Open Letter to My Dear Church Elders in Nagaland

Please allow me to share my heart out to you today.

Pastors and Church Leaders
I would love to see you every Sunday morning outside the church building waiting and greeting the congregation with a smile and hug. We love meeting you in person, we love it when you say “good to see you”.

I love spending time with you even after the church and even pray together. It also makes me more happy when you tell me “Would love to see you again next Sunday”.

Or even receiving a simple whats app message on Saturday night “See you tomorrow “ & “Glad to have you today” after church on sunday would boost up my spirit.

Children Ministry
Please invest in the children ministry: feed them, mould them, train them and shape them with the word of God and Christian values when they are young. Prepare them to be good human beings, good citizens and honest church members.

There are so many theologians and young people with the heart & zeal to serve God. Train these youths and employ them (yes employ them; stop asking for voluntary service always). Get the best for God. We need more children pastors and trained Sunday school teachers. Stop randomly picking people from your Chruch, colonies, localities to teach these children. Get the trained ones or get them trained; to be honest we have enough/sufficient theologians who are jobless and doing nothing.

Youth Ministry
Please don’t ever hesitate to invest in the youth ministry. Any church with active youth participation and presence is always lively and alive. Dear elders these youths are the church leaders and elders of tomorrow. Invest in them, train them and please try to listen to them and hear their side of the story also instead of always commanding, teaching, judging and complaining. (What you think is right might not be cool to their generation or may be outdated)

The youths are moving away from the church, Please attend the youth service and if you don’t find the youths, you better make church more interesting and youth oriented.

If they don’t come to Church, take the church to them. Meet them at the cafes, movies, Pizza, KFC, gaming parlour, park, sports ground, music concerts etc. You can share and preach there also.

Music and Creative Arts
Don’t hesitant to invest and encourage them even if you don’t know or are not interested in music or any creative arts.

Please pay the worship band, the sound guy, the media guy or the one handling the projector every Sunday,the amount doesn’t have to hefty, but according to your capacity. Please please stop expecting for free always. If your Church is small and poor it’s ok, but I see so many rich and big churches who don’t.

Music, Drama , Sports, arts etc , these activities will make them engage and stay active, and pull them closer to church and ultimately to God.

A good sound system and musical equipment’s are essential. Don’t hesitate to invest if you can afford. And please employ a trained sound engineer or train your church chowkidar or some youths from the church.

Please stop focusing on the church building for some time and focus on winning souls.

Please make the church without walls: accept and invite every sinner or section of the society to church. Let the drunkards, drug addict, prostitute, gay, adulterers, depressed, happy person feel welcomed so that they can come and hear the truth. Focus on building the relationship rather than judging too much and pushing them away from Church& God.

Mental Health / Sickness :
Depression, anxiety and loneliness are the biggest problem these generations are going through, lately suicide cases are on the rise. It’s time the church employ a professional counsellors or focus on these topics. Study and talk about these issues in the church.

Sex, AIDS/HIV and Corruption
Please don’t hesitate to talk about sex, HIV/AIDS in the church, we are the third highest estimated adult HIV prevalence in India. There is a rise in LGBTQ community in Nagaland. Please tackle and handle it wisely with wisdom from God and proper study.

Corruption is wrong, let them know – even more so, the ones who donates more.
Lastly, you keep account of the properties, tithes & offering, the wealth, mission works, church planting etc. but please start maintaining account of the souls you save in a year also. How many of your church members are saved in a year is more important than how many missionary you are sending outside.

Oh ya please stop playing politics inside the church !

Thank you for listening,
Yours faithfully,
Youth member of your church

Alobo Naga