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Vision 2019

Christ Presbyterian Church

cpcoxford.org

I want you think for a moment about the letters of Paul. In each and every letter, he begins by going through statements about WHO he his and WHAT God has made his people to be. Only after firmly establishing their identity does he ever work at giving them instruction on what to do. That’s what I want to do today: talk about who we are. Organizational guru Patrick Lencioni says that organizations are healthy only when they are clear about who they are AND when they have worked that clarity throughout their

• rganization, or what he calls “alignment.”

Since I arrived this summer, the leadership of this church has been working to formulate a way of talking about the values and mission of this church that is Biblical, coherent, and transferrable. What we’ll talk about today is the fruit of that work. Mind you, none of this discussion represents any CHANGE in the church’s mission or direction. Rather, it’s NAMING our identity so we can talk more clearly about how to accomplish this mission.

Vision 2019

PURPOSE

WHO WE ARE WHAT WE LOVE HOW WE ACT WHAT WE DO

PRINCIPLES POSTURE PASSION

My intention is to help us know what the Bible calls us to be generally speaking and what our leadership is convinced we NEED to be given our history, our location, and

• ur future. All together, we refer to these topics as our “philosophy of ministry.”

Think of it this way:

• how do you talk about Christ Pres?
• When people ask you about your church, what do you say?
• What do you love the most about our fellowship here?

Every member of this church ought to be able to answer those questions or else we really aren’t able to do effective evangelism and ministry among this community. Who are we as a church? What do we believe God has called us to do. I’d like to answer that question by identifying FOUR headings under which we are going to group our approach to ministry: OUR PURPOSE OUR PRINCIPLES OUR POSTURE OUR PASSION What do I mean by these headings? Well:

• Our purpose answers the question “Who are we?” What is our purpose at the

most fundamental level? Why are we here at all?

• Our principles answer the question “What do we love?” What topics do we return

to most often as a church? What do we “harp” on here?

• Our posture answers the question “How do we act?” What is distinctive about

how God has been at work among us to create our flavor, our vibe?

• Our passion answers the question “What do we do?” What is the specific mission

God has uniquely gifted US to do? What can we do that most can’t?

PURPOSE

Christ Presbyterian Church seeks to be a HOME for those who have found HOPE in the Gospel and a place of HEALING for the world.

Let’s focus on our Purpose for a moment. For the last two years, you have heard the leadership of this church present to you a statement about what makes our church tick that goes like this: But where did that come from? Is it just a marketing tool to say something religious about our gatherings?

• No. This purpose has been worked over and thought through. Let’s do some

work on where we got this language.

God brings glory to himself Creation Fall Redemption Consummation

Fall

Broken Horizontal Relationship

CHURCH (HOME)

Broken Vertical Relationship Kingdom And Image Bearers Biblical Storyline

CROSS (HOPE) God’s Mission H E A L I N G

CLICK 1: The first question any church needs to ask is, “What is our reason for being?” What is ANYTHING’s reason for being? Why is there “something” rather than “nothing” in the universe? We answer that question by saying this: the universe exists as the theater for the glory of God. We are who we are because HE is actively bringing glory to himself. All of our work is done for, to, and by his

• grace. This is the ultimately BIG PICTURE of life…the glory of God.

CLICK 2: So when God decided to enact this purpose, he did so by fashioning a theater, a realm…or what the theologians call “a kingdom.” This was the place where God was going to reveal his glory, but he would do so through special creatures that were created “in his image,” special creations that would uniquely bear his glory to the whole universe. CLICK 3: What follows was, to put it simply, a story. Events took place that laid out in big story arcs that would become a pattern for all stories to follow: Creation, Fall, Redemption and Consummation was the trajectory of every Bible story from that time forward. CLICK 4: But by far the most cataclysmic of events was the fall. This was when man pulled himself

• ut of alignment with God’s good creation. Two things resulted.

