State of the Church Report

In 2009, AUMC has continued to focus on the five fruitful practices of Radical Hospitality, Passionate Worship, Intentional Faith Development, Risk-Taking Mission and Service, and Extravagant Generosity.  This focus has enabled us to be a church that demonstrates congregational health, vitality and fruitfulness.

Radical Hospitality

We have continued our efforts to enable AUMC to offer an environment of acceptance and inclusion.  Hospitality has become a hallmark of our Sunday worship services.  Some effort has been made to improve our physical environment and make first time visitors feel as at ease as possible when they enter AUMC for the first time.  However, we still have opportunities to improve our signage so it is perfectly clear where events happen, the layout of facilities and offer a helping hand to our first time attendees.  Informal feedback I have received through the year from some of our visitors is that AUMC has a warm, family atmosphere and joiners have given this reason for wanting to become a formal part of AUMC.

Passionate Worship

Vibrant, fruitful, growing churches offer Passionate Worship that connects people to God and to one another through Scripture, music, spoken word, multisensory and metaphoric experiences, and Holy Communion.  People are searching for worship that is authentic, alive, creative, and most importantly, comprehensible and give meaning to their lives.  It is through this way of worshiping that people experience the life-changing God in the presence of others.

The worship services at AUMC strive for Spiritual Excellence in every element of the experience.  We have an active worship committee and weekly focus is placed on planning services to better help create a service that genuinely connects people to God.  Some improvements have been added to create a worshipful atmosphere, including the recent purchase of a beautiful electronic organ that will be used in all services.

Intentional Faith Development

Vibrant, fruitful, growing congregations practice Intentional Faith Development.  From our practices of Radical Hospitality and welcoming community into our midst to Passionate Worship, where we have an authentic experience of God in the presence of others, we must also continue to focus on the spiritual growth of our constituency.

We learn best when we covenant with friends who share the same interests and goals that we do.  This is why small groups are such powerful ways of keeping people involved in the faith.  It is also these groups, along with Passionate Worship that bring about life-changing experiences. 

AUMC has continued to provide many opportunities for people to engage in small group, from Sunday School to bible studies, Men’s and Women’s ministries, children and youth ministries, bible studies such as Disciple just to name a few.  There is a great foundation laid to build upon and we must get our focus on bridging new worshipers into these groups and constantly sense our community to be clear of the needs and do our utmost to address those needs.  A new ministry named appropriately “The Weavers” has been introduced to immediately provide new members with other people who have a heart for inclusion.  This program has successfully enabled us to get new members involved very quickly in the development programs at AUMC.

Risk Taking Mission and Service

“To be and make disciples of Jesus Christ in authentic community for the transformation of the world” is the mission of the Church.  We seek to practice Radical Hospitality, Meaningful Worship, and Intentional Spiritual Formation so that we might truly be the body of Christ, risking ourselves in mission and service for the sake of the world.

Risk-Taking Mission and Service is one of the fundamental activities of church life that is so critical that failure to practice it in some form results in a deterioration of the church’s vitality and ability to make disciples of Jesus Christ.  When churches turn inward, using all resources for their own survival and caring only for their own people, then spiritual vitality wanes and the church begins a slow death march.

We are fortunate that both of our pastors have a strong heart for mission and service.  This focus has enabled us to continue to put lay people into the service of others.  AUMC has many programs that are designed to just help meet the basic needs of people in our community.  Saturday’s Child is an active missional ministry that provides much needed food and sustenance to families in our community with small children that struggle to even put food on their tables.  Networking with other churches in Atascocita/Humble area, AUMC has helped to revitalize the Family Promise program.  Churches open their doors and provide the facilities to keep displaced families together and provide food, shelter and a warm bed.  Many volunteers from AUMC are faithfully working hard to extend the love and care to our community and beyond.

Extravagant Generosity

The practice of generosity describes the Christian’s un-selfish willingness to give in order to make a positive difference for the purposes of Christ.

Extravagant Generosity describes practices of sharing and giving that exceeds all expectations and extends to unexpected measures.  It describes lavish sharing, sacrifice, and giving in service to God and neighbor.

Vibrant, fruitful churches focus on giving very differently than most churches.  They focus on the abundance of God’s Grace that emphasizes the Christian’s need to give rather than on the Church’s need for money.  It is so much more important to help us realize that giving is an act of worship and a source of joy.

Extravagant Generosity does not follow economic principles as we witnessed in 2009.  It is not about the church needing money.  This is about first fruit giving.  It is about giving to God through worship first, not after all of our own needs are met.  We have made great gains in 2009 with our giving.  AUMC had a stewardship campaign in the Spring of 2009 which was tremendously successful.  Giving through the first nine months of 2009 met and exceeded the operating budget of the church and allowed us to catch up on apportionments for the current year and arrears from 2008.  We are currently making our plans for an even stronger campaign in 2010 and are working with other Methodist churches in our district to do this in a methodological way that we believe is spiritually based and will improve our commitments and giving.  I am personally very proud of the way AUMC has practiced Extravagant Generosity in 2009, even under very difficult economic conditions.

In summary, and consistent with my report last year, I remain incredibly optimistic about the future of AUMC.  We have a strong sense of hospitality.  We offer many opportunities and diversity in worship and I am wholeheartedly convinced that, with focus toward spiritual excellence in worship, we can truly honor God with our authentic eagerness and with an unusual clarity about the purpose of connecting people with God.

Faith development already has a strong place in our church and this is where we can truly offer life changing experiences for people.  We must each continue to develop our own faith, but we must also look from the inside out to bring programs that will develop the faith of others.  We must come to the clear understanding that only true peace and communion with God comes through service to others.  Finally, through our own practice of Extravagant Generosity we will continue to be a church in the Kingdom of God that spreads His abundance throughout Community and through our apportional giving to the world. 

I humbly present this report to Atascocita United Methodist Church.

Ron Hopkins