Becoming a Friendlier Church | Matthew Kim

What makes a church feel truly welcoming? 

In this episode of the CPT Podcast, we welcome one of CPT's Senior Fellows, Dr. Matthew Kim, to discuss his new book, Becoming a Friendlier Church: A Pathway to Genuine Community. Drawing from years of ministry, teaching, and personal experiences visiting churches around the world, Matt explores why many congregations unintentionally create barriers for newcomers and how pastors can foster a culture of authentic hospitality. 

The conversation examines five common obstacles to church friendliness—including insularity, apathy, busyness, comfort, and prejudice—and offers practical, discipleship-centered practices to help churches become places where people experience belonging from the moment they arrive. Matt also reflects on the pastor's role in shaping church culture, the connection between preaching and hospitality, and why becoming a friendlier church is ultimately part of making faithful disciples of Jesus. 

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Transcript

Matthew Kim 2:32

Right? So we prejudge people based on many different factors, whether it's their gender or race, ethnicity, class. We make assumptions about who they are. And I think sometimes for pastors, we struggle with if I see someone new coming to the church, immediate my thought process is how can I plug them in to become a volunteer?

Joel Lawrence 2:55

Matt, it's great to have you back on the podcast. Thanks for joining me.

Matthew Kim 2:59

Always great, Joel.

Joel Lawrence 3:00

Thanks for having me. So uh folks who are regular listeners of the podcast uh may uh remember that Matt was my co-host for a 10-part series on preaching that we did and that that uh came out last summer. So I'd encourage folks, if you haven't listened to that, to be sure to go back and listen to that. Those are just some really rich conversations, and uh I enjoyed listening back through it as it was coming out and just appreciated having you along with that journey, Matt, with your expertise and skill. I was honored to do so. So today uh we have Matt on for a conversation about a new book that he has out called Becoming a Friendlier Church, a pathway to genuine community. And this came out um just a couple of weeks ago. We're recording this May 26th, that came out May 13th. So it's it's fresh out there in the world. And look forward to hearing about the book and kind of your process and and what you hope to accomplish through the book, Matt. But before we do that, um let's just uh take a second and and and have you remind folks about who you are, your journey in ministry, what you're doing these days, uh how the Lord is is working in and through you in these in this time.

Matthew Kim 4:24

Sure. Thanks, Joel. Well, I was uh born and raised in Chicago and uh became a Christian at 13. Uh I had a period of a couple of years in early college where I fell away from the Lord and uh he brought me back my junior year of college, actually when I was studying abroad. And it was there that uh the Lord uh met me again, um, or I met the Lord again and uh rededicated my life to Christ. Uh my my third year of college. I I felt the call to ministry and eventually went to uh Gordon Conwell to get trained, uh, and then um met my wife uh while I was studying at Gordon Conwell. She wasn't a student, but met her in the Boston area. Uh, we eventually moved over to overseas to do further study in homiletics and then eventually pastored a church in Denver, Colorado, and uh we did ministry there for a while, and then uh prior to coming to Truitt Seminary, Baylor University four years ago, uh we um were in Boston uh teaching at Gordon Conwell for 10 years. And so that's been basically our journey uh over this over these seasons. And uh it's been an honor to teach pastoral ministry and preaching uh here at Truitt Seminary, and uh I have the privilege of directing the PhD and preaching program here.

Joel Lawrence 5:41

Yeah, it it in uh we talked about that program a bit last summer, and we had a couple of your colleagues from Truitt on the podcast and love what's happening there and the work that you're doing. It seems like it's just a a great spot for you. And so as you mentioned, you you've taught preaching, you've taught pastoral ministry, you did your PhD in homiletics. So preaching has has been something very important to you. You've published a number of books on preaching. This book is not on preaching, it's on becoming a friendlier church. And so uh I I want to just hear a bit of the backstory about about where this book has come from, where in your journey, where in your heart it has arisen, and um kind of what was it that inspired you to come at at pastoral ministry, but from a slightly different angle than you have been in the past?