CLICK 5: First, there was a broken vertical relationship with God. You know this from Genesis 3 because man HID from God. He’s guilty. He’s estranged from him. CLICK 6: Second, there was a broken horizontal relationship with each other. You know this from Genesis 3 because the man and the woman know they are naked. That means that there was shame that drove them apart from each other. CLICK 7: Well, God’s answer to the alienation existing between him and his people is the Cross of

• Christ. THAT is our only HOPE. The Cross is not good advice, it’s good NEWS. This is what we

proclaim week in and week out here. It is the power of God to salvation, etc. CLICK 8: But God’s answer to the shame that separates and harms his people is an institution he’s building called the CHURCH. And the gates of hell won’t prevail against it. If God is our Father, then the Church is our mother, said the old church father. Nurturing, protecting, teaching, loving…just like a good mother. THIS is the “homey feel” that so often characterizes Christ Pres in our community. CLICK 9: But there’s more, our HOPE and our HOME are not just for US. If we are to live the way in which God wants us to live, we have to be about HIS mission. What is that mission? To fix the world from the effects of sin and darkness. In other words, our purpose HAS to include an “outward look” to our community so that we can be a source of healing for the world. Hence, the HEALING.

Vision 2019

PURPOSE

WHO WE ARE WHAT WE LOVE HOW WE ACT WHAT WE DO

PRINCIPLES POSTURE PASSION

So that’s our purpose: we preach a HOPE that formed a HOME and began a HEALING. But what about the Principles? What do we mean by those?

PRINCIPLES

HOPE HOME HEALING

THE GOSPEL THE CHURCH THE KINGDOM

Well, begin with our three words: Hope, Home, and Healing. Each of these headings correspond to a HUGE Biblical topic that form our preoccupation, these are our big ideas, the things we harp on. There are topics that everyone should know and become committed to after just a short time as a member of our church. What are they? HOPE- The Gospel HOME- The Church HEALING- The Kingdom These topics should become consistent topics of conversation, understood by each and every member to be conversant with their lost neighbors with and helping to organize how we teach the Bible’s view of ministry.

Vision 2019

PURPOSE

WHO WE ARE WHAT WE LOVE HOW WE ACT WHAT WE DO

PRINCIPLES POSTURE PASSION

So you can see how the purpose and the principles are closely related and

• interconnected. Two ways of expressing the same thing, but for different

purposes. What about “posture”?

POSTURE

Biblical Hospitable Celebratory Incarnational Campus Aware Culturally Engaged

Remember a “posture” has to do with “how we ACT.” These are our behaviors or the vibe we put off to the community. They represent the mode of our ministry or how it’s

• packaged. Let me give you some that we’ve arrived at:

BIBLICAL- you may not realize it, but CPC is distinct in this community for our commitment to Scripture. We believe that God’s word is really all that we have to say to any of you. We’re not here to host the Curt Presley Show or the Les Newsom Show, but faithful exposition of God’s Word applied to every area of life. HOSPITABLE- Christ Pres sees our ministry as an outgrowth of Biblical welcome, inviting people into this fellowship and enfolding them in loving ways. Caring for them. CELEBRATORY- we LOVE to throw parties at CPC. If there’s something going on, when in doubt, let’s celebrate that. It’s a universal truth that you always get more of whatever you celebrate in life. We want to cheer each other on to love and good deeds here. INCARNATIONAL- That’s a fancy Bible word that simply means, we want to show up in people’s lives. We don’t want to do ministry from the cheap seats, boycotting this and “taking stands” against that. Instead, we want to be present in Oxford in a way that we can be salt and light to the community. CAMPUS AWARE- There are a lot of students in Oxford. Half of our community to be

• exact. That means that we have to minister in a context that always keeps them in
• mind. Sometimes that’ll mean reaching out specifically to them. Other times it means

participating with RUF and IV in reaching out to campus. CULTURALLY ENGAGED- By this we mean that we have a view of life that is determined to interact with the culture around us, not run away from it. We want to be a place that engages the arts, sports, education, economics, social change…all from the perspective of a Bible world and life view that sees Jesus Lordship over every area of life.

Vision 2019

PURPOSE

WHO WE ARE WHAT WE LOVE HOW WE ACT WHAT WE DO

PRINCIPLES POSTURE PASSION

So our posture is a vital way of maintaining a shared sense of identity as a church. Finally, we need to talk about our “passion.”

PASSION

Acts 2:42-47

Worship Fellowship Teaching Evangelism

Mercy

I hope you notice that each characteristic is getting slightly more specific as we move along. Our purpose is the broadest way in which we speak of who we are. Our passion is the

• narrowest. In other words, we need to ask “what has God asked US to do that is unique from

what he’s asked other Bible believing churches in our community to do?” This is where most churches get lost. Because there are TWO things to remember here: first, there are Biblical mandates for what a church MUST be in order to consider itself at church AT ALL. Acts 2 gives us FIVE of those things:

• The first church worshiped together: they participated in “the breaking of the

bread” which is a reference to the Lord’s Supper

• They had fellowship together: they devoted themselves it says in vs 42, “to

the fellowship.” This is a deep desire to connect with one another in our union with Christ.

