EldersRetreatBrief

Alright, the elders walked away. They all need to be up here. We did not allow for multiple stools for the elders.

So we got a presentation for you from the elders Retreat from the weekend last weekend. In March 24th through the 26th and Rob is going to start it off with a little bit of history of the elders. Retreats, and, The amazing things that get disgusted.

Okay. Hi.

I'm Rob Wilson there. A lot of people. I don't quite know yet. Good to meet you. I look forward to getting to know you better in the years ahead, really? Good to see you and you and all of you actually. So There you go. There you go. So what's that? We have Elders or treat on his Retreat? Don't, here we go.

Carmel Retreat. So I'm going to go for just a little bit real quick. This is a slide that dick cherneskie. I put forth on the 2008 Elders, Retreat. We every time we have an Elders Retreat. We talked about Who We Are. Why we are what we are doing.

You got that queso know. Okay from the very beginning started with the whole idea of a judeo. Christian first century Church model, we didn't want to model ourselves after other churches. We wanted to get as close to Jesus as we could. And I remember the original Elders saying this way back. I was not an original Elder. I was just a regular person. But in 1994, we were Incorporated with that idea, we wanted to be a first-century type church and we kind of played out. The first century 20th century Church model trying to be both. And when we became the 21st century, it kind of really not as nice 1st, and 21st and 9th 1994 December about a year. Later almost exactly a year later, they had come up with a constitution during that year, the Elder board met and studied trying to figure out what a first-century church looks like. And this is the best explanation I can give of who we are today. It's a plurality of Elders. No one lead Elder. First among equals sometimes someone would have a gifting or calling and they would come forward. Dwight have the gifting for teaching Dick had a gifting for law. Bob Paris had a gifting for money, so different people have different giftings and they worked in their area. And everyone recognized, they were the first among equals during this whole thing, but we were all equal. Radical concept. No one specifically in charge very difficult to get, a hold of and hard to practice. And we've been practicing this for almost 30 years. That's incredible. We're still practicing it. And we're doing a pretty good job as well as we can. In the situation, we are so we were Incorporated in 94, they discuss this idea. They put together the purpose statements, and the belief statements and put it in our constitution in 95. 96. Yeah, but it was just about a year later from 94. The 94 was December, the end of December and the 96 was January 1st. So it's only about a year that they studied this and figured out who they were and wrote it down. The Constitution is a hard thing to change. It takes a change by the voting members of church, the Messiah, so our statement of beliefs is pretty straightforward or Christian, Center Line, Christians, right? Down the middle. In terms of our statement of belief, our purpose is pretty good too, they'll be more on that later and then in 03, A number of people in the business world came up with this idea that we need a vision statement, a short concise vision statement and they looked at the Constitution. He said we don't have a vision. Yes, we had a vision, it's in the purpose statement.

and we put that forward as a vision since then, but but Dwight felt compelled to Put together a simple. Vision. That's easy to remember. Dwight loved what is it? When you have the same letter, multiple times a litter? Is he loved alliteration called anyone? Who knows, it's it with me. Commissioned commanded. Now, we can talk about a half an hour, but it wasn't what it means to be called. We could talk about the same amount of time for what it means to be commissioned and we can talk about the same amount of time for me to become mended. But you'll always remember this called commissioned commanded you can improve vision statement beyond that and that's exactly what the Constitution pretty much says. So that was called our kingdom Vision in 03. Before that in 02, a group of people met. Actually dichter nisky asked Danny Sullivan to put together a short brief one page only.

That was his request one page. Only statement about what it means to be a brick Heritage congregation, a Jewish roots congregation 15 different names for this, but it ended up being a brick Heritage congregation and so Denny wrote it, you asked me to read it. I read it, I commented on it by Paris, and also come in on. Bob Mass commented on it. John Garr, not dick, Dwight, prior, and Polished it for about 6 months and we ended up putting it out as a statement in. Do to those of you who are in how you sewed, it's a great. It's a great class. I think it's has a high subclass left.

