A United Methodist Pastor's Theological Reflections

"But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory (nikos) through our Lord Jesus Christ." - I Corinthians 15:57


Showing posts with label Staff. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Staff. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Church Staff Birthday Fun in Bremen, Ohio

Our staff celebrated our spring birthdays today at the Liberty Bell restaurant in Bremen, Ohio. Our spring birthdays are Joe Palmer, Deb Silvia, Jill Warner, Peg Parker, Clarence McCoy, and John Wesley.

From left to right: Sandra Yerian, Joe Palmer, Deb Silvia, Dan Kemp, John Coen, Jill Warner, Lisa Schenk, Peg Parker, Robert McDowell, & Clarence McCoy. (John Wesley is not pictured but we always include the 18th century founder of our denomination because his birthday is coming up in June.)

We also honored Sandra Yerian who recently went off our staff as our Youth Director.


Before leaving Bremen, we had a little fun with their beautiful town mural!


Monday, May 6, 2013

First UMC Staff Retreat - Being a Relay Team for Christ & the Church


[Picture of our staff team: Pastor Cheryl is holding the relay race baton because we discoverd that she is our fastest runner! From left to right: Pastor Robert, John Coen, Deb Silvia, Sandra Yerian, Pastor Cheryl, Pam George, Peg Parker, Sandy Roberts, & Clarence McCoy.]

Our staff held a planning retreat today at our Crossroads facility. Our focus was on being a great relay team for Christ and the church. A good relay team knows the importance of practice, holding on to the baton, placing your runners in the best position, improving track speed, and handing off the baton smoothly within the exchange zone.

Carrying the relay team theme to church leadership, we thought about how we also need to be disciplined and strategic in our church's ministries. We said how our relay team consists of the staff and the congregation and how the baton is the good news of Jesus Christ that needs to be shared with the people in our church and community.

We spent the first part of our morning discussing the book by church consultant, Bill Easum, Staffing for Effective Churches. Rev. Jim Waugh from our Capitol Area South District office spent the 2nd half of the morning showing us demographic information that can help our church be more effective in reaching out to our community.

After a wonderful lunch provided to us by our Staff/Parish Relations Committee, we brainstormed ways for our church to improve in helping people to grow in their relationship with Jesus Christ. During the day, our staff had fun participating in two relay races. We also shared in worship together.

We left our retreat with a renewed commitment to help our church run the race that God has given us.

Friday, October 26, 2012

Thank You Staff/Parish Relations Committee!

Our Staff/Parish Relations Committee provided a staff appreciation lunch for us this week.  We are blessed.

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Merry Christmas from the Staff of First UMC!


Our staff team extends a Merry Christmas to the everyone and especially to the great people of First United Methodist Church in Lancaster, Ohio. This is a picture from our Christmas staff lunch today in which we enjoyed a great meal and exchanged gifts.

I ended up receiving an inedible fruitcake, some great fudge, a tiny elf, a snow-maker, and a Christmas DVD.  Lots of fun!

May the peace of Jesus Christ be with you all as we prepare to celebrate the joyous season of Christmas!

Back Row: Robert McDowell, John Coen, Clarence McCoy, Jill Warner, Peg Parker, & Tim Warner
Middle Row: Hank Uther, Deb Silvia, Pam George, Sandra Yerian, & Sandy Roberts
Front Row Center: Cheryl Foulk
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Monday, October 24, 2011

Thank You, Martha Pool!


Here is my poem I shared at our Martha Pool Party staff lunch today.  To help understand the poem, Martha is known for her many sneezes, a time when she accidentally locked herself in her bathroom and the staff was very concerned, how she likes to quickly walk from room to room in the church, and how plants that don't have a home somehow make it into her office.  The names that appear in the poem are staff members. 

Martha is leaving our staff after twelve and a half years to take a full time position at the ADAMH Board here in Lancaster.  Some of her noticable responsibilities have included preparing our Sunday bulletin and monthly newsletter.  Her last day of work with us is Tuesday, October 25.


A Martha "Office Pool"
By Robert Vincent McDowell

I know we work in a Methodist Church, I’m no fool.  But let’s make our bets in an office pool.

How many sneezes does Martha have per day?  Cheryl says ten.  Pam says, 7.  I say, thir-tay.

Will she lock herself in a bathroom again?  Clarence says maybe. I say, It’s not if, but when.