• They were a teaching community: verse 42 says they “devoted themselves to

the Apostles teaching.” They were learning together.

• They were an evangelistic community: vs 47 says that the Lord added to their

number day by day those who were being saved.

• Finally, they were a community of mercy ministry. These people were selling

their goods so that no one among them were in any need. It’s very easy to be misunderstood here so let me say this clearly: if you don’t have all of these

• perating in your church, then you’re not fully a Biblical church. Full Stop.

But we need to ask a DIFFERENT question when we talk about our “passion” because church planting experts will tell you that tho these features need to be present in any Biblical church,

• ne or often times TWO features will stand out. They will be what we might call “our first foot

forward” to a community. Even beyond that, these features end up being the WAY in which you pursue and understand the other three or four. You discover this passion by looking at the nexus of three things: a) the history of your church, b) the character of your pastoral staff and c) the needs of the community around you. After months of discussion and prayer about these things, the leadership of this church has identified our two “first feet forward” as…

PASSION

Acts 2:42-47

Fellowship Teaching

Fellowship and Teaching. Why? Ask anyone in our community about our church and they will tell you that we are a group of people who love each other well and have a deep sense of

• community. Ask our deacons: we can’t even clear out the church for a full

HOUR after worship is over. That’s rare for a community of people. The good news is that fellowship as a passion can be harnessed to form a way to reach

• ut vitally to the community around us. More on that to come.

But second, we realize that we are a teaching community. Some of that has to do with the fact that we are Reformed and Presbyterian. Those two descriptors are known (and I think fairly) as somewhat academic traditions. We are the “explainers” in worldwide Christianity. We hold Jesus’ church accountable to maintain the integrity of the Bible and foundation fo the Gospel and the person of Jesus and the glory of God. It’s also to do with the fact that we have been blessed by people who love teaching. Curt, Melvin, Scot and Susan laid such a foundation that when people attend this church, they expect to be served MEAT. That’s a passion of our that we want to harness to form a way to reach the community around us. Please don’t hear me say that we are going to focus on these two attributes TO THE EXCLUSION of the others. That’s not what we’re saying. What this means is that Fellowship and Teaching become the MEANS by which we pursue the other emphases. How have we conceived of our mercy ministry? We insisted that those we help come and be a part of our fellowship. So they can HEAR God’s word. How have we pursued and taught evangelism in this church? We encourage people to “bring their friends” when they do so they can HEAR God’s Word and experience the sweetness of this fellowship . So we’re not talking about avoiding anything by “naming” our emphases. We are talking about working towards clarity of our mission in this community.

PASSION

Acts 2:42-47

Fellowship Teaching

CPC Oxford seeks to reach, train, and grow maturing believers by encouraging healthy spaces for rich fellowship.

So we fashioned this statement as a way of talking about what our church DOES: See the teaching part in the first part of the sentence. The second part summarizes our love of fellowship.

Vision 2019

PURPOSE

WHO WE ARE WHAT WE LOVE HOW WE ACT WHAT WE DO

PRINCIPLES POSTURE PASSION

So there you have it.

• We have talked about who we are and called it our purpose
• We have talked about our favorite topics and called it our principles
• We have talked about our behaviors, our vibe and called it our posture

towards the community

• We have talked about what we want to focus on as a church and called it
• ur passion

My dream is for these topics to make it into the water supply of Christ Pres. It’ll be taught at each Inquirer’s Class. It’ll be present in all of our publications going forward. It’ll be referred to in every training opportunity we have for new teacher and new staff. It’ll be a grid that we operate from when we teach. Our goal is clarity throughout every program we offer here and alignment with these Biblical concepts. We want to be clear and consistent so that we are prepared for what God has in store for us ahead.

Vision 2019

WHERE ARE WE GOING?

BUt what about 2019? I thought we were going to talk about what’s unique about THIS year? Well, we are…

Vision 2019

WHERE ARE WE GOING?

SMALL GROUPS OFFICER TRAINING INQUIRERS CLASS TRANSITION TEAM VOLUNTEERS

When we ask the question about what we want to accomplish this coming year, the staff got together in the last two months and wrote down some goals for ourselves to talk about what we want to grow in through the coming

• months. So I thought I’d share with you what the leadership has guided me on for where want to go this year.