Okay. Okay, those of you who are going through, how you said, it's a great class. This little one sheet of paper, which I don't think you have. Okay, it's on, it's on the website. All these things on the website. That's single sheet of paper is Who We Are. And what we think we're doing and it's, we had that way before how you sewed had it, and it's on one page, it's easy to read, not everyone's read it. I recommend you read it. It's excellent 02. Then we the kingdom Vision the following year and then the hebraic Heritage movement, concerns 04. There was a colloquium that was called together by John Garr of the absolute top Jewish Scholars. Jewish Messianic scholars in the world. They actually came from all over the world. They met I think in Arkansas. Fayetteville Arkansas, and they came together with and agreed. Summary. Which Steve is Santa. Jewish roots movement concerns, he calls it. It's actually insights, colloquium insights and colloquium concerns. And the reason they put this out is the Jewish roots movement. People were becoming very proud about what they were doing, their becoming very Jewish about what they were doing. They were coming, very confused about what they're doing is causing a lot of confusion in the Christian world. And so these are the insights. They thought were great things about the movement and concerns, and Dwight thought these were so important. Did this to the elders to incorporate and are foundational documents? I'd like to read four of them because they're really, really important. In this restoration, this move of God spirit and Into. That this restorationist move of God. Spirit not regenerate.

Now, I can do it. In two separate ISM from the church, sectarianism elitism or exclusivity.

Some people in the Jewish roots movement were separating from the church and saying they were distinct from the Christian church and they saw this as a problem. We want to help the church not harm the church, that those who have embraced the Jewish roots of their face, not manifest. Arrogance and judgmentalism against the Christians who did not share these Concepts, That legalism the idea that status before God is either gained or maintained by works of obedient to the Torah or other ecclesiastical Kodak decodes not creep in under the guise of the brick Heritage restoration and for that Judy izing, be opposed in all its forms, attempting to persuade followers of Yeshua to accept and practice Torah or Jewish Traditions, as a means either of achieving or maintaining salvation or Superior spiritual status before God. these are for big things and if you're studying, What it means to be a hybrid Heritage congregation. I encourage you to reflect on these for particularly

they're dangerous. You can cause all kinds of damage. Destroy families. When I was a teenager. I accept the Jesus and youth Youth for Christ kind of thing. And I came back and told my parents they're going to burn in hell forever if they didn't accept Jesus as their personal Lord and savior. That didn't work real good.

When you get arrogant about your fate above someone else. Particularly someone who's lived a long life and his work hard for their faith, it's not a good thing to do that. A good thing. .

That's it except for that slide. So no go back to this one, Elder Retreats and every Retreat, we ask ourselves who we are, what are we doing? And hand and why and how well are we doing it? And these are the areas that we look at our foundational documents First-century Judea Christian Church model founded 95 beliefs and purpose insights, and concerns Vision called commission. Commanded the break Heritage congregation. We go over that every time we have a retreat and we did this time purpose mission and vision. This is in the

Constitution. Somebody to call of Messiah on his assembly, to equip, God's people to worship, and glorify him to serve him, through acts of ministry, fellowship with one another and to reach the Lost. Vision advancing God's Kingdom. So that the body of Messiah may be built up in unity and maturity into the full measure of Yeshua himself. Any questions on these three slides?

0. Okay.

Frank. Just one.

Yep.

Sure.

You didn't? So you're not a voting member.

To be a member of church, the Messiah, you have to agree to the statement of beliefs and purpose cetera. You don't have to agree with.

You don't have to agree with. The kingdom Vision. You don't have to agree with the hebraic Heritage congregation, and you don't have to agree with the movement concerns. Those are all documents that can change easily at the at the whim of the elders. But the first two, we can't change a bill headed, a committee to change the constitution in 2004, it was very problematic thing. It took forever, we spent weeks trying to re re come up with a better statement of faith statement of belief, a few people in here, including John, had extreme recommendations on, what should be changed particular wording particular, order of words etc, etc and it can't it just it's just not worth that. You can't you can't get past anything Dwight in the in frustration set. Hey, we're we're praying one day and we're talkin about this and he said you just can't do better than the Apostles Creed.

