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Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. Today we’re talking with Ashley Lentz from Lutheran Church of Hope in Iowa. As the Connections Pastor at one of the largest and fastest-growing churches in the country, Ashley brings a wealth of practical insight into creating personal connection in a growing church.

Struggling to connect new guests and help them take meaningful next steps at your church? Tune in as Ashley unpacks how her team prioritizes clarity, simplifies the path forward, and builds systems that still feel personal—without overwhelming people or staff.

• Offer more than one pathway. // At a large church like Lutheran Church of Hope, it’s easy for people to feel lost in the crowd. A website can’t be the only entry point. While it’s useful, relying solely on digital tools can confuse guests. People often want a conversation—not a scavenger hunt. Churches must create multiple, intuitive connection points beyond online portals.
• Four paths of the Hope Circle. // Lutheran Church of Hope staff uses an internal tool called The Hope Circle to identify where people are in their discipleship journey and help them take next steps. The circle starts with Seekers, for people who are exploring what Jesus is about. Next are Believers, identified as people who have heard the message and are into Jesus, but don’t know what to believe or do next. Followers have been transformed by Christ and wanting to actively live out their faith. Finally is a Servant Leader – a mature believer leading and serving others through their transformed life.
• Start with Alpha. // Ashley recommends Alpha as a go-to starting point for anyone in the Seeker, Believer, or Follower stage. For Seekers, it provides the foundational answers they need. Believers benefit from a supportive community. And Followers get a refresher and grow more confident in sharing their faith. This simple, effective course has proven to be a unifying tool across spiritual stages.
• Personal relationships at scale. // Despite its size, Hope prioritizes personal touches. The “New to Hope” area is centrally located, staffed with volunteers in bright orange vests, and offers a free t-shirt to first-time guests. Visitors fill out a connection card (paper or digital) and are invited into further conversation, tours, or ministry introductions. Automated systems send follow-up emails and texts, but staff personally respond to replies to ensure people feel seen and valued.
• The power of serving. // Serving is one of Hope’s primary pathways to connection. Volunteer opportunities—such as hospitality, communion, or the café—allow people to engage while they’re already attending worship. Serving builds natural community, makes a large church feel smaller, and creates discipleship opportunities in the context of teams. Ashley notes that service can be a more accessible first step than joining a class, particularly for busy families.
• Clarity is kindness. // One of Ashley’s key takeaways is that clarity is crucial. Large churches can easily overwhelm people with too many programs. Recently, Hope streamlined its discipleship offerings, moving some content online and focusing attention on core pathways like Alpha, Foundations, and Tuesday night programming. By simplifying options and communicating them consistently, Hope has made it easier for people to know what to do next.
• Metrics and insights. // Ashley has observed consistent patterns: from sign-up to actual attendance, about 20% drop off; and from week one to week four of a class, roughly 40% of participants fall away. To address this, Hope emphasizes shorter class cycles and practical on-ramps. These metrics help them refine offerings while staying realistic about engagement.

Learn more about Lutheran Church of Hope at www.lutheranchurchofhope.org and email Ashley.

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Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Risepointe

Do you feel like your church’s or school’s facility could be preventing growth? Are you frustrated or possibly overwhelmed at the thought of a complicated or costly building project? Are the limitations of your building becoming obstacles in the path of expanding your ministry? Have you ever felt that you could reach more people if only the facility was better suited to the community’s needs?

Well, the team over at Risepointe can help! As former ministry staff and church leaders, they understand how to prioritize and help lead you to a place where the building is a ministry multiplier. Your mission should not be held back by your building. Their team of architects, interior designers and project managers have the professional experience to incorporate creative design solutions to help move YOUR mission forward.

Check them out at Risepointe.com and while you’re there, schedule a FREE call to explore possibilities for your needs, vision and future…Risepointe believes that God still uses spaces…and they’re here to help.

Episode Transcript

Rich Birch — Well, hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. I’m super excited for today. We’ve got a church that I’ve been tracking for quite a while and excited to have a leader from there on. But then I know this is an area that so many of our churches are struggling with, and it’s kind of like an area that you might not be aware that you’re struggling with. And so I’m hoping that we open up a discussion today to help that will move you to really make some changes that will ultimately see your church help people get connected to it.

