Report 11

Bishop's Quadrennial Report (part 1)

2001-2005

Part 1 | Part 2

Paul Hirschy
Bishop, US National Conference

"Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:4-7).

As I look back over the last four years, I certainly want to rejoice in the Lord for His many blessings. It has been a wonderful privilege to serve my Lord and the Church of the United Brethren in Christ in this role.

The above passage of scripture is an amazing challenge and comfort. The challenge is to rejoice in the Lord always, and the comfort is to know that the Lord is near and the peace of God will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. I am endeavoring to meet the challenge of rejoicing, and I am certainly sharing my testimony about how the peace of God has been my comfort through the health issues of this past four years. My miracle has been that I have not been sick through all of the treatments. I trust that you will join me in praising and thanking the Lord for this immeasurable blessing.

Appreciation for Staff

I have the privilege of working with an admirable staff here in the United Brethren Building. During this four-year period we have had some transition in our staff. Our Finance Director, Marda Hoffman, retired in 2003 and Janet Bilyew was hired as the Finance Director. Mabel Mundy, who had been serving in Global Ministries, moved to the accounting clerk's position that Janet Bilyew had held. Darlene Burkett was hired as the new Administrative Assistant for Global Ministries. Additional staff changes saw Linda Kreiger and Sue Cherry leave our staff.

In 2004 Susan Hoopingarner, Administrative Assistant to the Bishop, accepted an offer with Youth for Christ in Fort Wayne, Ind. She was replaced by Sherry Rupert. Janet Bilyew, after serving a year as Finance Director, accepted a position with the Missionary Church Headquarters in Fort Wayne. Jane Jordan served as a temporary Finance Director until we were able to hire a fulltime Finance Director in the person of Marci Hammel.

• Gary Dilley, Director of Global Ministries.
• Donna Hollopeter, Associate Director of Global Ministries.
• Darlene Burkett, Administrative Assistant for Global Ministries.
• Steve Dennie, Communications Director.
• Sherry Rupert, Administrative Assistant to the Bishop.
• Marci Hammel, Finance Director.
• Mabel Mundy, Accounting Clerk.
• Marilyn Waters, Literature Secretary.
• Phylis Stouder, part-time secretary and literature shipping clerk.

US National Conference Development

The General Conference in 2001 adopted the structure which established each country as a national conference. This meant the US National Conference would develop a different relationship with the international conferences and the US Bishop would no longer be responsible to travel to the international conferences. This report will cover only the ministries of the US National Conference. The work of the Global Ministries Leadership Team and the Global Ministries Director will be our connection with the international conferences.

Following the General Conference in 2001, the US National Conference structure was established around leadership teams. The Bishop recommended the personnel for these teams to the Executive Leadership Team for approval. Each of these four years, the annual report has been formatted around the work of the various leadership and ministry teams. I will carry that format into this quadrennial report. Under the heading "Leadership Groups," I update the work of each leadership team. Then, on this page, I list the members of the various groups. I will try to indicate all of the people who have served in the various leadership teams during the four-year period, since there have been a few changes.

Leadership Groups

Administrative Leadership Team

The Administrative Leadership Team oversees the financial operations of the US National Conference and the operations of the UB Headquarters Building. This team is responsible for overseeing the pension program for ministers and missionaries, the various investments of the National Conference, the development of the annual budget, and of the Ministerial Aid program.

The ALT receives the annual update report on the Ministerial Aid program. As of the end of 2004, there are fifteen individuals still participating in Ministerial Aid. A detailed report at the end of 2004 will be included in the US National Conference notebook.

The ALT approved the increase in the employer contribution under the 403 B plan for pension from 2% to 2.5% for the year 2004. It was not increased for 2005.

The ALT agreed not to charge the college to let the Graduate School of Christian Ministries use space in the United Brethren Building. The college in turn is helping with some of the routine maintenance snow removal and providing internet access. The decision not to charge for the Graduate School of Christian Ministries is based on the understanding that Huntington University underwrites the Graduate School of Christian Ministries program for a significant amount.