And I said, no. So anyway, we do have a statement of belief. It's in the Constitution, it's online, you can read it. And that's all I have to say about all of that.

Thank you.

Okay, well, I'm going to make this quick. So the elders got together last month and we decided we're the best Elders ever. We solved all these problems, we never have to discuss them again. Just can I have the sheet your sheets with the slides? I'll give them back to you but that's that's a good idea. I did not bring that.

Yeah, thank you and Paige knew you wanted to. Thank you.

So, the weekend of the 24th through 26 is a weekend of. I haven't heard any snickering yet. I'm really surprised worship, prayer, discussion confusion, rebuke and encouragement. Confession. Sorry.

so,

And Rob said this, these are questions. And the thing to keep in mind, is probably every one of those Elders. Retreats, not every one of them, but most of them had a few different people on it. I think. Probably this Retreat, we just had to had the largest number of new people or different people at least as far as I know. So, when, when we looked at this, I think we looked at it with fresh, Rob was part of some of the other Retreats and I don't know. It was Greg.

Okay, so So, the rest of us, you know, this, this was new for us and in Rob, didn't tell us ahead of time that we've done that been there. So anyway, as Rob was saying in one of the documents you have, yes. The statement of belief. and the purpose which is the original purpose of the one on the slides has been slightly split apart to make a good mission and vision statement, but as Rob pointed out the kingdom vision statement called commission and commanded really

Would be difficult. I think, as I go through these documents and I wasn't here when any of these documents were created, other than I think I was around with Kingdom Vision came forward.

These are unbelievable documents. I don't think you could find documents this. Well written and thought out at any church, anywhere in the world, I think they're amazing. If you sit down and look at them and and they get to the point in it, it shows how led by the spirit, the Elders of the Church of the Messiah were in the early days and hopefully now we're we pray for that everyday. So anyway so the foundation's documents and as Rob said, we didn't hand them all out. Most of them, I don't know if the Articles of Incorporation are on the website but everything else is on the website, you can download it this. two pages that we printed out those are available on the website and yeah, they are very important and Balanced. I think it's the word. I would use very balanced documents. so,

Essentially with these documents that the purpose and this is the one like I said, you have is directly from the Constitution. This was kind of pulled apart to be a mission and vision, and it works well that way.

So that is primarily what we used. Kyle kind of lettuce into that with his outline he created and basically we went through the mission part of the purpose statement and

Pulled out.

The different sections and said, okay? So what what are the metrics here? What's what are the measurements that we can measure? Whether we're achieving the mission of the church in the Messiah?

Oh, I forgot to mention this document to sorry, I have them here. This isn't really so much, one of the founding documents but this in one form or another has been on almost every Comm flyers on the Church of Messiah website. And it also is a very well-written was originally written by some of the early members of Church of the Messiah and it even further defines, I think really well, what church in Messiah is about. And the main thing, there are the two lines involved. Give praise in our focus is to give God all the glory. And that's that's what we're about. That's what Christmas is about. Also everywhere you see listed for Church of the Messiah is this statement Church of the Messiah is an interdenominational independent congregation and that's really the answer. When somebody says where you guys are Messianic congregation. And as Robin said before, yes, we are. Cuz we worship Messiah and God but we're not your run-of-the-mill or that we're not a Messianic congregation from the fact that we are Jews who have become Messianic Jews. We're all Christians. Where all have, as the previous document said, we all come from diverse Church background And we celebrate that with everything, we do hear the music styles that that we worship with and everything else and end. I think it's it's amazing. There's not another congregation like Church of the Messiah anywhere. When do I used to teach around the world? He would have people come up to him, James can confirm this, people would call the center, where can I find a church? Like Church of the Messiah in here? It's where you can find a turkey. And the other thing, I'll just jump ahead for this at the elders, Retreat. One of the first things we said after, kind of going through some of this stuff is It's amazing. Why aren't we a mega church? Because Church in Messiah is so cool. God has done wonderful things for Church of the Messiah, but we know that's not the plan. That's not the goal, but yeah, it's Certainly a lot different. So getting into the measurables the metric. So how do we take our mission statement?