Rich Birch — Today we have ah Ashley Lentz. She’s the Connections Pastor at Lutheran Church of Hope. It’s one of the fastest growing in the churches yeah churches in the country with, I believe, seven campuses, if I’m counting correctly, in Central Iowa.

Ashley Lentz — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Iowa. Sorry, it’s early in the morning, getting my lips going here, friends, ah multiple smaller local sites and opportunities to join online. They actively partner with and support other churches through their Hope Network. Super excited to have you on the episode today, Ashley. Welcome.

Ashley Lentz — Thanks, Rich. Thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here and help in whatever ways I can and just share, share what we learn.

Rich Birch — Nice. Why don’t, for people that don’t know, kind of paint a picture of Hope today, kind of tell us a little bit about the church and your role as a Connections Pastor.

Ashley Lentz — Yes, you described Hope beautifully. We are located in the metro Des Moines area of Iowa.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Ashley Lentz — So Des Moines is our capital for those who don’t know. And like you said, we have seven campuses and a whole bunch of local sites, is what we call them, and partner with churches all around the country to simply help them do ministry and meet them where they are.

Ashley Lentz — And so ah Hope is, we would call it a multi-site megachurch, right? But it very much feels like I’ve grown up in the Hope, what I would call the Hope system, the Hope Network. I did our middle school and high school ministry here and came back to be a pastor here.

Ashley Lentz — And so um I think we do a really beautiful job of reaching people where they are and inviting them into ah something deeper, but also meeting them where they are and saying like, if this is where you’re at, like we will, we will meet you there and walk alongside you and wherever you are in your faith journeys.

Ashley Lentz — So my role as a Connections Pastor is just that. I get to meet people where they are and help them navigate ah what is next in their faith journey. We worship at our campus, the larger campus here in West Des Moines. We worship about 7,000 in person weekly. And my favorite way to meet them as a Connections Pastor is truly to have one-on-one conversations.

Ashley Lentz — And sometimes that happens you know during weekend worship. Sometimes it happens during the week at other things. um But that’s what I love doing is getting to know people, helping them find the next best step for them in their faith journey and making a really large church seem intimate, seem like a ah community that is for them and finding a place where they can really feel like they belong…

Rich Birch — So good.

Ashley Lentz — …not just fit in, but where they can belong here.

Rich Birch — Well, for friends that have been tracking with for with me for a while, they know this is like a passion area for me. I’m super excited to learn from you, clearly an expert in the field. And you mentioned it, you know, one of your campuses is 7,000, multiple thousands in the other locations.

Rich Birch — It’s a large church by all, you know, all, you know, metrics, probably the top 0.2 to 5% of churches in the country. ah And, you know, when a church like yours is attracting thousands of people coming through the doors every single weekend, you know, helping them take the next step can be difficult. And one of the misnomers that I, that bug me is I know that a church like yours is very good at connecting people. That is a part of the reason why you’re the size you are. But there are challenges that you run into trying to connect with people at scale. I love that you started with, I love to connect one-on-one. I’m like, how do you do that at a so church that size. But what are some of those challenges? Talk me through why is it so hard at scale to connect with people?

Ashley Lentz — For sure. We do not do this perfectly. I’ll be the first to say that. And it’s important that anybody listening knows we do not have this completely figured out.

Rich Birch — Sure.

Ashley Lentz — I will just tell you where we’ve been and some of the challenges we faced and what we do in the midst of those challenges to just navigate them as best we can, because we’re still figuring things out too.

Ashley Lentz — One of the biggest struggles that we have is communicating effectively. When you have the the size of staff that we have, and by no means do we have a massive staff. I think many of our staff, people would tell you we’re probably understaffed. We could always use more. But we have so much programming. A lot of it is volunteer led. I help lead our women’s ministry and I have women facilitators leading those classes.

Ashley Lentz — But we have things happening every day of the week in every ministry area. So it is hard to effectively communicate where I want people to plug in. Because it’s easy to say, hey, check out the website. Everything is listed on there. But really quickly, people get overwhelmed by that.

Rich Birch — So true.

Ashley Lentz — And that’s one of, again, that’s one of the things that love is I tell people, come talk to me. Some people love that. They’re like, yeah, would love to sit in chat. And other people are like, no, let me just navigate the website and figure it out on my own.

Rich Birch — Love it. Yes.

