Churches Deciding: Service Or No Service

To close or not to close?

That has been a question many churches have had to face since the concerns over coronavirus surfaced.

One church that decided to hold services on Sunday was Cookeville First Baptist Church. Senior Pastor Scott McKinney said the church tried, and will continue to try, to stick to guidelines passed down from the federal government.

“We’re kind of analyzing this thing at a moment-by-moment basis and trying to figure it out,” McKinney said. “Now the President came out and said no groups bigger than ten was his recommendation, so we’re going to listen to our President of the United States, certainly, and we’re going to take into account what our government is saying.”

McKinney said he did not notice a significant drop in church attendance even with the concerns.

“We had good attendance,” McKinney said. “We are fortunate to have multiple venues and multiple service times, so we were able to keep our attendance below the 250 they recommended per service time.

Although First Baptist has not yet made a decision regarding this coming Sunday, McKinney said the church already has multiple outlets they use to reach people that cannot get to church on Sundays.

“We would do online, we would do television, and we’re looking into Facebook live, as well,” McKinney said.

McKinney said First Baptist would likely make any cancellation decisions on Tuesday.