Connecting Church Leader Training Guide

Overview

Whether you're just beginning to explore the idea of becoming a Connecting Church, have recently stepped into the role of a Connecting Church Leader at your church, or you're a veteran leader looking for a refresher, this article is for you.

Designed to accompany the Connecting Church Training video embedded below, this written guide breaks down the key content of the training video into clear, manageable sections—so you can learn at your own pace and revisit important details anytime.

Intended Audience

 

Included in This Article

• Part 1 Overview: Ministry Philosophy of the Connecting Church Feature
• Part 2 Overview: Who Connecting Churches Partner With
• Part 3 Overview: Important Settings & Tools for Connecting Churches
    - Connecting Church Leader Role
    - CarePortal Card
    - Transactions Tab
    - Connecting Church Radius
    - Engage Your Community
    - Manage Community Responses
    - CarePortal Fund (optional)
• Part 4 Overview: Taking the Lead on Local Requests
    - Finding Requests with Resources Available
    - Step-by-Step Walk Through to Take the Lead
• Connecting Church Launch Strategy & Tips

Part 1 Overview: Ministry Philosophy of the Connecting Church Feature

The Connecting Church feature is a strategic innovation by CarePortal to to bridge the gap in our Circles of Care between the Church and the broader community. CarePortal already empowers churches to meet vetted, real-time needs. But with this feature, community generosity flows through the local Church—not around it—ensuring that the Church remains at the point of care. Why is this important? Because while anyone can offer resources, only the Church carries the biblical mandate to serve the vulnerable in the name of Christ. The Connecting Church feature ensures that when a community member gives, it’s a local church that delivers—not just the item, but relational presence, hope, and spiritual grounding—with a posture of humility that prioritizes the family's dignity.

This feature also helps resource under-resourced churches in high-need areas without compromising their role. The goal isn’t simply to meet needs—it’s to steward those moments into meaningful, gospel-centered connections.

Being a Connecting Church isn’t about collecting more. It’s about connecting more. It’s a chance to reflect who God is and what He's done for us by how we show up on our neighbors' doorsteps in their moment of need.

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Part 2 Overview: Who Connecting Churches Partner With

When your church is a Connecting Church, you and your teams are positioned to steward generosity from beyond your walls. Community Responders—whether individuals, non-local church members, or organizational partners—can all say “Yes, I Can Help!” to real-time needs in your area. When they do, your church is invited to Take the Lead.

Here’s how it works:

• Community Responders are individuals not on a local church response team—or they may belong to a church that’s not local to the request.

• Community Champions are businesses, nonprofits, foundations or other non-Church groups using CarePortal to serve their neighbors with purpose and consistency.

Once a response is made that needs a local church to Take the Lead, the most local Connecting Church gets a 24-hour window to Take the Lead as the "Recommended Connecting Church". If one of your church’s own team members funds a request—even if you're not the closest—you’ll still be the Recommended Connecting Church because of your relationship with the responder.

🚨 Why the Church at the Point of Care Matters
Community generosity is powerful and necessary—but also untrained. These responders do not have the same level of preparation as churches do, and can begin responding right away to requests upon enrolling. Your team might even be a responder's first real interaction with someone through CarePortal.

The Church also has a mandate to serve from a selfless, unconditional posture. It has a natural discipleship pipeline that allows for specific training that connects the idea of being on the doorstep of vulnerable families to the deepest level of purpose and calling we feel that God has planted in us. CarePortal, from the Church's perspective, is an opportunity for gospel-rooted hospitality, discipleship, and collaboration.

📣 How Community Alerts Work
Responders are notified when:

1. A critically urgent request is posted (immediate alert)

2. A high urgency request does not receive a response within 2 days

3. A normal urgency request does not receive a response within 5 days

4. A Connecting Church chooses to manually Engage the Community with a custom invitation about the request

Even if you're not the Lead Church, you can still advocate by sharing the public request link. Anyone who clicks to help will be walked through a simple sign-up process to respond.

