I recently read a book titled “Worship Is a Verb”.  It is one of those books where the title really tells the message.  Worship is not a spectator event, it is an action word, something that we do.  I hope that some of the things we are doing this summer introduce the idea that worship takes many forms.  It is certainly not limited to music.  We have included some of the creeds, and done more unison scripture reading, hopefully it has enhanced our worship.  I really enjoy having the kids sing, and it is fun to get them involved in worship.  If you would like, you may certainly sing along with the kids.  I have also spoken the idea that giving is an act of worship. 

In the survey that we did two weeks ago (results posted by the office) 37 people reported that giving was an opportunity to express stewardship and 29 acknowledged that God is the owner of all our resources.  We have resumed passing the offering plate this summer to reinforce the idea that giving is an act of worship, acknowledging the value that we place on God. 

The decision of how to handle communion was very difficult.  It is definitely a time when we participate in worship.  Many indicated its importance in worship. Only one person preferred the dipping method while 27 preferred passing the elements through the rows.  My decision was to continue passing the elements on the first Sunday of the month, but to use the other method on some Sundays, but not all Sundays.  This week we will not have communion. 

There is some method in my madness.  I have the privilege of being interim pastor for a few months until a permanent pastor can be found.  It is my job to make the transition easier.  One of the ways that I can prepare the way is to make changes from what Pastor Dave did, to make it easier for the new pastor to make the changes he sees as necessary.  Thanks for your cooperation this summer, and please continue to pray for the next pastor and for a search team.  Prayer is the backbone of a successful future together.  

Our summer preaching is centered around worship.  The series is “Of God and Me”. The idea that I am following is from John Calvin, the famous 16^th century Swiss reformer, who said, “Nearly all wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists in two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves…which one precedes and brings forth the other is not easy to discern” (John Calvin, Institutes, 1.1.1).  As our image of God comes into sharper focus, we will be able to see ourselves better.  Last week we looked at Psalm 139, The God who knows me.  This week at Psalm 19, God reveals Himself.  Next week will be Isaiah 6, the Holy God.  These are some of the truly great passages of scripture.  Take some time to read them and think about them before Sunday. 

Reminder that after worship on Sunday members can pick up a ballot.  We will vote on taking $15,000 from our long term savings for parking lot maintenance. 

The search team continues to look at some excellent candidates to be our next pastor.  Please make prayer for this choice a top priority. 

Gym project:  We set an initial goal of $70,000 for the completion of the gym.  We have now received about $73,000. Thank you for your generous giving.  There were some major cost overruns in the project.  The largest was leveling the concrete floor.  The project is nearing completion with some major clean up yet to do.  You already approved taking $15,000 from our long term savings account for this project. We will also take some money from the rent paid to us by the preschool.  There will be some additional small items along the way, so we still don’t know the exact final cost, probably around $93,000.  Check out the gym.  It is a completely different room now. 

Parking Lot Repair:  It has been 5 years since we patched and sealed the parking lot.  We need to do that regularly to preserve the lot.  We are looking at major repair at the Dover St. entrance, filling cracks, sealing and striping the lot.  The cost will be about $15,000.  We would like your permission to take that from the long term savings account.  We would do it at the same time that we get the money for the gym.  We will give you a ballot on June 9.  If you have questions, please speak to me before that time. 

A New Preaching Series:  the next two months I will present a series on Worship called “Of God and Me.” The great church reformer John Calvin wrote “Nearly all wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists in two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves…which one precedes and brings forth the other is not easy to discern” (Institutes, 1.1.1).  When we truly worship God, we recognize and small and vulnerable we really are. John the Baptist said (about Jesus) “He must increase and I must decrease.”  That is where true worship of God takes us.  Let’s learn together this summer as we explore some of the great texts of the Bible.

“Change”, a beautiful or ugly word, depending on your point of view, and what is involved in that change.  Sunday is the last day for Pastor Dave Conrads and for Joey Gugliuzza.  We will miss them both, and hope to stay in touch with them as they continue to serve Genesis Church in Coralville. 

