The Epic, Pt. 45

A special Ministries Board meeting was held on Sabbath afternoon, January 10, 2009, after a potluck for its members and their families. The purpose of this meeting was to create new mission and vision statements for the church.

This meeting had six segments. In the first segment Pastor DeSilva offered an explanation of what a mission statement is supposed to be. One of the prime criteria listed was that it ought to be short enough to fit on a T-shirt. The second segment consisted of the board members being broken up into groups by tables to come up with mission statement suggestions. The recommendations were then collected, discussed, edited, and voted on in the third segment. "We seek to know Christ and lead our community into a relationship with Him" was the mission statement that was ultimately chosen. After the third segment was finished Pastor DeSilva announced a five minute break, at which time many board members left. This was not especially surprising since it was getting close to 4 pm and many had family members with them, including small children.

The fourth segment featured Pastor James (the youth pastor at that time) describing the properties of a vision statement. Pastor James’ presentation dealt with the spiritual components that should be included in a church’s vision statement. He did not discuss how the vision statement should grow out of the mission statement. He then told us that the ministries board would not be working on the vision statement. Pastor DeSilva would be solely responsible for the creation of the vision statement.

Then Pastor DeSilva got up for the fifth segment to "cast the vision." This was to be a five year plan. He stated as he began that this vision was not yet in a written form, and that the office manager (who serves as recording secretary) would be writing it down as he presented it and that the written version would be reviewed at the next ministries board meeting. Some of the vision Pastor DeSilva presented was reasonable, doable, and even admirable, but it also included some high priced items, including beginning to produce DVDs of our services, live web streaming, and the introduction of two giant screens at the front of the sanctuary. (We presently do not have the technology or specialized expertise to accomplish any of those goals, so substantial financial expenditure would be required to develop the infrastructure and train personnel.)

When Pastor DeSilva finished "casting" his vision for the church, he invited questions from the ministries board. One of the first hands up in this final segment of the meeting was that of the communications leader. She expressed concern about the financial requirements of the vision that pertained to her department (which oversees all things electronic in the sanctuary) and questioned whether all of this technology investment was truly beneficial to the church or just a form of "keeping up with the Joneses." She also expressed disappointment that Pastor DeSilva had not shown her the courtesy of discussing these plans with her before bringing them to the ministries board. Pastor DeSilva responded to this that he had not spoken to anyone about anything he presented in the vision before presenting it to the ministries board just then.

The communications leader did not challenge this assertion in the meeting but she remarked to members of the Group afterward that she knew this statement to be a lie on two counts. First, several weeks before as she was leaving the church after closing up a/v operations for that Sabbath she paused in the entry just outside the sanctuary to listen to a conversation in the sanctuary because it seemed to pertain to her department. What she heard was Pastor DeSilva describing to someone the technological additions he wanted to make to the sanctuary. As she described it what she overheard that day was exactly the same pitch made by Pastor DeSilva in the ministries board meeting, almost word-for-word. Second, she stated that during the potluck on the afternoon of the meeting another department head had remarked to her that Pastor DeSilva had discussed potential plans for that department with that department head. In short, Pastor DeSilva had not only discussed plans for other departments with their department heads, but had also discussed his plans for the communications department with individuals other than the communications leader, so his assertion in the meeting that he had spoken to no one about the content of the vision in advance of its presentation was incorrect.

Next: Change of Plan

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