From the purpose statement and turn it into something that we can actually measure what we're doing. And that was, that was a concept. Kyle, had Kyle coming from emissions background. You're constantly measuring the success of your mission. You know how many people you're reaching etcetera, etcetera, so we see measurables or metrics not as the end of anything. God Is the End serving him if the end of what church messiah's about but it helps us know if we're going in the right direction.

so, going back from the purpose statement and primarily the first paragraph

if we pull those apart into, Individual items measurables we can say, are we inviting the call of Messiah on his assembly and inviting? I had to look it up. It's a word I've heard on my life but I had to look it up. So are we an expression of or do we give a tangible or visible form to the call of Messiah on his assembly? So that's one measurement of if we're successful. Are we equipped in God's people to worship and glorify him to serve him through acts of ministry and fellowship with one another? And the third measurable is, are we reaching the lost and a course? That's a tough one. We aren't really a Seekers church. We are in a sense. If you're a Christian seeking, To know, scripture seeking to know God's word. Speaking to know, God, seeking to know Jesus better and more deeply, then yes, we are reaching the lost but it's not the Lost in the world. It's maybe just the confused Christian. And we also many of the missions that we support Ministries that we support locally and a couple internationally, their Outreach is reaching the lost and certainly, if we had people coming into our church who were lost and needed to know about Jesus, they would get in your fault if they came. So So if we look at what could be improved and this is this is where the elders got two pretty quickly are there improvements we could make to the services, are there improvements that we could make to the study group? And saying we we don't mean the elders. Dictating these changes the Shabbat school which I believe that was in Rob's notes that's the children's ministry Rob. what does Shabbat school was and the Torah study, our own Fellowship opportunities, the missions that church the messiah's supports and can we make improvements in our structure of church in the sky and the operations one of the things that the elders all agreed on the foundational documents,

We don't see a lot of room there for improvement there. Pretty pretty darn good. Documents obviously, very inspired by the Holy Spirit. so, We talked about service adjustments that, you know, we actually sat there and everybody brainstormed, what could we change in the service in and I got you, it's so perfect right now. I just don't know what else we could do now. I mean, it's it, the service order that we have now is it's been years and years and years in the making and we have changed the service ordered. Man, we've changed the service time. We have discussed, a few small, Minor Adjustments such as maybe more music towards the end, but none of those are set in stone and that's because, you know, at over the next few months or maybe in the fall, it depends. You know, how how attendance goes over the summer. But as you can see, on every other items on here, feedback is what we're looking for at this point. Feedback from the people involved. So the teen study groups will be looking for feedback from the teams will be looking for feedback from the leaders of that group Shabbat School very competently.

Put together by Ryan and an motyka and we've already discussed, you know, allowing them to come to the elders meeting. Give us their feedback. Why do they think war is working for them? What other tools can the others help them with what do they need to be successful? Or maybe they feel that, you know, everything's going pretty good the way it is but we need that feedback. None of the others. Attend the kids glasses. So Some of some of it. Well Kyle has children in that class and he seems to be pretty happy with it. So and missions, we do get feedback from time to time. People come to the elders and suggest missions that we could support new missions in different missions and the elders. Always take that under review. Take a look at how it fits with the How church in the fireworks and, and what we feel our purpose is. And so we review those kinds of things and Elders have discussion and we went through well for this fiscal year 2023 which ends at the end of June, we made some pretty big changes in the missions we support we moved to a more local Focus. On the missions that were supporting and I think that's worked out pretty well and we're also looking to try to bring people in from the Ministries in the missions to speak to church misael at they're doing next next week. Vince prepare o will be here he'll be talking about their Ministry. They were part of athletes in action now they've been off on their own for a couple years so we'll see what they have to say about their Ministry. Terry Northington and Andrea have a Ministry called the one master Ministries yet. And so, Carrie wants to set up a time to come in and talk to church of Messiah about that, but we had all this other stuff going on now. So, so that got pushed back a little bit and we've had others, and we've had people from Jeremiah tree. We've had people from IAH in our family promise with. We keep trying to get people into come in and talk to the group. I think we've had the Miami Valley Women's Center. We've had representatives from their come in, so that's something we're constantly working in with. Oh, and yeah, one Bistro. That's a group that were supporting 7 in many different ways. So we're trying to get more people to come in. Let everybody in church in this, I know what we're doing and the so then we can get more feedback about the, how everyone thinks that's going. And as far as structure, And looking at how we're doing things management of the church. And one of the things we really didn't discuss too much.

