Notes from Pastor Tony
But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, 25 that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. 26 If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. (1 Corinthians 12:24-25)
Last Sunday we had an amazing Annual meeting. That is an adjective that doesn’t always seem to match with the subject of an annual meeting. At the same time, it was a difficult meeting because of the issues we needed to address, especially church finances. First of all it is important for you to know that there was standing room only… the room was completely packed! Second of all there was lots of conversation and dialogue with the leaders and the congregational members present. No, not many people stood up to volunteer for positions that need to be filled, such as a church treasurer, but there was great conversation. However, we did get volunteers to attend the Grand Canyon Synod Assembly which will be held in Las Vegas this year. Sig and Toby Smitt will be attending the synod assembly along with me.
Now, there was the normal reporting about the Academy which is doing well. They did want us to know they have increased the tuition for the new school year 15%. They also have a few new events this year that will include interaction with the church congregation. Not only are we trying to integrate our ministries with the Academy, such and First Communion Classes and New Member courses, but seasonal activities such as the Easter breakfast and Easter Egg Hunt. Hopefully we will hold these events on a Sunday to coordinate with our worship schedule. It is our intention this year to grow the relationship we have between the Academy and the congregation… wouldn’t it be great if we have more parents from the Academy participate in church events? Wouldn’t it be great to see our families of the Academy participate in church events?
In my report to the congregation, I pointed out that as we evaluate the financial situation for church we want to take a proactive approach to our reality rather than a reactive approach. Being reactive can have negative responses and not be beneficial in any way. A proactive suggests we understand the situation and we are willing to improve it through any means possible. As We are One Body in Christ where every member matters, we are Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church and Academy and we are responsible to and for each other… we are accountable to each other and should not be for blame to where our financial reality stands.
It was reported that we once again finished the year in a budget deficit of $49,293. In fact, this is about the fifth year in a row that we congregation has finished in the red… basically using our limited savings to balance our spending budget. Our reality… we have out spent our reserves and savings. We are now living with a week to week checking and savings account balance. We have about $54,000 in our savings account but it is basically accounting for the designated funds in which we really should not use for any general fund expense. The Synod office and Bishop has been notified that we are in a very serious financial situation and need prayers and possibly guidance in the near future.
Our Financial Officer, Justin Templin, provided a figure to help us visualize one method to help us balance our year’s planned budget deficit. Basically if every giving unit ( NOT member) would gift $10 more per week ($520 yearly) we would balance our yearly budget. However, we are well aware that many people in our congregation live within a fixed income budget and are already giving to the church congregation a top level commitment. Still we know there are others who might be in a financial situation where they might be able to set a higher level of financial commitment as to where they are currently committed.
The Council and the Stewardship Team will be working in the near future to ask the whole congregation to re-evaluate their commitment to the church this year to see if we have the capacity to meet our budget deficit this year by increasing our giving NOW. If we find we cannot do this and the findings are simply not in the reach of our membership we will then have to look at our budget and see what ministries we can finance and what ministries we simply cannot afford to be doing any longer. The goal would be to propose a new operating budget to the congregation that is balanced.
At the end of the meeting someone brought up the conversation regarding our worship attendance and the idea of going to one service time. It ended up being quite the conversation with the majority of people present stating they would support the idea od going to one service time to accommodate everyone to come into worship as one church family. We decided to take a vote and there were a few who opposed the idea, but the super majority voted in favor of a change in our services to one service time. It was decided that Council would this into discussion and have an official vote on the matter this week. So, this past week that discussion took place, and it was voted that as of March 2nd we will move to ONE WORSHIP SERVIVE beginning at 9:00am.
The congregational meeting ended with quite the excitement and one member even stood up and loudly announced, “Come on people… we can do this!” What a wonderful way to end a congregational meeting!
As your interim Pastor I am well pleased with this congregation that is willing to do the hard work it will take to get the ministries of this church body healthy with a good operating budget and worshipping together as one. Congratulations people! Job well done! AMEN!