Minister’s Letter — November 2007

On Sunday Dec. 2, our Committee on Ministry will sponsor the first of a series of congregational meetings with me over the coming months. Subsequent meetings are planned for February and April. The meetings will be held after each Sunday service. I am announcing our first meeting a month in advance to give everyone plenty of time to think about what you would like to share with me in regard to your view of our mission and our ministry. More information about these meetings will be forthcoming in the weeks ahead.

As already alluded to above, the purpose of the minister/congregational meetings will be to discern together how we can best serve and minister to each other and the larger community and fulfill our mission. I will want to hear your respective views about how we can improve our ministry, but the word “discern” is important here as it implies a collaborative effort to determine how we can all support one another as we seek to minister and fulfill our mission. In most meetings we like to declare our views and score our points. Fine. But I am looking forward to these meetings as being an opportunity for all of us to determine how we can proactively and cooperatively identify, expand and improve our efforts to serve the community and transform ourselves.

Let me define what I mean by mission, ministry and transformation. Mission is not a Fellowship program. Our mission is the meaning of our existence. We exist to transform and change ourselves and the human community in light of the principles by which we seek to live. Living by our faith and principles leads to depth, engagement with others that is real and sometimes healing, and service in the community. This is how we transform ourselves.

Our ministry is a shared ministry. A shared ministry is one in which together we seek to support one another by finding the avenues through which we can best serve the life of the Fellowship and the needs of community. I am interested in fostering a ministry culture. A ministry culture approach believes and expects that all people have been given gifts for ministry. Moreover it believes that ministry belongs to the congregation as a whole; it does not belong only to the ordained. Seen this way, our ministry is a partnership.

So I am looking forward to listening to you when we meet to share our vision of our ministry, not from a “if-only” “should-have” or “judgmental” point of view but from a view of hope, appreciation and abundance. I say “abundance” because I believe that all of us have gifts for ministry. Our task is to help one another discover, identify and exercise those gifts for the greater good. See you at the Fellowship. I love you all. Jim Covington