Halloween Visioning!

Part One

We agreed that the relationship with our consultant, Bonnie, should be continued. Bonnie “set the direction” by “priming the pump” with “good questions” and did a good job of “leading without pushing” . The next time we meet with her we would like to learn more about how other churches are engaged in “Visioning,” though we do not want to “know their results.” We want our process to be authentic to our context.

Part Two

We looked for a foundational definition of “Church” in scripture.

We studied Matthew 16:15-19; Matthew 25: 31-46; Luke 9:1-6; Acts 1:6-8; Acts 2:41-47 and Acts 16:13-15.

We learned that the purpose of church is:

• To listen to God
• To offer forgiveness and reconciliation
• To lighten people’s burdens—taking care of disadvantaged people
• To look for Jesus in every day life
• To travel light
• To heal
• To share good news
• To be witnesses of the good that has happened
• To be empowered by the Holy Spirit
• To baptize and break bread
• To promote the three-legged-stool: Piety/Action/Study
• To live a common life
• To gather to pray
• To gather to listen to preaching
• To meet in homes…and where the people are

Part Three

We claimed “church growth” books from a table and explained why these books piqued our interest:

“Why Men Hate Going to Church” (Because it seems true!)

“Unlearning Church” (Because it seems like we have to do things very differently now!)

“Looking in a Mirror” (Because it helps us to know what kind of a church we are!)

“Sundays in America” (Because she visits lots of churches.)

“Church Transformation” (Because the author (Bill Kemp) came to our area recently.)

“Bowling Alone” (Because society has grown more private!)

Next Steps:

1. Doug will offer an overview of each book to see if the group is interested in reading one or two of them.

2. We will ask Stone Soup Groups to discuss visioning questions: A) What is the most important thing to you about this church? B) If God asked us to start something new, we should start with what?

3. Results of the above discussion will be shared with consultant Bonnie whom we hope will help us to synthesize the following three streams of data:

A) Our first discussion of what team members felt was most important about FUMC Hudson (see blog #1).

B) Our Part Two learning about the purpose of the church.

C) Stone Soup Group’s responses to visioning questions.

An editorial comment: The Stone Soup Groups will be finished by November 16^th, but since this is a holiday period, results may not be ready and thus a meeting may not be possible until January 2009.

Thanks for a great meeting everyone!

Doug

What Kind of Animal Are We? Sept. NOTES

Attendance: Jim, Matt, Sammie, Jane, Christie, Mary, Carolyn, Rosanne, Doris, Mario (graphic artist), Doug and Bonnie M (consultant)

Doug offered some historical stories and resources and prayer to ground us as we look toward the future.

Bonnie introduced the Circle Process and invited input from the group on several questions. Her goal was to elicit the groups input and thoughts about how to manage this work.

Question One: What do you cherish about this church?

Responses: welcoming, felt quickly at home, youth group, lots of children, people know each other, anonymity isn’t possible, open, all accepted, love and caring, praying church, acceptance, prayer warriors, taught me to deal with change and go to church, walk in and be yourself, total acceptance can be fleeting- cherish it, beautiful space –visually stunning, anything is possible, no nay-sayers

Question Two: What is our task and our challenge?

Responses: Discerning God’s will and moving toward that in the next 5-10 years, need to offer my input, envision future ideas and how we get there, don’t need to know it all – it will come together, feeling excitement about what might be available for my children, we are diverse-discern God’s will knowing that God speaks to us in different ways, psyched to be part of a group actively seeking God’s will, God calls prophets to hard things – how will we be stretched?, we are hard workers for God, how share what we learn?, hope to be a participant and able to speak honestly and openly.

Question Three: What type of animal are we like and what might we strive to become?

Responses:

Chameleon - different at different times, new challenges and multiple passions

Kangaroo – comfort and bouncing

Phoenix – something rising again

Mother tiger – fierce, protective, responsive to crisis

Human – communicating with God so we can make a difference

Large cat – beautiful, independent, draws others closer, follows God

Colony of ants - can we take flight and become a hive of bees?

