meeting

Ascension Lutheran Church

NCD Meeting

Sunday April 24, 2005

 

Attending: Brian Peterson, Matt and Celeste Domsch, Carol Renker, Lorain Glawe, Steve Cox, Becca Andersen, Carter Naylor, Gary Cowles, Scott and Nancy Johnson, Eric and Wendy Schorn, Edna McKelvey, Anna Fleming, Margaret Bachand, Don Bergstrom, Kris Beckman

 

Disclaimer:  This is not a perfect list—these are the people I remember seeing and talking to. If I left you out, I am sorry and will gladly add you back in. Send an email to me.  If I put you on the list and you were not really there, my apologies. Also, not everyone who attended necessarily answered the questions below.

 

This is the complete list of answers. I typed in every response to every question, unless they were identical. In those cases, I just put the number of respondents who said the exact same thing.

 

Notes transcribed by Celeste Domsch to the best of her meager abilities…

 

 

Strengths:

• Variety of instruments (piano, electric piano, organ, bells, guitars)

• Musicians

• Organist 

•  Choir director

• Choir selections

• Choir (10 respondents)

• Communion weekly

• Communion circle distribution

• Assisting ministers

• Strong SIRs

• One service time

• Lay participation

• Sermons (2 respondents)

• Trust in pastor and leaders

• God’s guidance

• Uplifting

• Empowering

• Same goal

•  Building itself

• Beauty of worship space

•  Daycare (Hand in hand)

• Nursery during worship

• Child friendly service

• Loving relationships

• Friendly people (2 respondents)

• Being with our church family

• Greeting visitors/ sharing the peace

• Welcoming spirit of congregants

• Generally upbeat mood

•  Multiple liturgies

• Different settings (I took this to mean musical worship settings)

• Combo blue and green hymn books

• Marty Haugen liturgy

• Blue book “With one voice”

•  Talented members

• Committed members

• Website e-ministry

Weaknesses:

• Limited variety

• “Lutheran mentality” (quotation marks written on card—not mine)

• Lack of imagination

• At times feels like “same old same old”—a lack of variety

• Bland worship space

• Sanctuary not as attractive as it could be

• Holes in congregation

• People spread out so singing is weak (2 respondents)

• More diverse music needed

• Uninteresting ancient hymns

• Slow music

• Songs sung

• Weird hymns without written musical notes

• Differences in music and reading knowledge

• Need to use more hymns that we can sing

• Disparity in members’ past worship experiences

• Different styles of hearing and learning

• Different preferences

• Sparse attendance

• Regular attendance

• Number of members

• Not enough children

• Limited involvement of young children

• Need children’s sermons (4 respondents)

• Not enough aimed at the kids

• Lack of people for worship leader positions (assisting ministers, readers, ushers etc)

• Failure to involve more people

• Involve more of the congregation in worship

• Doesn’t utilize gifts of as many people as we possibly could

• Not enough people participating (2 respondents)

• Lack of nursery volunteers and youth Sunday School teachers

• Announcements too long

• Distractions and interrupted flow

• Too many hymn books

• Bulletin format

• Little interaction

• Need more individual testimony

• Communion liturgy too long

• Occasional lackluster sermons

• Unskilled

• Commitment (Presumably this mean a lack of…)

• Threats:

• Location (2 respondents)

• Bomb threat

• Lack of faith/hope

• Disinterest

• Upset members

• Contention among members

• Distractions regarding form—rather than positive focus on substance

• Loss of focus on a sacramental community

• Discomfort in unexpected forms of worship

• Conflicts may be magnified

• Unwilling to get involved

• People not being willing/confident enough to share gifts

• Not enough people participating

• Low attendance (3 respondents)

• Number of members

• Lack of participation in planned progress

• Losing members if we do something different (3 respondents)

• Sporting events

• Busy lives

• Burn-out of over-active people

• Continuity in the service

• Lack of childcare limits adult Sunday school attendance

• Finances (4 respondents)

• Taking people out of comfort zone (2 respondents)

• People complaining

• Worship must be in the sanctuary on Sunday morning

• We have never done it that way before!

• Unwilling/resistant  to change (2 respondents)

• “We have this nice organ and must use it” attitude

• Many members won’t like new sounds and rituals

• Fear of new worship ideas

• Radical change of worship may drive some away

• Change will not help

• “What’s happening to my church?” attitude

• People will not like change/loss of membership

• Old belief on worship—no change

• Attitudes toward change

• Loss of sense of community if things “change”

Opportunities:

• Sharing our own Christian experiences

• Finding people’s gifts and growing from there

• Listening and speaking to God in better, more meaningful ways

• Being authentic in a phony culture

• Sermons related to current events

• Plays, skits, puppets, different musical offerings (instrumental, traditional, contemporary)

• Guest pastors/choirs

• Access to seminarians and their gifts

• Steven’s enthusiasm

• Use of other worship spaces –PLC, garden etc.

