How To Invite Back the Regulars Who Drifted Before Christmas Eve
Hey friend!
Pull up your attendance records from last spring. Look for the names that showed up most Sundays and then stopped.
You probably know a few of those names by heart. You may have wondered what happened to them. Then the week got busy, and nobody reached out.
Christmas Eve is the easiest invitation you will make all year. It's one night, and nobody expects a person to explain where they've been.
Today I'll walk you through the whole plan, from building the list to the note you send after Christmas.
Let's dive in.
A regular who drifted needs permission to come back without explaining themselves.
A regular who drifted knows your church well. They know where to park and who sits in the third row.
They also know they've been gone. That's what makes coming back feel awkward. Every Sunday they stay away, that feeling grows a little.
Your message has one job. It tells them they can walk back in and nobody will ask for an explanation.
Start with a list built from your own attendance records.
Before anyone writes a word, decide who counts as drifted. Your church management software or check-in system can usually pull this for you.
Here's a starting point you can adjust: someone who came most Sundays for at least 3 months and hasn't been back in 6 weeks or more.
Then go through the list with your pastors. Someone who left over a conflict, or someone going through a crisis, needs a call from a pastor. Take those names off this list and hand them to the right person.
The message should come from someone they already know.
Match each name on the list to one person. Pick a small group leader, a greeter, or a friend from their usual service. Pick someone whose name they will recognize when the text comes in.
A text from a person they know feels like a friend checking in. That's the feeling you want.
Give each sender 5 names at most. Past that, it starts to feel like a chore, and the messages start to sound like it.
Staff can send messages too, as long as they have a real relationship with the person.
Guilt keeps people away longer, so mention the time away once and leave it there.
Skip "We've missed you!" and "Where have you been?" Someone who already feels awkward hears both of those as a question they have to answer.
Name the gap once, lightly. "It's been a while, and that's totally fine." Then talk about something else.
Every message should leave the door open. If they say no, the answer is "No problem. You're always welcome." That's the end of it.
Christmas Eve gives them an easy reason to come back.
An invitation works best when it has a date on it. "Sit with us on Christmas Eve at 5:00" gives them a real plan.
This year Christmas Eve is on a Thursday. Lock in your service times, parking details, and plans for kids before anyone starts sending.
Then add one personal offer. "Want to sit with us?" is the line I'd keep in every single message.
Send 3 messages between mid-November and New Year's.
- Week of November 16: a personal text. It's a short, warm check-in that doesn't mention Christmas yet. Its only job is to start the conversation again before you ask for anything.
- Week of December 7: the Christmas Eve email. It comes from the same person, by name. It includes service times, parking, what happens with kids, and the offer to sit together.
- Week of December 28: a short note. If they came, say thanks and mention one thing coming up in January. If they didn't, tell them the door is still open.
Some people will reply to the text and want to talk. Others are easier to reach with a phone call. Have your senders ready for both.
Keep names and personal details out of the AI.
The prompts below write templates. Your senders add the names after.
Don't paste a person's name, phone number, prayer requests, or your guess about why they left into ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini. That information belongs to them. Keep it in your church system.
Build workflows like this with other leaders in the Builder Collective.
Michael Lukaszewski and I run the Builder Collective. It's a practical AI membership for founders and operators, and that includes those of you leading churches and ministries.
Every month there's a live Deep Dive where one AI workflow gets built from start to finish, with your questions answered along the way. There's also a Show and Tell on the first Friday of each month. Members get the resource library, a private Slack community, and our in-person and online events at no extra cost.
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Now here are 3 prompts your team can use this week. The first writes a personal check-in text your small group leaders can send in mid-November. The second writes the Christmas Eve invitation email for someone who used to attend. The third builds a phone call guide with kind answers to 6 replies your volunteers might hear on the phone.
Grab all 3 copy-paste prompts here ⤵️ ⤵️
