oregon synod leadership & ministry plan 2013. leading with our values data from religious...

Oregon Synod Leadership & Ministry Plan

2013

Leading with our Values

• Data from religious institutions, including the ELCA, shows rapid declines in religious attendance and financial support. These trends are accompanied by the "greying" of congregations. The Oregon Synod, situated as it is in the "None Zone," is certainly not exempt from such trends. Our region is, in fact, something of a poster child for a new cultural articulation of "spiritual but not religious."

• The question before us is whether these trends prophesy death, or herald a new, spiritual, awakening.


The ministry plan outlined here makes several conscious choices:

•We believe that the Spirit is leading both our church, and our culture, in a wholesome direction. Where the Spirit leads we will follow.•We believe that death is not defeat and chaos is opportunity. Death leads to new life and chaos encourages reorganization.•We observe that the dynamics of change require new forms of leadership skills and practices.•We recognize that old patterns of behavior are both a gift and an impediment.•We choose to risk radical reorganization and new behaviors in the midst of uncertainly, trusting the Grace of God to lead us.•We choose to invest in new tools, techniques, and experiments in faith. Our children and grandchildren await a Church that speaks to their realities.

Mission: A Working Definition

The Crowd icon symbolizes the lived ministry of Oregon Synod congregations and allied institutions. Synod Leadership is tasked with Supporting Vibrant Communities of Faith for the sake of the Gospel. This remains our primary focus.

The LIFT task force recommends that:That congregations and synods in partnership develop

a mission plan that will strengthen the congregation.

Shared Ministry

The Triangle icon symbolizes a network of arenas in which Synod Leadership is called to work with individual congregations and ministries. Honest, Courageous Engagement in such arenas is essential, and a gift to all.

The Foundation

The Foundation icon symbolizes the new work to be undertaken for effective support of vibrant communities of faith. Five building blocks are highlighted. Each provides opportunities for new learning, action, and growth.

Building BlocksMutual Discernment• Mutual Discernment is about patterns of

work undertaken by Synod Leadership with congregations and individual ministries.

• Local faith communities face challenges of sustainability, relevance, and access in the midst of changing cultural realities.

• Synod staff has found that whether they are working with congregations in call processes, in response to crises, around mission planning, or staffing and governance, there is a startling similarity in the work to be done.

• It is time to articulate a central, adaptive process for the similar work being done in traditionally separate venues.

Convening Leadership• Convening Leadership is vital to developing

and deploying new patterns of engagement. • Interim pastors, ethnic specific leaders,

Cluster Deans, and Rostered leaders are already convened on a quarterly or annual basis.

• Convening congregational presidents, advocacy groups, ecumenical partners, youth, new ministry leaders, and similar networks offers great benefits.

• Such groups share challenges and opportunities, lift up new leaders, identify resources, provide feedback on common work, and evidence the Spirit's presence with us through prayer and creative imagining.

Building BlocksCommunication Strategies• New Communication Strategies are called

for both by the nature of the new work, and the radically transformed communication patterns of our culture.

• Face to face conversation, personal relationship building, phone calls, the passing of paper, and committee work continues to be vital for effective ministry.

• Email, websites, listserves, cyber drop boxes, and shared documents allow for ongoing, a-synchronous work. However, such tools create redundancies and information silos.

• Social networking, such as Twitter and Facebook, can aggravate the multiplicity of information silos. Social networking also provides opportunities for communi-cation and collaboration in ways never before possible.

• An investment in the tools and ways we communicate to support common work is essential.

Building BlocksCapacity Building• Capacity Building refers to the work of

equipping congregations and ministries to capitalize on the opportunities before them.

• Capacity building is developing a congregation's (or the synod’s) depth of relationships, leadership, financial resources and understanding so that they can maneuver effectively in the current culture.

• Each of the prior three building blocks is about capacity building. Honest conversations about financial stability, institutional sustainability, grant writing, and shared facility uses are also about capacity building.

• When local challenges and opportunities call for individualized, adaptive solutions and strategies, the work of the synod must shift from resourcing to capacity building and networking. Solutions emerge from their context. They cannot be imposed from other venues.

Building BlocksIncubating New Ministries• Incubating New Ministries is exciting and

rewarding work. When looking for a common thread between thriving congregations, this seems to be it.

