
The help with parking and setup came next, as well as help to operate the sound board and microphones. The process of planning didn’t seem too difficult and everything seemed to just come together as it always does.
Although this pandemic is a scary and tragic event, it can also be a good time to bring our focus back to God. We can still pray and read our Bibles. We have nowhere to go for entertainment, no ballgames to watch, no restaurants to gather in, no public school, and no vacations to travel to.
In addition, it has also brought to mind the many messages that have been preached about spreading the gospel outside of our churches and into the world. So maybe our drive-in worship services are a way to get "outside" our church walls to spread the gospel.
Luke 14:23 says, "And the Lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled."
We pray that this would be an outreach in our community and a way to bring people to know Jesus. During this pandemic, our church will continue to have a drive-in worship service Sunday morning at 11 a.m. Fellowship Christian Church is located at 746 Tazewell Pike in Luttrell.
Please come join us!