• Beautiful property could be used in new ways—outdoor worship area, park etc.

• Add picture window to sanctuary

• Move worship to PLC for summer

• Several different locations/buildings

• To reach any generation

• Children’s sermon

• Include children

• Children’s worship

• Use of music that comes from other sources that is spiritually moving

• More contemporary music (2 respondents)

• Hymn selection

• More diverse music

• Young musicians—a relatively untapped resource

• Uplifting music

• Instrumental music from chamber groups

• Start up bell choir again

• More special music

• Access to outside musicians

• Have visitors a lot

• Outreach

• Meeting new people

• Greeting new people

• Different worship times

• More participation

• More variety in the service

• Openness to hearing different worship experiences

• New liturgy forms

• Open to different liturgy styles

• Different setting (again I took this to mean musical worship setting)

• Make worship schedule for longer period

• Learning about God

• A new day

• Growing in God’s amazing grace

• Spiritual growth

• Use of technology/multimedia ministry (4 respondents)

smmary

NCD Summary:

We haven’t done it this way before…but we sure could.

By Celeste Domsch

 

Here is a summary of the answers our members gave at our first Natural Church Development meeting on April 24, 2005. We were asked by Pastor Elliott Pancoast to identify our strengths, weakness, threats, and opportunities related to worship. Our goal is to have an inspiring worship service where people encounter the living God. 

 

Our primary strengths, as noted by this one group, included our choir (named specifically by 10 people), and the loving quality of our relationships with one another (named by 7 people).  We also enjoy our weekly communion around the altar, our strong SIRs, our multiple liturgies, and our generally upbeat mood. We are talented and committed, and on a good Sunday, we go away empowered and uplifted.

 

However, we also have some weaknesses. The primary ones identified by this group included our congregational music as being too slow, uninteresting, and difficult to read and sing. We are unhappy with the logistics of our service, from long announcements to the bulletin format to the lack of interaction and personal testimony. We would like to see more regular attendance, more people involved as worship leaders, and more opportunities for children.

 

There are threats to changing our worship, and the primary one appears to be that we are Lutherans. Specifically, there were 20 variations on “We have never done it that way before” voiced, and many of those people feared losing members if we changed our practices. We are also concerned about our finances and how to pay for any changes we decide to make.

 

We do see a number of opportunities on the horizon: use of other physical spaces for worship; more frequent children’s sermons; uplifting music and access to outside musicians; use of technology and multimedia in worship; new liturgy forms and more variety in the service.

 

The complete list of answers is available at the church office. On a personal note, let me describe one irony I noticed: we are all afraid of making changes because we think others might leave. To a person, the members at this meeting expressed desires to change various things and had great ideas. So it appears that the people we are afraid of are…each other.  If we are all ready to improve our worship to be a stronger encounter with the living God, what are we waiting for? We may not have done it this way before, but with God’s help, we sure can.

pastor

Natural Church Development

 Pastor's Perspective

April Accents 2005

             As many of you know, about thirty of us took part in an extensive survey of our ministry the, the first step in a process known as Natural Church Development.  The purpose of this survey was to help us get  a fix on our ministry and to identify areas of strengths and areas for growth.  The survey helped to identify and evaluate eight specific quality characteristics of ministry—empowering leadership, gift oriented ministry, passionate spirituality, functional structures, inspiring worship, holistic small groups, need oriented evangelism and loving relationships.

             None of these characteristics can be missing from any Christian community.  They’re universally valid qualities.  They are applicable to any situation, including ours here at Ascension and each has a positive connection both with growth in quality and in size of a worshipping community.  While no one factor by itself leads to growth in churches through the interplay of these factors we can clearly recognize signs of the Spirit at work.

             Our focus becomes the so called “minimum factor”, in other words which of our particular characteristics was the lowest.  As we’ve noted before, it’s like a wooden barrel with eight planks or staves of different lengths.  The barrel can only be filled to the point of the lowest stave, so if you raise the stave, the capacity of the barrel becomes greater. 

