Mission Action Plan 2010

Bible verse for all six churches during this year

Joshua 1:9 (New Living Translation)

This is my command - be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

Prayer for all six churches during this year

Lord God, you have called this church to reflect the light of Jesus to those in this parish. Lord God, you are calling this church to join other churches now in ministry and mission. May we in faithfulness in this place bring others into that love of Jesus and may we in faith join hands with these other churches, not knowing where the future will take us, but knowing only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

St Lawrence Church Mission Statement – what we are about

We are a welcoming community of people bound together by a common faith in God as revealed in Jesus Christ, our Lord. With the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we are dedicated to celebrating God's love, sharing our faith, and serving the needs of others.

St Lawrence Church Vision Statement – what we want to do this year

In faith in Jesus to grow the congregation in faith and number; to develop opportunities and consolidate ministry.

To get to be where we want to go this year, we need every member -

· to take seriously Christ’s call to ‘make disciples’. Not simply the reality of welcome that we give, but more particularly the relationships that we make to bring people to know Jesus.

· to take seriously their call to know Christ as well as to make Christ known. Our growing in the faith and our confidence in sharing our faith.

· to take seriously their place in the fellowship and how they can, by what they do, support and strengthen the Body of Christ in this place, regardless of generation and worship style.

Caring for God’s people in church and parish

Pastoral Care Ministry Team

· With outside diocesan help the team to be given a fresh impetus during the summer to take it forward in this new stage of its life now that the team is fully established and involved in a number of avenues of pastoral care.

· To liaise with appropriate bodies so as to be able to take on more referrals to care for isolated individuals in the village.

· To re-engage with having a focal point in church for prayer and requests

Caring Links

· To establish fully this pattern of care for the congregation before Easter.

Fellowship Ministry Team

· To draw more people into the team so as to share in the organising of refreshments and social events.

Equipping God’s people to serve through the church

Ministry Support Team

· To offer a diocesan course on worship and liturgical leadership that refreshes all those who are Eucharistic Ministers and worship leaders. (This to be opened up for anyone else interested across the wider benefice.)

· To seek to bring in two new people into the Ministry Support Team.

· In conjunction with our stewardship campaign, to encourage all in the fellowship to take advantage of the numerous ways members can help the church in its mission and ministry. Every Member Ministry.

Supporting God’s people in service from the church

Financial Ministry Team

· To raise the fundraising profile of the church with a view to bring in £3,000 through this into the church’s income.

· To put together a sensitive and low key stewardship campaign in order to increase the church’s income especially by more people joining the weekly giving scheme.

Fabric Ministry Team

· To lead the development of the vestry as a place for the new Benefice Administrator.

· To solicit the views of the congregation and ministry teams as to fabric development plan.

· To look at increasing storage space within the church

Ecumenical Ministry Team

· To continue the pattern of ecumenical activities for this year. However, to leave a door open for reflections arising from the ecumenical study day on St. Paul in April.

Web site

· To build into the site space for all the churches in the benefice to be represented and to develop more of a benefice feel to the site as a whole.

Parochial Church Council

· To correct an imbalance that has appeared in current agendas away from fabric and finance, and to give more time to matters of vision of and for the church. A tighter format needed to ensure all areas of the church are given equal precedence.

· To look at ways of raising the profile of PCC members so as to be more accessible to congregation members.

Reaching out to God’s people in the parish

Pioneer Minister

· As agreed in areas of primary and secondary focus for this year as distributed.

Supporting God’s people through ministry

Ordained Local Minister

· During April to have agreed which two half days in the week the OLM will be engaged in ministry in either Gnosall or Moreton.

· From that to draw up a pattern of ministry expectations appropriate to the time offered.

Nurturing God’s people in church and parish

Baptism Preparation Team

· To fine tune the preparation that is nearing completion as a basis for all future baptism preparation.