Ashley Lentz — But when you have so many things, they’re all great. It is hard to effectively communicate. Here’s what we find most important. Here’s what we would say. Start here and then do these kinds of things.

Ashley Lentz — Prescribing a discipleship journey is really hard. And probably not effective because everybody’s on a different journey.

Rich Birch — Right.

Ashley Lentz — So we do like to offer, like we just have different offerings and I get to help people navigate season of faith, season of life, and what might meet them where they are right now and be an effective discipleship pathway for them. Yep.

Rich Birch — Okay. I’d love to unpack that a little bit more. You talk about, and there’s a great description. We’ve got lots of different things going on, lots of different ministries, ah and but we’ve got to simplify it. You didn’t quite least say that. You said, we got to start here. We have to you know make it kind of really obvious or have pathways. What does that look like in practice? Help us understand how you’re doing that.

Ashley Lentz — Yes. One of the tools that we use, and it is very much an internal tool is what I would call it. We call it the Hope circle. And it is what I would call a discipleship tool or discipleship pathway. And if I were to say that to our congregation members, they would really have no idea what I’m talking about. It is very internal. But it’s helpful to identify where people are on this Hope circle.

Ashley Lentz — And so the circle starts with being a seeker. At a church our size, we have people every weekend who have zero idea what the church thing is about. They’ve maybe never been introduced to Jesus. Someone just invited them to church. They maybe knew they needed church and walked in the door, but have no idea what to expect. And so they are seeking something that has been missing in their life. And so ah helping people identify if that’s where you are, here are kind of the very preliminary places that would be helpful for you to start plugging in.

Ashley Lentz — As we move around that circle, we get to believers, people who are like, okay, I’m bought into the Jesus thing. I’ve heard the message. I believe. Now what? Like, I I want to understand this better. Like, I believe in Jesus. I believe in God. Like, I’m here for it, but I don’t really know the things. So where do we go from there and how do we help them then move into like being super excited about Jesus? Like, I don’t just believe like I’m on fire for Jesus. I’m a follower, right? Like I am, I am all in my life looks different. I’ve been transformed. How do I follow him? And then how do you serve people in that arena too? Because that’s going to look different than somebody who’s come in as a seeker looking for Jesus and somebody who’s on fire for Jesus. So how do we move them around the circle?

Ashley Lentz — So it’s seeker, believer, follower, and then kind of the last part of our circle is servant leader. How do we move them then into serving and letting the transformed nature of the gospel pour out of them into the world around us?

Ashley Lentz — And I would say our secret sauce here at Hope is we love volunteers. Like as we move people around the Hope circle, I and my colleagues, we want to equip people to lead.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Ashley Lentz — So being a servant leader inside these walls, but also outside these walls is really like, that’s what’s attractional to people is is letting them know like you’re on fire for Jesus. Go tell everyone about it and serve in the arena you find yourself in, whether in the church or outside the church.

Rich Birch — That’s good. So how do you, how do you help people self-identify that? What’s that practically look like for folks that are at the church? How do you help them? And um folks, we’ll, we’ll put the Hope circle in the show notes. You can look down there. You can see it there if you’re, if you want to see that as a tool to kind of visualize that. But how do you help folks self-identify where they might be in that process? Or is it purely, they got to talk to somebody?

Ashley Lentz — No, it’s not. I would love to say, please just talk to me, but you’re right.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Yes.

Ashley Lentz — With 7,000 people worshiping on a weekend, there’s no way.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I can’t do that.

Ashley Lentz — Even if if everybody on staff talked to some people. We, I’ll talk about this as kind of like on ramps or pathways.

Rich Birch — Yep. Yep.

Ashley Lentz — One of the best places for people to start as a seeker, a believer, even a follower is the Alpha course. I’m sure you’re familiar with Alpha course.

Rich Birch — Absolutely. Yep.

Ashley Lentz — We love Alpha here at Hope. And Alpha does such a beautiful job of if you are a seeker, it gives you the foundation that you need to step into what’s next.

Ashley Lentz — If you’re a believer, it’s going to connect you to community, which is a really important part of discipleship. If you are a follower, like you are bought in and you are learning the things, we tell people Alpha is a great place to brush up on the basics, but also get plugged into community. So would say one of our biggest on-ramps is Alpha.

