Thanks be to God, the Evangelists Service Team (ST) just finished a joint meeting in LA with the Elders, Teachers, Women and Chairmen Service Teams. Though there are many challenges before us, we definitely made tons of progress on some very important issues. Take a moment and read down the list. We have much to be thankful for. God is certainly working among us as we collaborate and cooperate in His name.
1. The Evangelists, Elders and Teachers ST endorsed a proposed Christian Professional Leadership Conference for our working professionals. Elders and Evangelists are working with respected Christian Professionals to plan this event. The Louis’ and Lusks will be helping and keeping the Evangelists ST informed.
2. We agreed upon a much needed conference in Brooklyn, NY. We will be gathering in September for a brand new type of Delegates meeting. For three days we will include the traditional Delegates voting and concerns, but we will spend most of our time on planting, watering and seeking God’s blessings in growing our churches. In the next few weeks the 2020 Regional Family Leadership (RFL) subcommittee (Taliaferros, Williams, and Ortegas) will start working on the program pulling other committee members in to help. Be praying for God to bless our gathering. Thanks Sam P, Steve K, and Jim Brown for your work securing the venue and the New York City Church for hosting us.
3. The International Youth and Family Conference (ICYFM) in Brooklyn, NY. Thanks to the Louis, Poctas, Laings and the Y&F Service Team for setting the table for a great banquet of help for our families around the world in September in Brooklyn. Great job.
4. HOPE worldwide: A new funding strategy for HOPEww. Though this is not a formal proposal, we are excited about helping HOPEww to raise $1.5M this year from the ICOC for their Intl Day of Giving. HOPE will be calling around to ask the churches for input and the goal for their donation this year. We will help with the follow through. Randy Jordan, John Causey and Roger Lamb traveled to San Antonio for a one day meeting to map out strategy to help the church and HOPEww work closer together and to help with fundraising. We are excited that God has blessed the ICOC first class charity to serve the poor and we believe more disciples want to give to the offering in the fall.
5. A new relationship with the ICOC. HOPEww initiated a new alignment committee that has been hard at work (Bruce Williams has represented the evangelists committee) to help HOPEww move closer to the ICOC in our partnership. HOPEww truly desires that HOPE be an ICOC charity, and not just the ICOC’s charity of choice. While this will take time, and must be carefully mapped out, we appreciate the hard work of this alignment committee to help the two get closer.
6. Global Missions Strategy and Mission Societies. An excellent Global Missions Strategy was presented to help us reach Jesus’ Great Commission. Many of our Regional Families of Churches will begin forming Mission Societies right away. Others will be assessing their own geographic situation. This concept that is working well in many parts of the world is spreading to more world regions. Thanks to Doug and his subcommittee for the outstanding help. They will keep us posted on the progress.
7. The HOPE Youth Corps proposal was vetted and approved by the Evangelists, Elders and Teachers and should be passed easily in NY. It will help to raise HOPE’s profile and begin to get more kids back in the incredible Youth Corps.
8. 2016 Continental Summits are moving ahead. For N. America, Oklahoma City and St Louis will be sending info to the N. American delegates, who will in turn be casting their votes by May 15th.. We should be announcing our North American site by June 1. This great event will also host the International Leadership Conference that year. It will be overseen by the Evangelists and Elders Service Teams.
9. We approved Jamaica as the host site for our 2015 Delegates Meeting. Mike Fontenot will communicate and coordinate with the Caribbean churches to insure an awesome event. This will be held in conjunction with the Caribbean Evangelism Conference. The Delegates Meeting is designed to be hosted in different parts of the world to connect our leaders with local disciples.
10. All our subcommittees did a great job. We’ve already mentioned Global Missions, the 2020 RFL Development, and the Youth and Family subcommittees. Sam P and Mike F are co-chairing the Leadership Development subcommittee. They plan to help us raise up more and better leaders in our churches.
11. The Delegates Subcommittee will be kicking into high gear to handle all the important business at the upcoming Delegates Meeting in NYC. Shawn and AT co-chair this group. Thanks!
The truth is we had a very productive meeting. This stuff is going to help our churches. Committee work is like changing the oil or fixing the brakes on your car. Sure, we’d all rather be driving around, but sometimes you have to pull over and do some maintenance. I also loved our discussions on helping large churches, raising up leaders, and helping hurting regions. Some great messages were given as well. Thanks again to all the committee members for their hard work. Thanks to the Elders, Teachers, Women and Chairmen for the teamwork. May God bless us in all the areas he wants us to go.
Mike Taliaferro Chairman, Evangelists Service Team