(Wanna do some good? Grab a staff member and ask them how YOU can help them achieve their goals this year!) First, we want to develop a coherent plan for small groups: So many church management books talk about churches of our size that we HAVE to do small groups well. The women’s ministry already has so much work done in this area, we want to multiply that success throughout the church. This will be seen in two areas: men’s ministry and fellowship groups. Our men’s ministry is going to be starting some new initiatives in the coming months. Stay tuned. Our fellowship groups have gotten unwieldy so we are trying to preserve the best of them while updating them with some fresh perspective. Second, we are in need of new officers: Today, we have 6 elder and 6 deacons. That’s no where near what you need for a church of over 500 people. Therefore in February, we are going to be taking nominations for elders and deacons. There’ll be much more information to come in the days ahead, but we are convinced that God has raised up certain individuals among all of his churches that are gifted to help oversee the church’s spiritual life (elders) and oversee the material need of her members (deacons). To be clear, he has already prepared many of you. We just need to identify and train you. Then, in accordance with the Bible and our church’s book of order, we will put those qualified men in front of you to determine if they are fit to represent you as leadership in this church. Stay tuned. Third, we are streamlining our Inquirer’s Class: Our hope is to have the pathway to membership into Christ Pres perfectly clear from the moment someone walks in the door. Why? Because we think being a member of a church is a really big deal. You need it! So we have solidified dates for future classes and streamlined the process into 5 classes followed by the same 5 classes right behind to cover any “make up” classes you might need. Why do we do all this? Because joining a church is, in one sense, inviting a group of religious people into your business. It’s something that you don’ need to take lightly. So we try to prepare people for it as much as possible. Fourth, we need a Transition Team to form for our move to the new building: There is no way to overstate how much of a challenge it’s going to be to navigate this move without wanting to kill each other. So many opinons and perspectives in one place is going to require a LOT of leadership and designated authority to keep us calm throughout. We are going to need someone to remind us that the WORST possible thing we could say after moving into the new building is something like, “Wow, we spent all this money and we don’t have a ….” We need a wedding team assembled. We need facilities team assembled to talk about cleaning and maintenance. We need a groundskeeper team to make sure our facility looks good. We need a Business team to help us manage the finances. Finally, we need to work on our Volunteers: The staff has set a goal to increase our volunteer involvement in 2019 by 50%. How? First, we need to make it EASY to get involved in serving in the church. Second, we need to communicate about where we need help and when. Third, we need to do a better job expressing how thankful we are for you when you do serve. This was the whole goal for the engagement surveys.

Vision 2019

UPDATED RESOURCES

So that’s where we’re heading this year and what we’d like to see. Next year at this same time, we’re going to put this same slide up and see how we did. But I want to focus for a moment on two new resources that we wanted to introduce to you to help us along in these goals. The first I am overjoyed about.

My Church Center App We finally have a church app for your phones. You can search right now on your favorite app store on your phone an app called “My Church Center.”

My Church Center App

• Get Directions and Service Times
• Make Donations to Church Funds
• Manage Small Group Involvement
• Sign Up for Conferences and Events

Here’s the logo for the app so you make sure you get the correct one. As soon as you download the app, it’ll ask you for your location using a ZIP

• code. Once you put that in, you’ll find CPC as one of the choices of churches.

Input your email address, confirm it, and you’ll have full access to the app. What does this app do?

• It helps with directions and service times for visitors
• It is a donation management tool for you to give AND access your giving

records at any time, straight from your phone.

• It’s a small group app that keeps you informed of all the groups you’re a

part of and when and where they’re meeting and who’s in charge.

• It’s a sign up spot for conferences and events as well.

Let’s take a look:

On the opening screen you’ll see the picture of the new church. That may get updated soon with our new logo so we can maintain a sense of unity across the church’s frontward face. There’s our purpose on the front page along with quick links to call, email or get directions to the church. Notice some of the features here:

At the top of the screen you’ll see a little Profile Icon. Click on that and you can help us keep track of your information. If you change addresses, if your kids get a cell phone, if you’d care to help us know your birthday and anniversary, you can do it all straight from the app.

Take a look at the bottom of the app for its main functionality. You’ll see 4 tabs at the bottom: HOME, GIVE, GROUPS, and EVENTS: Let’s go through each of these for a quick peek into what it’ll do.

First, take a look at the Give tab: It opens with a simple interface to input a donation. Let’s put in $100.

And then click next.

