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..adapted from our Annual Congregational Meeting Report of February 1st, 2009 \ Taking the Pulse of a Congregation A Message from the Pastor The constitutional occasion of our Annual Congregational Meeting means a time for reflecting together on who we have been together in the past year – as well as sharing with one another our prayers and hopes for the year to come. Here are a few of my own thoughts on the subject, which may be helpful as a catalyst for further conversations: We were reminded once again, with the departure of Pastoral Interns Jim and Katie Pazan after a year and half in our midst, that we continue to grow into the role of a teaching/nurturing congregation for new ministers on behalf of the larger church. Those of us who watched them mature in their confidence, skills, and perspective over that time can have no doubt about this vibrant and meaningful ministry we have right here where we live. Pray with us as we engage in transforming this periodic internship into a permanent, regular two-year, ordainable Residency program over the course of the next few years. We are reminded by our vibrant Family Circle Storytime Café that there are other experiments in ministry successfully transpiring right under our own roof. A multi-generational team project that provides leadership experiences for parents and other volunteers from the congregation, the Family Circle Café is our Sunday morning beachhead for fulfilling the baptismal vows we take as a church every time we baptize a child. Café participants are endeavoring in ever new and creative ways to provide a grounding in the Bible stories and the songs of the church – with a spoonful of crafts to help the medicine go down! Along with Confirmation, Triennium, Highlands Camps and multi-generational worship experiences, this commitment to build our children up in the knowledge and love of Christ represents for all of us what it means to follow His leading. The eagerness of new leaders to emerge in a church at various levels of its life, whether at the level of ordained Deacon or Elder service or the level of hospitality, educational, visitation or music and worship volunteers, is one sure sign of a vibrant congregational pulse. It has occurred to me in the past year that in a community of faith, what makes Jesus’ burden light and his yoke easy is not so much that we do ministry ‘for’ one another as that we do ministry ‘with’ one another. Finally, amid these uncertain economic times, the pulse of our community of faith continues to be vibrant in direct proportion to our continuing commitment to Christ’s mission in the world, regardless of the size of our annual budget. In their task of setting a budget for 2009, our entire crack financial team is faced this year with the continuing change in the way congregational members pledge in advance for the following year—this number has been declining steadily over the past decade or two. On the following page you will find these statistics—while pledging is declining for some reason, giving is not necessarily declining on a parallel path. I encourage you to look at these figures, and consider the following proposal being made by our Session—to discontinue our practice of keeping track of pledges all together. We will instead keep close track of our mission—what it is and where we are with it—and we will do this ‘with’ one another. The number of pledges each year does not the pulse of a church make! The pulse is determined by the heart, and the heartbeat of a living congregation is to be found nowhere but in the heartbeat of Christ, in whom all things are possible to those who believe. – Brad Gustafson
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