Matthew Kim 6:43

Yeah, this uh this book probably came into my mind many, many years ago, visiting churches, just uh whether it was in the United States or in other countries, and just feeling like that experience that I had, or that exchange I had with a church member, or the feeling uh I received just become being a visitor or guest, it just seemed very odd. And I I didn't feel received or welcome or noticed. Um and I I didn't necessarily document all my experiences, but it just seemed like a pretty prevalent experience of going to a church where you don't know anyone and you're a visitor and walking through the doors. Sometimes the the odd experience even started in the parking lot, just not being able to park or or um just feeling just uh a sense of hesitation, reservation from people in the in the church. And so uh that led me to think about it more. I started actually I received a contract, Joel, in in 2020.

Joel Lawrence 7:47

Oh, really? Okay.

Matthew Kim 7:48

So it was actually during COVID that uh I was starting to write down some of the chapters and you know what were I was trying to identify some of the issues that I felt. Uh, and so eventually that became five problems and five uh practices that we could try to implement into our churches to just um never let people feel like they're a nuisance or they're unwelcome or that they don't belong in our church community. And and so that that was really the impetus of the book. It wasn't necessarily this one glaring moment, it just was repetitive experiences in different different churches, feeling like I didn't belong or I wasn't welcome.

Joel Lawrence 8:27

So some of the language that's used in the particular introduction is around kind of the crisis of unfriendliness of the of the American church. Um I I'm curious what what is it about us as followers of Jesus who don't, I think on the whole, don't want to be unfriendly. We're not setting out to be unfriendly, but I think we've all experienced this in one form or fashion, whether ourselves as visitors or even for us as pastors, kind of recognizing there are there are just challenges to us the way that we communicate with people who are coming into the church. What what is it you think is at at the heart of that, or maybe a couple of things that really contribute to to why it can be so hard for us to be to be friendly?

Matthew Kim 9:20

Yeah. Well, if you use the uh biblical analogy of the church as family, a lot of times we see families, we just have this insularity. There's a common language, common history, familial bond. Uh, if you want to use a negative term, it would be clickishness. We we just see that. We just gravitate toward people that we like. We're comfortable with people that uh we've gone to church with for a long time. And so there's this unspoken comfortability factor that uh when when a new person comes in, it just seems unnatural for us to break out of that comfort. And so comfort is one of the things I address in one of the chapters. But there's really the sense of insularity where uh we we have insider speech, insider language, insider practices, even the in the worship uh gathering, where most people who've been part of the church for a while, they don't need to be they don't need to have explained to them how the church functions. They they have gotten in over time. But those coming in from the outside, they haven't heard that language. They haven't um received instructions on how worship gatherings operate. They don't know where the children's ministry is. So there are basic things that I think most churches could do a better job of in communicating to visitors that this is how our church uh operates. These are, you know, you can get some things on the website, but it's different when someone actually helps you along in that process.

Joel Lawrence 10:46

So I'm thinking about some of the ways in which there's it might be inevitable to a certain degree that that when we become a close community, that we do become somewhat insular, that we do have kind of our cultures have their own language. And in some senses, there's a goodness to the fact that we have some of our our own language. So, how do we think about that balance between kind of the goodness of building an ecclesial culture in a local church that has a thick set of relationships with each other? That that goodness has a has a a shadow side, another side to it in the way that we present ourselves. So help us think through, particularly maybe for pastors, about okay, we want to shepherd the church towards uh a rich, dynamic, relational community with each other that that in some ways means we're gonna have our own culture, but not have that take on some of the real problematic nature of the of the downside of that.

