Service Times

Our church is growing! For a number of weeks, we’ve consistently seen our 9:30am service reach 70% capacity or higher. To create more room for everyone and to continue welcoming new guests, we’re adjusting the service times to 8:30am and 10:00am. This change helps distribute attendance more evenly, making our worship environment more comfortable while preparing us for future growth. 

The benefits of this shift are significant: 

• Room for Growth: By spreading attendance across two services, we create more space for everyone, making our worship environment more comfortable.
• Future Planning: This change is a proactive step toward potentially adding a third service, ensuring we’re prepared for ongoing growth.
• Balanced Attendance: Adjusting the times helps balance attendance between the services, preventing any single service from becoming overcrowded.
• Enhanced Community: With more room and flexibility, we can continue to foster a welcoming environment where relationships and spiritual growth can flourish. 
• A Sense of Sabbath:  We hope that with an hour time change, our congregation will experience a greater Sabbath rest by having worship in the morning to set the spiritual tone for the remainder of Sunday. This means you have time in the morning to enjoy worship, get to lunch, and have more of your day to truly rest in the Lord.

Additionally, with different Sunday school times, we’ll see a greater interaction between all those who attend the two services. We believe this will continue to foster a culture where we maintain two worship styles in one church. 

This decision was driven by our commitment to ensuring that Church on the Hill remains a vibrant, growing community. As we began to see consistent attendance increases in the 9:30am service, we provided an opportunity to participate in a worship survey earlier this year to examine what our people valued in their worship attendance. We also obtained demographic data for our local community which provided us with 5 and 10 year projections to consider how that may impact future growth as well. Since we are already reaching a point where our current setup can no longer comfortably accommodate everyone, our church council entered into a season of consideration and prayer. We believe that adjusting the service times will best support our current growing pains and position us for the possibility of launching a third service while - God willing - allowing us to keep growing without sacrificing the quality of worship. 

Starting on Sunday, October 6, 2024, our new times will be.

• Traditional Service: 8:30 am
• Contemporary Service: 10:00 am 

We’re excited to offer these new times with the hope that they still fit well within most families’ Sunday worship schedules.

We plan to maintain these times indefinitely, but we’ll continue to evaluate the needs of our congregation. If further changes are needed in the future, we’ll communicate them well in advance. 

This change directly supports our purpose of making disciples of Jesus Christ as it helps to create space to be a welcoming, growing community of faith. By adjusting our service times, we’re making space for more people to hear the gospel and join our fellowship while maintaining the quality of worship we all value. 

We’re aware that the time change will impact our current Sunday School schedule. We’re working with leaders and classes on a plan to adjust class times. Our goal is to minimize disruption while ensuring everyone can continue to participate. 

Our children’s and student ministries are preparing for this change. We will offer preschool childcare (ages 0-4) at 8:30am and will offer both preschool and elementary kids at 10am. Middle school ministry will be offered at 10am and high school ministry will remain at 6pm. This ensures that your kids and students have access to the same high-quality, age-appropriate worship and learning experiences. This change gives families more flexibility in choosing a service time that works best for them.

We understand that people have a routine. While the new 8:30 am service is earlier, there was a time in the life of our church when the early service was at 8:00 am. We hope this time change is a minor inconvenience, and there are many current church members already on campus prior to 8:30 am. We appreciate your flexibility. The 10:00 am service is only a 30-minute shift and is designed to be a convenient option for those who prefer the mid-morning time. We are confident this small change will be a positive adjustment.

No, the style of worship service will remain the same. The change is only in the timing, not in the style of worship.

In early 2024, we sent out a worship survey and your responses gave us very helpful information. For instance, about 1/3 of the traditional service attendees attend the service primarily for the time, not the style of worship. Our hope is that by offering a 10:00 am worship option, those who attend 9:30 am primarily for the time will make the 10:00 am service their primary worship choice. This will accomplish the dual purpose of bringing more participation into the contemporary service while also freeing up room for the rapidly growing traditional service. We also believe that by shifting to 10am, we can afford families an added benefit of having their morning shaped by worship, while freeing up more of their day to enjoy rest and renewal in the presence of God in the manner they please. 

