Dear Friends,
“The Present Future is Coming!” You may have seen that announcement and wondered what it meant. Here’s the answer: The Present Future is a very important movement forward for our church. Allow me to explain:
There are many churches, including ours, that are struggling. There are many factors in our society, our culture, and within our church itself that have brought us to the place we are now: lower attendance, reduced giving, fewer leaders, and so forth. Like I said, these are issues many churches are facing. What do we do about this? Give up? Ignore our current reality? Just hope that things will get better? No, none of those approaches will work, nor will many of the programs available for church growth be as helpful as they once might have been. Our world, and Christianity’s place in it, has so drastically changed that for us to be faithful to our calling as a church we need to rethink how we fulfill our mission. It isn’t so much that our mission has changed as is the approach we need to take to be faithful in fulfilling our mission. The Present Future will help us in this task.
The Present Future is a special seminar, based on a DVD series by Reggie McNeal by that title, and including the subtitle: Six Tough Questions for the Church. The ten sessions are as follows:
1. Preparing for the Future
2. What Are You Looking At? (Looking at the world around us.)
3. The Collapse of the Church Culture, part one
4. The Collapse of the Church Culture, part two
5. From Church Growth to Kingdom Growth. (There is a difference.)
6. A New Reformation: Releasing God’s People
7. The Return to Spiritual Formation
8. From Planning to Preparation
9. The Rise of Apostolic Leadership. (Leadership requirements for spiritual leaders.)
10. What’s Next? (Next steps for aligning ourselves with God’s future for us.
As you can see, this is serious and important stuff. We are fortunate to have as our facilitator Rev. Sam Brink of the American Baptist Churches of Wisconsin, who has a great understanding of this material and is using it with his own church.
The Present Future is being held over two weekends. The schedule is as follows:
Friday, March 19, 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm.
Saturday, March 20, 9:00 am to 4:00 pm.
Friday, March 26, 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm
Saturday, March 27, 9:00 am to 4:00 pm.
There will be free childcare, and lunch and snacks will be provided. All you need to do is register your attendance either by calling the church office at 722-4312, or emailing me at pastorjjs@tds.net.
The Present Future is open to all of our church family – young and old, members and non-members alike. Obviously, it will require a big commitment of your time and energy. But our church is worth it. God’s Kingdom is worth it. And our future may depend upon it.
In His Name,
Pastor Jim
“The Present Future is Coming!” You may have seen that announcement and wondered what it meant. Here’s the answer: The Present Future is a very important movement forward for our church. Allow me to explain:
There are many churches, including ours, that are struggling. There are many factors in our society, our culture, and within our church itself that have brought us to the place we are now: lower attendance, reduced giving, fewer leaders, and so forth. Like I said, these are issues many churches are facing. What do we do about this? Give up? Ignore our current reality? Just hope that things will get better? No, none of those approaches will work, nor will many of the programs available for church growth be as helpful as they once might have been. Our world, and Christianity’s place in it, has so drastically changed that for us to be faithful to our calling as a church we need to rethink how we fulfill our mission. It isn’t so much that our mission has changed as is the approach we need to take to be faithful in fulfilling our mission. The Present Future will help us in this task.
The Present Future is a special seminar, based on a DVD series by Reggie McNeal by that title, and including the subtitle: Six Tough Questions for the Church. The ten sessions are as follows:
1. Preparing for the Future
2. What Are You Looking At? (Looking at the world around us.)
3. The Collapse of the Church Culture, part one
4. The Collapse of the Church Culture, part two
5. From Church Growth to Kingdom Growth. (There is a difference.)
6. A New Reformation: Releasing God’s People
7. The Return to Spiritual Formation
8. From Planning to Preparation
9. The Rise of Apostolic Leadership. (Leadership requirements for spiritual leaders.)
10. What’s Next? (Next steps for aligning ourselves with God’s future for us.
As you can see, this is serious and important stuff. We are fortunate to have as our facilitator Rev. Sam Brink of the American Baptist Churches of Wisconsin, who has a great understanding of this material and is using it with his own church.
The Present Future is being held over two weekends. The schedule is as follows:
Friday, March 19, 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm.
Saturday, March 20, 9:00 am to 4:00 pm.
Friday, March 26, 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm
Saturday, March 27, 9:00 am to 4:00 pm.
There will be free childcare, and lunch and snacks will be provided. All you need to do is register your attendance either by calling the church office at 722-4312, or emailing me at pastorjjs@tds.net.
The Present Future is open to all of our church family – young and old, members and non-members alike. Obviously, it will require a big commitment of your time and energy. But our church is worth it. God’s Kingdom is worth it. And our future may depend upon it.
In His Name,
Pastor Jim
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