NewSong Board of Elders

Minutes of January 13, 2008 Meeting

 

The Board of Elders of NewSong Community Church held its January meeting at the church on Sunday, January 13, 2008 from 4:00 to 6:00pm at the Church. Elders present included Linda Blanchard, Brian Brown, Jerry Cauley, Vicki Eitel, and Steve Jackson. Ed Densmore and Brent Orr were absent.

 

The meeting began with Pastor Steve asking if there were any questions about the Pastor’s Report which was emailed earlier to the Board.

A.    Brian Brown mentioned that the financial report was certainly a praise for the church.

B.     Linda Blanchard commented on a concern over our average attendance going down slightly over the years. There was the theory of moving across the street from the high school or other reasons. The monthly average attendance seems to be going up with new members joining. It was stressed that numbers are not the most important thing.

C.     Brent Orr’s resignation was briefly mentioned, to be addressed later in the meeting.

D.    Steve mentioned a series of sermons based on “love” and “grow” called “Extreme Love: The Greatest Commandment.” It was mentioned that materials are available and small groups could be started from this series, with the books available at church. Steve will order the books.

 

The following are highlights from the Pastor’s Report:

 

Pastor’s Report

December was a good month at NewSong. We started off with a bang on the very first day of the month with over 30 people gathered at the church to decorate for the season. This group also took the opportunity to clean, paint, repair, and reorganize our space at Central Plaza as we were decorating. On the 8th 18 people from our church went to the Operation Christmas Child warehouse to deliver our shoeboxes and to work in the warehouse. Also on the 8th we had a group of 12 to go out and do local mission work cleaning houses and doing minor repairs for (mainly elderly) people in the local community through “The Place”. On the 15th we held a Family Movie Night, showing the movie “The Nativity.” Several groups also held Christmas parties during December including the Wise and Wonderful (15th), our Sunday School classes (16th), and our Youth (also on the 16th). On the 16th our youth also bid farewell to Kevin Sanders, who has been our Director of Student Ministries (through Youth Outreach United) for the last 18 months. Kevin has taken a position with another church in Gwinnett County. We will miss Kevin, and we wish him all the best. On Christmas Eve we held our annual Christmas Eve Candlelight Communion Service with approximately 200 in attendance. During December I preached a series called “Love Came Down at Christmas” where we emphasized the first element of our mission statement, “Love God,” and the fact that at no time (except perhaps on the Cross) did God show his love for us more, than at Christmastime when He sent His Son. On December 23rd we dedicated Caitlyn Gilliland and our Children put on a brief Christmas presentation for us during worship. On the 30th, Vicki Eitel was our preacher, sharing some of the obstacles we face in trying to accept and live in the love of God.

 

Other Items

Our Average YTD worship attendance for the year ended up at 139. Attendance for the four Sundays of December was 141, 149, 130, 176, and 61. Last month we talked briefly about our previous years’ average attendance, so I am listing those below:

 

2000 - 120

2001 - 150

2002 - 158

2003 - 160

2004 - 156

2005 - 148

2006 - 145

2007 - 139

 

Current membership statistics as of the end of November reflect the addition of one family, the Brewers, who joined on Dec. 9th. We now have 59 member families, 100 full members, 45 preparatory members and 77 constituent members for a total of 222. 

 

Financially speaking, revenues for the month were $47,457 (reflecting heavy “end of year” giving) and expenses were $25,004 with income exceeding expenses by $22,453 for the month. Our final YTD numbers for 2007 are revenues of $289,431 and expenses of $239,447 with revenues exceeding expenses by $49,984. Our income of $289,431 bodes well for our chances to reach our $275,000 budget for 2008. As of the end of December the balance in our Fidelity account (reserve) was $44,351. and the balance in our operating account was $55,842.   We continue to deposit $430.76 a week in the Fidelity account to cover the children’s director and worship leader salaries.