Carol Morehead, chairperson of the salary and benefits committee of the ALT, has been instrumental in helping with the staff selection and staff transitions during this quadrennium.

Ed Souers served as chairperson of the Administrative Leadership Team until the fall of 2004, when he was selected as chairman of the Huntington University Board of Trustees. With this additional responsibility, Ed felt that it was appropriate for him to ask to be relieved of the chairmanship of the ALT. The ALT then recommended that Carol Morehead be named as chairperson, and the Executive Leadership Team confirmed Carol's appointment. I appreciate Ed's service as chairperson and I am thankful that Carol is willing to assume this responsibility.

The Administrative Leadership Team also established four sub-teams:

1. Investment Committee.
2. Salary and Benefits Committee.
3. Property and Building.
4. National Budget Committee.

You can see the members of the Administrative Leadership Team and of the sub-teams on this page.

Education Leadership Team

The Education Leadership Team is responsible for policies that affect the work of higher education in the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, USA. All of the members of the team are trustees of Huntington University, which makes them responsible for the oversight of the college along with the rest of the trustees. They are responsible for the ministerial education of the National Conference, and for the oversight of the United Brethren Historical Society.

Since the Education Leadership Team members are trustees of Huntington University, they have been involved in the continuing discussions regarding the concerns of the teachings of Professor John Sanders. This concern has been an issue throughout the quadrennium. The Board of Trustees of Huntington University is working to resolve the situation in a way that is most beneficial for the college and respectful of the concerns of everyone involved in this discussion.

During this quadrennium, Dr. Ray Seilhamer, the Dean of the Graduate School of Christian Ministries, has reported positive growth in the enrollment of the graduate school. The Graduate School added a family counseling program, and at the end of 2004 they approved several additional changes to the course offerings. It is hopeful that these additional changes will continue to enhance the program of the Graduate School and make it more attractive for a greater number of students.

I encourage you to read the very informative report from President G. Blair Dowden, our Director of Education.

The members of the Education Leadership Team are listed on this page.

Global Ministries Leadership Team

With the changes made at the General Conference in June 2001, our missions emphasis is now known as Global Ministries. Many of us will still refer to it as missions, and that is okay. Just be aware that when you hear the term Global Ministries, we are referring to what many of you think of as missions.

With the new international structure, Rev. Gary Dilley, the Global Ministries Director, serves as the liaison with the international countries. Gary does not have the responsibility of conducting the annual conferences when he visits. His role is to build relationships with the international countries and then encourage congregations and individuals in the United States to develop a greater identity with a special need or project in those countries. His office is still in authority over the US mission fields--India, Haiti, and Mexico.

For decades, UB missions was funded by asking people and churches to give to a General Fund. From that General Fund, we sent appropriations to mission fields, paid missionaries, staffed our office, paid office costs, and much, much more. UB people were comfortable with writing a check to General Missions and letting them decide how to use it.

Over the last decade, as in virtually all ministries, donors have become more interested in knowing where their gift is going, and when they do give, they like to designate where there financial gift goes. As a result of that trend, less and less money was coming into the General Fund. This was leading to budget shortfalls and questions of how to best handle the situation.

Generally speaking, this has been one of the areas where major changes have taken place since the decision of the General Conference in 2001. The Global Ministries Leadership Team was facing a significant budget shortfall, which meant they had to reduce the funding for national conferences. Gary Dilley worked very hard to help the national conference leaders understand the reason why funding from the US national church was declining. He also explained the necessary changes needed to make the move to funding projects from each of their national conferences. This has been a challenging process for the national conferences to understand. Gary has done an excellent job helping the leaders realize that their funding would come through special projects. The US National Conference churches have the option of choosing which projects they would like to support. By the end of 2004, this system had begun to work and the international countries were beginning to understand the need to develop projects that churches can support.

