We asked our church how they were doing during the lockdown. How they were *really* doing.

Here’s what we found out.

With the world in the grip of an unprecedented crisis caused by the spread of the COVID-19 disease, churches across the globe have been marshaling their faith, and the faithful, to begin meeting the needs of those whose lives are being torn apart.

In my experience, the Church’s response to a crisis typically involves raising money to a) give to local organizations, and b) make available for people in the congregation who reach out to express a desperate need.

Is it a good and noble start? Yes.

Is it strategic enough to meet the extraordinary circumstances we now find ourselves in? No.

Our local church in Denver, Colorado, wanted to help in a way that was more strategic. After all, with 40 million people in the United States filing for unemployment since lockdown began in March, it’s very likely that we will need to start doing a whole lot more — with a whole lot less.

This is not the time for reactionary hand-outs, but strategic, proactive and data-informed compassion.

In April 2020, we piloted a survey with one of our campuses. The survey comprised of 23 questions and focused on two areas of our lives: vulnerability to economic downturn and resources available to aid others. (You can read more about the priority of helping at the point of vulnerability, not need, here).

For a church survey, the questions were decidedly pointed: there is not a lot of grey in a question like, ‘If you were to become unemployed, would you go immediately into debt in order to survive?’. Fortunately for us, there seems to be a level of trust in our church that enables our congregation to answer these questions openly (of course, there was an option to answer anonymously, though not many people chose that option).

Ultimately, we wanted data on three points:

1. Individual points of vulnerability and need, with the hope that those needs could be met.
2. Vulnerability trends in our congregation, where we might need to respond on a larger scale.
3. Points of resource in our church, so that we can facilitate the meeting of needs on a relational basis.

The results are still coming in, but the initial data points are fascinating. Here’s what we have learned so far:

1) Our church has surprising strength.

It’s of surprising comfort to see many people in our church seem to be weathering the current storm. While 40% of our congregation were concerned about losing their jobs in the near future, 60% were confident they could remain reasonably financially stable in the event of losing their job. This speaks of families following Biblical principles: living within their means and building emergency reserves. Perhaps it’s also a shout out to Dave Ramsey for reminding us of the importance of building a safety net (seriously, there were comments about Dave in the survey). Encouragingly, 94% of our church had access to health insurance in the event of a medical issue.

We recognize that there could be many factors at play here: we’re a central Denver campus catering to a large amount of generally healthy, professional adults without children; our percentage of single-parent homes is low (5%); over half of our adults are employed in fields typically resilient to economic downturns.

2) There are definitely vulnerabilities and unmet needs.

On the other hand, the economic weight of the lockdown is beginning to take its toll on many of our families. A quarter of homes have someone who has become unemployed since March of this year. Ten percent of homes have someone with health concerns that make them vulnerable to COVID-19 complications. One in six of our working adults are employed in healthcare, placing themselves in immediate vulnerability to the contagion.

On a family level, we have people who already cannot pay their monthly bills. We have parents who cannot work due to school closures. We have congregation members already testing positive to COVID-19. We know that mental health issues are on the rise.

3) Everyone, regardless of their situation, wants to help others.

A particularly beautiful data point was the fact that 100% of our respondents wanted to be called upon to help others in need. ‘Helping others’ ranged from small acts of assistance such as collecting groceries, through to performing car or IT repairs and providing professional support, financial advice and legal assistance. A quarter of our church wanted to support others with direct financial assistance.

Even those who were admittedly struggling in some areas still wanted to help in areas that they could: one resilient respondent with a broken arm still offered to help collect groceries for others!

4) There is a beautiful pairing of need and resource.

Another joyous data point was the number of needs in our church that could be met by the resources in our church (those resources that are still privately owned by individuals and families), not just of our church (those resources that belong to the church as a collective organization). While we had numerous adults expressing concern over their declining emotional health during quarantine, we also had mental health professionals come forward offering their services, pro bono. Though 25% of family homes are experiencing unemployment, multiple people stepped forward with job openings at their organizations, and we are able to begin building a team of experienced HR professionals to support people through the job-seeking process. Because we are now aware of the need for social connection for so many people (particularly single adults living alone), we are able to pull people together to begin building new virtual small-groups to ease the burden of loneliness and disconnect that could easily befall any of us under such circumstances.

We also now have potential access to six fully-furnished apartments for people needing emergency accommodation, courtesy of a church member who would like to use his resources to care for others in this time.

By being bold enough to ask the tough questions, and our congregation being bold enough to answer honestly, our church is in a unique position: we are able to strategically plan to care for one another. We are less reliant on hearsay and anecdotes, and more prepared with the information that we need to build support teams, connect need with strength, and ultimately see that no need goes unmet in this time.

Let’s get smart, so we can do good.

Originally published at https://www.phillipbarnard.com on June 17, 2020.