This last Sunday our Children Ministry successfully conducted a test “lock down,” to prepare teachers and workers in the event of a genuine emergency. We have contingency plans that establish procedures to protect our members and their children in the event of dangerous situations whether by human attack or natural disaster, terrorist or tornado. No one can prevent all harm and our trust is in God alone, but we also want to ensure we have done our due diligence to the best of our ability. This is simply good stewardship.
Security is a constant, behind-the-scenes focus in our church. One of the chief motivating factors in launching our current campus expansion that will result in a new children facility is the realization that we can no longer maintain modern security standards for children in our current building. All those who work with children in any way have to undergo a background check. We have a security team that is constantly working to provide safety for our members and guests from parking lot to classrooms.
Much has changed since I first became senior pastor some 25 years ago. The world seemed simpler then. Evil people and dangerous situations, though, existed even then. Still, I find it amazing that we deal with some of the issues we do.
Many things changed the morning of September 11, 2001. For one, Americans suddenly awakened to the fact that evil can strike anywhere, anytime, even in the land of the free and home of the brave. The ensuing years have reinforced the reality of this new era, and we have discovered that we cannot guarantee safety even in church. Several notable tragedies have slapped us in the face.
Most recently, Pastor Fred Winters, Pastor of First Baptist of Maryville, Illinois, a Saint Louis suburb, was gunned down as he was in the pulpit in March of this year. Honestly, no security plan likely could have saved Pastor Winters. Sometimes evil people succeed in their evil deeds. But since then there has been a renewed interest in the issue of church security.
While God alone is our final line of protection, I do believe that the better prepared we are, the less probability there is that we will be victims of tragedy. Since I have readers of this blog in many different places, I want to make you aware of a resource that might be of help to you and your church in doing some intelligent preparation.
There are a number of firms specializing in church security, and several books have been written. Your church can hire a consultant to work with you in establishing plans to protect your people. The problem, though, is that not all advice, even paid advice, is good. Some is simply worthless and ignorant, published by people out to make a buck. Other approaches tend to be excessive and seem to give the impression that you should have SWAT teams drop out of panels in the ceiling at the slightest provocation. Following Pastor Winters untimely demise, there are even companies marketing bullet-proof apparel for pastors! Good grief!
Interestingly enough, one of the voices of reason to emerge out of this chaos is a friend of mine that is now becoming recognized as a leading authority on church security, even though this is the last thing in the world she wanted to happen. Tina Lewis Rowe and I went to High School together. She is a regular reader of this blog, as I am of her’s. If you check out the comments here, you have probably run across some intelligent input from Tina. She even spoke at our church on Memorial Day a few years back.
Tina has had a great career in law enforcement. She was one of the first female officers on the Denver Police force, one of the first female graduates of the FBI academy in Quantico, VA and rose through the ranks of the DPD to hold key positions such as commanding the largest and toughest patrol division in Denver and commanding the Police Academy. In 1990 she was appointed by President Clinton to be the US Marshal for Colorado. Not long after her appointment was the Oklahoma City bombing and the trial of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, held in Federal Court in Denver. Tina had personal custody of those two notorious prisoners for over three years and the responsibility to provide security for the courthouse where the trials were held.This is how she gained a reputation as a go-to-person for securing public buildings.
Since her retirement as US Marshal, Tina continues to train law enforcement officers. She is also in high demand as a trainer, consultant and speaker in the business sector as well, in areas such as supervision and management. In addition, she is also an amazing speaker for all sorts of functions in the public, business and law enforcement sectors. I’m proud of her amazing career and proud to be her friend. I am the unofficial head of the Tina Lewis Rowe fan club.
In December of 2007, a young gunman entered New Life Church in Colorado Springs and opened fire. You probably remember hearing about that horrible event. New Life Church is a megachurch and, like us, has their own security team and security procedures. Tina, though, was thinking about smaller churches, their fears and their exposure. In particular, she thought of a church of 300-500 in attendance where he daughter had attended private school. How could a church like that be prepared?
Tina offered to conduct a training session for the leaders of that church and prepared a document to serve as a guide. Her reasoning was that they did not need armed guards, a SWAT team or strong arm tactics. What they needed was some simple, basic training for people like ushers and greeters who often serve as the front line of contact. They needed to know what to do and who to contact in the event of an emergency situation.
In a few hours Tina put together a PDF file that she would use during the night of training at Calvary Apostolic Church. Since she was doing this, she decided she would make this file freely available to anyone who was interested. Maybe some other churches in the city could benefit from some of her experience. She had no idea what was about to happen.
Since then, Tina’s PDF file has garnered almost a cult-like following. She has personally sent out over 3,000 copies to churches all over the planet, on every continent. Since it is free, entire organizations have sent out thousands of copies more. She gets feedback constantly from people who say that her simple and free document is far better than what they have paid good money to obtain in books and seminars. Other law enforcement personnel who serve in churches have contacted her to express their appreciation for her wise and even-handed approach.
I’m mentioning all this because she has just updated this file with a very important addition. Even larger churches like ours can benefit from her template for a church security assessment. We have constant turnover in our ushers and greeters, and our security issues are addressed by a security team comprised in large part of current and former law enforcement personnel. But any church, large or small, can benefit from her step-by-step guide on how to do a periodic walk -through of the church to determine where security needs must be addressed and how to do it.
If you are interested you can go to her website, (www.tinalewisrowe.com) and go to the “contact me” section and send her a request. She likes to be able to say hello by reply email when she sends the file. Go ahead. It’s free! She wrote about this new file just the other day and you can see her thoughts here. You also might get hooked on her very intelligent and often entertaining blog.