The Global Ministries Leadership Team also made the decision to begin requiring our missionaries to raise their own support. This decision has provided greater opportunities for new missionaries to become involved in our missions work. When support was declining, there was no way to add additional missionaries. Now, with individual missionaries raising their support, individuals are stepping up and responding to God's call to serve, and they are willing to raise their own support. This decision is already proving to be a great addition to our missions emphasis.

The Global Ministries Team also decided to discontinue Latin American Ministries as an organization at the end of 2002. This followed the direction of the General Conference in 2001, which instructed us to incorporate cross-cultural churches into existing conferences.

I wish to thank our churches for their continued support of Global Ministries with the new format of underwriting missionary salaries and expenses as well as adopting special projects. We still face the challenge of raising the operating budget for Global Ministries.

Through the work of Global Ministries, we have two countries that are being recommended as national conferences to the General Conference in June of 2005. Mexico and the Philippines are preparing to be received as national conferences upon the approval of the General Conference.

The primary purpose of the Global Ministries Leadership Team is to help local churches participate in Christ's Great Commission and carry out the missionary emphasis of the US National Conference. You will find more specific details in the report of our Global Ministries Director, Rev. Gary Dilley.

The members of the Global Ministries Leadership Team are listed on this page.

Healthy Church Leadership Team

The Healthy Church Leadership Team is responsible for encouraging the development of healthy, growing, and reproducing churches in the US National Conference. Our goal is to have 100 healthy churches by the year 2010.

During this quadrennium, the Healthy Church Leadership Team encouraged local church leaders to use the Growing A Healthy Church training and the Natural Church Development Survey to help them develop a healthy church mindset and to evaluate the degree to which their church is expressing the eight quality characteristics of the Natural Church Development Survey.

Another part of the Healthy Church Leadership Team strategy was to get pastors of healthy churches involved in what we call healthy church clusters. Clusters serve as an accountability group for the pastors and also as a time of training and encouragement to work on a particular area of need in their local church. The other pastors in the cluster serve as a team to encourage and give ideas.

When we started the quadrennium, the Healthy Church Leadership Team estimated that we had 25-30 churches that we would classify as healthy, growing churches. By the end of the quadrennium, the number may have increased another 10 or 15. However, we would like to see a greater number of churches classified as healthy, growing, and reproducing churches. I will talk more about this in the statistical part of this report.

During this quadrennium, the Healthy Church Leadership Team sponsored the Healthy Church Retreat held at the Michindoh Conference Center on two occasions. In the first retreat, Dan Spader presented the basic Growing a Healthy Church seminar and Rev. David Engbrecht from the Nappanee Missionary Church shared some practical insights for pastors. During the second healthy church retreat, Dr. Bob Logan spoke about the importance of coaching in the development of healthy churches.

I want to be very clear that our healthy church emphasis is not dependent on church size. The degree of health that we want to see present in every church is what is important. Yes, many of the larger, growing churches are healthier. As a result, they are seeing more significant growth. It does not follow that all smaller churches are unhealthy.

My contention is that a small church that is healthy will see consistent growth, and we will eventually see an increase in their ministry numbers. So if you are in a small church, you need to start thinking about the quality characteristics of a healthy, growing, and reproducing church in the same way that our larger congregations need to start focusing upon these quality characteristics.

The Healthy Church Leadership Team also established sub-teams to work in two specific areas: church multiplication and youth ministry.

Church Multiplication Ministry Team

The Church Multiplication Ministry Team has been focusing its efforts on helping conferences with assessment and training of new church planters. It has not been the intent of the Church Multiplication Team to plant new churches from the denominational level.

The Church Multiplication Ministry Team has endeavored to focus attention on trying to establish a church multiplication mindset in the US National Conference. It appears that one of the most effective ways to plant churches is from a healthy individual church or a number of healthy churches going together to support and work with a new church plant in a given area.