What will she say when she answers the phone - that’s the test.  Peg says, “ADAHM Board” I say, First United Methodist.

How fast will she go since she just can’t keep still? Jill says superman fast.  I say, I agree with Jill.

Are we as fun as the ADAMH Board staff?  Deb says, let’s hope.  John says, nope.  I say, about half.

Will she agree to take all of the unwanted plants?  Hank and Sandra think so.  I say, not a chance.

And last but not least, who will most miss Martha?  I say it’s a tie.  But Sandy says, duh!
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Thursday, December 10, 2009

First UMC Staff Christmas Lunch/Party


Yesterday, was First UMC's staff Christmas lunch/party. We enjoyed a wonderful meal, exchanged presents, and had a surprise visit from Santa himself.

I wish we would have had our gathering today because of the beautiful white snow that is falling in Lancaster, Ohio.
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Thank you staff for the many ways you are helping and encouraging the church to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world!
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Thursday, September 17, 2009

Another September Staff Retreat Picture


Part of our staff group resting during a hike through the beautiful woods and rock formations of Camp Akita.
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Tuesday, September 15, 2009

September Staff Retreat - Inspiration & Renewal


The staff members of Lancaster First UMC participated in a two day overnight retreat at the georgeous (more about the spelling of this word later in this article) Camp Atika, about a twenty minute drive southeast of Lancaster, Ohio.

Nestled in the scenic hills and wooded area of nearby Hocking Hills, this location provided us with lots of inspiration and renewal as we gathered to renew our faith in Jesus Christ and plan ministry for the coming year.

Here are some of the highlights of our time together:
  • Our agenda included worship services, Holy Communion, singing, hiking, free time, eating, laughing, getting better acquainted, and board games.
  • We spent a lot of time sharing our personality profiles based on myers-briggs, enjoyed learning how we are created uniquely by God, and thought about how we might best function as a team based on our personality types and preferred work environments
  • Drawing from our Wesleyan and United Methodist heritage, we developed a staff covenant which will help us to function at a high level as a staff team.
  • We focused on our primary mission as a church which is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world and our core values which include 1) radical hospitality 2) passionate worship 3) intentional faith development 4) risk-taking mission 5) extravagant generosity.
  • Part of our bible study time was to read Acts 2:42-47 together which includes references to the core values and we discussed the six benchmarks to become an Acts 2 fruit bearing congregation. These benchmarks include 1) increase in membership 2) increase in worship attendance 3) baptisms 4) including new Christians into our church membership 5) seeing an increase of people involved in intentional disciple making small groups 6) paying 100% of our conference apportionments.
  • We spent some time thinking about how we might break the 80/20 barrier (20% of the people doing 80% of the ministries) and how we can increase our level of stewardship commitment within the church, especially in the context of our national economic downturn.
  • What would an overnight staff retreat be without a fun game of "Apples to Apples" and a two hour competitive round of "Trivial Pursuit?" My team lost, partly because I asked the question at one point, "Is the earth considered one of our planets?"
  • We conducted a SWOT analysis of our congregation (S - Strengths, W - Weaknesses, O - Opportunities, T - Threats) and listed our responses on a giant white board which led to a very helpful discussion. From this exercise we developed some key areas that we as a staff will work together to address in helping us in our mission of making disciples for the transformation of the world. These include 1) increasing the number of lay people involved in at least one ministry. 2) focusing on how we can continue to maximize the use of our beautiful Crossroads facility as we seek to live out our mission 3) find ways to help our church pay 100% of our conference apportionments 4) increase and expand the number of discipleship making small groups/classes.
  • Since Camp Akita has a beautiful lake, several of us enjoyed boat rides with one staff member (who shall remain nameless) capsizing his boat (did I use a male pronoun?)

OK, now the explanation for the word, "georgeous." I told the staff during the beginning of the retreat that I had misspelled the word, "gorgeous" during one of our Wednesday evening worship services and instead spelled it as "georgeous." So now, we have a new word to describe something as magnificent and wonderful. And that word is "georgeous."

So as you can see in our staff picture above, we had a georgeous retreat together these past few days! The staff would like to thank the congregation for giving us the gift of these two days which inspired and renewed us so that we can offer our very best in ministry.

We are excited about what God is going to do through us for the remainder of 2009 and into the new year.