I know that I am a pain in the (pick your part) about this
individual thinking business, but thinking was my business for a while, and
there are dividends to be earned from individual thinking. That said, here are
my thoughts. I don’t expect you to agree, and I am not asking you to. This is input. You are the synthesizers. The
objective is to state concisely in the CIF and expound with potential pastors
about who we are. Do NOT read this if
you have not done your individual thinking.
The Burns Flat Cumberland Presbyterian Church is a small,
family church that has been on the verge of growing for two decades. We have
had some surges, but the losses continue to outnumber the gains. This body is
known for its love. We are involved in our community, and people know it. Some
don’t want to pronounce or spell Presbyterian, so they just call us the love
church.
We are known as Christ’s disciples by our love! Service is
the predominant gift in this congregation. Giving is good for the number of
adults who attend.
Our evangelism—taking the good news to our neighbors and discipling them when they respond—is often stuck in neutral. It is a challenge not unique
to this area, but our challenge nonetheless. We have not given up, but we need
reminders that making disciples and resting in our comfort zones are at odds
with each other.
About 5% of the town’s population attends services here, and
the mission harvest fields sit just across the street from the church building.
We can do more. That said, we are one of two congregations in the Presbytery that
have experienced any growth over the past few decades. Apathy and ambivalence
among the adults we reach are often the most significant obstacles to connecting
many adults in the community with worship and fellowship in this body.
We do reach many children and youth!
We are blessed to have a rotating session with elders who
are both young and old, male and female, and dedicated to bringing glory to
God.
The congregation loves each other—a bunch. Over a decade
ago, our passing of the peace was moved to the end of the service because we
enjoy each other so much. The fellowship of believers continues well after
Sunday morning's last amen.
This is a church body that purchased a building it could not
afford and made it a place of worship and fellowship while without a pastor.
This church body paid off the loan for this building in
record time.
This church body purchased an additional three acres of land
during the worst part of the recession of the first decade of this century.
Trends and tendencies.
·
We like to sing (Y2K Survey)
·
We like to eat (Food with almost everything—early
2000s). Backed off some a few years later.
·
We help with physical needs (Food for the
hungry, school supplies, help with some bills, host for addiction recovery
meetings, host many drug court community service people, help via MA, other
help—last 17 years).
·
We don’t like to sign up but will often show up
for events and ministries.
Our biggest outreach ministries are VBS and the Backpack
Ministry.
For a time, our SEO for the church website attracted a
higher ranking on most search engines than our denomination’s placement. We
received calls from all over the country with CPC questions.
I would characterize the last three decades of pastoral care
like this:
Jim – Coffee Shop Ministry, venturing into established
circles. Letting people know we were here. Coffee Shop.
Duawn—Youth and Fellowship, to include more food in more of
our activities. Walmart ministry for ambulatory elderly for a time. F4
Feasts.
Tom – Missions and Evangelism, to include ongoing challenges
to fulfill our commissions and make disciples. Walk A Block and Walking
Ministry. First overseas mission for this body (X2).
Other turnover notes not related to the CIF.
Domains owned by Tom. See separate page. I expect to
retain the Burnsflat.org domain for a while. The cumberlandpresbyterianchurch.net
domain is scheduled to renew in July of this year, but I plan to release this
domain. I have never transferred a domain to anyone before, but if you want it,
let me know as soon as possible so I can figure out the how part.
The other Cumberland domains don’t expire until 2026, but if
you are interested, let me know. My initial plan is to retain .com and release
.org.
Another option if you have not worked with domain ownership
before is to start from scratch. I’m sure that there wouldn’t be much competition
for BurnsFlatCPC.
