Volume 1, Number 4: November-December 2006

 

Church Administration & Development Restructuring

 

By Dan Rogers
Dan Rogers, director of Church Administration & Development
Lorenzo Arroyo
Keith Brittain, southeastern regional pastoral leader
David Fiedler, northeastern regional pastoral leader
Ken Williams, western regional pastoral leader

For the past several years, CAD has operated through ten district superintendents (DS's). Our DS’s are exceptional, and they have done an outstanding job. However, after discussions with many pastors, DS's, denominational leadership and the CAD staff, we have seen that a new structure is needed for our future. With that in mind, resources offered by CAD will soon begin to be delivered by two new teams—one focused on pastoral administration and the other on ministry development. This approach will help us focus the time and energies of CAD leaders on their particular areas of giftedness and expertise. With this approach CAD will continue to provide pastoral leaders and congregations with excellent administrative and development services while maintaining current apportionment levels. 

As CAD director at the denominational headquarters in Glendora, I will provide leadership, training, and oversight for the CAD teams, for pastors and other elders, and for our congregations and their related ministries. I will continue to work alongside Nancy Akers, Charles Albrecht, Susan Dick and Pat Shaw in the CAD office to coordinate administrative and development activities for pastors and congregations. 

Pastoral Administration 

Pastoral administration will provide pastoral leaders with supervision and relational support through peer-level District Pastoral Networks. There will be 30 of these networks in the United States, each with about 10 Congregational Pastoral Leaders (who are senior pastors, pastoral team leaders or small group church leaders). Each network will be led by one of the senior pastors in the group who will be appointed by CAD to serve as the District Pastoral Leader. 

We envision that each network will meet about six times per year—usually face-to-face, though some meetings may be by phone conference. Some meetings will take place at regional or national conferences. These meetings and related operations will provide support, encouragement, coaching, sharing of ideas, and accountability in a team-based setting. We take seriously the need to build teams and to share ministry.  

In this new structure, the District Pastoral Leader will be the pastors' direct point of reporting and accountability. Pastors can call him to discuss administrative questions and issues, and he will receive and review their monthly church attendance and quarterly financial reports. (These reports are vital to CAD for planning, measuring goals, and setting the budget for the work of our denomination in the U.S.) 

Each District Pastoral Leader will report to and be supported by a Regional Pastoral Leader--Ken Williams in a western region; David Fiedler in a northeastern region; Keith Brittain in a southeastern region and Lorenzo Arroyo in a language-based ‘region’ of Spanish-speaking congregations. These regional leaders will provide administrative support, counsel, and other resources to the District Pastoral Leaders in their region.  

Ministry Development 

CAD will provide ministry development services to WCG church leaders and congregations through a team of ministry developers.  These developers will provide training and consulting in Great Commandment—Great Commission (GC2) disciplemaking ministry in general, together with related equipping in such specialized ministry development concerns as ministry to children, teens, young adults, parents and married couples; church planting; and mediation and reconciliation. Training will be provided through regional conferences as well as through district pastoral network training sessions. We also plan to use media resources such as DVDs, the internet and teleconferences for ministry development.

Ministry developers will include me, Lorenzo Arroyo (who will also be a regional pastoral leader), Randy Bloom (who will also be Church Multiplication Ministries director), Ted Johnston (who will also be Generations Ministries director), and Curtis May (who will continue to be director of the Office of Reconciliation Ministry). Other existing DS’s will be making transitions. Bob Taylor will be retiring from employment as a DS but will continue to serve the denomination in various ways. Bob Persky has transitioned to the pastorate of the Richardson Grace Family Church in the Dallas, Texas, area and Al Barr has become the pastor of the Queens and Manhattan, New York, congregations. We all thank these men and their wives for outstanding service in the past and pray for continued blessings in their new areas of responsibility. 

Forward Together 

This new CAD structure will be phased in, with completion scheduled for spring 2007. Please be patient as we work together to implement the transition in each area. Thank you for your dedication to the ministry and mission of Jesus Christ as it is carried out in the Worldwide Church of God. It is a pleasure to work with you as we continue to advance in the mission to which Jesus has called us. Let's go forward together!

Al Barr, pastor in Queens and Manhattan, NY Bob Persky, pastor of Grace Family Church in Richardson, TX Bob Taylor, to retire Randy Bloom, director of church multiplication ministries Ted Johnston, director of Generations Ministries Curtis May, director of the Office of Reconciliation Ministries

Getting Ready for Church Planting

By Lorenzo Arroyo

Randy Bloom, WCG director of church planting, and Lorenzo Arroyo, district superintendent of Spanish-language churches, attended a Church Planting Boot Camp at Denver Seminary the week of July 17-21.

The seminar was hosted by the Evangelical Free Church of America (EFCA). Randy and I bonded quickly with Bruce Redmond, a seasoned church planter, lead team instructor for the Boot Camp and director of church planting for EFCA. Two other instructors and EFCA church planters also shared their valuable experiences with us. The class was small enough (12-14) to get personal attention and large enough for good interaction among staff and students.

The Boot Camp is an intensive program focused on developing new potential church planters and grooming those who already have practice with new plants. The experience was eye-opening from a Worldwide Church of God perspective. Although WCG has its history of new plants, only recently have we engaged in the nuts and bolts of what effective church planting is all about. The class gave us an opportunity to rub elbows with church planters at all stages of the church planting process. Some of the attendees are in the fourth year of having planted a congregation, with average church attendance now running over 200, while others are just getting started.

The Boot Camp was not just about learning church-planting theory but hearing stories of those in the field. We learned of the hard work and self-sacrifice church planting families make for the advancement of the kingdom of God. They shared their journeys of tears, disappointments and heartaches, as well as miraculous providence, the joy of conversion and the exhilaration of church planting. One teacher used the phrase “crossing the line of faith” to illustrate to the unchurched what it means to accept Christ. After all, according to church-plant experts, church planting is the number one evangelistic method for reaching the lost.

We believe that the training we received was God-sent. The WCG is stepping up to the plate and rolling out a place for potential church planters. Please contact Randy Bloom or one of the team members of our Church Planting Task Force to see how you can answer God’s call, or help out by becoming a prayer partner in our WCG church planting ministry.

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