Ashley Lentz — And then from there, this is kind of like my bread and butter in my role, is taking people as they finish Alpha and helping them self-identify what’s next. Coming out of Alpha, am I ready to serve? Is that like, am I on fire? Am I ready to come back and host Alpha or step into a different service opportunity? Do I need more basics? Did Alpha spark in me like, oh, maybe I don’t know as much about the Bible as I want to. Do we direct them back to a Bible class and learning like the foundations of a Bible.

Ashley Lentz — This fall, we’re trying something new called Foundations. it’s a three-week class. The first class is, what’s my Bible? How do I read it? Second class is, how do I pray? And the third class is identity, like what God says about you.

Rich Birch — That’s cool.

Ashley Lentz — And so there’ll be people who come out of Alpha, yeah, who we say, maybe Foundations is next for you. Like, let’s Let’s really get some of these foundational pieces put together. up We also have a ton of just general classes, right? Like if you want to study ah spiritual disciplines, we have a class for that.

Ashley Lentz — If you want to really dive into the narrative of scripture from Genesis to Revelation, what is the story that’s being told? We have a class for that. We also outsource resources. So I’m always always directing people to BibleProject.com and other things that do a really good job of walking people through some of these basic parts of discipleship, Bible knowledge, prayer knowledge. How, how do I get plugged into community? These are the questions we continue to ask.

Ashley Lentz — And people can self-identify. I like, I do like directing people to the website. If you’re excited about community or getting plugged into a small group, check the website. There’s a page for small groups. Like we will help you with that.

Rich Birch — Right.

Ashley Lentz — By far and away, the best way we have found to get people connected is personal invites and personal relationships. I can’t personally do all of that. It is our congregation that does that for one another. And that is super beautiful to equip people who are on fire for Jesus to invite their neighbors and their colleagues, and to help them to share their story and say, here was here’s what my discipleship journey looked like. And I’d invite you to check out Alpha or this class or come join our small group and see what it’s like.

Rich Birch — That’s good. Yeah, I love that you’re, you know, stressing that. I think there might be people that are surprised who are listening who would say, you know, here’s a person talking, you know, a large church, really stressing personal relationships. Unpack that a little more a little bit more. How do you practically cultivate those personal touches at scale? How do you encourage that beyond, you know, just, you know, you doing that or a small group of people doing that?

Ashley Lentz — Yes, ah we build teams. And everything that we do, we build volunteer teams. So if you walk into Hope on a weekend, and this is true of any of our campuses, there will be a New to Hope area with volunteers who are clearly marked. They they wear bright orange vests here at our West Des Moines campus. You can’t miss them. The vests say: “New to Hope?” And we clearly tell people, if you are new, we love to connect with you.

Ashley Lentz — They can fill out an online form. They can fill out a paper form. They can have a conversation with a real person. But those people every week are being followed up with personally um by staff members, by volunteers. They are being checked in with because we so deeply believe in personal relationship and personal invitation.

Ashley Lentz — Same thing with people who are just getting involved.They might not be new to Hope, but the fall is a great example of getting connected, right? Like rally weekend is coming up for us this weekend where all of our fall programming kick kicks off. So we have a ministry fair where we will have tables in our atrium and invite people to stop by the tables and really get to know the leaders leading those ministries or the volunteers involved in those ministries and ask your questions.

Rich Birch — That’s great.

Ashley Lentz — Some people, again, some people won’t stop, right? Like they like, I don’t want to have a conversation with anybody, which is why a website’s a great tool. We have clearly marked women’s ministry, men’s ministry, general adult classes, everything’s on there. But if you are excited about what’s next and making a large place feel small, the best way you’re going to do that is by a conversation with someone or an email correspondence.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Ashley Lentz — But yeah, really having pointed conversations about where you’re at in your faith life and what you’re looking for.

Rich Birch — Okay, let’s deep dive on that. You talked about some stuff there that I’d love to double click on and hear a little bit more about.

Ashley Lentz — Yeah.

Rich Birch — So talk us through, if I’m if I’m a guest that comes, um talk us through, I arrive at the New to Hope, I see. So like, give me a sense of like, how many people are there? What happens when I arrive there? What are they going to ask me to do? How do they get me connected? I’m assuming I fill something out. Maybe I get a gift. Then what happens? You know, kind of talk us through what the the experience of someone who chooses to self-identify, you know, through the New to Hope experience, what’s that look like?