🤝 Who Can You Invite?
Think about local relationships you and your church has—businesses, families, teams, or ministries—who already trust you and might want to partner with you in this work. Inviting them to enroll as Responders or Champions is a natural next step in building a sustainable local network of care, with your church guiding the way.

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Part 3 Overview: Important Settings & Tools for Connecting Churches

These seven settings and tools are what make it possible for Connecting Churches to respond confidently and sustainably to families in crisis—ensuring resources are stewarded well and helping more meaningful connections take place.

1. Connecting Church Leader Role

Assigned by your Primary Point Person, these leaders receive alerts when someone in the community offers to help and have permission to Take the Lead on requests. This role is also able to request a CarePortal Card through their dashboard. For each request they Take the Lead on, they are positioned to help organize and coordinate responses from the community, have the ability to engage any response team at your church, and ensure requests are managed with care.

2. CarePortal Card

This secure, reloadable debit card allows cardholders to purchase items using donated money from responders to purchase and provide items from a request for a family in need. Activation requires training and a signed CarePortal Cardholder Agreement, and is required for any church to become an active Connecting Church. You can access deeper training on the CarePortal Card here.

3. Transactions Page

Located in your dashboard, this tab tracks every dollar—funds received, spent, and remaining—to ensure transparency and accountability. Anyone with a church leader role will see this tab in their CarePortal dashboard, even if they don't have a CarePortal Card.

4. Connecting Church Radius

Set by your Primary Point Person, this determines how far your team is willing to travel to serve a family if someone offered the resources to help meet a request for them. This setting can be adjusted throughout the year based on your ministry capacity and your local network leader can help you identify the best starting point based on your community's needs.

5. Engage Your Community

After Taking the Lead on a request, this option lets any of your church leaders to send a message to other churches, Community Responders, and Champions—inviting them to respond and help meet the remaining needs. As the Lead Church, you will be alerted of any responses from Community Responders or Champions, as well as any money donated toward the request from any type of responders, including Church Responders.

6. Manage Community Responses

When Community Responders or Champions commit to Provide items on a request that you Take the Lead for, you’ll see their contact information and what they've committed to in your dashboard on the request page by clicking the "Manage Community Responses" button. If something doesn’t work out, a Point Person or Connecting Church Leader can modify the item(s) yourself by removing their commitment and reopening the item(s) for other responders. 

7. CarePortal Fund (optional)

This tool allows your church to accept tax-deductible donations via your public page. Church leaders can make contributions from their CarePortal dashboard as well as direct money from this account to Fund specific items on any CarePortal request. If their church is local to the request and a Lead Church has not already stepped up, these leaders are given the chance to immediately Take the Lead on the request and trigger an automatic transfer of this money for the items onto their CarePortal Card. Otherwise, the donation would be offered to other local Connecting Churches once one of them Takes the Lead. You can learn more about CarePortal Funds here. 

Together, these tools help your church lead with clarity, steward generosity well, and create meaningful, gospel-centered connections with families in need. Your Network Leader is available to guide you through setup and best practices whenever you're ready.

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Part 4 Overview: Taking the Lead on Local Requests

Taking the Lead is how your church steps in to steward community-offered resources—ensuring they actually reach the family in need, and that a relational connection is made through the local Church.

Finding Requests with Resources Available

The Primary Point Person and Connecting Church Leader(s) of Connecting Churches can learn which requests in their area have resources available for them in three primary ways:

1. Email Notifications – Once resources are offered by a responder that will need to be stewarded by a Connecting Church, the Recommended Connecting Church is alerted and given a 24-hour window to Take the Lead before other local Connecting Churches are alerted. The button to Take the Lead is provided within the email that takes the leader directly to the request page.
2. Resources Available Badge – When browsing requests in your church's Requests tab, while using the Map or Grid view, the Primary Point Person and Connecting Church Leaders will see a visual indicator on requests (below), showing what type of resources are available to be claimed for each request.
   
3. Browse Open Requests Filters – The Primary Point Person and Connecting Church Leaders will each see filters available in both the Quick Filters and general Filters lists that will make it easy to see only the requests with available resources in their local area.
   