What's financial because financially cam is doing? Pretty well at this point.

We had a couple bumps when the market fluctuated because we do have some, of our money. We try to keep a certain number of months, 6 months to a year, operating capital. And we'll take some of the other, put it into Investments so that we can do more with that and supporting missions benevolence and all those sorts of things. So we really didn't have a big discussion about that because through the elders meetings that we have on it on a monthly basis. We know we're pretty pretty sound at this point with all the financial Area. So, so what we're looking at is things like mentoring and we had discussions about this again in the regular elders meeting, but we had a better more in depth. Discussion about looking at all the areas because there's a lot of us doing things that this church. I'll raise my hand, a few other people could raise. There's who probably need to be mentoring people to come alongside and continue to take. Take these jobs at one of the one of the things we said we wanted to look at, today. We're, we'll be in five years and we're, being 10 years and my comment was. Well, I just want to be looking at the grass from the same side in 5 years or 10 years. So that's that's my goal. So fellowship and we've always talked about this, do you know Church in Messiah? We have, you know, the carrying luncheons but searching the Saudis have a lot more going on. As far as home groups we had a many of you have been here for years and years and years will remember breaking bread, Fellowship meals. And we keep talking about that from time to time. We keep bringing that up, you know, that was that was great. That was a good way for people in the church, to get to know new people in the church and other people that they don't normally have an opportunity to get together with. So so we want to see more Fellowship opportunities and course that would be education. Also. So missions. I already talked about feedback and review for that, and we also talked about adjustments to the teaching and schedule. So we have had some feedback from some folks about the Torah cycle. The seven-year tour cycle is kind of long, but it really gives the teachers an opportunity to teach in-depth into the scriptures. And so that's, that's a good thing. And even even if we made some adjustments to the schedule, it probably wouldn't affect the tour study group and, and, or the tour moment on a weekly basis, I think. For teaching adjustments were probably looking at more things like Robert, Kyle or even Dugger doing things may be a series. Like I think one of the things I've heard Rob mentioned before, maybe doing a series, on the words of the original scripture, and the rabbinic teachings, and the lyrics of the songs of Bob Dylan,

I think that would be amazing. Now it is well, Bob Dylan of course, is Robert Zimmerman. And he is a Messianic Jew. So he at least he was I don't know if you still professes to be one. So you know I was also going to say that

The possibilities are endless. We've we've had in the past series of teachings on the Holy Spirit and at the end of the class, actually had a session where people were led to the in filling of the spirit that sort of thing. So there's all kinds of possibilities there and do nothing set in stone. And that is a good lead-in to the point that we didn't come up with all the answers for all the stuff at the, Elders Retreat. We mostly ask the questions again as Rob pointed out and hopefully in our elders, meetings through the next six months to a year, we'll come up with some more.

Solutions and that will be important for those solutions to come from feedback. From the congregation, we are planning to do a survey. I don't even remember what the survey was about, but Kyle sent out an email with the survey in it and so we'll be looking at getting more feedback from everyone.

