Friday. October 14 & Saturday, October 15, 2022 Spooky Nook Sports Complex and Conference Center, Manheim Our keynote speaker, Ms. Jerusalem Jackson Greer, works for the Presiding Bishop as staff officer for evangelism. She serves as a resource consultant for Baptized for Life and is a member of the Council of Advice for Episcopal Relief and Development. The author of At Home in this Life: Finding Peace at the Crossroads of Unraveled Dreams and Beautiful Surprises (2017) and A Homemade Year: The Blessings of Cooking, Crafting, and Coming Together (2013), she will lead us in two workshops on Friday and preach at convention on Saturday.
1:30-3:00 pm “Evangelism 101” – Ms. Jerusalem Greer. Evangelism 101 is a not-so-basic training designed to introduce a fresh, humble, effective and Episcopal approach to the spiritual practice of evangelism.
In our baptismal covenant, Episcopalians promise to proclaim the Good News of God in Christ through word and action, with God’s help. But what does this mean in a world that often sees Christianity through a clouded lens? How can we share Good News in ways that feel authentic and just? You are invited to join Jerusalem Greer, staff officer for evangelism in the office of Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, to explore these questions during the Evangelism 101 workshop.
Evangelism 101 is a not-so-basic contextualized training designed to inspire a fresh, humble, effective, and Episcopal approach to the spiritual practice of evangelism.
The workshop includes a Participant Guide, and handouts consisting of resources for understanding the Jesus Movement, redefining evangelism, celebrating revival, sharing our stories, walking the neighborhood, improving hospitality, and more.
3:00-3:30 pmBreak
3:30-5:00 pmWorkshops 1, 2 and 3
Afternoon Workshop Options
Workshop #1 “In the stories of all people…” The Art and Practice of Storytelling as Evangelism In the practice of Episcopal Evangelism, we recognize that God is at work in each of our lives and in the lives of all we encounter on our journey. Join Jeremy Tackett, The Episcopal Church’s Senior Manager for Creative Services and Digital Evangelist, for an exploration of how we seek, name, and celebrate that presence. We’ll focus on how to tell our own stories of faith and create open, safe space for others to do the same.
Workshop #2 Experiments in Evangelism in Our Diocese: Getting Started Where You Are, The Rev. Jennifer Mattson and a clergy panel including The Rev. Dr. Amy Welin, The Rev. Kyle Murphy, The Rev. Dr. Richard (Rick) Bauer, The Rev. Grant Ambrose
Workshop #3 Growing aGood News Garden, The Rev. Bradley Mattson
The mission of the Good News Gardens movement is to partner with people in creation care that feeds body, mind, and spirit. Good News Gardens is a church-wide movement of individuals, congregations, schools, colleges, seminaries, monasteries, camps and conference centers involved in a variety of food and creation care ministries – gardening, farming, beekeeping, composting, gleaning, feeding, food justice advocacy. In this session I focus on sharing the good news of the Gospel by using an integrated approach to creation care and green space use in parish ministry. We’ll have fun discussing ideas for how other parishes can use their green space, touching on the following areas
Land stewardship
Garden Tips
Recipes (did you know that you can make your own herbes de Provence?)
Church School/VBS projects
We’ll be giving out some live native plants, seeds, and birdhouses made by the children of Hope Church.
5:30-6:45 pmDinner
7:00-8:00 pmJerusalem Greer, “Community, Loneliness, and Homecoming” According to a study by Cigna, loneliness and lack of meaningful connection are one of the fastest-growing health concerns in our country. This concern stretches across all our congregations. For many of our church members, finding meaningful relational connections amid a busy modern life can be overwhelming. When you compound that reality with the effects of a multi-year global pandemic, churches, communities, and families will likely be experiencing what we call “a crisis of loneliness”. This crisis knows no age barrier – it is true for families, young adults, and our oldest parishioners alike. So what can we – or should -we, as the Body of Christ, do about this? Join Jerusalem Greer, staff officer for evangelism, and member of the Way of Love creation team, to explore the 59 One Anothers of the New Testament and how they can help us eradicate aloneness and create authentic communities centered on Jesus and his way of love.
For questions regarding Diocesan Convention, please contact Canon Alexis Guszick.
Evangelism Resources
From the chair of the Diocesan Evangelism Committee…
I invite you not just to benefit from the resources and ideas that our Committee has gathered for the last year or so but to contribute to them. Evangelism is done most effectively by parishioners, not by the national church. Each of us has a story that explains why we are followers of Christ, and our invitation to you is to find effective ways to share the story of faith.
I look forward to seeing how we spread the Good News in the years ahead.
The article outlines the basic idea that different people visit churches for different reasons, and some suggestions for beginning to think through the challenge.
A solid curriculum for super-basic, hands-on training for a group of ordinary parishioners. Looks dated but the content is still applicable. (From http://www.umcom.org/learn/welcoming-resources)
Instructions and checklist/survey for guest auditors to fill out. Although if you’re interested in a guest audit, please reach out to the SFRC and they’ll get your parish set up with a guest audit and follow-up visit.
Best part of this: “Rule of 10” which instructs parishioners to greet anyone that comes within 10 feet of them, especially people they don’t know.
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The Lutheran Church (ELCA) has lots of resources aimed at congregations (e.g., inserts for bulletins). These are pretty basics, but the idea is good and adaptable.
Connectional Giving team highlights the importance of stewardship
February 05, 2019
The Connectional Giving team increases awareness of and financial engagement with the apportioned funds, six church-wide Special Sundays and the missions of The Advance.
Improve your Instagram ministry with one simple change
February 05, 2019
Instagram is the social network with the highest level of engagement. If you know how to do Instagram well, it can be a great tool for building relationships.
How to be a better email communicator
April 09, 2014
Email has slowly become the primary communication channel for many churches. Are you sure people read your emails and act appropriately? Learn how to increase engagement now!
The original strategy of creating and scheduling content that relies on organic reach spurred by engagement through Facebook is no longer a sure path to success.
The communications agency of the United Methodist Church wants to hear from you! Be a part of our Latino Leader Engagement Panel and share your opinions and suggestions.
Understanding all three of these dimensions will move your content from flat to fully formed content that will help drive engagement and get people in pews.
Seminary-based resources. At Patricia Lyons is the dean of “Evangelism Initiatives” for VTS, but their website yields nothing, alas. I am using her new book, “The Evangelist’s Breviary,” right now, and it’s rich and provocative in ideas.
If you turn directly to Mother Google, the riches are too numerous to capture. If you search for “how to evangelize,” you get 2.7M links.
Workshop #1