• Ministries that are incubating creative, new approaches to service and proclamation display an infectious spirit. The result is not always "success" in a tangible sense. Rather, what is gained is learning, trust, comfort with risk, witness, willingness, time limited but important ministries, and sometimes ideas that endure.

• Meaningful experiments of this type emerge from collaboration, new partnerships, investments in relationship building, creative financing, public, transparent processes, accountability partners, prayer, courage, and joy.

• Incubating new ministries is dependent upon each of the building blocks listed here; that is, mutual discernment, convening leaders, strong communication networks, and deepening capacity.

• Effective incubation is birthed out of cooperative work between congregations, Synod Leadership and our denominational depth.

Strategic Engagement

The Strategic Engagement icon symbolizes the need to be pro-active, rather than re-active, as Synod Leaders. Institutional instincts need to be carefully evaluated. "One size fits all" solutions are not effective in dynamic, effervescent, environments.

Strategic

New Work - ExamplesMutual Discernment• Susan, Michael & Glenn have discerned

that they are now doing essentially the same work with congregations at different points in their life cycle – interim ministry vs. mission planning or stewardship.

• They see a need to develop one, new process built around:– Gathering Data– Assessing Data– Forming a plan– Supporting follow through

• Building and implementing such a plan is new work. It requires greater integration of individual work and support people to deal with various steps.

Convening Leadership• Glenn, Believe & Travis have begun to

convene leaders around the Macedonia Grant process and Money, Leaders and Congregations workshops.

• This work asks new questions around capacity building in new ways.

• These workshops are “member led” rather than taught by “experts.”

• This work shares challenges and opportunities, lift up new leaders, identifies resources, and re-frames shared concerns.

New Work - ExamplesCommunication Strategy• Ryan, Edwin & Jan are already working to

integrate data bases, email lists and processes with a new web presence and Soul Café.

• Staff is reorganizing the ways and frequency with which we consult and collaborate with each other.

• Through convening leadership and focusing congregational processes we anticipate greater face to face engagement through the synod between more people.

• Building and implementing such a plan is new work. It requires greater integration of individual work and support people to deal with various steps.

Capacity Building• Jan has worked with two congregations

looking at systemic staff re-orientations in light of their own sense of “new work” on the congregational level.

• In addition she does a significant amount or processing with congregational leadership on the phone. This is all new work she brings with her own unique skill set and job description.

• As synod staff builds our own, internal capacity we are increasingly working with both synod and congregational leaders to do the same. When everybody engages the work and leaders apply their deepest skills – change happens.


• New work requires new measurements to fuel us on as a learning institution.

• Worship numbers and budget figures are not sufficient information to gauge institutional capacity or progress.

• New metrics for tracking our work and adapting our strategies are required.

Strategic


New metrics might include:•Numbers of congregations working intentionally with other congregations or institutions;•Numbers of congregations involved in convened events offered through our new work plan;•Numbers of leaders displaying follow through with plans and local strategies;•Numbers of leaders involved in focused learning of new skills;•Gleaned insights and feedback from evaluations and “soft” feedback sources being put to use.

Strategic

Summary

• This new work has already begun. • Synod staff is collaborating to create new procedures for interim ministry

engagement. • An ELCA Macedonia Grant has been secured to allow for new

conversations around mission funding and congregational sustainability. This work is being taken out to congregations.

• The Believe Team has been a convening organization, and the primary locus of creative imagining.

• Soul Café, a new communication and collaboration technology, has been developed to allow for work never before possible in the same way.

• The Building Blocks are already taking shape.

Summary

• New ministries such as the Leaven Project, Wilderness Way, New Rivers, EcoFaith and Third Space show hope and creativity in local contexts.

• A lay school of theology is under develop- ment to train Synod Authorized Ministers for support for dwindling congregations.

• For the first time, consultation for congregations undergoing staff realignments is being made available.

• What is needed now is a conscious commitment by Synod Leaders, and the synod as a whole, to this new ministry strategy and approach.

End Note

The new work described here requires not only expertise, cooperation, and leadership support, but a financial investment as well. The Oregon Synod Finance Committee has develop a budget proposal appropriate to the needs and possibilities outlined in this document.

Investing proactively in the future is the right thing to do at this junction of our Oregon Synod ministry. Thank you for your prayers, energy, understanding, and expectation as we move forward together.