Ashley Lentz — Yes. Yes, I love this. Our New to Hope area is in the middle of our atrium. So we have our building is kind of, the worship center is obviously like big and there’s it’s kind of the main part of our building. But the atrium is very clearly when you come into the building, you are in the atrium. And so it’s a big old signs, bright orange. When you see that, you will see very friendly volunteer faces – usually like three or four and probably a couple of staff people lingering in that general area every single weekend, every single service.

Ashley Lentz — And it’s really funny, Rich, just this weekend, I was walking around the building and I saw a family. And it was a young adult woman and her parents. And they walk into our building. And you can tell when people are new because they just kind of stop and look around.

Rich Birch — A hundred percent. A hundred percent.

Ashley Lentz — Like they don’t know where to go, right?

Rich Birch — Yes.

Ashley Lentz — So I walked up to them and I said, hey, can I help you find anything? And they’re like, we’re brand new. We have no idea what we’re doing. And I so I introduced myself. And I said, here here’s where we’ll start. We’ll start at New to Hope. And so I had her fill out a connection card. We have paper connection cards, like a postcard. And it is name, address, email address, phone number. People can follow it as much or as little as they want. But I tell them, if you want us to get in touch with you, I need you to write your email and I need you to write it legibly.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Ashley Lentz — And then they can opt in for our weekly newsletter, right? Like that’s and then there’s a blank space that says, what are you interested in? What do you want more information about? Some people fill that out, some people don’t. But that’s, they can fill it out virtually. We have little tablets at the New to Hope or they can fill it out on paper. And then what we do, we give them a free Hope t-shirt and we tell people in announcements, like if you’re new, stop by the New to Hope area. We’d love to gift to you with a free Hope t-shirt as a way of saying thanks for being our guest today.

Ashley Lentz — So they get a free Hope t-shirt. And then I always ask them, can I help you find anything? Would you like a tour of the building? Like, I personally walked around this family this weekend. She was a young adult woman who had just moved here. And she said, like, where would I do young adult things? You have young adult ministry. And I said, yes. And I said, it’s not in the worship center. It’s in this, it’s in our chapel. Let me walk you around and orient you.

Rich Birch — So good.

Ashley Lentz — So when you get here on a Thursday night for, for that, then you know where you’re going.

Ashley Lentz — That’s what our volunteers will do for people too. We, I want people to feel seen, right? As It’s a large church. You don’t want people to walk in without being seen or walk out without being seen.

Rich Birch — So good.

Ashley Lentz — So yes, we I say hi to everybody that crosses my path. And some people purposely put their head down and don’t want to be said hi to. And it’s like, you’re in church…

Rich Birch — That’s okay. Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — …you don’t have to say hi back.

Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah.

Ashley Lentz — But if you cross my path on a Sunday morning, I’m going to say hi to you because I’m truly glad that people are here and I want them to know that.

Rich Birch — Yes. Okay, that’s that’s fantastic. When So let’s say I come, I fill out, let’s say i’m I seem eager, maybe like that family, I fill out all the information. I give you my my mailing address, my email, my phone number, the whole thing. What then happens from there? What’s my experience? Do I get certain amount of follow-up? So what all happens at that point?

Ashley Lentz — Yes, our we have a team that that does follow-ups.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Ashley Lentz — So those all go, we have, I would call it a track. They’re going to get an email right away. If they fill out a card on Sunday, they’re going to get an email on Monday that says, thanks for stopping by New to Hope.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Ashley Lentz — And generally that’s a generic email. It will have their name in it, right? So it seems like it’s personal. And it comes from ah Pat Quaid, one of our pastors here. um He’s been on staff for like 20 plus years. He’s incredible.

Ashley Lentz — And so Pat will say, you know, we’re glad. Thanks for stopping by New to Hope. And generally here’s some information. If people put on the card that they want specific information, he will put that in the email as well.

Rich Birch — Okay, yep.

Ashley Lentz — Then I believe there are a couple other follow-up steps past that. We can send text messages. And so if people have put in their put their phone number down, they’ll get a text message later in the week that simply invites them back to worship.

Ashley Lentz — It just says, hey, hey, Rich, this is Ashley from Hope. I just want to say I’d love to see at worship again this weekend. Reminder service times are…, or something like that. So they get a couple follow ups past that to know like we actually care.

