Hello Friends,
My Report for the September meeting is attached as a separate PDF, and for your convenience, the text is copied below. Thank you for sharing your gifts and energy we try to pay attention to the Spirit, one another, and our context. How can the presbytery better resource your clarifying, collaborating, courageous, and community mission? Where do you see the real Wow emerging? I welcome your comments.
Sincerely,
Kevin

Emerging Models for Congregational Mission: Wow!
He looked up. ‘I see men. They look like walking trees’ Mark 8:24. The Message

In his book Moneyball, Michael Lewis wrote about how baseball scouts and managers were wrong about what makes a great baseball player. They argued about it and invested millions in trying to understand it. They used the wrong radar, they looked for the wrong “Wow” factor of what makes the best player. When statistics taught a few teams what the real Wow was, the balance of power shifted. I pay attention to that information.
Do you know what the real Wow is for authentic and effective congregational mission? Let's take a look at a few emerging models. Consider the Gospel story recorded in Mark when people appeared like walking trees to a blind man healed by Jesus.

Mark's rapid-fire, cascading, accounts of Jesus' actions included the feeding of thousands of hungry people. That's good, but Jesus wanted more than a full belly for his team of disciples. Sure, they ate with the crowd that afternoon, but after lunch, Jesus quizzed, “And the seven loaves for the four thousand—how many bags full of leftovers did you get?” “Seven.” He said, “Do you still not get it?” Just like us, we thought the Wow factor was in the miraculous feeding, but Jesus wanted his team to understand the leftovers. The outcomes. The Wow was in the leftovers.

Jesus met a blind man and continued to heal him. The outcomes of the miracle were amazing. A person who knew only darkness saw light. This healing experience was not over. He saw people, but the people appeared to be upside down. The Wow was yet to come. If the blind man was in a hurry, if a little was enough, if getting by a bit better was sufficient, he would have walked away happy to see "any" light at all. Jesus knew the Wow was yet to come. As if Jesus said, "Wait, we can do better than this." Touching the man's eyes, full sight was restored. Where can we see the real Wow emerging?

Clarifying Mission
Almost 40% of our sessions have intentionally set aside time to join me to listen and lead in new ways. They are clarifying their congregation's unique mission and refocusing their ministry on new initiatives. Using demographic, survey, and other tools, they are realizing that every church can take responsibility to rekindle their mission passion to love their community in tangible and sustainable ways. Reliable data leads to better decisions. Like in Money Ball, when your session gains clarity about what matters most, and the real Wow emerges.
When a session and congregation discern and choose a clear, focused, mission, they begin to make better choices. They can say “Yes” to what achieves their unique mission and they can confidently say“No” to actions, programs, and ministries that are not aligned with their mission. By constantly listening to the Spirit, the focused mission becomes part of a new DNA for the church and the experience of blessing sure to follow reinforces the new direction that has begun. It is at this fundamental level that the presbytery, the collective spiritual energy of our congregations, can provide resources needed for the transformative work.

Collaborative Mission
For example, clarity in mission has led to exciting, new, emerging approaches to ministry. When congregations focused on achieving their mission goals together, new options appear. In consultation with teams such as the Committee on Ministry, Board of Trustees, and Mission Council, new energy has resulted from new, adaptive structures and relationships.
Elmwood United PC in East Orange and the former Central PC in Newark found mutual blessing when they explored what could happen when more resources would be released by uniting together. Instead of focusing on what was, or what is, the leaders began to focus on what could be. The opportunities for congregational and community transformation was discovered together. Today, God has blessed the collaborative mission with multiplied outcomes.

Driven by a similar kind of mutual vision, leaders from three West Orange congregations aligned their resources to unite as the United PC of West Orange. With the collaborative effort of a Newark Presbytery Administrative Commission, new opportunities for common ministry took shape. By selling deteriorating buildings and repurposing property into more liquid resources, the new united congregation now occupies a common site that is shared equally with Elmwood United's other growing worship site.

Courageous Mission
It takes vision and courage for a session to consider a realignment of mission objectives, redeployment of property assets for alternative or shared ministry, or contemplate a different way to respond to God's Spirit in collaborative mission. We know we must change. The critical moment is when a session and congregation choose to change with a sense of hopeful urgency.

What new Wow could emerge if our focus as a church was not the church, but the community the church is in? What does a session need to be equipped to re-tune its spiritual radar to see opportunities instead of only obstacles?

How useful is your church site, buildings and property, to achieve the unique mission God is sending your congregation out into the world to fulfill? We need congregational, and property, transformation. Instead of feeling stuck with your existing building, or overwhelmed by negative outcomes of deferred maintenance, what might emerge as a blessing if we considered alternative ways of gathering, worshipping, serving, teaching, and transforming collaborating with an adjacent congregation?

Already, we are excitedly watching new conversations develop as congregations explore possibilities for collaboration in Bloomfield, the Caldwell’s, Belleville, and in Newark.

Community Mission
How much more could be realized if new partnerships were nurtured within the faith community and the community at large? Our newly emerging Newark Presbytery Community Transformation Corporation is redoubling its efforts to bless our neighbors. By engaging in new ministries sited at our existing properties, opportunities for sustainable initiatives will transform not merely the host church, but help reconnect and empower new relationships and new futures.

Newark Presbytery, Elizabeth Presbytery, and Palisades Presbytery have been exploring how realigning our resources could lead to new health, growth, and vitality of all our congregations. We ask God to use us to bless the 4.5 million people that live within our bounds. Imagine, 28,000 plus Presbyterians discovering new, innovative, authentic, and tangible ways to demonstrate God's love in the name of Jesus Christ. Now, that's a real Wow that's worth exploring.

Throughout the Synod, and the national church, God's listening people are setting aside preconceived notions, self-interest, and former ways of being the Body of Christ so that more people experience joy and abundant living.

I'm not sure what makes a great baseball player, but I am confident that we serve a great God who is leading us to a great, new future! The choice is ours.

Thank you for sharing your gifts and energy we try to pay attention to the Spirit, one another, and our context. How can the presbytery better resource your clarifying, collaborating, courageous, and community mission? Where do you see the real Wow emerging on your radar?

Sincerely,

Dr. Kevin Yoho
Newark Presbytery
General Presbyter