Matthew Kim 11:52

Yeah, that's great. Well, I think one of the things I wanted to address in the in the book is to communicate lovingly that pastors set the tone of the culture of the church. And so whether we're extroverted or introverted, it doesn't really matter. We're we're still the, for lack of better words, the face of the church. We're the the outward-facing uh member that takes the lead in this endeavor. And I really think it's an intentional process, right? So friendliness doesn't just happen naturally, although some people uh would would be more um relational to begin with, it takes actual intentionality to think through what is the experience of a of a newcomer, right? So what what is what does it look like for them when they try to uh drive into the parking lot? Is there a space for them? Um is it clearly communicated? And then once you get walk, you know, walk into the doors, are there people at the door greeting you? Or are there people smiling at you, welcoming you into the to the building? And then from there, is there clear signage? Uh are people clearly knowing where they need to go to drop off their kids for a children's church or where the bathrooms are, you know, basic things that uh a newcomer wouldn't understand. And so for me, I think that the pastor can be very clear, intentional, and setting the tone for uh what it means to be a vibrant community that may unintentionally be unwelcoming toward visitors, but in the best of our ability, we can be leading the charge and making sure that any newcomer who comes through our building would be able to say, Yeah, I had a great experience at that church. And and what does that look like? It's all the way from people smiling and greeting you. Um one of the things, Joel, I recommend is to have a buddy system where if if uh someone on the welcoming team would be able to walk you through, have you uh sit down in a particular place, actually sit with them, answer any questions that they might have, uh, even as the service is going along. Like, hey, make sure you stand here, or this is where we give offering, or this is where we participate in the service. So there are a lot of intentional things that I think we can do more proactively as pastors that will trickle down to the rest of the church.

Joel Lawrence 14:03

There's you know, the last whatever, 30, 40 years, there's been a lot around being seeker-sensitive churches. I wonder, do you do you think about is there a distinction between a friendly being a friendly church and being a seeker-sensitive church? And and maybe what's behind this is is there an ecclesiology that's that's at work here and and as you think about the nature of the church, how how do you understand the purpose of the church and then how that that fits into this conversation of are we seeker sensitive? Are we are we for the community of believers? How does that play out in this question around being a friendly church?

Matthew Kim 14:46

Yeah, that's a great question. I don't know if I necessarily use that term seeker-friendly in the in the book, but what I'm trying to accomplish is there there are in this process of being being the church, uh, as you're talking about ecclesiology. I think there's this emphasis on, you know, we can we can so focus on seekers uh and those who don't know Christ yet, and that's a great thing. And then there's also this next level of once they become Christians, how do we disciple them? And so for me, I I I name uh that friendliness is a discipleship issue because we're wanting to help people grow in Christ, to have the body of Christ look more like Christ. And when we are unfriendly, whether that's our physical appearance or how we say things or what we say to people, that turns them off from Christ, uh that is going to be a stumbling block for them becoming Christians and then becoming disciples. And so for me, uh I think that secret sensitivity is great. We want to make sure that we're answering skeptics and those who don't know Christ and those who are coming from other religious backgrounds. But at the same time, uh that's one part of the equation. The other part of the equation is how are we discipling people into becoming disciple makers? And that is the purpose of the church, I believe, and in helping everyone become formed to look more like Christ. And so that it's all it's all interwoven, I think. And that's a great question that you're asking.

Joel Lawrence 18:06

Yeah, yeah, but I I I like that frame that you've that you've put it in. I I think one of the challenges of something like a like a seeker-sensitive can be it's a little bit more around just getting people in and can miss the the broader framework within which the church exists and the broader purpose for which the church exists. And so I think setting this conversation in oh, this is about discipleship, this is about moving people into discipleship relationship with Christ gives it um a broader context, I think, and a and and and a bigger kind of theological pastoral context as well. All right, so take us through the the structure of the book. You've got problems and practices, and you kind of you go pro, you know, chapter one is a problem, chapter two is a practice, chapter three is a problem, chapter four is a practice. I like that structure. Tell us about um kind of what you're hoping to accomplish through that structure and and uh how that can help people get their arms around the opportunity to become a friendlier church.