Ashley Lentz — While it’s automated, it also comes from real people.

Rich Birch — Right.

Ashley Lentz — So the system is in place because we’re such a large church.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Ashley Lentz — But if people text back, like I get those text messages back through an app, right?

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Ashley Lentz — Like I’m, I have good healthy boundaries. ah Nobody has, you know, like I’m not texting 7,000 people at a time.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — But we can personally respond to these people and answer questions that they might have.

Rich Birch — Yeah Yeah. I love that. So friends, I want to underline a bunch of things that Ashley said there, because this is best in class practice that we’ve seen in in other contexts. You know, the idea that the, you know, New to Hope is like in the middle of the atrium, it’s super obvious. It’s that orange. You’ve got lots of, you know, volunteers and staff there. The t-shirt I love, the free gift. People, you know, ah too many churches will say like, if you want to get connected, drop by the connection kiosk. That’s like way too, people are not interested in getting connected yet.

Rich Birch — They’re like just ah new. And so, but they will stop by and get a free T-shirt. It’s fantastic. I love that there’s multiple follow-ups. You wouldn’t imagine how many churches drop the ball there. they go They do everything else, but then they only follow up once or they, because they don’t want to bother people. I’m like, we’re talking about trying to get people connected to the kingdom of Christ. We’ve got to follow up with them.

Ashley Lentz — Yes.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s, that’s so good. There’s so much, so much good there.

Rich Birch — Okay, pivoting in a different direction. So, there’s a dichotomy, false dichotomy of in the church world around, we want to get people connected to teams or to groups. You know, we, we, and ultimately want to see them connect to both. And I think that’s the best practice. We want to get them there eventually, but it’s hard to point them towards both. What’s your thoughts on that? How do we, if if you were trying to kind of move people in an ideal direction, teams or groups, what’s that look like? What’s your experience been like when you’re trying to get people connected?

Ashley Lentz — Yep. I would tell you, we ask often around here, what does it look like for someone to be engaged? What is an engaged church member? Like, how do you define that?

Rich Birch — Yep.

Ashley Lentz — And I’m not going to quote the research because I can’t remember if it was Barna or Gallup, but it was one of the two. A few years ago released that a highly engaged church person, the research is that they attend church once a month. That’s a highly engaged church person…

Rich Birch — It’s true. It’s true.

Ashley Lentz — …in our society. And so to to engage them, like the task of discipleship is so interesting because to say like, if I’m highly engaged, that means I’m coming to church once a month. To ask them to do anything beyond that means you’re like a super duper, highly, highly, highly engaged person, right?

Rich Birch — Right. True.

Ashley Lentz — So one of, I call this maybe ah another secret sauce, secret weapon, is I love to invite people into service opportunities as their kind of pathway to getting more connected. What people undermine in service opportunities, and by service opportunity, volunteer opportunity, I mean like our hospitality team or our communion serving team or the kitchen team.

Ashley Lentz — We have a cafe where 100% of the proceeds go to missions. Somebody’s got to make that coffee, right? Like I invite them into these teams because I know that they will already be here for some of some of that time, right? Like if you’re coming to worship and I can get you on a team that greets before worship, I’m capitalizing on you’re already coming to worship.

Ashley Lentz — But number two, you are going to be in community.

Rich Birch — So true.

Ashley Lentz — You will start to have great conversations with these people in community. You’ll start to get to know faces, right? Again, large place will start to seem smaller. Discipleship will happen in the context of volunteer teams without me ever teaching a class. It will just happen naturally.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Ashley Lentz — And so I think we forget that that’s a really great place to get people plugged in.

Rich Birch — It’s so true.

Ashley Lentz — And then is it is an on-ramp to anybody who shows up in the in this space and says, I just want to meet people. I want to get connected.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so true.

Ashley Lentz — They might be in a season where they want a class, but I’m a young mom, right? Like I got two little kids. It’s hard for me to get here on a weeknight for six or eight weeks to do a class. A really good invitation might be, well, if you want to get connected, get to know people, you love greeting. Like you love talking to people. Why don’t you be on our greeting team? You’re already coming to service. Your whole family can do it.

Ashley Lentz — And discipleship will happen in that context in such a beautiful way…

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so true.