             The point then is to focus on that “minimum factor” which doesn’t mean ignoring the other seven areas.  They’re all important after all.  Focusing on the lowest stave though helps us to set goals and priorities for ministry.  At some point in the future, we might even discover that another of the 8 factors has become our “minimum factor”.  That’s okay.  We’ll know what to do then!

             So how did things turn out for us?  Well, it looks like Inspiring worship is our minimal factor.  But just what exactly does that mean? * Consider the following description:  

             “Inspiring worship is a personal and corporate encounter with the living God.  Both personal and corporate worship must be infused with the presence of God resulting in times of joyous exultation and times of quiet reverence.  Inspiring worship is not driven by a  particular style or ministry focus group—but rather the shared experience of God’s awesome presence.  Is the worship service an inspiring experience for those who attend?  It is not whether our services target Christians or non-Christians, whether they celebrate “in the language of Canaan” or a more secular language or in a more secular language, or whether we worship using a liturgical or a more free flowing approach.  Inspiring worship services are often described as fun.” 

From Natural Church Development Quality Characteristics:  A Summary Based on Natural Church Development by Christian Schwarz , copyright 2001 CoachNet, Inc.

                 Okay, where do we go from here?  Our next step is to meet again with Bishop’s Assistant Pastor Elliot Pancoast on Sunday afternoon, April 24th.  We’ll begin with a light supper at 5:30 PM, soup/sandwiches something like that.  Let me know if you are willing to provide something for the  meal.  Then at 6 PM we’ll have a brainstorming session in which we’ll reflect on our assets, consider ideas, think about potential roadblocks or resistance and develop a plan for inspiring worship in the coming months.  In the meantime, I’d like for each of us to take some time to seriously consider what “inspiring worship” means to us and to be prepared to talk about what we think.  On the 24th we’ll also begin putting together a steering committee who will help guide us through the implementation of our plan. 

             The Spirit is up to some interesting things here at Ascension.  I hope you’ll come and be a part of the new things God is up to here at Ascension.

Peace,   

Pastor Brian Peterson

team

Natural Church Development Health Team

Our Natural Church Development Health Team is now in place.  Celeste Domsch, Anna Simmons, Carol Crader and Charles Bachand and Pastor Peterson are developing a plan to look at "inspiring worship" as an area of focus for congregational growth.  Please keep this group in your prayers.  We will keep you posted as to developments. 

 oct

October, 2005 Developments

I am pleased to report to you that the Spirit-filled work of Natural Church Development continues here at Ascension Lutheran Church!

First of all, on behalf of the NCD Health Team, Charles Bachand, Carol Crader, Celeste Domsch, Anna Simmons and myself, let me express a word of sincere thanks to everyone who participated in last month’s Affinity Group Meetings. These gatherings yielded some great information that will definitely assist us in our work together.

Based on the many responses offered at these meetings the Health Team has identified seven areas of focus for us with regard to our minimal factor “inspiring worship”. In no particular order of priority they include: a spiritual core; fellowship in community with others; a connection with God through prayer, Communion and the liturgy; participation; music; variety; and children.

Now that we have identified these areas of focus, the Health Team will be spending some time at our next meeting formulating 4 or 5 specific goals for us to begin working on as a congregation.

Rest assured that these goals will be SMART ones, and by that I don’t mean clever or intelligent so much as Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant to our quality characteristic of “inspiring worship” and holding to a clear Timetable.

We will approach these goals from the standpoint of our strengths too, strengths that include a strong sense of “gift-oriented” ministry and “loving relationships”. You’ll remember that these are the two greatest strengths identified in the NCD congregational profile we completed earlier this year.

We’ll also be working to make sure that these four or five goals will reflect what we call Biotic Thinking. By “Biotic” we mean thinking not in mechanistic or robotic terms, but in terms of how life is lived from the smallest to the largest of living, breathing organisms.

There are six biotic principles we’ll be operating from. The first is interdependence which assumes that like an ecosystem, individual units are connected to each other in a larger system and are therefore affected by change. The second is multiplication which holds to the notion that like plants and seeds, healthy organisms do not grow endlessly, but reproduce themselves. The third is energy transformation. Here we see what the champion surfer is well aware of. Momentum or energy already moving whether positive or negative can be redirected to accomplish a specific purpose, in our case, God’s purpose. The fourth principle is multiusage. Here we think of the image of trees and leaves. Resources we use will increase our capacity for ongoing growth and development as well as serve multiple other purposes. The fifth principle is symbiosis. Have you ever seen of rhinoceroses and those crazy birds that perch on their backs? The arrangement is beneficial to both parties. For us symbiosis says that different ministries can cultivate cooperative relationships that are mutually beneficial and serve to multiply our efforts so that one plus one doesn’t equal two, but three, four or even more! The last principle is functionality. We think here of pruning trees. Our ministries need to produce discernable results that correspond to what we see as God’s intended purposes. If they don’t, then it may be time to let them go and begin something new.