Matthew Kim 19:18

Sure. Well, there are five major problems that I think are common to churches across the board. And so there are what I what I include are insularity, apathy, busyness, comforts, and prejudice. And I mean, we could name all the problems and leave it there, but we want to be uh proactive and thinking through how can we actually try to solve these issues. And so the the antidote or practice that I'm trying to suggest are communication for insularity, gratitude for apathy, intentionality for busyness, hospitality for comfort, and then celebration instead of prejudice. And so having them go back to back, I think provides uh a clearer, clearer roadmap than just identifying a bunch of problems and then trying to answer them later. Uh, and so going one by one, uh, I'm trying to be very proactive and intentional, even in how I wrote the book, uh, to be able to identify that. And uh I want to give a shout out to Elliot Ritsema who helped me as an editor to to walk through some of these things that structurally I think he strengthened the book, uh, and I want to commend him for that.

Joel Lawrence 20:27

So uh the the problems insularity, apathy, busyness, comforts, prejudices, I think there's some that kind of we would all resonate with pretty quickly. Yeah, insularity, we get the danger of that. Um, being pretty comfortable with our own kind of experience at the church. But is there one or two of these that you think we need to be more aware of that that maybe don't don't come to us quite as naturally, or we maybe we don't see quite as clearly as the others?

Matthew Kim 21:06

Yeah, I I think that uh insularity is one, and then probably apathy is the second one. And apathy can come in in various shapes and forms. I uh we bring briefly talked about insularity earlier, so let me let me address apathy first. Yeah and as you know, the etymology of apathy is simply no feeling. And so if I have no feeling towards someone who's visiting my church for the first time, I I just want to put myself in their shoes thinking through how much courage does it take, Joel, to visit a new church. In our world today, if you're gonna actually drive 20 to 30 minutes to a church and then park, and then you have no idea who these people are inside, you're taking a big risk to say, I'm gonna invest the next two to three hours uh visiting a church. And we take that for granted sometimes as pastors. We don't we forget that it's it's actually a significant investment of one's time to actually go to a church and visit the congregation and and experience the worship with them. So uh apathy, I think, in many ways goes along with Jesus' parable with the Good Samaritan, just the apathy that we have in our culture of even religious people walking by someone in need. Uh the same kind of thing happens in churches where, and and in some ways, these are all interrelated. Some of these things like apathy and busyness and comfort, they all they all have in many ways uh a common uh locus of uh selfishness. We're just preoccupied with the self. And that prevents us in my family. That I I forget that there are people here who are hungry, they're maybe they've had church hurt, and this is my opportunity to love them and bring them back to the fold. And it's not just a pastoral issue. If this can become a widespread congregational ethos, that our church is a welcoming church, a friendly church, a hospitable church, a church that uh helps you plug in. That's the kind of uh attitude that I think we want to aspire toward uh rather than feelings of like apathy where uh it doesn't matter, I don't care if that person visited, it doesn't matter to me.

Joel Lawrence 23:12

Right. So what about prejudices? When you refer to prejudices there, what what are you what are you talking about? What do you mean by that? And and how can we become maybe a little bit more aware of our own prejudices?

Matthew Kim 23:26

Sure. We have pre the word is really pre-judgment, right? So we pre-judge people based on many different factors, whether it's their gender or race, ethnicity, class. Uh we make assumptions about who they are. And I think sometimes for pastors, we struggle with if I see a a newcomer and particularly for smaller churches, if I see someone new come into the church, immediately my thought process is how can I plug them in to become a volunteer?

Joel Lawrence 23:56

Right?

Matthew Kim 23:56

So they haven't even committed.

Joel Lawrence 23:58

There's labor here.

Matthew Kim 23:59

Yeah, there's there's volunteer uh people that we can get people to contribute to the life of the body, which is great. Yeah, but that's not the first thing that we want to do uh when they walk through the doors. We just want to uh help them feel a sense of community and belonging. So prejudice really for me in this chapter is really thinking through in and the prejudice can come in many different directions in terms of how we as human in human nature prejudge people. And one of the things that I I do mention in the book is just pastoring a wealthy church in Denver, Colorado, it was a real struggle for us to welcome people who uh were living on the streets. Uh and uh things like class and thinking through passages like James 2 and favoritism and just how we treat people based on what they look like or the sense I get from them uh without giving them a chance. Though those are the kinds of things that I want to address in the in that chapter and hopefully um rectify some of these attitudes in our congregations.