Step-by-Step Walk Through to Take the Lead

The Primary Point Person and Connecting Church Leader(s) will see a “Take the Lead” button on any local request in their CarePortal dashboard (even if no resources have been offered yet)

Here's the general process:

1. Review & Commit – Confirm your church is ready to take responsibility for stewarding the resources offered, including any future resources that may be committed or donated on the request.
   Note: By Taking the Lead, you are not committing to providing any remaining needs out of your own ministry resources, but you can willingly commit to meeting additional needs yourself by making a normal response through the "Yes I Can Help" button!

   Step 1:

   Step 2 (if resources are still needed):

2. Engage Others – If needs are still unmet, the confirmation screen after you Take the Lead (below) will give you shortcuts to:
     - Engage your Response Team(s)
     - Engage the Community 
     - Share the request link via your own communication channels
     - Reply to posts and responses made within the request's Activity Feed

   

3. Coordinate with Responders – For provided items, you'll be given the community responder's contact information in an email confirmation (and they will be notified with yours) to start coordinating logistics. For funded items, the donation will be immediately transferred to your church's CarePortal Card balance and will be available to spend in meeting the need. No logistical coordination is needed with the responder(s) in these cases. 

4. Coordinate with the Agency Worker – In the same email confirmation referenced above, you'll receive the worker’s contact information to help you make the connection with the family, and they will receive yours. Whether it's a call or text, it's important to try and establish contact with them quickly, regardless of who reaches out first.

5. Use Your CarePortal Card – Donations for funded items are transferred to your CarePortal Card to be used on providing these items to the family. Aside from the intentional transaction restrictions to protect trust and accountability, this process removes logistical barriers to getting needs met for families.
6. Activity Feed – There are potential meaningful connections to make even with responders who fund items on requests you Take the Lead on. Be sure to Reply to their post in the Activity Feed of the request to say thank you, offer updates, and build trust in the process so they return and meet additional requests in the future.

7. Verify Participation – After the need is met, someone from your church who was involved in meeting the need will need to confirm your participation so your church’s impact is recorded.

🤝 Church Collaboration Notes
If another local church commits to provide items on a request they are local to, they’ll still coordinate directly with the agency worker—even if you’re the Lead Church. We encourage collaboration, but don’t require it. 

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Connecting Church Launch Strategy & Tips

How to build a healthy, sustainable rhythm from day one.

1. Choose Leaders with a Heart for It
   Your Connecting Church Leaders should feel called to serve families in crisis—and excited to do it more often if given access to the right resources. These leaders thrive when they see CarePortal as a way to experience God more deeply while helping others.

2. Use CarePortal as a Ministry Access Point
   Don’t treat CarePortal as “one more ministry” within your church. Instead, use it to support existing ministries with real-time opportunities to serve local families. Every ministry can become a Response Team that operates in their own unique way!

3. Set Healthy, Shared Rhythms
   Protect leaders from burnout by setting and sharing realistic response goals (e.g., one request/week). Communicate availability clearly with Network Leaders up front to help build sustainable local networks.

4. Stay Organized and Accountable
   When managing multiple responders or requests, organization is critical. Use your dashboard tools like custom saved views and your Transactions tab, as well as your own internal tools, to keep processes smooth and relationships strong.

5. Be Ready When You Take the Lead
   Taking the Lead isn’t the finish—it’s the start. Respond quickly to coordinate with Agency Workers and responders to make sure the family is served well and everyone involved feels supported.

6. Look for Connection at Every Level
   Every request is layered with connection potential—not just with families, but also community responders, Agency Workers, teammates, and even your own heart. Stay open to where God may be working.

7. Build Your Team Intentionally
   CarePortal highly recommends hosting a Response Team Training with your local Network Leaders as a way to invest in developing future leaders on your Response Teams as you respond. No one is meant to do this alone. And make sure church members who want to be involved are approved on your Response Team so they can help Fund and Provide when requests come in.

With these rhythms in place, your church will be equipped to respond consistently and compassionately, representing Jesus well in your local community.