 

UPCOMING AND ONGOING

I will be offering a Membership Orientation Class on Wednesday evening, January 9th and have invited all our current prospects. As of the date of this report I don’t know the attendance of that meeting, but I anticipate a good turnout according to who all has told me they plan to attend.

 

We are also holding a Leadership Huddle on Saturday, January 12th. Again, I don’t know the turnout as of the date of this report, but I look forward to “clarifying the win” for our leaders as well as going over the essentials all leaders at NewSong need to know in order to lead and minister effectively in our church.

 

LOVE AREA

As for my preaching I am now preaching stand alone sermons based on the Revised Common Lectionary. I’m anticipating starting a new series during Lent titled, “Extreme Love: The Greatest Commandment.” This series would begin On Feb. 10th and run for seven weeks through Easter Sunday (March 23rd). Lifeway even has a small group curriculum you can use along with the series. I would still write the sermons, but the main thought of each sermon is provided by the curriculum. For example, on week one the key thought is, “God is love and He wants you to love Him completely.” I would like the Elders’ opinion about if you think it would be a good idea to try to get some small group participation in this, or to simply buy some of the books for folks to work through them at home? Obviously from the title to the series you can see the emphasis throughout the series is “Love God and others” which goes well with our new mission statement.

 

On Friday night, Jan. 25th the Praise Band is planning an event tentatively called “Friday Night Jam” which will be like a musical coffeehouse. We will have some of our musicians playing as well as invite others to come in and “jam.” I see it as a time to reach out and get folks to come to our church in a non-threatening environment where they will hopefully see that “church-people” really can have fun. Refreshments will be provided.

 

GROW AREA

Sunday School restarted last Sunday (Jan. 6th) with a good crowd. We had 40 in attendance. I hope we keep this momentum through May. I’d really like to see someone step forward to be our point person/champion concerning Sunday School and Small Groups.

 

Sunday Night Bible Study restarted on Sunday night as well. We had 19 at our first Gospel of Matthew study. 

 

Our Women’s Group continues meet. They just finished up their Beth Moore study called Living Free and are about to embark on a new study. The study is led by Michele Green and meet on Tuesday nights at 7pm. Attendance in this group has historically been about 6-8 per week.

 

Our women will also continue to hold their Women’s Coffee and Prayer meeting the first Saturday morning of every month at 8:30am at the church.

 

Our Men’s Group is engaged in a study called Faith Under Fire which is an apologetics study where the men learn to defend their faith and to clarify beliefs.  The group is led by John Krauss and meets on Thursday nights at 7pm. They average about 6-8 men a week.

 

Our Men’s ministry will also continue to hold their monthly breakfasts the third Saturday of every month in the KidZone room.

 

Small Groups/Home Groups had 12 people sign-up as being interested in the October ministry campaign. I’d still like to see us do some kind of training/launch/campaign in the first quarter of 2008 for small groups which we definitely see as a large component of the “Grow” piece of our mission. This could be the “Extreme Love” study I mentioned above. The curriculum is fine and it’s only a Forty Day Study.

 

SHARE

Outreach Ministry Group - B.J. Fisher will be leading this ministry again in 2008. Plans now call for there definitely to be a Gulf Coast/Katrina Relief trip, led by Chuck and Dawn Kirkland, in May of 2008.  I am planning a meeting for Jan. 20th to discuss a possible Ghana trip. Donna and I plan to go in July and would like to take a team with us. I don’t know about El Salvador yet. We will need a leader to step forward to do the leading before we can offer the trip.

 

CHILDREN AND YOUTH

Our youth will continue meeting on Sunday nights at 6pm. As we all know, we have hired Justin and Kristyn Woelk as our new DSM. Their first official night is January 13th. Last week we had parents do the leading, with Justin and Kristyn assisting. They had 22 present. Justin and Kristyn are working on a calendar and will hopefully have some dates and ideas for us, possibly as soon as the Leadership Huddle this Saturday.

