There are many challenges to ministry in today’s world and having a vital and relevant ministry is even harder. Churches across all denominations face drastic declines in both attendees and financial giving. With this as the background, it is imperative that vital ministries seek out opportunities to grow and engage groups and communities that have previously been overlooked, missed or not involved for other reasons including some theological reasons. With this idea and goal in mind, this essay sets out to examine and design a process by which the Churches of Cherokee, Oklahoma can successfully connect with and minster to the new Hispanic community in Cherokee. Using the pastoral cycle method, a process will be designed in this essay to reach out to, engage and minister to this new and growing community within the town. This essay will explore the four parts of the pastor cycle and how each part of the cycle can be used to study, build and implement a plan of ministry and evaluate this new ministry once it is up and running. Perhaps the best place to begin would be the question: what is the pastoral cycle? The pastoral cycle is a tool for evaluating the practice of ministry. This method of examining or evaluating ministry can be used for a single practice of ministry or evaluating a whole ministry and everything in between. This is a very wide ranging tool to assist minsters, lay people and ministry teams in examining the practices of ministry. The four main pieces of this evaluation are experience, exploration, reflection and action. Experience can be described as the realization of an opportunity to minster to an individual or group. Exploration is the process by which a response is considered for the experience and the analysis... ... middle of paper ... ...rsonal relationships must be addressed for any plan or action to be successful. A commitment, on behalf of the churches and the longer term residents of Cherokee, will be required for this plan and action to have any hope of success. In addition, the local churches must seek to understand a new and vastly different culture and perhaps worship style that is represented within this emerging community. The last key to success would be an approach to this emerging community seeking to understand their unique needs for church, church services and community services and resources. Using the pastoral cycle method a plan has been developed to assist this emerging community in engaging the local churches and to provide this new community a voice in the design and setup of these services and goals. Works Cited Ballard and Pritchard, Practical Theology in Action 2nd edition
While the major thrust of this manual is to help Christians in a nursing home ministry, this final part enlarges the scope a bit to help churches organize to meet the needs of elderly people both inside and outside of nursing homes.
The Native Americans of the southeast live in a variety of environments. The environments range from the southern Appalachian Mountains, to the Mississippi River valley, to the Louisiana and Alabama swamps, and the Florida wetlands. These environments were bountiful with various species of plant and animal life, enabling the Native American peoples to flourish. “Most of the Native Americans adopted large-scale agriculture after 900 A.D, and some also developed large towns and highly centralized social and political structures.” In the first half of the 1600s Europeans encountered these native peoples. Both cultures encountered new plants, animals, and diseases. However, the Indians received more diseases compared to the few new diseases to the Europeans. The new diseases resulted in a massive loss of Native Americans, including the Southeast Indians which had never encountered the new diseases. Three of the main tribes in the southeast were the Cherokee and the Creek. They were part of a group of southeast tribes that were removed from their lands. These tribes later became known as “The Five Civilized Tribes because of their progress and achievements.”
In my paper I will talk about my visit to The Community Church at Murphy's Landing (CCML). I have chosen this particular Church because it is a family church type and my neighbor goes there and she encouraged me to go with her. I went there with my neighbor on April 6, 2014.This church is an appropriate for this assignment because the people there are welcoming me with an open heart and they are willing to help and provide me with information. When I visit the Church’s site I read these words “We know visiting a new church can be intimidating. But, we want to help you to be as comfortable as possible when and if you join us”. The people gather in the church weekly to glorify God in joyful worship. The expressions of worship on CCML take many forms a prayer, a hymn of reverent awe, a guitar ringing with a chorus of praise, or a warm handshake and a welcoming smile. Their weekly services begin at 9:30 each Sunday at church. Also, they have weekly podcast if anyone wants to listen online. They have many types of services for parents, kids and students. People at CCML were so friendly; they gather around me and start welcoming me, one by one. People there introducing themselves to me, one after another and provide me with their contact information and help. Then we start talking about the church services and Christianity in particular. The mission of CCML was knowing, growing and loving. They seek to live out our mission by worshipping together as a local community of believers, growing in spiritual maturity through discipleship, education, and small groups, caring for one another within the context of the larger church body and small groups, and Communicating the love of Christ to our world, both through local outreach and global mis...
In African American Pastoral Care: Revised Edition, Dr. Wimberly spoke about responding to God’s unfolding and continually changing times when dealing with healing and reconciliation. In this revision of his classic book, Dr. Wimberly updated his message by examining current issues in African American pastoral care, counseling, and outreach ministry in the community. Dr. Wimberly reminded us that we need to do more for our members and proposed new pastoral care approaches to the crisis of disconnection. Using his own narrative, he explained and described how pastors and church leaders can claim a new narrative method for reestablishing the African American village. His paradigm for African American pastoral theology is inspiring African Americans.