The Church Multiplication Ministry Team adopted a set of recommended procedures for establishing a new church. These procedures have proven to be effective in other denominations. I hope that all of our future church plants pay attention to these guidelines, procedures, and training opportunities.

Youth Ministry Team

The Youth Ministry Team is responsible to work with youth leaders in the US National Conference. Each year they hold a Youth Pastors Summit, and all youth pastors in the US National Conference are invited to attend. This summit has proven to be a very beneficial experience for the participants.

The Youth Ministry Team has also endeavored to have a newsletter sent during the quadrennium. Toward the end of the quadrennium, they switched from a newsletter to a web page.

As we began the quadrennium, I was very pleased with the number of churches that had added youth pastors to their staff in a fulltime or part-time position. I am disappointed to report that as we near the end of the quadrennium, several of the churches have restructured their staff positions because of financial reasons and eliminated youth pastors from the staff.

This tight financial situation may require the Youth Ministry Team to consider more ways to facilitate volunteer youth leaders in the local church. We do not want to overlook the importance of a dynamic youth ministry in each of our local churches.

The Bible Quiz program is under the supervision of the Youth Ministry Team. Bob and Jolene Tobey serve as the directors for the Bible Quiz program. For those churches who participate, the Bible Quiz program is a valuable part of their ministry. It has had a difficult time attracting new churches, and it seems like each year it is harder to maintain the number of participating churches. The addition of the junior division opened the opportunity for a few more churches to participate.

In the last year of the quadrennium, 2003-2004, the Bible Quizzing program included the following:

• Michigan Conference: 12 senior teams.
• Central Conference: 8 senior teams, 4 junior teams.
• Mid-Atlantic Conference: 4 senior teams, 4 junior teams.

I want to express appreciation to all of those individuals who volunteer to work in Bible Quizzing.

The members of the Healthy Church Leadership Team and of the two subteams are listed on this page.

Women's Ministry Leadership Team

The US National Conference in June of 2001 established a new Women's Ministry emphasis for the US National Conference. The Women's Ministry Leadership Team is not a replacement for the WMF, which continues raising funds specifically for missions. The Women's Ministry Leadership Team is designed to involve women in areas of activity and interest beyond missions. The churches that have WMFs will continue the WMF to support the Global Ministries emphasis. Those churches may choose to adopt additional women's ministry projects in other areas through the emphasis of the Women's Ministry Leadership Team.

Churches that have no WMF may choose to start a whole new women's emphasis in their church. We have tried to minimize the conflicts between the WMF and Women's Ministries. Donna Hollopeter, who is on staff with Global Ministries, also heads up the missions emphasis for the Women's Ministry Leadership Team. Donna has been instrumental in helping to communicate with the WMF and Women's Ministry Leadership Team issues that have helped prevent some of the conflicts which could have arisen.

The Women's Ministry Leadership Team is focusing attention on the importance of women's ministry in the local church. I am pleased with their positive attitude and direction. They are promoting the healthy church training for women, and I think it will be a definite asset for developing a healthy church mindset in the local church.

The members of the Women's Ministry Leadership Team are listed on this page.

Commission on Ministry

In 2001, the US National Conference asked Bishop Hirschy to appoint a Commission on Ministry. You can see their names on this page.

The Commission on Ministry discussed the importance of licensing and ordination procedures for the US National Conference. One challenging issue was how to deal with ethnic pastors who have not had all of the schooling that Anglo pastors would have had here in the United States. The Commission on Ministry discussed this several times throughout the quadrennium.

I am happy to report that the Commission on Ministry has had some very profitable progress in addressing the issue of licensing pastors who are not fulfilling the requirements in our present Discipline. The Commission is recommending a solution to the US National Conference in 2005: the establishment of an accredited tract and a non-accredited tract for licensing and ordination.

It is also being recommended that in 2005, the Commission on Ministry become one of the regular leadership teams of the US National Conference.

I want to express my thanks and appreciation to all of the members of the various leadership teams and the Commission on Ministry for their excellent service during this quadrennium.

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