Church Security Issues
This last Sunday our Children Ministry successfully conducted a test “lock down,” to prepare teachers and workers in the event of a genuine emergency. We have contingency plans that establish procedures to protect our members and their children in the event of dangerous situations whether by human attack or natural disaster, terrorist or tornado. No one can prevent all harm and our trust is in God alone, but we also want to ensure we have done our due diligence to the best of our ability. This is simply good stewardship.
Security is a constant, behind-the-scenes focus in our church. One of the chief motivating factors in launching our current campus expansion that will result in a new children facility is the realization that we can no longer maintain modern security standards for children in our current building. All those who work with children in any way have to undergo a background check. We have a security team that is constantly working to provide safety for our members and guests from parking lot to classrooms.
Much has changed since I first became senior pastor some 25 years ago. The world seemed simpler then. Evil people and dangerous situations, though, existed even then. Still, I find it amazing that we deal with some of the issues we do.
Many things changed the morning of September 11, 2001. For one, Americans suddenly awakened to the fact that evil can strike anywhere, anytime, even in the land of the free and home of the brave. The ensuing years have reinforced the reality of this new era, and we have discovered that we cannot guarantee safety even in church. Several notable tragedies have slapped us in the face.
Most recently, Pastor Fred Winters, Pastor of First Baptist of Maryville, Illinois, a Saint Louis suburb, was gunned down as he was in the pulpit in March of this year. Honestly, no security plan likely could have saved Pastor Winters. Sometimes evil people succeed in their evil deeds. But since then there has been a renewed interest in the issue of church security.
While God alone is our final line of protection, I do believe that the better prepared we are, the less probability there is that we will be victims of tragedy. Since I have readers of this blog in many different places, I want to make you aware of a resource that might be of help to you and your church in doing some intelligent preparation.
There are a number of firms specializing in church security, and several books have been written. Your church can hire a consultant to work with you in establishing plans to protect your people. The problem, though, is that not all advice, even paid advice, is good. Some is simply worthless and ignorant, published by people out to make a buck. Other approaches tend to be excessive and seem to give the impression that you should have SWAT teams drop out of panels in the ceiling at the slightest provocation. Following Pastor Winters untimely demise, there are even companies marketing bullet-proof apparel for pastors! Good grief!
Interestingly enough, one of the voices of reason to emerge out of this chaos is a friend of mine that is now becoming recognized as a leading authority on church security, even though this is the last thing in the world she wanted to happen. Tina Lewis Rowe and I went to High School together. She is a regular reader of this blog, as I am of her’s. If you check out the comments here, you have probably run across some intelligent input from Tina. She even spoke at our church on Memorial Day a few years back.
Tina has had a great career in law enforcement. She was one of the first female officers on the Denver Police force, one of the first female graduates of the FBI academy in Quantico, VA and rose through the ranks of the DPD to hold key positions such as commanding the largest and toughest patrol division in Denver and commanding the Police Academy. In 1990 she was appointed by President Clinton to be the US Marshal for Colorado. Not long after her appointment was the Oklahoma City bombing and the trial of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, held in Federal Court in Denver. Tina had personal custody of those two notorious prisoners for over three years and the responsibility to provide security for the courthouse where the trials were held.This is how she gained a reputation as a go-to-person for securing public buildings.
Since her retirement as US Marshal, Tina continues to train law enforcement officers. She is also in high demand as a trainer, consultant and speaker in the business sector as well, in areas such as supervision and management. In addition, she is also an amazing speaker for all sorts of functions in the public, business and law enforcement sectors. I’m proud of her amazing career and proud to be her friend. I am the unofficial head of the Tina Lewis Rowe fan club.
In December of 2007, a young gunman entered New Life Church in Colorado Springs and opened fire. You probably remember hearing about that horrible event. New Life Church is a megachurch and, like us, has their own security team and security procedures. Tina, though, was thinking about smaller churches, their fears and their exposure. In particular, she thought of a church of 300-500 in attendance where he daughter had attended private school. How could a church like that be prepared?
Tina offered to conduct a training session for the leaders of that church and prepared a document to serve as a guide. Her reasoning was that they did not need armed guards, a SWAT team or strong arm tactics. What they needed was some simple, basic training for people like ushers and greeters who often serve as the front line of contact. They needed to know what to do and who to contact in the event of an emergency situation.
In a few hours Tina put together a PDF file that she would use during the night of training at Calvary Apostolic Church. Since she was doing this, she decided she would make this file freely available to anyone who was interested. Maybe some other churches in the city could benefit from some of her experience. She had no idea what was about to happen.
Since then, Tina’s PDF file has garnered almost a cult-like following. She has personally sent out over 3,000 copies to churches all over the planet, on every continent. Since it is free, entire organizations have sent out thousands of copies more. She gets feedback constantly from people who say that her simple and free document is far better than what they have paid good money to obtain in books and seminars. Other law enforcement personnel who serve in churches have contacted her to express their appreciation for her wise and even-handed approach.
I’m mentioning all this because she has just updated this file with a very important addition. Even larger churches like ours can benefit from her template for a church security assessment. We have constant turnover in our ushers and greeters, and our security issues are addressed by a security team comprised in large part of current and former law enforcement personnel. But any church, large or small, can benefit from her step-by-step guide on how to do a periodic walk -through of the church to determine where security needs must be addressed and how to do it.
If you are interested you can go to her website, (www.tinalewisrowe.com) and go to the “contact me” section and send her a request. She likes to be able to say hello by reply email when she sends the file. Go ahead. It’s free! She wrote about this new file just the other day and you can see her thoughts here. You also might get hooked on her very intelligent and often entertaining blog.