Ashley Lentz — …that that I love introducing people to volunteer opportunities.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. I would say that for sure we’ve seen that as a trend in lots of prevailing churches like yours. You know, I would say particularly post-COVID, I think there has been a stronger emphasis or emphasis, depending on how you say it, to, you know, move people towards serving opportunities as like, a you didn’t say it this way. I’m saying it, but like as a primary path. Or like a let’s let’s take a first step there ah because of all the stuff you talked about. You know, we can get people on a schedule. We can yeah you know, there’s there’s something about the kind of envisioning we do in teams where we’re like pouring in like, hey, this is what Hope’s about. This is what Hope’s about that doesn’t necessarily happen in in in groups. So yeah, that’s that’s great.

Rich Birch — Curveball question. We didn’t talk about ahead of time. Hopefully you can take a curveball, Ashley. I’m sure you can. You’re an incredibly smart person. What are the metrics that you think about in this area? Like, are there numbers that you reflect on that you like come back to you time and again that somebody asks you about regularly? What what would be some of those metrics that you think about?

Ashley Lentz — What a good curveball question. Yes. Here’s what is fascinating to me, as somebody who does discipleship and gets people connected. I know, and this is specific to our context because these are numbers that I have crunched.

Rich Birch — Yep, yep.

Ashley Lentz — We can have really good intentions with groups and classes, but I will tell you that from sign up to show up, right? So if you’re promoting a class, amount of people who sign up versus the amount of people who show up just automatically will drop 20%. Because people have really good intentions.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Yeah, it’s true.

Ashley Lentz — But when it comes to coming to class, you’re going to lose about 20%.

Rich Birch — Yeah. It sounded so good at church on Sunday to sign up for that class, but I did not actually come in. Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — Yes, so that being said, the people who show up to your class, you’re already looking at 80% of people who are gonna come. But we’ll we’ll call that 100% of people who are showing up.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — From week one to week three or four, you will drop 40% by week four.

Rich Birch — Oh, wow.

Ashley Lentz — I see this consistency, consistently across discipleship at Hope and and the groups that we do.

Ashley Lentz — And so we have also tried to build Alpha. I would tell you is probably the only exception. Alpha, we do Alpha in nine weeks here at Hope. But everything else we have tried to build in three or four week chunks because we just know that by week four, you’re gonna lose half your class or so about about anyway, right?

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s a good insight.

Ashley Lentz — So we have great intentions with six or eight week classes. And I love to teach the Bible in six or eight weeks. I also know that for people’s schedules, they see a six or eight week class and that’s daunting. So to do things in three or four week chunks is really, really helpful. And those are some of the metrics that I keep in the back of my mind.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Yeah. And you could see that, right? It’s like better to have two three-week classes than one six-week class. You know, you kind of re-up like this is part one, part two, how do we move people along? You know, that’s, you know, that’s fantastic.

Rich Birch — Well, let’s say you’re at a conference and someone is, you know, pulls you aside and they’re like, Ashley, oh, you’re the connections person from Hope – you guys do such a great job. What’s the one thing that you think I should do to make it easier? I’m sure you give out like common advice to somebody, to churches, church leaders around like, Hey, here’s the thing you could do to make it easier for people to get plugged in.

Ashley Lentz — I would tell them clarity is kindness.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Ashley Lentz — Be clear about what you’re asking people to do or or where you want them to get plugged in.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Ashley Lentz — Yep. If that’s a conversation, be clear that like step one is a conversation. If it’s Alpha, be clear that Alpha is like the thing you want people to do. Clarity is kindness. Make sure your website is clear. We’re not perfect at any of these things by any means, but…

Rich Birch — Sure. Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — …the more clear we can be about where we want people to go, what we want them to do, what we know works. That’s a really loving thing to do for people is just be clear.

Rich Birch — It’s so true. And, and I know that’s like an, that’s like a journey, not a destination. Like we’re clarity is something we keep working on. We have to keep refining, keep making it easier. I think even in this, that’s part of why I was double clicking on theNew to Hope kind of process. Cause I’ve, in other contexts I’ve talked about that, that, that piece of that. I think every six months you got to look at it again. Okay. What can we do to make this easier?

Ashley Lentz — Yes.

Rich Birch — How do we make it easier for people to connect? Can you think of some areas where you’ve had to gain more clarity? Where like we thought it was clear but then, no, it wasn’t clear – we had to change it and and make it a little more clear.

