How We Do Ministry

We had our first Church Council meeting last week at Hope UMC and I started the meeting off with a document of how I hope and desire to do ministry at Hope. You could say that these are my ministry values. There are likely a few ideas that I will add later, but I wanted to share them with you.

1. Prayerfully- We can do nothing without covering it in prayer. As a leader, I am challenging you and myself to be committed to praying for our church, our leaders, our community, and our world on a daily basis. “Pray without ceasing.” 1 Thessalonians 5:17

"God does nothing except in response to believing prayer." John Wesley

"No learning can make up for the failure to pray. No earnestness, no diligence, no study, no gifts will supply its lack." E.M. Bounds

2. Excellence- In everything that we do as a community, we must give our very best. We should not settle for a half baked plan, idea, event, or worship service. We need to strive for excellence in every facet of ministry. Excellence is an attractive quality!

3. Passionately- Our faith is caught as much as it is taught. In all we do, we will seek to do it with passion because we are passionately in love with God because of the salvation we’ve received through Jesus Christ. Why would anyone want to be part of something that we are not passionate about?

4. Innovation- The world around us is constantly changing through innovation. As a church, we will strive to be innovative in everything that we do. We have the life changing love of Jesus Christ to share and we should be looking for new ways to share it. We will not give into the temptation to say, “We’ve never done it that way before.” Money is not an issue when it comes to innovation as creativity is heightened when resources are few.

5. Evaluation- We will be constantly evaluating all our ministries, events, and outreaches to see if they are fulfilling their purpose. In order to achieve excellence, we must be willing to examine the effectiveness of what we are doing. This will require an open heart to receive evaluation and a gentle spirit in giving it.

6. Vision- We will be working on refining, defining, and discerning God’s vision for Hope Church. This vision will guide who we are as a Church and where we spent our energy and resources. Once a vision is established, we will remain focused on the vision.

7. Accountability- We are a community connected by our relationship with God. We are a community who is striving to walk in the light- to live as Jesus lived. We will create an atmosphere of encouragement and accountability in our personal walk with God- and in the ways our church communicates our faith. At all times, we will seek to choose words that build up rather than tear down. “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” Proverbs 27:17

8. Freedom to Fail- certainly we don’t want to fail, and will not plan to fail, but we will be free to try new adventures without the fear of failure because we know that even if we fail, we will learn more about ourselves, our church, our faith, and our God. We will not allow a fear of failure to paralyze us from action.

Your comments and thoughts?  What would you add to the list for your ministry values?