Nightshift Ministry

[Leslie]

Nightshift workers, like the deaf and disabled, are marginalized by the church. 10-11 AM on Sunday morning, for a nightshift worker, is like 3 AM for ordinary people. When I worked the night shift in a hospital ER, most of my colleagues who were believers never went to church just because of the service time. Many of them were able, willing, and eager to worship weekly but just did not have the stamina to turn around their biological clocks. If there had been a service at a nightshift-decent hour, it would have been easy to fill it with both believers and seekers.

Recently I heard of a church that polled the local hospitals and factories to determine a decent hour for worship, then conducted a worship service at an acceptable hour--early morning, I believe it was. Uniforms were acceptable attire. Coffee would help.

Good, bad, or indifferent idea?

 

[Pergamum]

On base in the military we had a 730am service and this fit hospital workers getting off a Saturday night-Sunday morning shift very well. Since it occurred at this time of morning and was on a base casual dress or uniforms were okay.

I think it is a good idea.

 

[Richard King]

I think this makes very good sense.
There is an entire population of people out there that don't work the standard 9 to 5.

 

[JBaldwin]

This is an especially good idea if the church is in a community where a lot of the members are working crazy shifts. An evening service say at 7:00 p.m. on Sunday would also be an option. In the church I attended as a teenager, the night shift folks came to church in the evening.

 

[jd.morrison]

As a member of the "night working" community, I must say that it is really difficult to do my job and go to an 11am worship service. My church has a 9am worship service but it is Contemporary... Not my particular cup of tea, so I rough it, and then I work with the youth group at 5pm then it is usually off to work after that... I think it would be an amazing IDEA to have a 7:30am church service...

 

[tellville]

My church tries to do this. On Sunday we have 8:00, 10:00, 12:00 and 2:00 (Korean) services. Then there are the different youth services (Korean/ English) and children services (Korean / English). During the week there is service every morning (6:00 AM) if people want to worship and have a sermon and pray before work. Also, there is a Wednesday night service and every Friday night they have a communion service. Basically, you have no excuses for missing church at my church! Well, unless your English and then there are only 2 different services on Sunday, one for children, and one for everyone else.

Personally, I think it is an awesome idea to have a service really early in the morning or late at night so as to minister to those whose work schedule's don't necessarily coincide with us standard folk. They don't have to be as hardcore as my church is, but an extra early service or late service on a Sunday can go a long way to reaching some people!

 

[Ivan]

It's a good idea, however I worked third shift from 10 PM to 7:00 AM. I either attended or supply preached at 10:30 or 10:45 AM services all the time (most churches I supply preached were at least 45 minutes away). I was usually asleep by 1:30 PM or 2:00 PM. It was never a problem for me. I did that for two years.

 

[Grace Alone]

A local church here started a Sat. evening service at 6 pm. I think that is a nice time for people who have to work at night or in the daytime on Sunday.

 

[TimV]

I'm with Perg. There's plenty of time for a nap during the day.