The Spirit is definitely moving among us these days. Hold on to your hats my friends and let’s prepare to be surprised. It’s a blessing to share this journey with you.

Yours In Christ,

Pastor Brian Peterson

goals

 NCD HEALTH TEAM

PROPOSED S.M.A.R.T. GOALS

1.      Plan and implement a monthly Sunday evening worship event on a 3 month trial basis beginning in January 2006.

2.       Actively create participation opportunities and invite all members at least once a quarter to one of the created opportunities.

3.       Plan and implement special "5^th Sunday" worship experiences, i.e. "youth or 'Christ Care Group Sunday", new liturgy Jazz, bluegrass, etc.)

4.       Recruit and train a "preaching team" of at least 5 individuals to offer the Sunday sermon once a month (2-3 times per year per individual), beginning the season of Pentecost 2006.

5.       Offer a five week class on the elements of Lutheran worship during Lent 2006. (Could be a Sunday morning offering, but could also be held at another time.)

6.       Recognize member birthdays & anniversaries once a month with a special order of blessing & fellowship on the second Sunday of the month beginning in January 2006.

7.       Monthly or bi-monthly meetings of the NCD Health Team, Worship Planning Team and Fellowship Planning Team beginning in January 2005 to allow for greater synergy between worship and fellowship ministries.

Presented at the Congregation Meeting - 1/22/06

8/2006

NCD - August, 2006 Perspective

Tuesday evening, August 1st, the Natural Church Development Health Leadership Team met with ELCA Mission Director Pastor Steve Kanouse.  Among other things, we took some time to review the ongoing work of transformational ministry that we have been engaged in now for almost a year and half.

 

You may recall that back in late 2004, many of us completed a congregational questionnaire to help us get a reading on our ministry here at Ascension.  Eight areas of congregational life were assessed and through this process we determined that we would focus our energy and attention on “inspiring worship” as a ministry priority for

the next year and a half to two years. If you do the math, you’ll realize that time is about up, so it seems fitting for us to take stock of where we’ve been and of what lies ahead.

 

As the health team recognized the other night, the Holy Spirit has been at work among us in some interesting and exciting ways and that is truly cause for us to celebrate.

 

We have experienced worship in some new and interesting ways—through the shimmering lights of the luminaria labyrinth last November, the active and eager participation of Christ Care

group members on “fourth Sunday worship”, the bright receptive faces of our children lifting their beautiful voices in praise to God, as well as through the fragrant oil of anointing and prayer with the laying on of hands in our service of healing the last Sunday in July.

 

The NCD Health Team recognizes how important it is to involve as many people as we can in worship, not as passive observers, but as

active participants, for it is when God’s people are equipped and encouraged to use their God given gifts that great things begin to happen.

 

There are still some opportunities in worship ministry that we want to explore in the coming months—continuing to have Christ Care Groups

serve as worship leaders in “fourth Sunday worship”, encouraging the young musicians in our congregation to share their gifts with us, experimenting with some other different styles of worship

from time to time (how does a Gospel service for Reformation Sunday sound?).

 

Of course, charting the path we travel these days together as a congregation, discerning the Spirit at work among us is not simply a matter of figuring out what we should do or how we are to act, but rather how to react to the various opportunities that present themselves to us in such a way that will continue to support growth. After all, we’re not a bunch of mechanistic robots, but the Body of Christ, a living breathing organism.

 

Another way of looking at it is to consider the difference cutting flowers and growing them in the garden. To be sure, cut flowers are beautiful, but such beauty is brief because sooner as opposed

to later they’ll whither and die and have to be thrown away. Yet, the beauty of flowers in the garden is lasting (at least more so than those that are cut and put into a vase). So, instead of seeing our work trying to gather up cut flowers, looking for the proverbial “quick fix”, let us look for ways to open up space for the bright blooms to grow among us?

 

Just as there are no quick fixes in life, so are there none in ministry. In the words of the great Christian poet Theilard de Chardin, it’s

about trusting “in the slow work of God”. 

 

May God grant us eyes to see, ears to hear what the Spirit is slowly, gradually making of us, even now.

 

Yours in Christ,

 

Pastor Peterson

* NOTE:  Clicking on this link will take you to another website.  Use your browser's "back" button to return.