✉️ Newsletter // December 2019

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Merry Christmas from your ECO Synod Staff!

We are grateful to have had another year to serve you and do everything we can to help your unique church flourish. It is a privilege for each of us to be able to encourage you and the life of your congregation, whether it is supporting your church as it takes courageous steps towards your transformation journey, helping your pastor transition well, or if you’ve started seminary courses or are planting a brand new church.

We look forward to helping you take your Flourishing Next Step in 2020 and to seeing what God has in store for you and your church in the coming year!

DECEMBER BLOG

A Flourishing ECO Church Prepares to Launch

By Rev. Dr. Dana Allin

ECO Synod Executive

In working with transforming churches, Paul Borden always starts with three principles (or assumptions) about his understanding of church. The first one is that the church is a living organism and every living organism GROWS and MULTIPLIES. As you know, when our children are born, we take them in to measure height and weight, and we track their progress as compared to other children their age. We make this correlation to the life of the church as well! A healthy church will grow in the quantity and quality of disciples. Usually churches are ready to embrace the concept that healthy things grow. What is more of a challenge for churches is to embrace is the concept that they should also multiply. Churches can become resistant to multiplication for a variety of reasons that usually stem around fear of losing people or resources to church plants.

This year in my newsletter articles I have been focusing on the values and measures of ECO . The last of these measures of a flourishing church is that it “Prepares to Launch”. This measure doesn’t mean that a church only prepares and births a new church, but it is also continually in a state of multiplication. Just like the vast majority of the cells in our body continually go through mitosis where they replicate their DNA to prepare for multiplication, so healthy churches are always in a state of replication.

Ministry Resource Spotlight: Prepares to Launch

Flourishing Church Podcast

Developing A Heart For Church Planting with

Keon Abner

Keon Abner is the lead planter at Legacy City Church (Cleveland, OH) along with his wife Ashley.

Listen to the Podcast

Subscribe on iTunes

The Dandelion Project

(dandelion.church)

The Dandelion Project is a multiplying network of Home Churches who seek to reveal God’s Kingdom wherever we live, work and play.

Visit Website

NATIONAL GATHERING

Merry Christmas to you!

Give yourself and your team the gift that keeps on giving all year long - register for the 2020 National Gathering today!

We can’t wait to see you in Dallas!

www.econationalgathering.org

CALLING ALL ECO AUTHORS!

Have you written one or more books that would benefit the body of

Christ in ECO?

Contact G.P. Wagenfuhr (ECO Theology Coordinator) at greg@eco-pres.org for information on how your books can be displayed at the National Gathering!

ECO AND TPF

Don’t Forget to Order the Complementary Year-End Bulletin Inserts from ECO and TPF!

Remember the gift that leaves a legacy of love! The end of 2019 is quickly approaching, and with it comes the perfect time to remind your congregation that they can both change the lives of others and capitalize on available tax savings. To assist you in these efforts, ECO and TPF are pleased to offer, at no cost to you, a new bulletin insert created to inspire generosity during this special season.

Click the button below to order your free bulletin inserts online. If you prefer not to use the Internet for ordering, and/or have special instructions, please call Martha Ingrum at 800-955-3155 or email her at martha.ingrum@tpf.org.

Order Here

EMERGENCY APPEAL FOR SYRIA FROM THE OUTREACH FOUNDATION

Over the past month, you have seen the troubling news coming from Syria, as Turkey made assaults against the Kurdish forces in the area even as U.S. troops hastily withdraw. Caught in the swath of this conflict, which also involves Russia, are 3 of the 18 Presbyterian congregations in Syria (Qamishli, Hasakeh, and Malkieh) which are a part of the National Evangelical (Presbyterian) Synod of Syria and Lebanon. Over 100,000 Syrians in nearby villages have been displaced in the fighting and the area is now bracing for the forced repatriation from Turkey of over 1 million Syrians.

For the past 8 years, and with your help, The Outreach Foundation has not only supported all these congregations but has made 7 visits during the war, as recently as this past February. Click the button below to find out how you can help provide support and encouragement for our family-by-faith in Syria.

Outreach Foundation

COMMISSIONED LAY PASTOR TRAINING

Reflection on my CLP Journey

By Brad Jenkins

First Presbyterian Church, Harrisonburg, Virginia

My journey toward the nearly yearlong Commissioned Lay Pastor training I just finished has been two decades in the making.

Back in the 1990s, when I was a college student, I divided my time between my two favorite places on campus: the Baptist Student Center and the newsroom of the student newspaper (Yes, I went to classes, too, but much of my personal growth happened in those two spots).

At the BSU, my faith grew and I developed an interest in ministry leadership. At the newsroom of the student newspaper, my interest in writing and storytelling grew too, and I relished the chance to cover breaking news and human-interest stories alike.

When I graduated, I went into full-time journalism work, and yet have felt that call toward greater ministry work. Twenty years later, I am still in Harrisonburg, now working with student journalists at James Madison University, the place where all the wrestling began. Between college graduation and now, I have been part of two other churches besides First Presbyterian in Harrisonburg, our current church. Both were Presbyterian Church (PCA), and the only way to go into full-time ministry with that denomination would have been through going away to seminary and getting an MDiv.