Being Made New

1. Being Made New Bishop Wayne N. Miller Metropolitan Chicago Synod ELCA

2. Looking Back: Driving Forward • Where were we then? • Where are we now? • How have we responded? • Where are we going? • What will it take to get there?

3. John 8: 32 You will know the truth… and the truth will make you free!

4. Where We Have Come Congregations Avg Worship Baptized Total Income to Congregations Regular Mission Support Percent Mission Support Comparison -25% -29% -33% +50% -20% -3.6% 1988 251 40,166 134,774 $49, 040,956 $3,677,489 7.5% 2011 193 28,531 91,495 $74,927,513 $2,956,849 3.9%

5. Where This Leaves Us • Strengths • Weaknesses • Opportunities • Threats • Leadership, Wealth, Networks, Artists, World Engagement. • Shy about sharing, Prone to attachment, Organized Expensively • 7.5 million people– 3 million unconnected; world on our doorstep. • Aging; limited imagination; lack of conviction.

6. How Have We Responded? New Mission Starts Since 1988 Mergers/Consolidations 6 SAWC’s 6 New Congregations 33 Where Are They Now? Alive Growing 4 1 4 0 16 7

7. How Have We Responded? • Church Growth Strategies • Very effective in some settings reaching new people • The gap between expectation and commitment must be financed with debt • Turn Around Synod Initiative • New resources, relationships and partnerships for congregational mission planning • Increased energy/Uncertain measurable outcomes • Missions of Compassionate Service • Congregation-based Social Ministry Organizations • Hands at Work Partnership

8. How Have We Responded? • Community Organizing • Excellent leadership Development • Best single vehicle for the mission of Justice • Is it faith or is it politics? • Antiracism/ Cultural Competence • Growth in awareness/ improved access to leadership • Resistance and denial are stubborn/voluntary engagement • Mission Trips • Raises consciousness/Immediacy of experience • Short term effect/Ad Hoc relationships

9. What Does This Mean? • NO BLAME-NO SHAME: we are all working hard under difficult conditions trying to figure it out. We have learned from each response! • Significantly fewer people are giving significantly more: high dedication and personal sacrifice. CONGRATULATIONS! • Mergers and consolidations will not fix this. • Our tried and true models and strategies are necessary but insufficient. We need a fresh approach.

10. Matthew 13:52 [Those] Fit for the Kingdom bring out…what is new and what is old

11. Essential Mission Community Proclamation! Invitation (Evangelism) Formation (Discipleship) Action (Apostleship) Service! Generosity Compassion Justice! Respect Freedom Vocation

12. Reformation Invitation Formation Transformation Action Inside Outside

13. Affiliated Mission Communities • Missionary called to staff of “incubator” congregation • AMC meets weekly under guidance from missionary • Missionary may be lay or clergy and may lead up to 3 AMC’s at once • All AMC’s grow and multiply on the Reproducing Leadership Model

14. Affiliated Mission Communities • AMC’s are differentiated but always connected in the Local Network • Missionaries are guided by a local accompaniment team and by community with other missionaries • At least 10% of all new AMC’s focus on Christian Community Among People in Poverty or on the margins

15. Affiliated Mission Communities • Initial funding for Missionary comes substantially from the synod mission fund • Continued funding depends upon AMC growth metrics • Video story telling will invite congregational partners into the venture

16. AMC Advantage • Outreach to those who will NEVER affiliate with a conventional congregation • Small spiritual community for those seeking belonging and relational faith • Integration of thinking, feeling, and doing

17. AMC Advantage • Rapid proliferation of new communities: LITTLE BETS! • New calls for new pastors/ leadership development may PRECEDE seminary • Financial load structure for a new community – approximately 20% of the cost of a new conventional congregation • Incubator congregations continue to grow with proportionate increase in cost

18. What MCS Could Look Like • If 20 incubator congregations create 3 communities each, in 6 years we could be back to the 1988 number of communities and GROWING! • We could be more effective in our engagement with the poor than we have ever been! • We will be more focused on saving lives than on saving buildings!

19. Levels of Participation • Become an incubator congregation • Connect with an incubator network • Support another local network of AMC’s • Participate in a TSI strategy to build strength for a new future • Release your present form to invest in Resurrection

20. “It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to heaven for us, and get it for us…’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross to the other side of the sea for us and get it for us…’” Deuteronomy 30:11-14 Surely this is not too hard for you…

21. What Will It Take? • PRAYER, THOUGHT, AND ADAPTATION… we need to open this conversation in a hundred ways with one another and KEEP LEARNING. • Every congregation needs to find its place in the vision. • A new level of commitment and investment through stewardship.

22. What Will It Take? Financial Responsibility • We must build back very quickly to a MINIMUM commitment threshold of 5% of total congregational income as undesignated mission support. • After this minimum has been met, we work toward the tithe through dedicated gifts to new mission… including participation in the ELCA anniversary fund. • A combined return to the 7.5% level will yield 1.5 million new dollars every year dedicated to mission growth.

23. A Network Vision Relationships Resources