The purpose of Up to Date is to give current information regarding events and developments at Greenleaf Friends Church and to tie those activities to intentional steps we are taking to create avenues for us to grow from a church of roughly 175 to a church of 350 to 400 persons.
Alpha – Last fall we hosted our first Alpha course at the church. From it a group has come together to oversee GFC testing Alpha as an evangelism/discipleship tool for the next year. Ron Mulkey has been key in bringing this together. The Alpha group will be fully up and going well before he leaves his position the end of April. Ron reports:
ALPHA
Practical Introduction to Christianity
UPDATE
An ‘ALPHA Task Force’ Team, meeting weekly, has been formed to shepherd next steps for ALPHA with the following goals:
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Advocates for ALPHA as an evangelistic and discipleship tool/Encouraging ongoing visibility of ALPHA before our congregation. And to explore expanding ALPHA home groups into other area churches.
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Recruit/train/run 4 or 5 home groups during the next 12 months
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Create ways for support to home groups (i.e. – childcare, help with meals, facilitator substitutes)
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Evaluation of ALPHA (after having multiple home groups completing the course):
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Effectiveness of engaging the unchurched and those burned out on church as an evangelism tool.
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Effectiveness for Discipleship for new followers of Jesus Christ and believers who’ve had ‘little to none’ Discipleship training.
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New believers, unchurched, burned out on church connecting to a local church.
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Replication – growing group of people open to hosting, helping, supporting new home groups.
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Does this work in our culture/community.
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The ‘ALPHA Task Force’ members: Brad Holton, Liza Warner, Joe Venneman, Barry and Pauline Andrews and Pastor Ron.
Becoming a Welcoming Church – Here are some ongoing results from our work January 24 congregational discussion of the book: Becoming a Welcoming Church.
Website – I was recently in a conversation with someone from another state who had visited our website. This person is quite knowledgeable about websites. She was very positive and complimented our format and the information provided.
Digital bulletin – You’ve noticed the sign giving access to our bulletin in digital format. It is one more way of creating accessibility. (It is okay for you chuckle and comment that the digitally clueless senior pastor had nothing to do with this. You are absolutely correct.)
Restrooms – Improvements in the restrooms are underway. They were recently repainted and new flooring will be installed soon. There is a new sign at the top of the doorway to the restroom entrance. Some parts of becoming more welcoming are very simple and inexpensive. This has been a great reminder just to pay attention.