One Matters Award: When One Invitation Matters

Saegertown UMC and the Unexpected Growth That Comes from Showing Up

Rev. Jeff St. Clair knows something about strategy. Before coming to Saegertown United Methodist Church in northwestern Pennsylvania, Jeff planted a church in Florida. He spent years thinking about church growth, community events, small groups, Fresh Expressions, and ways to connect with people beyond the walls of a church building. When Jeff was appointed to Saegertown in July 2024, he brought his experience with him. But the event that became a catalyst for new life at Saegertown wasn't part of any strategic plan. It began with an explosion in the town. One Sunday morning in February, during worship, Jeff was preaching when the church building began to shake. Dust fell from the ceiling. People started checking their phones. Soon they learned there had been an explosion at Parker Lord, a chemical plant about half a mile from the church. Jeff stopped worship, prayed for the employees and first responders, and eventually dismissed the congregation amid emergency alerts. Then came a question that is at the heart of community engagement:

What can we do?

The answer was simple: food, water, and presence. And then came an invitation that made a difference.

Showing Up When the Community Needed Them

After returning home, Jeff contacted the chair of the church's staff-parish relations committee. They began talking about purchasing sandwich trays and using a pallet of water already at the church to support firefighters and others responding to the emergency. Before those plans had come together, a church member named Matt texted Jeff. He and his daughter, Ellie, were already at the church wanting to help. Ellie brought along a friend named Aubrey, and that invitation changed something. Aubrey helped the church respond to the emergency. Within a week, she and her mother came to a worship service. Then Aubrey invited a friend. Another family came. More children and families began participating. Confirmation grew. Membership classes followed. By the end of the year, more than twenty people had joined the church, and there were twenty-four professions of faith among those coming into the congregation.

When we talk about the One Matters Award, it can be tempting to focus on the number at the end of the story. But this story began with one. One church deciding to respond. One young person deciding to help. One invitation to a friend. And one friend inviting another. Sometimes a movement begins with one small action.

From Belonging to Mattering

The work of Jennifer Breheny Wallace, author of Mattering: The Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose, offers a helpful way of understanding what happened next. Belonging tells us there is a place for you here. Mattering takes another step: Your presence makes a difference here. Saegertown didn't simply welcome the young people who began showing up. The congregation started making room for their gifts. Ellie, whose invitation helped begin this chain of relationships, was identified as a potential leader and invited onto the congregation's strategic leadership team through the Empowered Church Project. She now sits alongside adult leaders as they learn about leadership and strategy. Other young people have asked to serve as liturgists and take responsibility in Sunday worship. One young woman recently approached Jeff after becoming CPR certified and asked if she could serve in the nursery. These people aren't simply attending; they are contributing, using their gifts to serve in ways that make a difference in the life of the church, the community, and the world.

Churches sometimes talk about wanting more young people, and sometimes young people do enter into the life of the church. But churches don’t always provide the space for young people’s gifts to grow and flourish. So, those young people find another way or place for their gifts to matter. Saegertown is discovering another possibility: that young people become part of the church by helpingto be the church. Their gifts are noticed; their ideas are taken seriously, and their leadership gifts are nurtured. That's mattering, when there is space to belong and their presence and gifts make a difference in the life of the church.

Creating a Permission-Giving Church

This extends beyond young people. Jeff describes Saegertown as increasingly becoming a permission-giving culture. His experience as a church planter taught him that pastors cannot do ministry alone. They have to build teams, trust and equip people, and make room for experimentation. So, when someone brings an idea that aligns with the congregation's mission, vision, and values, Jeff's instinct is, “Let's try it.” Recently, one woman approached him about starting a Bible study, and another person wanted to explore a mental-health ministry. Rather than asking, “How can I get people to help?” a permission-giving pastor asks a different question: “What might God already be stirring in this person, and how can the church help make room for it?” That question has profound implications for mattering. People aren't needed just to fill volunteer slots. Their imagination, experiences, spiritual gifts, and their sense of calling matter. Saegertown has used spiritual-gifts inventories to help people recognize the gifts they bring and how those gifts might strengthen the ministry of the church. The result is a congregation where people are comfortable approaching the pastor with ideas. New energy emerges as people recognize they have permission to act upon what God is placing on their hearts.

