Nominations are now closed.

At our June 26 Congregational Assembly the congregation voted to begin the process to call someone to be our new Family Life Ministry Coordinator/Shawnee Campus Worship Leader. This person will be responsible for leading worship at the Shawnee campus, and for working with youth and families at both campuses. We are very excited about this future addition to our staff, and wanted to use this space to tell you a little bit more about this position and what it means for our life together as “A Community Following Jesus.”

In terms of music, we expect that a full-time position will allow the worship leader to have a longer tenure, which in turn provides more continuity in the style and feel of worship at the Shawnee campus. In terms of youth and family ministry, this position allows us to strengthen our ministry to this very important segment of our church. There is so much we have wanted to do but have been unable to do up to this point: build even deeper relationships and deeper faith, youth retreats, mission trips, and so much more. However, it is important to note that this position is designed to fit within the Sustainable Youth Ministry model, in which the staff person works with, assists, and equips parents and other volunteers. Parents are still seen as the primary influencers of a child’s faith.

This is a called position, and, as many of you know, a call process can be a lengthy process. To give you an idea, here is what we believe to be an optimistic but realistic timeline. Of course, many things can happen along the way to slow us down from this scenario:

  • End of July: Receive the names of any potential candidates from the congregation
  • End of August: Receive a final list from the Kansas District
  • September: phone interviews
  • November: on-site interviews
  • Early December: issue a call
  • January: person starts

Because of the complex nature of this position, we have put together a carefully chosen call committee to represent a diversity of views. The Call Committee consists of the following people:

  • Praise Band Member (Shawnee) – Lisa Miles
  • Praise Band Member (Shawnee) – Mark Linville
  • Youth Family (Mission) – Julie Messbarger
  • Youth Family (Mission) – Kerry Barker
  • Youth Family (Shawnee) – Kristol Stenstrom
  • Youth Representative (Shawnee) – Ryker Stevens
  • Pastor Phil Cook
  • Rhonda Synovec
  • Ben Spalding

As we move forward, there are several things you can do to help:

  1. Pray, pray, pray! This is a Spirit-led process, and we want to seek the Lord’s will along every step of the journey.
  2. Send us names. If you know of anyone whom you have seen in another church such as a DCE, music minister, or gifted lay person, whom you feel would be a good fit for this position, please fill out a nomination form and the Call Committee will consider this person along with the other names we receive from the district. Nomination forms are available in hard copy form at each campus and online.
  3. Stay in contact with the members of the Call Committee. We would love to hear your questions, concerns, thoughts, and input as to what you would like to see in this new person. Later in the process, as you learn some about the potential candidates, we need to hear your feedback on how you perceived them. We want this process to be as open and inclusive as possible, and to do that, we need to hear from you.
  4. Pray, pray, pray! We trust that God already has the right person in mind, and we are eagerly waiting for Him to reveal this person to us.

Thank you,
The members of the Call Committee

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