Our “Vision 2026: Deep & Wide: Deeper Roots, Greater Reach” finds its source in the imagery of Jeremiah 17:7-8: “But blessed is the one who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” Our prayer is that as we grow closer to Jesus, individually and corporately as a church, these roots of growing in a relationship with Jesus will branch out into greater reach into Washington County. More specifically, our prayer is that God will work in and through us to reach more people with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to help Washington County families experience renewal and flourishing. Therefore, our “2026 Vision” is, “Out of the overflow of growing deeper in a relationship with Jesus, we pray we will see more lost people coming to know Jesus as their Savior and more Washington County families renewed and flourishing.” You can read the entirety of the vision by picking up a copy in the Commons or going to https://www.fbc-brenham.org/pages/vision-2026.
In our vision, the area focused on seeing more lost people coming to know Jesus as their Savior reads as follows, “Out of the overflow of the deepening roots of God working in us and our abiding in Jesus, our prayer and strategic areas of focus will be on seeing God use us to provide greater reach by addressing the needs of lostness and families in Washington County:
• Lostness: The language of “lostness” comes from the parables (stories) of “the Lost Sheep,” “the Lost Coin,” and “the Lost Son” that Jesus tells in Luke 15. These are stories of God’s pursuit of people who need Jesus. In each of the stories, there is rejoicing over a sinner repenting: “I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents han over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent” (Luke 15:7). No one cares more about people who need Jesus than God, and He is calling us to go to the same people He loves and love them and share the Good News (the Gospel) of Jesus Christ. Therefore, because lostness is the primary problem in Washington County, we will prayerfully pursue the following:
VISION 2026: DEEP & WIDE: DEEPER ROOTS, GREATER REACH
1. Enhance and Strengthen a Culture of Evangelism: We believe this cultural shift will be done by, at a minimum, focusing on prayer, training, and love. The call to tell people the Good News of Jesus is first and foremost a call to pray. The call to pray is also a good reminder that we “cannot convert anyone”; we are called simply to be faithful in telling others the Gospel. Someone coming to faith in Christ Jesus is ultimately a work of God (Luke 18:27). Second, we will train people in ongoing ways in how to share the Gospel and answer questions people may have, provide opportunities to invite people to church, and equip people to see every area of life as a place to live “on mission.” Finally, we will remember that telling others about Jesus is rooted in loving people and building relationships with them. As we have opportunity, we will speak the Good News of Jesus to those who do not know Jesus. If they reject the Good News, we will not reject them; we will continue to love them, pray for them, and be their friend.
-Objective: We will double the number of our baptisms each year.
2. Staff for Outreach: We will give a special focus and emphasis on staffing with a focus on local and global outreach (i.e. towards growing and strengthening our local ministry partnerships, evangelism training, serving with our national and international partnerships, and mission trips, etc.). The staff position may be solely focused on these areas or combined with another area of ministry focus.
-Objective: By the start of 2025, we will have added a new pastoral or ministry director position or reorganized the staff in such a way for the position with these areas of focus.
The Church Council has been focused on the “Staff for Outreach”section since last summer. Beginning in August of 2024, Pastor Ross, who is also a member of the Church Council, formed a team of Church Council members who volunteered to serve on a team focused on this “staffing for outreach.” The people on the team included Ron Kirby, Nelson Byman, Gregg Workman, Ken Baker, Debbie Fathauer, and Ross Shelton. Over a series of meetings, they reflected on research on best practices for staffing for churches, navigating church size transitions, feedback given by church members over the years and in the vision feedback sessions leading to the development of “Vision 2026,” etc. Out of this season, it was discerned that the “staffing for outreach” should begin with staffing for outreach AND retirees. It is believed this combination is the next best step for our staff and specifically for “staffing for outreach.” It was also discerned that we wanted to wait until we completed year-end 2024 and got into 2025 before any additional discussion would take place about this position.
During the spring of 2025, most of Pastor Ross’ leadership energy went to focusing on helping our school navigate the transitions associated with the cancer diagnosis and passing of our school administrator, Nancy Jahns; helping with some strategy and decision items within the school; and working through the process that led us to the calling of Jana Woods as the new school administrator. Over the past months, Pastor Ross has also reached out to a number of pastors of healthy, growing churches and asked them questions about staffing for new positions. That is, while the process was delayed longer than originally planned in “Vision 2026,” this gave us time to further reflect. Out of this time of reflection, the Church Council, in their regular meeting on June 22nd, spent a substantial amount of time discussing and discerning the consideration about whether God might be calling our current youth pastor, Chad Marrs, into this new role. Out of this time, we were unanimous in agreement that we believe God is calling Pastor Chad into this role! We believe his gifts, passions, background, training, experience, and already existing connections with our mission partners makes him the best fit for this new role. In preparation for this time of transition, here are some answers to questions you may have:
