Resources e-letter 23:6 - December 2023

NEW: Keep all your seniors in touch

This is a joint output from Peter Crumpler and myself.

Although somewhat slow to join the technology revolution, many churches are now very much online. But they are leaving some people, many of them seniors, behind. Not everyone has a laptop or smartphone. Some are finding it frustrating that online access to information or bookings is now wholly online. So what is to be done to show proper care?

These notes offer seven principles to follow and then give ten practical ideas. The ten include:

• Ensure there are alternative ways of discovering information.
• Have a printed database available and remind people on rotas.
• Don’t expect everyone to follow your church services on screens.
• Distribute hard copies of committee papers to those who opt for this.
• Make an audio CD of your services.
• Create a printed library of these website resources.

Many seniors have embraced the new world but some have little desire to do so.  We need to show love and care for them in appropriate ways.

Training Notes TN149, Keep all your seniors in touch, are now available without charge on the Training Notes index page of this website.
  

NEW: Prayer at church business meetings

Prayer at and for church business meetings can become perfunctory. These notes first consider what a church business meeting should be all about and propose:

• To seek God’s will
• To work together
• To take action for the future.

Given these three purposes, the need for prayer becomes clearly apparent so the notes then seek to answer three practical questions:

• When might you pray?
• Who else should pray for the meeting?
• What forms of prayer might you use?

So instead of a short opening prayer and the Grace to close, think again as to the part praise and intercession might play in your church business meetings and use the ideas given here to underline the need for divine wisdom and guidance.

Training Notes TN150, Prayer at church business meetings, are now available without charge on the Training Notes index page of this website.
 

Resources on structures and staffing

Here is a listing of website resources on this theme.

Articles index page

A3      Salary differentials for Christian staff – A case of worldly thinking?
A6      Job descriptions – Advice and examples for staff and volunteers
A8      Worker agreements – Appropriate paperwork for church use
A17    Staff selection step by step – From advertisement to interview
A48    Organising your small groups – Choices to be made
A50    The patronage process as drama – A guide for Patrons and PCCs
A56    Organising pastoral care – …in an all-member culture

Training Notes index page

TN5      Responsibilities of mission agency boards
TN20    Line management in a church staff team
TN35    Causes of friction in mission agencies
TN37    To pay or not to pay?
TN40    Appointing an Administrator
TN58    Beware committees!
TN65    Sharp interview questions
TN66    A daily office for church staff
TN76    How to prepare a job reference
TN80    Staff salary scales
TN92    How genuine are your GORs?
TN111  A church policies checklist
TN130  Appoint a ‘Staff Action Group’
TN147  The role of the PCC

You can download a leaflet listing all 215 items from the Resources page of the website (scroll down to ‘Print your own listing’).

Please ensure all these materials are widely promoted in your church.  Thank you for your interest in my website and have a Christmas full of peace and joy in spite of a world at war and in pain.