Next week I will assume the title Interim pastor.  I plan to use the next few months to explore some different options in our Sunday worship.  We are going to explore the nature and character of God and what it means to worship Him.  We will find that the reverence and awe of God will make us to feel small and insignificant.  We hope this will be a meaningful journey for all of us. 

On a much smaller scale, I need to change the day for our June Hymn Sing.  I have been asked by another of our sister churches to help them in a special meeting on June 2, and I don’t want to miss the Hymn sing, so we will change the Hymn sing to Saturday, June 1, at 5pm.  Sorry for the change, and hope that we can meet at this time.  See you there. 

Pastor Gail

This has been an incredible year for us at the River.  We have seen some growth in two ways: first, a number of new visitors, some who have stayed with us; second,  we are growing in the nursery.  Both are exciting. 

This year we committed to a complete renovation of the gym.  The gym project is nearing completion.  The baskets will be installed in a month or so.  This will open up many opportunities for our kids, and outreach to youth and our neighbors.  In addition to the $15,000 we approved to take from out Savings certificate we still need $5-7000 to complete the project.  Thanks to the many who have sacrificed for the success of this much needed project. 

Our food bank has reached the maximum capacity of our building and our giving.  Sarah Steele has become the director and is working to make it better.  We believe that the next step means forming a non-profit organization so we obtain better funding from outside sources and move into a larger facility.  We have decided to move in this direction by joining a non-profit church Christian group already working in our neighborhood.  Our plan is to move on June first to the Towncrest area, joining with several other churches to work together in service to the needy in our area.  We hope this leads to a better sharing of the Christian message, and an improved model for leading people out of poverty.  We hope that it leads to better funding, better staffing and better service.  Thanks for your continued participation in this ministry to the needy. 

For the past 6 years we have finished each year in the black.  As we head into the last quarter of the fiscal year our income is lagging behind our expenses.  With the added costs of the gym and the pastor search we have asked a lot of you this year.  Thanks for being so faithful. 

1. gym—we are working to level out the concrete. We are remodeling the bathrooms and hallwaysby the gym.  We are getting ready to build storage cabinets in the gym.  We are still working with the money that we have, and have not yet had to take any money from our savings account. 

2.  food bank—we are talking with the Christian Culture Community (Yes, it is a cumbersome name, so they call themselves IC Compassion, a much nicer name) about how we can work together for a single location in the Towncrest area to give out groceries, clothes, gas vouchers, etc. This move would be much more convenient for needy people, would allow us to get more resources from other churches, and would release two classrooms for our use.   We’ll keep you up to date as we continue to work out the details of this possible merger.  

3.  Pastor Search Team continues an aggressive schedule to find a new pastor starting this summer.  While we have no guarantees, we can report that we are reading a lot of resumes and listening to a lot of sermons.  Your prayers are a key factor in this search.  Keep praying for the Team and for the person that God is preparing.  

Another Week of Toys

The gym floor is progressing—but not yet done.  The floor was actually worse than we originally thought.  It will take longer and cost more.  Hopefully we can move stuff back into the gym by the end of the week.  We don’t have to store the old pine pews any more. Pastor Steve sent them to the auction and we made $200.  Next we will finish the lights and work on the walls. 

Stay after church Sunday for a hot dog roast and Family matters.  We will have reports on the gym, the search team and our finances.  See you at lunch time. 

A few weeks ago we voted 32-0 to allow our search team to spend up to $10,000 to find us a really good candidate for the position of Sr. Pastor.  We are getting along well in the search.  We are processing the first batch of potential pastors and have some very good possibilities.  You will get a more complete report at the family matters meeting on Feb 24. 