Welcome to Gospel Spreading Church. (n.d.). Retrieved March 28, 2011, from Gospel Spreading Church: www.http://gospelspreadingchurch.com/
We recently had a church meeting to articulate changes that will affect the church’s future. This chapter came in handy because I was able to engage the congregation by asking the necessary questions to get their buy-in before actually setting the change in stone. Although I ready to implement the change, it was not executed until the congregation saw it the benefits and rewards. This practice is not always the best way, because time may or may not allow it.
advantage of the rich black soil for farming. Corn was their main source of food,
In old, but not so ancient times, native americans populated our land widely with different tribes diverged. One of the most widely known and popular tribes was named the Cherokee tribe and was formed as early as 1657. Their history is vast and deep, and today we will zone into four major points of their culture: their social organizations and political hierarchy, the tribe’s communication and language, a second form of communication in their arts and literature, and the Cherokee’s religion.
It is apparent that the issues are similar at Willow Creek and New Hope, as both have experienced great growth. They are addressing these issues by adding additional services and by assignment of small groups or small ministries to meet their congregation's needs. They have been successful in addressing the issue based on each church's individual needs. Willow Creek has added services to accommodate the service seekers or the un-churched. New Hope attempts to match congregation member's needs through joining auxiliaries or other ministries of the church.
“Reaching Out without Dumbing Down” seems to be constructed for the church leader, elder, or pastor who is considering altering their current, historic worship style for a more modern one that may attract greater numbers of unsaved people. She provides excellent standards to help Pastors and Worship Leaders plan, execute, and evaluate worship services. These same standards provide a great opportunity to educate the church family on the reasons behind the use of certain worship elements. Although written for church leadership, the everyday church member would also benefit from understanding the very concepts that Dawn is directing at God-empowered leaders.
The church must strive to have in place a biblical foundation to discipleship that relates to the millennial generation. All of the churches discipleship efforts should strive to build and foster authentic relationships. We are at a precarious point in the life of the church where the Christian community must come to a conclusion to rethink the efforts to making disciples. “Some (though not all) ministries have taken cues from the assembly line, doing everything possible to streamline the manufacture of shiny new Jesus-followers, fresh from the factory floor. But disciples cannot be mass-produced. Disciples are handmade, one relationship at a time.” In today’s culture the church needs new architects to design a way in which the local church community can foster and build authentic relationships that lead to discipleship.
Young, D. S. (1999). Servant Leadership for Church Renewal: Sheperds By the Living Springs. Scottdale: Herald Press.
After covering the entirety of Lee Vukich and Steve Vandegriff’s book, Timeless Youth Ministry, I arrived to the conclusion that there are timeless principles within the student culture today and that youth workers can successfully minister these students by recognizing these principles. Vukich and Vandegriff provided a window to the life of adolescents. Anyone who reads this book is likely to become familiar with the student culture and what may occur in the future concerning the student ministry. Furthermore, he or she may understand how churches have approached students and how a youth worker should conduct him or herself. In 22 chapters, Vukich and Vandegriff presented an insightful picture of adolescents and their culture,
With this in mind, the following will focus on the spiritual formation process within the Christian community. The concept of Christian community stems from the Bible with the perspective of the body of Christ. The body of Christ is compared to the humane body, a whole comprised of numerous parts; each individual part is required and created by God to form a cohesive whole, no matter believer or non-believer or social status (1 Corinthians 12). Similarly, the spiritual community is also comprised of bountiful parts and can be customized to the individual as the formation. Ashbrook appraises the significance of individuals and community, “Our spiritual formation is designed by God to happen in the context of Christian community, the chu...
The shepherd and sheep relationship is the best illustration for the relationship between pastor and parishioners. When Jesus asked Simon Peter does he love him three times and said to him “Feed my sheep”, the shepherd and flock relationship has been set. Since Jesus is our good shepherd (Jn. 10:11a), he laid out a good example for us to follow - to lay down his life for the sheep. (Jn. 10:11b) Thus, the wellness of both in and out of the parishioners should always be the concern in the pastors’ hearts. Soul care for the people is essential. Christian friendship is the foundation of Christian soul care. Pastoral ministry including preaching, teaching, and worship forms the broad context of pastoral counseling. Pastoral care is within pastoral ministry but broader than pastoral counseling. God’s love is the source and motivation. Within the pastoral care, there are spiritual direction and pastoral