For those of you that aren’t Wesley members but figure while you are here, you might as well read on, I think I’ve mentioned before that right now, we are discussing creating a new service at the Wesley Foundation building out at Arkansas Tech. The conference is very interested in this idea, thinking that there are a number of unchurched in a growing Russellville, including some that have gone through the Wesley Foundation program while they were college students and never really got into a church after graduation. The WF program is considered one of the best in the nation and apparently (as a non-Tech graduate I can’t speak from experience) is something that is so great, people don’t really want to leave and can’t acclimate to a “regular” church experience.
The director of WF has been there forever. I went to elementary school with his daughter, so it’s longer than I’d like to think about. Supposedly he has a list of people that were active in WF but aren’t attending church right now. This list is going to be the basis of our contacts to try to get people to start this new service.
As I said, the conference is behind this idea. So much so that they will give us a grant for 3-4 years to pay all the expenses of the second service. It won’t cost us anything until it’s a self-sufficient (or at least close to it) endeavor.
All well and good, right? A chance to reach out with no financial outlay? A minimal risk leap of faith? What’s the problem?
The problem is that the service over there at WF, if we are to get that grant money, must be at 11:00 on Sunday mornings. That’s when “the fish are biting”, as it were, and those that aren’t going regularly to church are more likely to go.
This has been more of a hurdle than I really expected. I knew some would be worked up about it—some are worked up about anything—but I didn’t think many people would be that inconvenienced by a shift upward of about an hour to the worship service.
Right now we are at 9:15 for Sunday School and 10:30 for worship. Most likely, the new schedule would be 9:30 worship at the current locale, 10:45 Sunday School also at Wesley, and an 11:00 service at WF. 9:30 would be very traditional, 11:00 more “contemporary”, with bands, etc.
Typically, this would be the kind of thing that you’d expect me to be on the complaining side about. Change is not usually my friend. I’m as conservative as they come and I’ve argued against numerous changes in the last few years. Some of those things have worked out (though I was arguing more about clearing out the old stuff instead of incorporating the new), some like the name change didn’t happen.
Frankly, I’m a bit surprised by how easily and readily I jumped on this bandwagon. Ever since the first mention of this, I’ve been on board. It seems to me like the easiest and best way we can make an impact for Christ in this city.
If we had to put out money for it, I’d be against it. Wesley’s financial position, while not critical, is not as strong as it has been in the recent past. Everyone is feeling the economic pinch, so I don’t think that’s any big news. Right now, laying out a lot of money to back a gamble wouldn’t be the best idea.
If we didn’t have a list of contacts, I’d be a little more leery of the idea. If we had to start from scratch, I’d be more pessimistic about its chances for succeeding.
I’m rambling a bit, so let me put my pro-change points in bullet-point style:
- It can grow Wesley. The powers that be (our district superintendent, the WF director, and our pastor) think that we could have 100-200 people very soon after startup. I’m not so sure about that, but I do think we’d be able to have a net growth of 10 families by the end of the year, if this information we have is correct.
- It can make Wesley younger. Obviously, the demographic that’s being targeted is the late 20s to early 40s group, people starting families or with young children in the home. That’s the demographic everyone targets, right? Wesley has more younger people involved than it did in the past, but it still has a fairly gray population. It’s an active population, but at some time you have to lay a foundation for your future. I think this is that time.
- It’s likely to happen anyway. As I said, the conference is very keen on this idea. If we reject it out of hand, they are going to take it to the other Methodist church in town or just start a new church out there. If that happens, that young foundation we want to reach will become that much harder for us to attract. Which means that the future of Wesley might not be as bright as we’d want it to be.
- It’ll help with preacher selection. (For you non-Methodists, we don’t hire our own preachers, they are appointed by the conference and moved on a fairly regular basis. If you’ve got questions, let me know and we’ll talk.) I think that the conference has been a bit heavy-handed in the way that they’ve presented this aspect, but it boils down to this. If Wesley becomes a charge with two services, one that needs an energetic preacher with specific skills, they are going to find people with those skills. Which should help us get preachers that are more interesting, more exciting, and probably on the younger side. We see what kind of revitalization we’ve had over the last few years with Blake. If we turn down this, we become a regular charge that doesn’t need any special skills, so they can fill this church with anyone and, at least on paper, be doing their job. We know how well that’s worked in the past…..
- It doesn’t cost any financial outlay. I hesitate to say that it won’t cost anything, due to some of the people that have come out against it. I don’t know for sure, but I’d guess they are larger contributors than some others and, if they leave the church, we may have less coming in than we had budgeted. Some of that hopefully would be made up with donors at the new service, but maybe not the whole amount.
- It’s not final. This vote that we are taking next week is whether or not we want to do the research and detail work on this idea. If we get into that work and find out that not enough people on this list can commit to coming, we won’t do it. There will be another vote at a later time to fully commit ourselves to the process. Right now, we just have to show that we have an interest in doing this and finding out more.
Those are the points that, in my mind, point toward us taking the next step. When weighed against a time change, it really seems to me that the benefits outweigh any drawbacks.
I haven’t heard many other points against this proposal other than “I want to be here at 11.” I missed the meeting after church yesterday that turned into a more contentious discussion than I would have expected. Maybe I missed some strong points on the other side in that one, though that wasn’t what people were talking about afterwards. If they were there, they got lost in the ugliness and apparently un-Christian attitude some people brought into the discussion. That’s what I hear, at least—as I said, I wasn’t there. Hopefully that’s been exaggerated to some degree. I doubt that it was, however.
Don’t get me wrong, there are some wonderful people on the other side of this issue and I’m sure they feel their side is right just like I think mine is. I hope that if it goes through, they’ll stay at Wesley and help it through this transition.
Granted, a large part of this transition is not a huge deal for me, which is probably another reason I’m for it. I’m there at 9:15 anyway for Sunday School and staying until 11:30. A change would only mean I’d do worship first, which of course isn’t a big deal. In fact, I’m hoping it’d revitalize our Sunday School class, which was decimated when the small group concept went around. If you are coming to the 9:30, you might stick around for class at 10:45. (All you former Koinonians, take note of this!)
There are a lot of details to work out still, I realize that. But I think we owe it to those not going to church to make the effort. As for time changes, it’s like being the host at a party. You make sacrifices to help out others. Since we’re the “host”, it’s just good manners (if nothing else) to offer to move our time for the benefit of a new group of people.
I’ve been at Wesley right at 32 years (which bothers me, because I should not be able to say that I’ve done ANYTHING for 30 years) and seen a lot of ups and downs, twists and turns in its history. I feel like this is one of those pivotal moments that will define the church for a long time to come. I just hope it defines it for the positive.
No comments:
Post a Comment