The PC(USA)’s hope multipliers
Four mid council leaders report to their colleagues on the good news from their neck of the woods
LOUISVILLE — Billed as “hope multipliers,” a quartet of mid council leaders told their colleagues Monday about the good things going on in their presbytery.
Their talks were part of the Mid Council Leaders Gathering going on Monday through Wednesday online and at the Presbyterian Center in Louisville, Kentucky.
“We’re going to try to multiply some hope today,” said Dr. Corey Schlosser-Hall, who organized the panel. “I’ve never done a hope multiplier with a group of mid council leaders, but we will put on new habits and see what happens.
Presbytery of the Inland Northwest
The Rev. Sheryl Kinder-Pyle is executive presbyter of an immense presbytery with 4,000 members and 37 churches, half of them with fewer than 100 members. The Presbytery of the Inland Northwest used a Thriving Congregations grant from the Lilly Foundation to partner with Rooted Good and its Good Futures Accelerator, where a congregation aligns its building use with God’s mission in order to increase its impact on the community.
One church in northern Idaho has 16 members and is led by a commissioned ruling elder. Meetings with some of the 2,500 community members revealed people’s desire for the church to provide an arts venue in its basement. Over the past six months, six events have been held, including four community concerts. “Now this little town in Idaho knows [the church] is alive and connected to their community,” Kinder-Pyle said, “and the congregation is totally energized.”
Presbytery of Chicago
The Rev. Dr. Craig Howard told how four of the presbytery’s largest churches purged their rolls at the same time three years ago. As a result, that year the presbytery lost more members than any other presbytery in the country. “You get serious when you say, ‘we are the worst in the country,” Howard said.
In response, the presbytery developed a Faithful Innovation Team, with the goal of opening at least four new worshiping congregations each year for the next five years. Funding comes from congregations that have closed. “We are following other presbyteries with this type of incubator,” Howard said.
He told the story of being in the Seattle area and being disappointed with the far-off photo he’d taken of Mt. Rainier. An online map suggested he turn in the opposite direction, where he saw a long line of tall peaks to photograph.
“What if we start looking at what God is doing in the community?” Howard said. “If we just change the direction of our gaze and stop focusing on one big mountain, we may find a whole mountain range of what God is doing.”
Presbytery of East Tennessee
The Rev. Dr. Wendy Neff, the presbytery’s general presbyter, discussed the need to overhaul the presbytery’s committee structure. “I like structure in my life. It was a challenging thought to me,” Neff said. The presbytery’s stated clerk thought it was just what the presbytery needed, and so the two of them created Jubilee language, “that we would Jubilee our standing committees. We are going to let those go so we can move into the new thing God is calling us into.”
“I have a whole cadre of pastors and elders excited to let things go and Jubilee” so that “we can look forward with real openness of what God is calling us to do,” Neff said. “We are very excited in the Presbytery of East Tennessee.”
Presbytery of San Gabriel
The presbytery’s executive presbyter, the Rev. Wendy S. Tajima, discussed a pair of neighboring churches — one large, the other dying. The smaller church ended up calling an associate pastor from the larger church to do ministry for people without homes.
“The session of the dying church met the young pastor and they fell in love,” Tajima said. “They put together an amazing ministry that has been doing well for three years — and by the way, they joyfully acknowledge the presbytery’s role in helping to make this happen.”
“Our church leaders have seen and heard that miracles can happen, if we take discerned risks,” Tajima said.
After thanking the panel, Schlosser-Hall, a member of the Unified Agency’s senior interim leadership team, reminded mid council leaders that “we get to choose what kind of environment we want to steward.”
Check back with pcusa.org for additional reporting on the Mid Council Leaders Gathering.
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