The sun was shining bright when the Steering Team met this past Monday, May 6 at Grace Lutheran Church! With the promise of warmer weather, a feeling of positivity and hope was evident at our meeting as well. God is good!
Many things with amalgamation are starting to take shape. We reviewed the meeting notes from our Working Group gathering, held on the morning of April 13. The various committees updated us on any developments since then. After discussion, further directives were given. Here are the highlights of our meeting: …Finances first! Our Finance committee has drafted a proposed budget for 2020 as we continue to use all four church locations during our transition period. …Our Governance committee met on Tuesday, May 7 to begin working on the new constitution and transition plan for our future amalgamated church. ... We now have joint services planned for right up until September 22. These services are such wonderful opportunities to share in our faith and really get to know each other - mingle, mingle, mingle! The schedule is as follows: May 26 Transfiguration at Grace and St. John’s at Faith 10:30 am June 9 Joint service - all four congregations at St. John’s 10:00 am June 30 Grace at Transfiguration 10:00 am July 7 Grace at St. John’s 11:00 am July 14 Grace at Faith 10:30 am Transfiguration at St. John’s 10:00 am July 21 Transfiguration at Grace 10:30 am July 28 St. John’s at Transfiguration 10:00 am Aug 4 Faith at Grace 10:30 am Aug 11 St. John’s at Grace 10:30 am Aug 18 Faith and Grace at Transfiguration 10:00 am Sept 8 Town Hall Meetings (at individual churches) Sept 22 Joint service – all four congregations at Faith 10:30 am Sept 29 Amalgamation Vote (at individual churches) … Our Outreach working group is going to look at all the wonderful projects and outreach initiatives that our four churches are currently involved in, then work out how we can continue to keep them all up and running in 2020. ...We identified our top priorities in determining a location for our new church. Using these, we will be looking at our three current properties, as well as whatever other properties may become available in the upcoming months. Rest assured, we will have a home!! ... We need a name for our new church-to-be and we want your help! We have a short list of criteria to be used in suggestions for this name: - no hyphens - doesn’t have the name of any of our four churches in it - a name that speaks to outsiders - a name that is easy to remember/memorable Now, feel free to run with your ideas and submit your suggestions by June 23. Your church will give you further details on how to do that. …We set up a separate committee to look at the non-rostered staffing positions for the amalgamated church i.e. musicians, janitorial, etc. … And, we’ve saved the best news for last - our pastors aren’t going anywhere! Pastors Daniela and Thomas Mertz and Pastor Loretta Jaunzarins will be the official “called pastors” in our new amalgamated church going forward. After amalgamation, Pastor Doug Schweyer will be retiring (for the second time!). We thank him for staying on at Transfiguration to help his congregation through this important process! That’s all for now. We are finally starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel! As the Working groups and Steering team continue to meet to find solutions to all challenges, please keep this process in your prayers. We want all of you to be able to vote with confidence on September 29! Have a wonderful week!
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Our JourneyHere you can find all the congregational communication update from the amalgamation working committee (previous task group). If you have any question or comment please use the contact form by clicking the "contact" tag on the top right of this page. Archives
June 2019
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