CSI Pizza Party Follow-Up

First, an update for those who may not know and to explain the gap in my postings on this blog. About an hour after I posted the previous blog we received news that my father-in-law had passed away. He had been in failing health for years so it was not a total shock. The nursing home staff where he resided found him in his bed and he had just died so we did not realize that his passing was imminent. He was a godly man who had faithfully served in a jail ministry for almost 30 years so he was ready to go home to be with his Lord and previously deceased spouse.
Because of the death in our family I was unable to present for the CSI Pizza Party. The Transition Team led the event very, very well without me. I knew they would! The following is the report that I received from the team about the evening.
Everyone enjoyed as much pizza as they wanted. The team then sent the teens and youth sponsors out with about 10 leftover pizzas to give them away in the neighborhood around the church. This was just one more component in our efforts to improve our "servant evangelism". More will be shared in the next post about servant evangelism at First Wesleyan.
Lisa Herman shared the conclusions from the congregational survey. These conclusions were given in the previous post on this blog. The congregation had gathered around the tables in small groups for discussion. People had been assigned to tables by a random draw of names from a bowl. The groups were given the opportunity to reflect and discuss the findings from the survey.
Once this discussion was concluded the groups were instructed to brainstorm on ways that we as a congregation could do a better job of reaching out into the community around us. All of the ideas were written down by the team member at each table so that the team could compile a master list to present to our church board.
As the team is concluding our work on the current task of "determining our congregational identity" and preparing to move to our next task of "embracing the new pastor and our future" the team is working on a preliminary church profile before we take a much deserved Christmas break. The team will do enough of this next task so that we can present a church and pastor profile to the church board by March 1st so that they can begin the search process. But the team must also work on the last task of "examining leadership and decision-making concerns" before the church elections in the spring and the team's intentional interim assignment is completed.