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NICE

An Acronym You Can Use!  

Marvin Bryant

(From Church Growth, 3rd Quarter, 2001)

Mac Lynn once told me that congregation after congregation claims to be friendly and loving, only to have guests tell a different story.  Guests at these congregations’ assemblies often feel they are not friendly at all.  What accounts for the discrepancy?  According to Mac Lynn, frequently it is that the members are being friendly only with themselves!  There is great fellowship among members who have known each other for some time, but they are so busy talking to each other that they hardly notice or welcome new people.  

What to do? Be NICE!  The acronym, NICE, is a tool you can use to help members remember and act on the Christ-like quality of welcoming guests and newcomers who come to our worship assemblies.  

Notice People. First, we need to develop the skill and habit of simply noticing the new people around us.  If we believe people are coming to seek God among us, then by all means we need to notice them and take care of them. I believe God is much more likely to bring such seekers to congregations who will take care of them than ones that hardly notice them.  I pray often that He will find us faithful enough to entrust us with the care of sincere searchers.  The first step in caring for them is to notice them.     

Introduce Yourself.  Following our Father’s example, we need to be the ones to initiate a relationship by reaching out to people. Smiling, approaching someone with an unfamiliar face, and extending your hand is a way of extending a little bit of the love and kindness of God.  I usually just say, “Hi, I’m Marvin Bryant” or “Hi, what’s your name?” It doesn’t matter initially whether the person is a member or guest, so I don’t say anything about that.  

If the person I meet happens to respond with a somewhat indignant, “I’ve been a member here for twenty years,” I recommend resisting the urge I’ve had to retaliate with, “Well, if you’d get a little more involved maybe I would recognize you by now!”  Instead I say, “Well, it’s good finally to meet you.”  Or, if someone says, “Yeah, I know, you met me three weeks ago,” I accept it as painful training in humility. I respond with, “I’m sorry I didn’t remember; I’ll keep trying.”  I mention these scenarios because the fear of meeting members (especially ones we’ve met before) often hinders us from reaching out to others as we ought.  I also publicly discuss these scenarios with the church, to help reduce the power and damage of cranky members who respond with barbs.   

Meeting members is great, but we especially want to get to any guests who are present at our assemblies.  To do so, we must remember that guests will often feel uncomfortable, since they don’t know the ropes and may not know any of the people.  If it has been a while since you have visited an unfamiliar club or group that meets on unfamiliar turf, I highly recommend it for the sake of empathizing with what guests at church feel.  Because of their discomfort they often leave quickly.  We must deliberately focus on introducing ourselves to guests before we engage our friends, who are much more likely to stay around a while.  

Connect with People.  Sincerity demands that we offer people more than a token introduction and handshake.  By talking to them and showing interest in them, we are offering them a more substantial taste of the love of God.  What’s more, the relationships and rapport we develop will be vital to our credibility for more direct evangelistic opportunities that may lie ahead.  I usually converse about whatever they happen to mention or, if they don’t say much, I ask if they are from in town or out of town and then build from there.  If you are the shy type, you may find another acronym useful:

 FORM.  You can usually get a person talking by asking about his or her Family, Occupation, or what they like to do for Recreation.  (The M stands for Message; see below).  The main concern, however, is sincerely to show interest in them.  By doing so, you will be demonstrating God’s love.

 Extend an Invitation.  The primary message we want to leave with people initially is that they are welcome here.  We can send that message by extending an invitation to something appropriate to them and to where you are in your relationship with them.  We might extend an invitation for them to come back next week, attend our Bible class, come to our fellowship group’s cookout, go out for coffee with some folks who are going, etc. Whatever invitation we extend, it tells them they are welcome and creates opportunities to build closer relationships that may become a bridge that leads to their salvation. We hope and pray that we may eventually have the opportunity to extend an invitation to sit down and explore the gospel together.  

Perhaps you can think of a better acronym, but being NICE at least catches the “other-centered” spirit of Jesus and communicates its essence in a way members can understand, remember and act on.  We frequently print the acronym with its short phrase explanations in our bulletin.  I often remind people of it just before our “let’s all stand and greet someone” times at the beginning of most of our services.  I find regular opportunities to remind people of it during sermons as well.   

To be true to the spirit of Christ, we ought to be NICE in our neighborhoods and workplaces as well.  If people are to perceive we are Christians by our love (John 13:35), however, we must by all means be NICE when we gather as the body of Christ.  Perhaps a little more awareness of and practice at being NICE in our assemblies will lead to our being NICE in those other settings as well.

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