Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Thinking aloud
Every time I meet with the church board I have a thinking aloud section. This allows me to incubate vision and process ideas together, rather than being a top-down leader who presents ideas fait accompli/like it or leave it. Here is what I wrote today.
End of the year. How to end the year? We have our AGM which starts the year. But how do we evaluate the year and honour God for all that has been done? What is a sustainable (ie yearly) way for us to celebrate our life as a church?
Ive begun to wonder about a day long celebration;
that starts and ends with worship (10:30 pm and 7 pm), that offers a barbeque lunch, that has coffee throughout the day, that has a bouncy castle and play area for the kids, that has a performance space where at regular intervals throughout the afternoon, people sing or do comedy, that has multiple stations set up through the church.
: each ministry department saying what they have done and what they need resources for next year
: with pictures and names of those baptized, come into membership, those who have left membership, newly planted congregations
: with video footage that we have collected
: with a thankyou space and cards to write to volunteers in our midst
: with a dream space for people to imagine about next year
: with time to walk through all the newly painted areas including the prayer room
: with an evaluation space where people can ask the Board questions
: ending with a praise and prayer wall, where people write up all that they are glad of, and all that they were dreaming of
This would enable people could take time, at their pace, to “wander” through the year. We could set the church up in “zones” based around our mission;
Enabling people to walk (blue)
: Evangelism
: Community ministry
: Worship
And grow with Jesus (green)
: Youth
: Children
: Spiritual growth
: Administration
: Property
: Small groups
Reflecting his love in our communities and beyond
: Missions
: Pastoral care
love the way you think aloud.
Out of interest just when does your year end and begin? For us it’s officially Sept 1st, but we have a large number of students in our congregation who drift back during early September.
Love some of your ideas. Keep thinking out loud, so we can all be in your board meetings 🙂
Comment by Lorna — July 19, 2005 @ 6:53 pm
Thanks Lorna. People in New Zealand work very much by the summer holidays. So the end of the year is Christmas and things really go slow in the heat of January, then back into it February.
All of this starts to work well with the liturgical Church Year, which starts with advent, the 4 weeks leading up to Christmas.
So I am looking at running this event the last Sunday of the church year ie late November. Then 4 weeks of Advent, and summer holidays and we have our church AGM early February, where we introduce some hopes and dreams for the year, around food, as people come back refreshed from the summer holidays. So the “open day” bookends the year and the AGM “book marks” the start of the year.
Comment by steve — July 20, 2005 @ 10:07 am