So overall, what word, I think the cam Elders are looking for at this point and this is what we pray for it. Every Comm elders meeting and this is what we prayed for at The Retreat. And this is what we all individually. Pray for all the time, and that's wisdom and leading of the spirit, and that's what we would like, the congregation to be praying for The Elder wisdom. And the leading of the spirit, of course, and we always pray for calm families. And we pray for, operations and needs. So that is what we will continue to pray for, and that's what we would like prayer. For the elders from the congregation for these things, primarily. And of course, to give thanks, always in all things. And that's what the elders want to have constantly is an attitude of gratitude giving, thanks to God, because everything that is going on at church, the Messiah is going on because of his leading, that's our prayer. That's our hope and We, of course hope that the congregation feels the same way about that, at least closely the same. We don't all have to agree on everything. So that's that sorry that took longer than I thought. But the elders are going to come back up. And if anybody has questions For the elders. That we can answer.

Or not. Or we may answer your question with a question.

one more one more somewhat confusing thing from the very Inception of church, the Messiah, the the principle, once an elder always an elder was stated and it still is even though Bill disavows knowledge of that statement,

He is an elder but he's not an active Elder so they're active Elders on the board. There are lots of Elders in here who've been Elders there. People who've been asked to be Elders, who refused being an elder all that's going on in the mix here. The active board now is 5.

Well.

5. Greg, Travis is the other active Elder. Kyle is still a teaching Elder, but he step down from being an active Elder. If you want to join the elders group, you're welcome. Anyone is welcome to come and sit in for the meetings. If you sit in the beatings long enough will ask you to do something and depending on how the relationship works out, we might ask you to be an elder but it's not a definite thing. We're not asking you. Do you want to be an elder, fill out these forms. That that's the old way. We, we say meet with us work with us. We'll see if it works out.

Eldership does require membership.

Confusing. Okay.

So who has the burning question? For the elders.

Hold on. I'll and I'll come to you with the microphone. I did not assume we're recording this session. Because Kyle won't want to read. Do it later.

And also just keep mention to carry Northington and James Whitman are also inactive elders. What involves being a member?

Okay, so if you want to be a member of Church of Messiah, you sign a form in order to sign the form. You have to read the statement of belief in the purpose statement. If you're in agreement with it, you want to be a member, you can sign a form and with that, you get to say what you want to do that. We've got like five or six lists like the prayer list in the fellowship list and announcement list and I don't know what they all are. So you say what you want to get and then you, you just sign the form and we put it in a book and we scrub the book. Years ago. I went to a meeting at a different church and I've been going to the church and the people who were at the church that week were no one I'd ever seen before and they had come because they were voting members and they were voting out the pastor. And they'd all been called together because there were of like minds and it didn't like what was going on in the church. So they came back for one meeting and voted out the pastor. That's just hurtful. We do is scrub. If you haven't been an active person involved, in church of Messiah for six months, you're no longer a voting member and wheat. We go through that scrub whenever we have the question of a vote, but it's not something we think is going to happen often. So, if you want to be able to do you like to be a member, Thinking about it. Okay. Okay. Any other question on that one?

Yes, you can attend. You can Fellowship, you can Worship. You Can Dance. You can even speak short teachings and even long teachings, without being a member. There's a problem with. Speaking from the platform, you kind of have a commitment to be in agreement with what we're doing.

Okay. I've been coming here with my family for 12, 13, 14 years. 12 years ish. I didn't know there was a membership Rob, when, when were you going to tell me where to sign? Okay, okay. Did you remember where it said, amended 2004 that was the big thing before that, the Elder rotated, every two years, which I would love I'd love to sit down and not the active Elder. I, I, I don't want to leave without providing. What I need to provide before I leave. Mentoring people, Etc.

But back then, the Elder put Force Elders to be approved by the congregation affirmed was the word I Believe by the congregation and the elders. Put forward two names to be affirmed by the congregation and the congregation refuse to affirm these two Elders that the elders put forward. And we had two outgoing elders, and no incoming elders and you can't do that. So the active Elders, continued being active elders, and that whole thing, caused the Constitution to be revised. So that's no longer required that the people of firm and Elder. So there's no real reason for voting except if you want to change the Constitution,

Which well you can. Look at the Constitution. We might want to let me know things in it. I'd like to change but it's not it's not that critical. Go ahead. I did have a comment before before I the membership thing came up.

