As we communicate our goals of increasing the vitality of our congregations, the number of people worshiping with our congregations, and the ethnic diversity of our membership, it is helpful to consider critical questions. Stating WHAT the focus of our attention and energy needs to be naturally leads to other crucial questions such as:
WHY: Many of us would agree that a solid theological should be at the core of everything we do as a community of faith. It seems to me that a passage like 2 Corinthians 5:17-20 provides just that:
“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us…”
HOW: I would suggest that the fulfillment of our goals needs to be approached in a spirit of partnership. True to our confessional, connectional and missional nature, the Presbytery will work to create the conditions (support, facilitation, and promotion) for Sessions and other church leaders to prayerfully pursue increased vitality, worship participation, and diversity. In addition to strengthening our grant program, we will provide inspiration, training, coaching, and consultation.
WHO: This effort requires “all hands on deck”. We are working to get involve as many churches, worshiping communities, committees, and staff involved as possible. Mike Harbert (mharbert@sfpresby.org) coordinates the efforts towards the Church Vitality goal, Nick Warnes (nick@cyclicalla.com) the Worship Participation goal, and Wendy Gist (wgist@sfpresby.org) and K.C. Wahe (kwahe@burbankpres.org) jointly coordinate the Diversity goal.
WHEN: We are already meeting with committees and Sessions to discuss how we can more effectively support our churches in seeing increases in their sense of vitality, the number of people worshiping, and the ethnic variety of participants. In the Spring of 2024, we intend to assess to what extent we fulfilled the goals. A service of gratitude and celebration will be held in the Fall of that year.
WHAT’S NEXT: The Discerning Team (composed of the Lead Team and Strategy Team) is encouraging that, as appropriate, committees hold “open houses” in which committees can get to know each other better and consider forms of increased collaboration. We are also planning for four regional “Town Hall” meetings to hear from churches. While the Discerning Team continues to consider the appropriateness of our current organizational and financial structures, various committees will be more actively identifying new members.
Thank you for being part of what God is doing among and through us.