Western Plains District

We’re probably all familiar with the Sesame Street game “how are these things alike, how are they different?” What does that have to do with your Western Plains Leadership Team, you ask?

With the exception of only three members (including ex-officio), the LT is the exact same people as it was last year, many of whom carry over for more than just the last year. What that last sentence portends, however, is that the day will come when certain key leadership positions will encounter term limits. Very seasoned leadership with a good sense of institutional memory will be graduating from the team as it already did this year in smaller numbers. Succession planning is important. Finding people with the right gifts, skill sets and commitments to district vitality is challenging.

In the near term, the leadership team continues its monthly Zoom gatherings, trying to efficiently address issues of health and growth and challenge for our little body of Christ in the plains. Here’s a non-exhaustive list of matters that have been on our agenda the last several months that includes things new:

• A productive leadership forum in September that re-focused a number of the teams’ goals for the year and a beginning exploration of our purpose for district.
• Approval of what we’re calling a DnA process (Discovery ‘n Action) to refresh and energize a sense vision and action for our body of Christ in the Western Plains. In coming months, be watching for a discovery focus group opportunity in your neighborhood.
• A revision/reorganization of our Area Ministry Team program.
• Systematic review and refresh of financial management and budgeting processes for the district.
• Initiatives to make more intentional connections between the district and its various congregations, including in-person visits when possible, but also through creative use of technology.
• The restoration of Campfires for Tomorrow, a campaign for the revitalization of our district outdoor ministry facilities and programming.
• Re-envisioning of education and training opportunities that are forecast elsewhere in this issue of Shepherd’s Voice.
• Updating our pastoral credentialing processes in ways that are complementary with the uniqueness of Western Plains.

A common thread that runs directly or indirectly through these initiatives is an effort to revive a sense of common cause and accountability between the district and its members and congregations. You, dear reader, are welcomed to make this a two way-street, contributing your needs, your perspectives, your gifts, and your hopes and dreams of what Western Plains Brethren are yet to become.

We live in a day when ongoing concerns persist about the contagion of a pesky virus and all its variations. Let’s not let go of hope for a different kind of contagion – the infectious enthusiasm that can emerge when a community of believers converges on a shared vision and makes things happen growing out of that vision.