Listening Beyond the Building

That same posture extends into the community. Jeff brought his experience with Fresh Expressions to Saegertown, but he didn't replicate programs that worked elsewhere. He paid attention to what he was learning and to the community's context. One thing Jeff noticed was that kayaks sat in yards throughout town. So, Saegertown began a kayak ministry. The church later launched Sacred Steps, a Wednesday evening walking and hiking gathering at nearby Woodcock Dam. People walk together, bring children and dogs, spend time in creation, and pause along the way for a brief reflection and Communion. One recent gathering drew twenty-four people. The point isn't kayaking or hiking. It's listening. Jeff describes listening as one of the things he values most about Fresh Expressions: pay attention to your community and discover what people are already doing. Sometimes ministry begins by asking:

• Where are people already gathering?
• What do they love?
• Where are relationships already forming?
• How might the church join them there?

At a community celebration, Jeff placed a kayak in front of the church. People kept stopping by to ask why the kayak was there. When he explained that the church had a kayak ministry, people responded with some version of, "We kayak. I could do that." That's contextual evangelism at its simplest. The church doesn't always need to create a new destination. Sometimes we simply need to recognize where our neighbors already are and meet them there.

Love the People

Near the end of our conversation, Jeff shared a lesson his father, who was also a pastor and district superintendent, gave him early in ministry. Jeff had asked him how he defined successful ministry. His father's answer was: "Love the people.” His father told him, “If you love the people, your ministry's gonna take care of itself." Years later, after planting churches, developing strategies, navigating a pandemic and denominational conflict, and beginning again in Pennsylvania, Jeff still returns to those words.

Those words also provide a theological foundation for mattering. To love people is to pay attention to them, notice their gifts, listen to their ideas, care about what is happening in their community, and trust them enough to lead. And sometimes, drop the Sunday morning plan because something has happened half a mile down the road, and your neighbors need you.

What Other Congregations Can Learn

Saegertown's experience offers several practices that congregations of almost any size can begin.

Listen to your community. Pay attention to what people love, where they gather, and what needs aren't being met. Jeff recommends beginning with prayer and discernment, listening carefully to the community, and then developing a concrete plan for action.

Respond before you have the perfect plan. When the explosion happened, Saegertown didn't form a committee to develop a long-term response strategy. People brought what they had and showed up.

Make invitation natural. Ellie wasn't trying to execute an evangelism strategy. She invited a friend to come help. Relationship led to service; service led to connection, and connection opened a pathway toward faith.

Give people permission. When someone brings an idea that fits the church's mission, help them explore it rather than immediately listing the reasons it might not work.

Move people from welcome to contribution. Don't just tell newcomers and young people, "We're glad you're here." Ask what gifts they bring and give them meaningful opportunities to use them.

One Invitation Can Change a Church

Jeff laughed during our conversation about the irony of it all. Here was an experienced church planter accustomed to attaching a strategy to nearly everything, watching something unfold that he hadn't planned: the Holy Spirit moved through a crisis; a congregation was willing to respond; and a young person offered an invitation. As Jeff put it, it became a remarkable year of growth "just because one girl invited another friend to come and help." That may capture the One Matters Award better than almost anything else. Because one matters, one person matters, one relationship matters, and one invitation matters. When people enter a community where they are welcomed, trusted, needed, and empowered, they often invite others.

Then those people discover they matter too.

Community engagement doesn't always require a sophisticated strategy. Sometimes it begins when a church is paying enough attention to notice what is happening around it, loves its neighbors enough to respond, and trusts its people enough to say: “Go ahead. Invite somebody. Try something. Use your gifts. Let's see where the Spirit takes us.”

How could you use the spiritual gifts survey to empower and equip those in your faith community?

Just as Jeff noticed the kayaks, notice what gifts and opportunities you see when you walk around your community. How might your congregation create space for those opportunities to grow into something more?