Dear Friends,
Happy New Year! I want to thank you all for your faithfulness to our church during this past year. We have been blessed by each of your efforts. The year 2018 holds vast potential for Broadway Baptist to continue to be a place where people are led to live out their Christian faith through worship, fellowship, and service. I believe that sharing of information about what is happening in our church is vital for unity and harmony. I share these messages with you to keep you up-to-date on what is happening in our church, and to give you an opportunity to ask me for clarification or additional information.
Your Deacon body continues to meet the second Monday of every month. In addition to the general tasks that fall within the purview of the Deacon body, we also take very seriously our role as servants in God's Kingdom. We are divided into five ministry groups. You may have noticed the weekly "deacon on call" for new members and for hospital visits listed in the Worship Folder. The Deacons serving on the hospital visitation group are Robert Dixon (chair), Ken Cox, Ellen Waddle, Ron Newcomer, and Tom Burress. Our new member Deacon group includes Teri Veal (chair), Shelly Jones, Katherine Devins and Steve Naiser.
Additionally, we have Deacon groups that serve to reach out to our homebound members, and those who are in transitional care after a recent illness or hospital visit. The Deacons serving on the transitional health care group are Janet Hymer (chair), Lilly Davis, Katie Williams, Bob Hook, and Bill Stevens. Deacons in the homebound visitation group are Barbara Taylor (chair), Claudia Wells, Audy Sisk, Lou Ann Twyman, Debby Griffin, Reba Cobb, and Curtis Barman. We also have a building oversight group that includes Mark Riddle (chair), Connie Rogers, and Stephen Lin. Our goal with all these groups is congregational care - sharing our concerns and working to keep each other updated on changes that affect the life and health of our congregation.
Our last Deacon meeting celebrated the retirement of our debt and gave thanks for the generosity of our members who very quietly contributed $84,000. The fiscal year 2017 will close with Broadway in the black. My thanks to the Finance Committee who saw the trend of income and expenses and recommended the budget cuts to keep us in the black. It was a wise recommendation to all of us.
We approved a request to the Bylaw Committee to begin a review of the Bylaws, Handbook of Organization, and Operations Policy to align these documents with current/best practices. There are several discrepancies and inconsistencies which were noted and which the committee will be reviewing. Our goal is to have those proposed revisions completed for presentation for congregational review at our May business meeting, and then formally approved at our August business meeting. The Deacons also approved a request for the Audit committee to conduct an audit for 2017 and to bring any noted concerns to the Deacon body by the May meeting. We agreed that the deacons and personnel committee would begin formal evaluations of all staff and ministers for the year 2018. We have asked Susan Reed to accept an additional short term assignment (which will occur outside her regular ministerial responsibilities) to revise/update the Personnel Policy Handbook. Susan began this process in 2014 as part of her graduate work, but it has not been brought before the church for approval. She will be compensated for this work by the generosity of one of our members who has made funds available for this purpose.
Lastly, we discussed the steps that have been taken to address the elimination of the position for Congregational Care and the tasks that fell under that umbrella. The obvious need for a strong Volunteer Coordinator to organize and recruit volunteers to handle those tasks is apparent. There are many moving parts and some tasks occur frequently and some infrequently. We are blessed that Mary Lucy Hook has accepted this challenge and very soon, I'm sure, will be making you an offer to accept an opportunity to serve your congregation in some unique way.
The Ad Hoc Committee, after the approval of Phase I in our staffing budget alignment, continues to work through Phase II, which addresses aligning responsibilities for the ministers and staff which are critical to the needs of our programs and our congregation during the transition, and then, later recommendations for the optimal staffing structure for our future and within our 2018 budget.
We were blessed on Wednesday, January 10, with a very spiritual and beautiful Deacon Ordination service. Please keep those Deacons who have accepted the call to serve on your Deacon body in your prayers. Audy Sisk and Bill Stevens were ordained; Curtis Barman, Tom Burress, Reba Cobb, Ellen Waddle, Claudia Wells, and Teri Veal were installed.
We are a church on the move, embracing all the changes and challenges that are before us. I pray that we will continue to be patient and loving with one another and that, to quote Dave Watkins, who shared a coach's catch-phrase at the Deacon Ordination, we all follow this admonition: "Head Up, Head In, apply your efforts 100%, All you got, All the time." There is no coasting in life, and there is no coasting when we are serving our God. Amen to that!
Debby Griffin
Deacon Chair
