january 2012 Newsletter

From Our Senior Associate Pastor On November 27 our church held a business meeting in which we voted unanimously to accept the Church on the Avenue Advisory Committee’s plan presented to the congregation a few weeks earlier. The plan includes a three year commitment of prayer, financial support, and cooperative mission effort. It also requires that I move into a part time role at Winn’s effective January 1 so that I can dedicate the time needed to provide pastoral leadership to the Church on the Avenue. In a sense I will now be bi-vocational (part time church plant pastor and part time administrative pastor). I will remain in this role throughout 2012 and in 2013 will relinquish my position at Winn’s as I move full time into the position of Lead Pastor at the new church.

In my new part time role at Winn’s I will continue to manage the day to day operations of the church and assist Pastor Brauer from time to time with pastoral care needs. I will no longer have responsibility for the educational ministries (including preschool, elementary and student ministries) or the outreach and mission work of the church (except where there is a joint effort between the churches).

Many of you have wondered how all of this will affect Cheryl. Please pray for her as she takes on the dual role of being my help mate to get a new church started while continuing to serve full time as the Director of Children’s Ministries at Winn’s. To help with this the Personnel Committee has granted her one Sunday a month to be at the Church on the Avenue. We know that eventually Cheryl will have to transition out of Winn’s as the new church grows but we are leaving the timing totally up to God. I give our Father the praise and I thank all of you who were at the business meeting for your support. I thank everyone from our church family who has answered the call to start the Church on the Avenue. I thank Pastor Brauer, the Deacons, the Finance Committee, the Personnel Committee and the Missions Committee for their support and help in making it all a reality. We have done this right and we are united. To God be the glory!!!

I truly believe God is going to bless Winn’s abundantly for being so supportive. My prayer for Winn’s Baptist Church is summed up beautifully in 2 Corinthians 9:10: “Now may He who supplies seed to the sower, and bread for food, supply and multiply the seed you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness (NKJV).

Gratefully yours, Pastor Jeff Chadwick