Joel Lawrence 24:57

So can you take us through a little bit? You mentioned your personal experience when you were pastoring in Denver. What ways did you really seek to address this question and change the culture or shape the culture? What's the you said that you earlier in the conversation pastors really are the the leaders of the culture, the shapers of the culture. What what advice can you give to pastors about steps they can take to maybe be more intentional about shaping the culture of friendliness in their church?

Matthew Kim 25:31

I I confess that I I probably failed more than I succeeded in this. So that's why I wrote that's why I wrote the book.

Joel Lawrence 25:37

It's usually how pastoral ministry goes, though, right?

Matthew Kim 25:40

Exactly. Um if there were some positive things that I did, um one was having a written um document of when when someone lives on the streets and they're coming in asking for help. We actually came up with a paper that described these are the ways that we can financially help, these are the ways that we can relationally help, and uh these are the ways that we would not commit to helping. And that came out of really uh several experiences where uh church members would say, Hey, Pastor Matt, come here, um so and so Tony wants to talk to you. Uh and Tony would be coming off the streets, or maybe he came in saying that he had cancer and he needed financial help, or uh Tony needed to stay at the hotel uh for a night or two, or Tony needed Gas at the gas station. And we become reactive. And we would say, oh, yes or no on the spot. But why not have a pre uh thought and pre-considered document that says in these cases we will help? And of course, you know, you also want to trust the Holy Spirit. So if the Holy Spirit told you to help, then we we would, of course, help. But taking um action steps like that was very, very helpful for us to think through how can we be more friendly toward people who didn't have much and didn't have many uh means. One of the one of the struggles was that our church as a wealthy church, you could know that we were a wealthy church primarily based on the cars that were parked in the parking lot. And so so people living on the streets were be would see our church cars and say, oh, of course they have money, and they would just come in. So that would be one thing. I think in general, um, training people, and I think it's it seems almost ridiculous to say train people to smile, train people to uh be relational and friendly toward others. But sometimes I've seen the most um unfriendly people who are greeters at the door. And so how can we be better at that? And so those are some of the things that I think uh the pastor is responsible for in many ways to set the tone for the rest of the church.

Joel Lawrence 27:46

So I do I do want to bring in um your expertise on preaching uh into this conversation. This isn't really the thrust of the book, but but I am curious as you think about what's the role of preaching in a friendly church? And again, this can kind of get back to the seeker-sensitive. There are certain kind of models of preaching that are seeker-sensitive models, but but when you think about the role of of preaching in in setting the tone, but also how much should the should the preacher's mind be on the people who might be visiting on a Sunday? How do you think about that? What's your recommendations for how we think about preaching ministry in light of the becoming of a friendlier church?

Matthew Kim 28:41

I think the best thing that we can do to increase our friendliness from the pulpit is to be well prepared. And what I mean by that is if we're not knowing our sermon very well and we're constantly looking down and we're not prepared, and again, I don't want to be judgmental toward uh preachers who preach with notes and and such or or read their manuscript, but uh, the more we can be familiar with our sermon, what it what I'm getting at, Joel, is that we'll smile more. Uh we're gonna smile more because we're not so consumed with what we're gonna say. Uh and also our gesturing, our facial expressions, our our body language is usually more open toward uh and we're we're more cognizant of the fact that there are other people out there uh versus when we're less prepared or ill-prepared for our message. So that would be a basic practice I think uh preachers can include uh as a as a regular practice, just be could be more familiar with our sermons so that we could be more spiritually aware toward toward our visitors and who's out there. That would be one thing. Uh another thing would be the the illustrations and application, thinking those things through that um there might be people who, for example, I I really messed up one time and I didn't I I I saw the person, but I didn't make the connection with my sermon where I was uh looking at a person who was of Indian descent, South Asian descent, and later on it it turned down turned out that my congregant had brought uh a Hindu friend from work, a coworker. And my illustration was about my love for steak. And so there was this like juxtaposition of this guy who's visiting who comes from a Hindu culture who who doesn't care for that kind of uh food, and then my love for it, and I just I messed up and I realized later after preaching that sermon that I wasn't aware of who was around and making that connection. And so uh just those kinds of things, and sometimes it's unavoidable, we're gonna make mistakes, but whenever possible, I think our illustrations, especially in our application, uh even our use of language, of being um gender inclusive, um uh using illustrations where a female is the physician and not the male. So there's just some proactive things that we can do to create a more hospitable environment.

