For some institutions, the motto “Doing Church Differently” might be considered a hallow bit of sloganeering. But IMPACT Church prides itself on taking a unique approach to worship. “When I think about IMPACT, I think about uniqueness,” explains support pastor, Edwin Turnipseed. “We try to make worship an experience, [and] we want to engage the people that are coming.”
Shiquita Lockley, IMPACT’s creative director, plays an integral role in achieving the goal of creating a unique worship experience. “The average age of a person who attends is 33 — they’re used to change,” she says. “[But] we [could] have a grandparent, a parent and a child that all attend IMPACT and it’s important to do something that engages all of them.”
Pastor Edwin Turnipseed
IMPACT Church
On Being Open To Inspiration
“We believe that it’s not always going to be in the message that God will speak to you. It may be a song, it may be a skit, it may be one of our volunteers greeting you with a smile that may be what you need to get you through the whole week.”
On Continuing the Conversation After Sunday
“We’re going to use social media to do that. We want to hear from our community. On our webpage, we have sermon comments that link to Facebook. I have a Twitter page, Olu has a Twitter page to increase the people who have access to us.”
Creative Director Shiquita Lockley
IMPACT Church
On New Approaches
“Instead of having everyone give their offering as they normally would, [our lead pastor] said to give their offering to a person or organization that they knew needed it. It got everyone involved.”
Addressing the Public’s Career/Economic Concerns
“We’ve [had] networking events to help members transition out of one industry — say the auto industry — into another, like maybe energy. We have connection groups of about ten people that center around topics such as finance.”