 

I have thanked both Drew Grubbs and Kevin Sanders for their work with us. Drew said please don’t hesitate to call on him in the future if we need the assistance of Youth Outreach United.

 

Our children’s programs for now include Sunday School on Sunday mornings at 9am taught by Greg Citta and Pat Plant, Junior Worship during our worship services led by Edith Banta, Shuri Orr, a children’s teaching and activity time on Sunday evenings from 6-7pm led by Christina Krauss and Rebecca Brown, and occasional “outings” for the group led by Rhonda Sloyer. We still don’t have an overall leader for the children’s area.

 

 

Old Business:

 

  1. The question of financial support for missionary Amy Jackson was raised. Did this start in January 2008, or immediately after it was voted on. The consensus was it was supposed to start back when it was first approved. A motion was made by Vicki Eitel, second by Linda, to pay Amy for the months of Oct – Dec 2007 1% of the 10% set aside for missions. Motion passed unanimously (with Pastor Steve abstaining). Vicki will notify Mandy to make this adjustment.
  2. Special thanks were expressed to Brian Brown and his team of church members for their work in finding Justin and Kristyn Woelk to be the new Director of Student Ministries at NewSong. It was agreed to keep the team of adult members who did the interviewing together as a Youth Accountability Team (not official name).
  3. There was a short discussion of proper attire while serving in the church. It was agreed that those ushering, greeting, working in the welcome center, on the platform, etc… should all be dressed modestly and appropriately. Rather than addressing this on a blanket basis, the Board agreed this should be handled through individual “asides” by the Elders and the various ministry team leaders.
  4. Second Service Discussion: Vicki and Brian made a presentation concerning the possibility of a second service. They said for it to do any good with the overcrowding we would need 30-40 people to attend the additional service. The suggested schedule is:

9:00 – 10:00 Worship and Kids Sunday School

                        10:00 – 10:30 Fellowship

                        10:30 – 11:30 Worship, Junior Worship, and adult and youth Sunday School

 

The second service would be a 12-week experiment, starting on Easter Sunday (Brian mentioned NewSong started on an Easter Sunday so this is appropriate). Vicki and Brian will contact the primary groups involved (Vicki: Sunday School and refreshments, Brian the Praise Band). Tying this into the Lenten series, Pastor Steve suggested we have 50 of the Extreme Love books available on January 27th with the new series to start on Feb. 10th, running until Easter. This would give us seven weeks for potential small groups to get started. Brian will contact those who expressed an interest in starting a small group to see if they are still interested. These families include; Brown, Bennett, Fisher, and Ellington.

 

  1. New Church Directory – Vicki advised that Catherine Bennett will head up this project. Pictures would be taken on Sunday mornings.
  2. The Board accepted the resignation of Brent Orr with gratitude for his past service. Our bylaws say that we will have 7 Elders. It was decided to table the discussion of what to do about replacing Brent until the February meeting.

 

New Business:

 

  1. Officers for 2008: A secretary and treasurer are needed. The secretary job is being handled at present by a rotation of the existing Elders. As for the treasurer, discussion was held that perhaps we should look outside the Board for someone with this gift or vocation. The bylaws say all corporate officers must be Elders however. Therefore discussion was held about having a Treasurer who is on the Board who has a lay member or team who actually does the work of the treasurer, reporting to the Board through that Elder. It was decided to table this discussion until the next meeting and to elect officers from the Board of Elders at that time.
  2. At this point, after a short break, NewSong member John Krauss addressed the Board about Elder concerns. Main issues discussed were:
    1. Missed opportunities for discipleship
    2. Help in mentoring in ministry areas
    3. Support, encouragement, and involvement

 

Brian Brown closed the meeting with prayer, and the meeting was adjourned.

 

Elder of the Month for February – Ed Densmore

 

Next Meeting Date – Sunday, February 10th 4pm at the church.