· To demonstrate from July care and sensitivity in both welcoming people from the churches who will join the team and to forge links between baptism families and their respective churches though the preparation is to be centred at St. Lawrence.

Wedding Preparation

· To seek two new volunteers to join the preparation team (ideally a married couple).

· To fine tune the preparation that is nearing completion as a basis for all future wedding preparation.

· To demonstrate from September care and sensitivity in both welcoming people from the churches that will join the team and to forge links between wedding couples and their respective churches though the preparation is to be centred at St. Lawrence.

House Group Ministry Team

· Immediately following Easter to set up and run a minimum of two house groups in the parish, with leadership, worship and programme content.

Adult nurture

· To explore appropriate ways to offer nurturing courses for those both exploring the faith and those more established in the faith.

· In the meantime to offer four weeks courses in the year exploring appropriate books in the Bible – the first being Joshua!

Impstones service

· To produce both a service and a hymn booklet.

Older people

· To explore appropriate ways in which not only to reach out to those older in the village in faith, but also to enrich within worship those older in the church.

Supporting God’s people in worship

Choir

· Through the relationships of those youngsters in Junior Choir and through our church school and within high schools in the area to increase membership of the junior section of the choir.

· To increase, seeking the help and assistance of others, adults in the choir.

Music Group

· To enlarge the group especially through both a keyboardist and vocals.

· To continue the improvement in the group seen over the last couple of years.

· The group being able to lead and share in a wider variety of services than at present

Parish Praise

· To create a third team to organise and lead parish praise services.

· To use all opportunities to use this service as the worship bridge to all whom the church comes into contact with for the first time, especially baptisms and weddings.

Healing Service

· To offer this service within an informal communion structure and to produce a standardised service booklet as a consequence.

· After road testing the service to advertise it more in the life of the village.

Worship Ministry Team

· Where possible, and appropriate, standardising booklets for certain occasional worship services.

· With the presence of children and young people into the first Sunday 10:30am service bringing them more into the worshipping life of the church, the team to lead a group to be formed from different strands of worship to reflect on the service.

Supporting God’s children at school

Foundation Governors

· To lead the development of a coherent strategy so as to enable the church school to move from good to outstanding in their SIAS evaluation for 2011.

School Ministry Team

· To bring together the varied school focus individuals/ groups of the church to better direct and nurture our church/ school relationship.

Nurturing God’s children in church and parish

Ministry to those aged up to 5

· To let run both Little Angels and Play and Praise in the life of the church as both groups are still in their infancy.

· To explore appropriate ways to develop relationships amongst the adults of Play and Praise into Little Angels and Parish Praise

Ministry to those aged 5 to 11

· To run the structure for this age group to July in the Grosvenor Centre, though with a name change and a reaching out to appropriate contacts – baptism and Kids@essence, etc.

· To allow the June meeting of all involved in the 5 to 11’s Sunday ministry to decide on short term objectives following July.

Ministry to those aged 12+

· To run the structure for this age group to July in the Grosvenor Centre and to continue the monthly Youth Service.

· To allow the June meeting of all involved in the 12+ Sunday ministry to decide on short term objectives following July, bearing in mind that the numbers in this age group will be larger, but volunteers possibly fewer.

Midweek Ministry to children and young people

· To pilot the transport scheme (grant now given to us from the diocese) of bringing in children and young people from all the other parishes in the wider benefice to centre our midweek ministry – namely: from April the Holiday Club and Bright and Light.

· To involve adults from those respective parishes and to be sensitive of relationships.

Supporting God’s people through the enlarged benefice

Benefice Administrator

· To bring about the appointment of a part time benefice administrator during the summer months.

House for Duty Minister

· To bring about the appointment of a House for Duty Minister before the year’s end.

Benefice Life

· To invite individuals to help to plan either a large scale weekend retreat or a fellowship week for all ages for 2011.

Leadership Team

· To invite the benefice leadership team to draw up a remit for the group.

· To draw up a common benefice wide ordering policy in order to achieve savings.