The mentoring bullet on the on that slide. I read that a red men's ring in my head hurt discipleship. But then you highlighted Steve. The mentoring people into positions and it's not where my head was. My head was in discipleship, and I wanted to say that it doesn't, sometimes we think things don't need to be said, because they're so obvious. They don't need to be sad. But sometimes it's good to say things even though they're obvious and may not need to be said. And that's that Rob has taught multiple times from here to vote for yourself, a teacher. And it has been a blessing to me to find people in this congregation who are older and wiser than I am and to become good friends and to learn from them. And so, I think every person under the age of 50 in here, should find someone Who's over the age of 62 Point as a as a mentor and that's what so it doesn't need to be said cuz it should be obvious, but I'm saying it. So

I'm sorry years ago, my good friend. Frank Fenton asked me to be his mentor. Was that the right word. And I said, you don't understand. You appoint me? I don't have a choice. If you want to learn from me, learn from me, but it doesn't mean I have any direct responsibility outside of our friendship and that was something he didn't like he wanted. Learn these things and that was not where I was at. We work through that now for how many years, Frank?

I can make a snide comment like, don't denigrate anyone. And he might say, including yourself. It's just something we there's certain things we just connected on.

I have I have been discipling. Frank, Frank is also discipling me because I appoint him as my teacher sometimes. But I also point

I appoint as sure as my teacher, I appoint been as my teacher. I have things. I can learn from them. Appointed teacher acquire a friend by a friend, invest in friendship. And

Don't denigrate other people. I think of the other principal there. So I put everyone in the best.

Don't don't say bad things about people, you don't know what they've been through. Try to view their circumstances in a positive light. That's the third principal in that boat statement.

No.

They learned three things.

The different 3.

Anything else?

Eileen has a question. I don't have a question, but I do have a comment. I will say a pearly on Elder Frank doll. He really, really good teacher. Frank got a word from the Lord and gave it to the congregation. In regards to the reason why we are not a megachurch and we never get big. Yeah we kind of swell and you know shrinks while and tried but God gave him a word that said we were to be a grow and go to church and that's exactly what we've been doing. Over the years, people come in, they learn about to break Roots the study and they take it out and they take it to other churches and that's how we grow. That is evangelizing.

One of vandalizing. So we made an attempt to evangelize Church. The Messiah was part of the big group. Who distributed, the Jesus movie went door-to-door offering salvation, 23 entire zip codes That's no small thing.

Door to door, knocking on every door, offering prayer, offering, whatever. They wanted gave them of Jesus video. Three entire zip codes major, major effort. Didn't get any newcomers from that wonderful effort. Some people may have been saved, don't know. People have been saved in this service and people have been saved at Feast. So thus the idea that we're not reaching, the lost is kind of nuts. We're not going out of our way. Yes, we are because we've also offered teaching, nevermind, we've done it. We've done lots of things with other Ministries where we've offered help teaching. Jeremiah tree guys, said excetera. We we we baby have reached a lot of lost people. I can only remember one person who I know. Became save because I prayed with him or God, let him into salvation and I was involved in some way, that's a better way to put it, cuz I didn't really do anything, but he has a long list of people who come to Salvation. Do they are they credited to me? I don't know. That's not my issue. My issue is to be filled with the joy of the Lord, all the time, and overflow with it to the point that people get it. And that's what I try to do. and I cry a lot, so

Sorry, talking too much.

Well, in, there are other examples of our Outreach. Also such as the Feast of Tabernacles, which was held at Beaver Creek Church of the Nazarene for years that relationship was started because of the David company which was our original dance ministry, sent out from church in the side and they went and did he break dance at Beavercreek Church of the Nazarene and that created the relationship that we had with that church. And I think we also did a, we did a Passover meal at their Church. We've done Passover meals at several other churches in the area. Kyle this year presided over a seder meal. At a church up in Enon. I believe few days before he did our. So we have We do a lot of Outreach to other groups and and other people. And yeah, who knows how many The peoples, whose lives? We Touch. How many lives they've touched. We're not keeping score from that standpoint but but there is a lot of ministry that has gone forth actually even our dance and worship team. Mark Weibel was one of our worship leaders. They did a public Xenia Community event quite a few years ago. Ironically enough for a long time students from Cedarville used to come over here for the Feast of Tabernacles and for a long time before they came, we found out surreptitiously. It's a big word. The bruise that I went to college We found out surreptitiously, the reason they were coming to check us out at Feast of Tabernacles was because they supposedly were told that we were a cult.