Zebra - daring to be different, stand for what we believe in

Sand plover – darting to and fro, coming back, opportunities, constant movement, fragile

Flamingo – balanced, centered, pink reflecting what is eaten (who we are/what we are)

Bird – going where needed, working and playing

Question Four: Name an outrageous thing God may be calling us to do

Responses

Become like Harvest Café – connected and reflective of the community

Expand ways we help people in need and in the community, change government

Be instruments of God’s grace – strengthen connections with the community

Move beyond this space (sell?) and build/find space to meet human needs (daycare, meals, feeding program) and also worship

Explore ways to assist with skills training and employment

Be a clothesline connecting the community churches – ecumenicalism

Become a table where gathering and “feeding” happens

Offer a spark of enthusiasm and faith

Show community who we are

Bonnie also shared a visual of the lifecycle of a congregation which demonstrates the need to revision during the prime of ministry to discover the next new call and to avoid going into ministry boredom and decline.

The group offered these hopes for their work.

God’s work can be big and scary, don’t cower, accept, let go and run with it

Avoid being irrelevant, be active on the fringes

Effectively discern next call like the last vision and building groups did

Create actionable goals

Don’t fear action

God leads us to be open to change

We drafted the following criteria for this visioning work.

Ø Balance creative exploration with concrete tasks

Ø Conduct both internal and external data collection

Ø Communicate, communicate, communicate….

We created a letter to the congregation sharing words of affirmation, challenge, hope and promise. Rosanne collected the cards and will create the letter. The group can review the letter and use is as a communication piece to the congregation at any time.

The group agreed to try the blog again, with assurance of coaching from Doug.

Bonnie agreed to send a summary of tonight’s input along with some samples for congregational and community input. Her recommendations for next steps are noted below.

Next meeting: October 28, 2008

Carolyn will serve as the Convener

Meeting September 31st PREVIEW

Vision 2012 Team: Happy Fall!

Our second meeting will be Tuesday, September 31 at 7pm in Pastor's Office.
In August we agreed to reflect on three things:

1. What is our mission as a Church?
We agreed to write a statement to be shared at our next meeting.
2. Who are we as Hudson First UnitedMethodist Church?
We agreed to talk to people about how they perceive this local church and report back.
3. What is our local church context?
We agreed to think about area businesses and organizations to consider which people we ought to talk with about Hudson/Marlborough area needs.

When we meet next time, we will be lead by Rev. Bonnie Marden who will offer us tools to help us organize our ideas.

The purpose of this next gathering is to come to better clarity on our identity as a local church.

I invited Mario DiMare, a graphic artist in our congregation, to sit with us and sketch some of the images he hears us sharing. The communications team hopes that we will be able to produce some kind of logo which expresses our identity.

In preparation, you may want to look at this website which demonstrates effect church logos:
http://churchrelevance.com/resources/top-church-logos/

See you soon!
Doug

First Meeting

Attendance: Mary, Sammie, Jim, Doug, Jayne, Matt, Rosanne, Dorris, Carolyn, Christie. We missed Lisa and our consultant Bonnie!

The goal of the meeting was to simply get to know each other.

First we introduced ourselves by revealing most embarrassing moments from the past. One of us accidentally kissed the back of a stranger's neck! Another tripped on his acolyte robe! Another did a back flop from the high-dive!

Next, we shared the most important moments we have experienced at First United Methodist Church of Hudson. We allowed those experiences to teach us what we and people like us need from Church. Here is the list (without names attached to maintain confidentiality):

Church should...

1. Mentor new people and help them claim gifts and leadership.
2. Find belonging, support and healing through intimacy in small groups.
3. Welcome newcomers.
4. Not be judgmental or hypocritical.
5. Offer a sense of history (through rituals like baptism) and community (through experiences like the Walk to Emmaus).
6. Be authentic/genuine.
7. Be explicit about Jesus' welcome (as we are with Holy Communion).
8. Appreciate that people are at many different stages of age and faith. Feed needs.
9. Be inclusive of all people. Pay particular attention to younger people.
10. Pray.

TASK IN PREPARATION FOR NEXT MEETING:

We need to discern three things,

• Our Christian Mission
• Our Church Identity
• Our Context or Demographic

Each of us agrees to help discern:

Our Christian MISSION--by reflecting on the good things we have each received from this particular church and writing one statement from all of these good things that explains what the mission of the church seems to be.

Our Church IDENTITY--by talking with church participants as well as non-participating neighbors about what FUMC is known for. Keep a written record of what people say.

Our Context or DEMOGRAPHIC--by making a list of important local organizations and people who can help us better understand realities in the community and needs of the people.

OUR NEXT MEETING WILL BE IN SEPTEMBER
The only days when those in attendance can meet are Tuesdays, Sundays and Saturdays.
Please respond to this post listing which Tuesdays in September you CAN meet.