Last week we had you do a survey.  There were only 3 questions and some of you thought they were worded in a funny way.  Let me explain why.  We are working with our reginal association, the MIBC, to help us find and screen candidates.  As a part of the screening process we have to fill out an extensive online survey about our church and what we are looking for.  We answered a bunch of theological and demographic questions about our church and how we function.  There were a few questions that we could not answer without asking the congregation for their input.  So we lifted out those few questions for your direct response.  We were not able to change the substance of the questions because we have to enter the answers on a computer survey (we have to check specific boxes). 

You told us that about 68% of the congregation have graduated from college and almost 40% of those have some graduate work.  Another 20% have some college and 12% have graduated from high school. 

 Your priorities for our church were (in this order)

1.  Preach the Word;  2.  Worship God;  3. Make better disciples;  4. A tie between Save the Lost and Be a Family.    We know that prioritizing  these is difficult because they are all important and the categories overlap so much, but we can only use these categories because we have to put these in order in our online survey, and we didn’t think we could answer these questions without asking you directly. 

On the third question 65% prefer some form of blended worship with almost equal numbers preferring that the music be mostly either traditional (14%) or contemporary (12%).

Thanks for your input on these.  The questions may have seemed strange to you, but your answers moved us closer to the successful completion of our task. 

Several things are happening “behind the scenes.”  Here are some of them:

The Pastor Search team is starting to receive and review names of possible pastoral candidates.  Our goal is to sift through these candidates in the next two months, to narrow the list until we have a few very good candidates, then narrow the field to the one we believe can take us the next step forward as a church.  Part of the selection process is letting the candidates know who we are, so that they can also make a good decision.  We have designed a very brief congregational survey, with only three questions, to help identify who we are and what we want in our future.  We will pass those out at the end of the service on Sunday to anyone who considers The River their church home.  Your help will be greatly appreciated.  This process should only take 5 or 10 minutes.  Our Team will have a special meeting on Sunday evening with the representative from our Minneapolis district office. 

The gym project is moving along.  We are getting to some of the more difficult and expensive parts.  A team of concrete workers will come in on Monday to start leveling the floor.  We need a very level floor as a base for the final playing floor.  They will probably be working all week.  I need several volunteers on Sunday afternoon or evening to move stuff out of the gym.  (We can’t start too early, because there will be a baptism service by another local church at 12:30.)  let me know if you can help and what time might be good for you. 

In about 2 weeks (after worship on Feb. 24) we will have another family matters meeting.  These are times when the church family gets together to talk over our family business.  We will give some reports and let you ask as many questions as you would like.  This meeting will include lunch, and we have decided to make it a hot dog bbq.  We provide the dogs and drinks, we’ll make the rest potluck.  Keep it on your calendar.   

Members, please return to your seats quickly after church Sunday.  There will be a short business meeting.  Two items will be presented.  There will be a vote to authorize the church leadership team to draw funds from out savings account if it becomes necessary.  We will continue to use the money we already have, and the additional that comes in while we prepare the room for the final phase, the installation of the flooring.  Before we get to that final phase we need to level the floor and cover the walls.  We have the funds to complete this next phase. 

There will also be a vote to authorize the search team to spend up to $10,000 in their search for a new sr. pastor.  This would include travel expenses for interview the top candidates, and a weekend visit for the top candidate.  

There will be a short business meeting after worship next Sunday am.  We will consider the proposal from the leadership to authorize spending some money from our savings account to finish the gym.  We will also consider the budget submitted by the Search Team.  This budget will be added to the annual church budget and approval will authorize that Team to spend money in the process of selecting our next pastor.  There will be a copy of the proposed Search Team budget in the bulletin on Sunday.  They believe that the process could cost up to $10,000. 

We had excellent income during the months of September and December.  Other months we have not received enough to cover the month’s expenses.  For the fiscal year beginning August 1 our income has exceeded out expenses by $9275.  Our income for that 5 month period has been about $5500 over our budget.  We obviously need this good income to continue through the year to finish in the black.  