Ashley Lentz — For sure, I will tell you, we kind of touched on this at the very beginning. We offer so many things as far as adult discipleship goes here at Hope, specifically even just our West Des Moines campus, ah that it’s kind of unclear where to even start.

Ashley Lentz — So one of the things that we have done in the last year is really kind of cleaned up what our fall and winter adult discipleship schedule looks like. So that when people say, okay, I’ve already done Alpha and maybe I already took that class, that we kind of have a very clear trajectory for them depending on where they find themselves in their season of faith, season of life.

Ashley Lentz — So we, Foundations is a good example. That will happen each semester. It’s kind of the foundational course. Here’s where you start. Then it’s Alpha. Then we then there are Bible classes and prayer classes, if that’s what you’re looking for next. Small groups. We always have a small group kind of class to help launch small groups.

Ashley Lentz — But we cleaned up a lot of what I would call white noise around that. So people say, like, what do I do? As a team, we clearly know: this, that, and the next thing, if you’re looking for a prescriptive track. Otherwise, iI got a million women’s groups meeting. There’s a million men’s groups meeting. I can point you in that direction too.

Rich Birch — Right.

Ashley Lentz — But we’ve cleaned up a lot of that white noise to say, generally, this is what we’re offering. It’s going to continue to happen in kind of a cycle, a semester cycle. And so it just makes sense.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. I know so many, so many models, you know, churches, every seems like every five years, it somebody comes out with some new approach to cleanliness and clarity.

Rich Birch — And people are like, Oh, this is like the, you know, it’s Highlands’, you know, step one, step two, or, you know, 101, 201, 301. Or it’s like, you know, Saddleback’s run the bases. Or, you know, but the, the foundation of all of that is we’ve got to be super clear. We’ve got to make it as clean as possible. I feel like we cleaned up our schedule is like Des Moines nice for like, we cut a bunch of stuff or like, what did we do? Like that cleaned up. What does that mean? Like you, you are still doing everything, but we’re focusing people’s attention on just a few things? Is that what that means?

Ashley Lentz — Yes, we did get rid of some things and it’s not because they weren’t good.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Right.

Ashley Lentz — We actually moved some of them online. We said people can take this online at their own pace. It will always exist. It’s good stuff.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — But let’s be really clear about what we want people to jump into in the fall…

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Ashley Lentz — …and in the winter and in the spring. And so we just kind of moved some of those things.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Ashley Lentz — And then, yes, communicated it more clearly. A lot of our stuff happens on Tuesday nights. And so we have told our congregation, come on Tuesday nights. Men’s thing, women’s thing, general classes, dinner, stuff for your kids, right? Like we’ve also tried to make it super accessible. So it’s like, if you don’t know where to start, just show up on a Tuesday night and we’ll help you kind of a thing.

Rich Birch — Right. Right. That’s so good. Well, this has been an incredible conversation, Ashley. I feel like I’ve got a page of notes here that is super helpful for me. There’s lots of other stuff I’d love to talk about, but I know you got other things to get to. So we’re going let you go. Just as we wrap up, any final word you’d have to say for us or anything you’d like to say just as we close today’s episode?

Ashley Lentz — I would just encourage listeners, like what you’re doing is great and continue ask to ask yourself and the people that you’re around, like what are they looking forward to? So many times we try to do things, like I live in church world, right? Like this is my frame of reference. It’s really when I start listening to the needs of other people that we really start gaining some traction, right?

Ashley Lentz — So I would just encourage them, like what you’re doing is great. Keep going…

Rich Birch — So good.

Ashley Lentz — …and ask your congregation what what they need and and what they want. And then just clarify that for them.

Rich Birch — So good. Well, thanks so much. If people want to track with you or track with the church, where do we want to send them online?

Ashley Lentz — Yes, LutheranChurchOfHope.org is our like landing page website.

Rich Birch — Perfect.

Ashley Lentz — From there, you can find our West Des Moines campus. You can find all of our other campuses. You can find out what you need to know at LutheranChurchOfHope.org. And I’ll be on our staff page and happy to connect with anybody further. My email, I think will be in the notes, but Ashley.Lentz L-E-N-T-Z at HopeWDM.org.

Rich Birch — Perfect. Thanks so much, Ashley. Appreciate you being here today.

Ashley Lentz — Thanks, Rich!