that if I could drop the mic right there, I would but I won't and after they had come for two or three or four years or whatever it was, Finally, somebody over there realized we were all about Jesus and the Jewish Messiah to the maximum. There was no question about that and now suddenly, ironically, enough. Look what happened to Cedarville this year? As it happened down in Kentucky, as it's happened all over the country and we have an option or we have the opportunity to expand on what that Revival mode through Cedarville has spawned in my humble opinion. And so yeah, we definitely, we definitely made a difference on somebody or some group of people at Cedarville and

Yeah, it go ahead. Well, the other reason that we got dropped as being called a cold is because Kyle Kyle wanted to set up a booth for us at their one of their job fair. They said no you can't cuz you're a cult. So Rob and Kyle started talking with their Department of biblical studies or whatever. It was Rob knows more. And basically hired out said, you know, our statement of belief is almost identical to you. There was like two sentences, I think that they said well we're not sure about that but but eventually true Robin Kyle's dialogue with them that was Taking care of mainly Kyle, mainly Kyle and one other thing Cedarville. Whoever was thinking we were called one of the people at least, he thought we were called, he looked online and saw this hebraic Heritage, congregation sheet and he thought that was their statement of belief. It's not a statement. I believe, it's what we are as ever, break his congregation or statement of belief is straight down the center Christianity. So, I think part of it was getting the right.

Okay anybody else or do we want to move into? It is getting late. It's 12:30. Do we have prayer or praise report? We just address the mentoring thing just a little bit and we've said this before in the service really what we want to do to is some of us are getting older. Okay, I'm there too. But you know we're looking for folks to step in and and Mentor doing some of the things that we do is not just tell there's other positions things.

Worship piano and being on the worship team, John and crew Mentor any new folks to come in and train. Her updated was a part of that you know you work with him. Quietly been learning the trade a little bit. So a lot of things that we Yas Island, room Tech guys, always looking at. It's nice to get people in rotation to. So if you can get more than you need, it's always a good thing. So you can get extras to fall back on cuz people do Vacations or whatever it was sick or something. So, the nice thing is we do have Steve put together multiple sheets of different things that go on around here, so he wants to get those printed out. And see if anybody is interested in in stepping, in to do, you know, to join in with somebody? Who else that whoever is doing something else help you with it. But the other thing to is New, Blood brings new ideas, as well young kids. We like that. We want to get our Hughes. There are coming out at ESG, get them involved in various places and see what they have. I'm a stickler. I get my daily job is I've got it down to a science. Now for me to have somebody else My job, if I don't want to have them, do exactly the way I do it. I want them to take whatever God's given them and Gibson and ideas and let them run with it. So, it's the same thing and goes with worship goes with goes with leadership, whatever I were studying anything like that. So, that is, I think one of the things were talking about and mentoring we want to be able to get some of the younger. Younger folk younger than us anyway, jump in and, and get your feet wet. So, yes, do you have another question? Do you have another there? Any, any thought given to maybe having one or two women, as Elders in the church? I think the short answer is. Yes. Yeah, I know we've had them in the past. We've had a woman in older, women are are encouraged to come and attend Elders, made things. They might find it way too boring to be part of that group. Lately Terry's been coming and Jane have been coming, and we value your involvement highly. It's wonderful. There was a teenage boy who asked me in this congregation. Is there anything against a teenage boy being an elder? And I said, no. And he goes, well, I can be an elder you walked off, but you have to come and be part of the elders meeting for a. Of Time. How long will you know, you have your going to be asked to do things and the pickup responsibilities see if you like doing them, see if it works for you see if it works with us if it does then after while we say would you like to be an elder at which time most often we get told no.