Since its birth in 1998, Parkway Presbyterian Church has been creating faithful servants of God. The church’s mission is fundamental: connect with God, grow in His word and serve the world. Its members are spiritually tied to that mission and it perfectly aligns the ministry through their walk with Jesus.
A church deeply rooted in prayer, Parkway Presbyterian prides itself on actively communicating the works of Jesus to the world. As their mission describes, Parkway strives to communicate the love of Christ with everyone in their community.
Successful churches work from the inside out, strengthening the church body to be warriors for Jesus. Sue Harris, Finance Director of Parkway Presbyterian, says her church is able to meet this goal through several different ways of helping others. “We have a program called the Rainbow Ministry which is run by some women in the church who reach out to the community, particularly for children who have suffered a loss of a close family member.”
“We also support a program called ‘No Longer Bound,’ which assists young men who are suffering from addiction. In addition to ‘No Longer Bound’ and others, we have an outreach program called ‘Days of Service.’ Once a month on a Saturday, the congregation will visit there. We also support that mission with monetary donations.”
Parkway Presbyterian doesn’t just assist with local ministry efforts, though. They also have global missions that help those in need around the world. “We pack meals twice a year – usually about 2,000 meals every time we get together. Those meals can then be shipped overseas,” said Harris.
However, sometimes even the greatest strengths don’t overshadow the weaknesses. Parkway Presbyterian was thriving through their community outreach program but they were having some difficulties effectively reaching their church body.
“We were concerned with not communicating with our members,” says Sue. “We were looking for something that was a better communication piece for our church.”
That’s when Parkway Presbyterian found Realm. Through Realm, church leaders are seamlessly able to communicate with group members. “We have a group called the Prime Timers – a group consisting of people 55 and older. When we sent emails out about this group, it was exciting to know that all members would get the communication.”
Outside of groups, Sue also loved the fact that the church could notify the entire congregation at a moment’s notice – something that was more difficult with their other software.
“I needed to send out an email to the active members of the church that included a message from our moderator of the presbytery. I used a query and searched all the members and Realm sent the message to over 300 people. If we had not had Realm, I don’t know what we would have done.”
Parkway Presbyterian Church is still new to Realm, but Sue is very hopeful that it will change how their church does ministry. She looks forward to the future and how Realm can assist in facilitating change in communication strategies at Parkway Presbyterian. “I’d tell anyone who is thinking about switching that I think Realm is the best product ACS Technologies has ever created.”
Church communication can be stagnant and lifeless or enthusiastic and vibrant. Learn more about how Realm can breathe new life into your ministry.
