Elder Minutes For 21 November 2011

PRESENT: Doug Joseph, George Cope, Jim Norman, Jack Norman, Wray Petry, Dave Tinker

ABSENT: Frank St. John, George Joseph

Pastor Rick Moore, Pastor Jack Cain, Pastor Steve Sienkiewicz, and Debbie Carey joined the Elders to pray for the needs of the church.

Debbie Carey provided the administrator’s report:

> Offering was $27,455

> 684 people in the main service

> There was discussion concerning the current vacation schedules for employees

> There was discussion on the progress being made with regards to Calvary’s signage package and the City of Orlando.

>  Debbie shared information requested by David Tinker for the Extreme Sports ministry and the corresponding costs, which will be covered by the participants.  

Debbie exited the meeting at 4:55PM.

There was a motion made by Jack Norman and seconded by Doug Joseph to pass the 11/14/2011 minutes, which was unanimously approved by the remainder of the Elders.

Pastor Cope shared with the Elders some of the vision for the coming year and ministry changes in the near future.

The Finance Council joined the Elder’s meeting.  

Pastor Cope began by sharing from God’s Word and praying.

                Psalms 127: “Unless the Lord builds a house, he labors in vain”

>  We seek the spiritual birthing of children in our Body. It is the Lord that increases the house, not us. It is our responsibility to be diligent and discerning.

Pastor shared some of his history over the six year period of his tenure here at Calvary.

Several questions discussed included: Who is Calvary and what do we want Calvary to become?

What does a New Testament Church look like?  The Book of Acts gives us the model for the New Testament church.

Pastor Cope shared some of the struggles and life-cycles that Calvary has experienced.  Calvary’s challenge is trying to find the new ‘life cycle’ that will infuse life into the church.  Leaders have been baffled to come up with the solution for this puzzle.   Pastor acknowledged that this is the problem of any leader in the position of authority he has assumed.

It was recognized that some of the changes in the church have been perceived as alienation to some of the older members of the congregation.

Four necessary areas that we need to focus on to bring health back to Calvary are
    1)       Staff Health

              a.       Life Group for pastors

              b.       Staff development, enhanced communication

          2)       Body Health

              a.       Focused teaching

              b.       Life Groups

              c.        Define and expand on “Health” in all areas of life

          3)       New Converts

              a.       Discipleship groups for building and growing mature Christians

              b.       John Krall is developing a plan for taking new believers from the altar, to mentoring/discipleship, to Life Groups

              c.        Evangelism/new outreach ministry

          4)       Worship

              a.       Testimonies are part of worship and we need to hear more personal stories

Pastor Cope mentioned that out of the 168 hours in each week, the church has only 4 to 6 hours to affect people’s lives.

Dave Tinker had a vision which he shared with the Elders: We need to unify, not in building a single service, but rather in focusing on individuals and the heart. Unity is a heart condition where everyone is working together to meet the needs of the body/community.

Jack Norman shared what the Lord had given him concerning moving the people to the ‘Promised Land’

Promised Land

(Fighting Battles) – A Victorious Christian Life

The Jordon - The Holy Spirit

Wilderness – Spiritual Growth - (Dying to self)

Red Sea - (Salvation)

[Egypt / Slavery] - (Pre Christian)

A discussion was held between members of the FC and Elders regarding the following:

>         Communication - How to “close the gap” between the pastors and the congregation and be more effective in communicating with the congregation.

>       Vision - We do not need consensus building because we should be in unity through Jesus Christ. Rather, we need a solid resounding vision which will, in turn, produce passion.  Jim Tharp recommended Andy Stanley’s book entitled “Visioneering: God’s Blueprint for Developing and Maintaining Vision.”

The Finance Council and Elders prayed together and the Council exited at 7:55PM

The Elders discussed the points raised in the meeting and committed to praying especially about ‘vision’.

With no further items, the meeting was adjourned at approximately 8:15PM.