From this screen you can do so much

• Choose A Fund: General or Building
• Choose A Frequency
• Choose A Payment Method
• Bank Draft preferable to Credit Card
• Choose to cover processing fee or not
• For donations over $500, please use

bank draft

• Review Donation

First you can choose a “fund” to donate to: right now the only thing available is GENERAL or BUILDING Choose a frequency, or how often you want to automate this donation: one time, weekly, every other week, monthly, or twice monthly. Choose a payment method: you can choose a bank account OR a debit/credit card. There are fees associated with each mobile donation you make. For a credit card, it’s 2.3% of your donation. For a bank transfer, it’s .25 cents no matter what the size of the donation. So, clearly, a bank draft is preferable to a credit card. However, if you want to streamline your donation, you can click the small circle to cover the fee in your donation. So instead of $100, I would be drafted $100.25 from my bank account. Setting up your bank account is a multi step process that we strongly encourage you to do. All donations feature the latest in security features. But if you’re looking for a guide, any donation over $500 should have a bank draft attached to it. This really helps us be good stewards of your donations to the church. Once you click “next” then you’re ready to review your donation and finalize it. So EASY!! Now, why are we doing this? For some, this feels a bit too automated for the heart that it takes to be faithful to give to God’s work in this church. I get that. But there are so many ways in which we automate the rest of our lives to be faithful. Like alarm clocks to keep us from sleeping in and being lazy. When your giving is consistent and not subject to forgetful minds and reluctant hearts, it makes our cash flow and budgeting so much easier to manage. This isn’t for everyone, but for many of you, there’s going to be some real blessing that comes from this capability.

The next tab is the “Groups” Tab. There’s lots of things you can from this point:

• Find a small group to join
• Find groups you’re already signed up

for

• Find information about when and

where your next meeting is

• Find information about others in your

group

Eventually (not just yet) you’ll be able to sort through any small group that YOU’VE signed up for. You’ll be able to find a small group to join (including fellowship groups eventually). You’ll be able to access information about when and where your next meeting is. And you’ll be able to find information and contact numbers for others in your group (as long as the leader has agreed to release it).

The last tab is the Events tab: This is one of the best feature of the app.

• See relevant information about

events

• Sign up for events
• Pay for events you’re attending

From here you can gather all the relevant information about times, dates and registration for trips and weekend events. AND, even better, you can now PAY for your kids conference straight from the

• app. No more having make a mad dash up to the church to give Scott his

check for junior’s registration to RYM. (Partial payment and scholarships can be managed through the app as well.)

Vision 2019

Christ Presbyterian Church

cpcoxford.org

We’re so excited about the new church app and want you ALL to download it right now and start making use of it. But there’s one last thing I want to introduce you to before we have a time of questions and responses.

Vision 2019

CPC Oxford Branding Project

And that is our branding project. A small group of us in the leadership and staff have been working the last few months with a company out of Memphis to develop a logo for our church that reflects something of who we are and what we want to be.

CPC Oxford Branding Project

What we’ve had…

Take a look tho first at where we’ve been and what we’ve had. Honestly, it’s a great logo, but it lacks something of the character of who we really are. You logo is the front face of your ministry to the community. The thing they’ll likely see first before anything else. So you want that logo to have some of your DNA in it.

CPC Oxford Branding Project

So we had a great process. We had numerous meetings where the graphic design artist listened very carefully to what we wanting and pulled together colors and designs that reflected who we are as a church.

CPC Oxford Branding Project

Our New Logo…

In the end, the leadership of the church selected the following design for our CPC’s brand:

So here you have it. Notice a few features of the logo:

• first, there is a Cross at the center, reflecting our HOPE in the Gospel

alone.

• Second, the shape of outer rim is that of a HOME, a nod to our love of the

Church.

• third, the layers in the logo reflect Movment not only inward, but upward as

we advance the kingdom to bring about this HEALING. Not only that, but the logo vaguely resembles the front tower of the new church when it’s built, so there’s an added feature there as well.

Our hope is that you start to see this logo everywhere. In our paper projects we send out, In our social media accounts, On our front doors when the new building is built. Everywhere where you see CPC, you’ll have an opportunity to talk about what we are as a church. THINK ABOUT THAT!

Vision 2019

Christ Presbyterian Church

cpcoxford.org

So that’s where we’re going. It’s my intention to do this event every single January for the duration of my time as your pastor. We want to so badly to be good stewards of the resources you have given us to conduct the services of this church. The least we can do is keep you aware

• f what we’re doing and why we’re doing it.

Let’s have a time of Questions if there are any…