Pop's n' Flip Flops- Our Father's Day Celebration

Let's see...we have a small congregation...the ladies outnumber the men...it will be Father's Day in a few weeks...so what do we do to make this Sunday 'different?'  These were the questions that ran through my mind last year as we were planning for Father's Day.

One thing we thought of is our men do not wear ties to church.  In the summer they wear shorts and some wear 'flip flops.'  I mean this is a tough assignment being in San Diego!!  So lets capitalize on that being a strength and promote our guys wearing 'flip flops.'  Being the creative team that we are, we decided to title our Father's Day: Pop's n' Flip Flops. 

Once we had that idea of Pop's n' Flip Flops cooking, all we needed was to add the components to how the service would look and feel.  Sometimes you need to take the disadvantages of what you have and make them work for you.  For example, our worship center does not have air conditioning.  Remember, when the church was built, there was this idea that 'we are in San Diego and it never gets hot here.'  Wrongo!  It does get hot and the stained glass windows that open up to allow a breeze in does not work all that well during the summer.  This too was well before we knew what 'global warming' was all about! 

Now the church has a 'courtyard' area and as I began to think about how warm that day might be, I thought why not have worship outdoors!!  So that's exactly what we planned, to have our Father's Day 'Pop's n' Flip Flops' worship in the Courtyard.

We advertized that our band would be outside and all we needed everyone to bring was their lawn chairs, plenty of sunscreen and their friends.  It made it really easy for our men to invite their co-workers and friends to church on Father's Day.  The response was incredible and we gained a few new families from the event! 

We secured a sound permit from the city and contacted our neighbors to tell them of our plans and that our band would be outside playing that Sunday.  There was not one registered complaint from any of our neighbors.

This year we are taking 'Pop's n' Flip Flops' to another level; we are having worship outside again with our band and we are adding a Classic Car and Hot Rod Show along with a BBQ lunch for everyone.  It's part of our '52 Quality Sunday's at The Fellowship.'  Please feel free to contact me at rick@fellowshipofsd.org for more information.
RB