Change can be challenging, but it also presents new opportunities to build community across our congregation and with new people who are finding our church. We encourage you to see this as a chance to meet new people and strengthen our church’s bonds. Remember, our mission is bigger than any one service—it’s about growing together in Christ, reaching others, and increasing in depth of love for God and our neighbors. 

Yes, in addition to the service time change, we’re exploring a few other strategies to create more room, including:

• Adding More Chairs: We can add about 20 more chairs to the chapel to accommodate immediate growth. However, we believe our current seating arrangement is already the maximum number of chairs we can comfortably fit. If we were to add 20 more chairs, the seating arrangement would be uncomfortable, particularly for those who have mobility concerns. In the worship center we have chairs we can add as that service grows. 
• Missional Moves: We may approach certain families who currently attend both services or who indicated on the worship survey that worship style is not their primary means of attending a service to make a “missional move.” This means they would commit, for a period of time, to attending another service each week to create room for new guests. 
• Future Planning: Given the growth of the traditional service and future projections of our community’s growth, we anticipate adding a 3^rd service as growth demands.  

These steps are part of our ongoing commitment to making Church on the Hill a welcoming place for everyone, where we can all grow together in faith. 

While nothing can be said for certain, it is our prayer that this time change, along with asking a select number of families to consider making a “missional move” to the 10:00 am service, will provide short-term relief in the early service. Our long-term goal, however, is our desire to launch a 10:00 am traditional service in the chapel when the growth necessitates that we do so. This time change is a prayerfully strategic move as we anticipate God continuing to use our church to reach more people for His glory. 

We understand that the new times might not be perfect for everyone. However, we ask for your flexibility and understanding as we begin this transition to benefit the greater church body. We hope you’ll find a way to make one of the new service times work for you and your family. If this is your church home, we believe a one-hour time shift is ultimately a small sacrifice for us to make in order to continue reaching more people and live the purpose of making disciples of Jesus Christ. 

Here’s what you can count on: what you have enjoyed about this church, whether you have attended here for 4 months or 40 years, is staying the same. You can continue to anticipate a powerful worship experience, a commitment to preach the Word of God, opportunities to grow in community on and off the Hill, and a dedication to serve our neighbors. 

At the current 9:30 service, we have and we’re still filling them up. Adding chairs is a temporary fix. It doesn’t solve the long-term issue of growth, and we have found that even after adding chairs, we are still nearing capacity in the chapel.

We currently have the maximum number of chairs in the chapel that we can comfortably seat our congregation. While we can add few more, it will become a burden, especially to those who may have mobility concerns.  By changing service times, asking for key people who don’t have a preference of traditional vs. contemporary to help us make a “missional move” to the later service, we’re proactively making room for future growth and ensuring we can continue to offer a welcoming and comfortable worship experience for everyone. 

Jumping to three services overnight could overwhelm our current structure and volunteers, sacrificing the quality of worship. Plus, this transition period is being used to increase our teaching team, which will be needed if – and when – a third service is needed. By making this gradual change, we believe, we’re setting ourselves up for a healthy transition to a third service as growth demands, without compromising our worship experience or teaching quality.

There is always that possibility. We’re committed to monitoring the impact of these changes and adjusting as needed. If the new service times don’t achieve the desired results, church council and staff will prayerfully explore other options and, as always, keep the congregation in the communication loop.

Your flexibility and willingness to adapt to these forthcoming changes and continuing to WORSHIP, GROW, and SERVE here on the Hill are invaluable. We want to thank you for trusting the leadership of our church and their desire to position our congregation for the best and brightest future possible. Together, we know that by making this one-hour time shift all of us will make this transition smooth and successful, which will ensure that our church continues to grow and thrive.