The leader ship has discussed how we can finance the rest of the gym renovation.  We have received about $57,500.  That is about $12,500 short of our goal.  We have done some work, but the most difficult and expensive parts still remain.  In November we had a family matters meeting where we presented the possibility of taking money from our savings account to complete the project.  That savings account is in a 5 year certificate at the church growth fund of Converge Northwest, earning 4% interest.  The certificate matures 3/1/14. 

It is the opinion of the leadership team that we do not want to use this money if we do not have to.  (We do see some other large projects on the horizon for which it might be needed, e.g.,  roof and parking lot maintenance/repair).   Our solution:  We will ask the members to authorize us to withdraw funds up to a specific amount but not make the withdrawal unless it is absolutely necessary.  This would enable us to complete the work, and allow us to call upon these resources only when it becomes absolutely necessary or for some reason it might be an emergency.  We will ask for permission to use enough to ensure completion of the project (possibly $15,000 or $20,000), again hoping that it will not all be needed. 

We will ask the members to vote on this use of funds at the end of the service on January 20. If you have any questions please talk with me or with Mark Jessop.  We want to keep the meeting as short as possible, and we want you to be as informed as possible.  We accomplish these two goals by presenting the info ahead of time at a family matters meeting, by using this means of communication and by being available for individual conversation.  Thanks for your cooperation and support.   

Your search team has started meeting, to get organized and decide on the best way to proceed.  We have spoken with the representative from our association in Minnesota.  Sunday morning the Team will be introduced with a time of prayer for them after the Worship.

After we Baptize 3 people on Sunday AM, the Vineyard Church from Coralville will come at 3pm to “reuse” our water.  We are glad to offer the use of our facility to other churches.  We recognize that churches are not in competition, but working together to bring people into God’s Kingdom. 

Have you remembered to include the less fortunate in your Christmas plans?  Our food bank is always in need of canned meats, Tuna, and toilet paper.  Last month we served 125 different families.  This month we are also offering families a small toy as a gift for their small children.  We always need money.  put food or toy items in the box in the foyer.  Put Money gift in the offering box.  Mark on the envelope how much is for the food bank. 

It been a good season, and we are moving ahead.  Here are a few examples:

1.  Attendance has been growing this fall, up to about 125, with several weeks around 140 and last week at 157.

2.  We had concrete poured in the gym last week.  One corner of the room was very bad.  This was necessary before we can take the next step of laying the playing floor.  Progress is slow, but it is progress.  We still need about $18,000 to complete the project.

3.  Sunday Evening we are going to meet our new Pastor Search Team.  The 6pm meeting will follow a time of Christmas Carols.  We will have a good time of prayer for the search team, and for the pastor they will help us to find.  This seems to be a very good team, and we look forward to the task ahead. 

4.  Our food band has asked they we remember the less fortunate in our holiday season.  We are collecting canned meats, soups, and vegetables in the box in the foyer.  We are also asking that you include a gift for a young child, so we can help our needy families to a better Christmas. 

The Elders and the Leadership team are working on the criteria for a new Sr. Pastor, and appointing a Search Team.  We will also work with our association, the MIBC, to help us find the right person.  We hope to have the Search Team in place by the first of December.  It is important to our Leadership that the decision of a new Sr. Pastor be bathed in much prayer. so we are calling the church together for a time of prayer for our new search team, for their process and their results.  Here is the schedule we have come up with.  On Sunday, December 2, at 6pm we will introduce the Search Team and then spend time praying for them and their work.  This meeting will follow after the monthly hymn sing.  So the schedule for Dec. 2 will be

    5:00-5:45 pm Hymn Sing (We will be singing Christmas Carols)

     5:45-6:00 pm Cocoa and Cookies

    6:00-6:45 pm introduce Search Team and prayer. 

But don’t wait until then, start praying now especially for those people who will complete the Search Team and for the Leadership team as they work on the pastor/Church profile and the Job description.  Prayer is the key to this process. 

Gail