Joel Lawrence 31:00

So the the book is structured, as we said, in this kind of problem solution. It also has some guides for conversation uh built into the book. So when when you are writing it, who would who is primarily in your mind? Who who would you like to be having these conversations? Is this for pastors of churches? Is it for elder boards? Is it for welcome teams? Is it for everybody? What do you who would you recommend it to?

Matthew Kim 31:29

Well, I I know that the the right answer is not is it can't be for everybody. Um as as you know, Joe from writing books. Yeah. But um I I think my target audience really is small groups. Yeah. And and and and um groups that meet in homes. And I I think those are the best ways for us to be able to dig deeper into some of the chapters and have opportunity for conversation, dialogue, confession of, you know, I messed up in in that area, or I can grow in that area. Uh so um, yeah, of course, I would love for pastors to read it and elders and and such, but I think the the most uh generative conversations will come out of small group ministries, um, and any kind of uh women's Bible study or group or men's Bible studying group, uh, those kinds of atmospheres and environments would be a good way for us to to really consider, you know, how can we do this better?

Joel Lawrence 32:24

So are there any uh kind of final words of encouragement that you would want to give, particularly to pastors who are who are listening here? Maybe there's a pastor out there and and he knows this is a problem in his church. He's trying to figure that out. Maybe there's a cultural issue, and it's just hard to crack culture at times. So we just love to give you the opportunity to share whatever whatever final words of encouragement you might have for shepherds of the church out there.

Matthew Kim 32:56

Yeah, thanks, Joel. I would say be kind to yourself. It's okay. Um we all come at this from a different angle or perspective or ability, even consciousness. And so give yourself grace, but at the same time, maybe make it an intentional practice of saying, what's one way I can be friendlier this week? Uh, how can I be a better uh steward uh of this great gospel that we claim to preach and believe and we do? And so, how can we be a better steward of that uh kind God, friendly God, and look more like uh our our our triune God and being that kind of great welcomer to strangers uh and bring them into the kingdom? And so we're gonna mess up. I've messed up countless times, but uh don't let this stop us from to try to be more proactive in this. And I really believe that uh when I'm making this more of an intentional practice, people will stick, people will come back, and it'll trickle down to the rest of the church.

Joel Lawrence 33:56

Well, Matt, thanks uh for joining us for the podcast today. And uh thanks for the work you're doing to serve the Church, to serve her pastors. I feel like you just you're just cranking out great books all the time. So keep them coming. We'll keep you we'll keep having you on the podcast. Really grateful for your ministry, brother.

Matthew Kim 34:14

Praise God, Joel. And uh I'm I'm just grateful for the church and I love the pastors too. So keep keep at it, you're doing great.

Joel Lawrence 34:21

Amen. Amen. Thank you.

Zach Wagner 34:24

Thanks for listening to today's episode of the CPT Podcast, a theology podcast for the church. If you enjoyed this episode, would you consider subscribing if you haven't already? You can also help us out by leaving a rating and especially a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. We love hearing from listeners in this way, and it helps others find out about the show. The Pastor Theologians Podcast is a production of the Center for Pastor Theologians. You can learn more about the CPT at our website, Pastor Theologians.com. You can also find us on Facebook, YouTube, and follow us on X. This show is produced by Seth Porch and Sophia Luke. The show is recorded and edited in partnership with Glowfire Creative, and editing is done by Seth Creekmore. Hosting duties are shared by Joel Lawrence, Rae Paul, and me, Zach Wagner. Thanks for listening.