LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2010, Page 40

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40

SYNOD REPORTS

• Work was begun on the development of a resource for organizing
for children’s ministry, which will include a section on reaching/
serving families in the greater community.
• The first National Children’s Ministry Workshop, “INsideOUT,”
was planned and developed in partnership with the North Wisconsin
District. The August 2010 workshop will focus on the cycle of gathering as a Christian community and then going outside the walls to
serve the greater community.
• Work was begun on a revision and expansion of In His Hands,
a primary resource for beginning and operating early childhood
programs, now also to include a chapter addressing strategies for
effectively reaching out to the community and to the growing number of families with no church affiliation that are coming to early
childhood centers.
Family Ministry

• A vision for family ministry was developed and articulated in an
e-presentation for use by family ministry network regional leaders
as they champion intentional ministry with families within their
congregations and regions.
• Family ministry e-publications (24/7, Home Base, and Great
Expectations) continued to address the importance of outreach
“through families to families” and provided practical ideas for
expanding outreach strategies in the local church setting.
School Ministry

• During the past triennium, over 6,000 students were baptized as a
result of their attending a Lutheran school.
• Ten components for “Lutheran Schools of Excellence” were identified and developed for use by Lutheran schools as they prepare
to be the “school of choice” in their neighborhoods.
• A resource manual for National Lutheran Schools Week provided
service activity suggestions to empower students to reach out to
their communities in unique ways.
• National Lutheran Schools Week offered congregations and schools
opportunity to celebrate their special heritage and promote themselves in their communities.
• “Strengthening Schools and Congregations” (SSAC) provided recommendations to enable struggling Lutheran schools to remain
effective in providing services and outreach to their communities,
so that the mission of “sharing the caring Christ” could be accomplished more effectively.
Stewardship Ministry

• Faith Aflame: 360 Degrees provided encouragement to individuals and congregations for their outreach. Module 3 of the process,
“Living as God’s Child,” focuses on the importance of being stewards of the Gospel. Module 4, “Living as God’s Family,” focuses
on the importance of the congregation being about God’s mission.
• The Congregational Stewardship Workbook was put in an e-learning format to allow leaders to access it online for “just in time”
learning.
• New video resources were prepared for the purpose of assisting professional church workers and lay persons with their stewardship
leadership responsibilities. E-learning resources include materials
from Module 1 of Faith Aflame: 360 Degrees, “Living with God’s
Word.”

Youth Ministry

• The Lutheran Youth Fellowship Teen Leadership Initiative promoted outreach to youth through its “Teens Reaching Teens”
training initiative.
• The Youth Ministry Department began a major outreach project
under the title “The Eutychus Project,” which explores ways for
churches to reach unchurched and marginally-churched youth more
effectively.
• A major emphasis developed for the 2010 National LCMS Youth
Gathering encourages congregations to target and invite nonchurched teens to attend.
• The Young Adult Task Force challenged congregations to build a
post-high school youth and young adult ministry.
(3) Fostering Faith Development in Children and Adults
Children’s Ministry

• Children were authentically engaged in every aspect of the National
Children’s Ministry Conference as event leaders, workshop hosts,
greeters, and more.
• Articles of the Web magazine, Children’s Ministry (CM)
Connections, were downloaded an average of 30,000 times per
month.
• More than 600 individuals were involved in an ongoing national
prayer ministry for children that was established during this
triennium.
• The 2008 National Children’s Ministry Conference, which set a
new direction for such conferences with greater focus on the actual
involvement of children in all aspects of the conference, prompted
the complete reworking of the 2010 VBS resources published by
CPH.
Family Ministry

• More than 9,000 subscribers to family ministry e-newsletters benefited from current literature and research relative to ministry with
families and were offered insight and ideas for promoting faith
growth in the home setting and in the local congregation.
• Administrative systems were planned, initiated, and mobilized
within the DCS Family Ministry Department to carry out programs
to promote vision, goals, and objectives that will support, equip,
and encourage those involved in family ministry (Family Ministry
Action Team, Family Ministry Summit, Regional Family Ministry
Network, and more).
School Ministry

• More than 300 Lutheran schools participated in the “Ablaze! Bible
Listening Project,” which encouraged students to listen to the Bible
with an iPod device and then pass that device on to others.
• Quality resources such as “Chapel Talks” and the National Lutheran
Schools Week Resource Manual provided worship and devotional
resources to foster faith development in the lives of students, faculty, and administrators.
• The “Spiritual Development” component of Lutheran Schools of
Excellence encouraged educators to mentor students as they grew
in their relationship with Christ.
Stewardship Ministry

• More than 6,000 people benefitted from StewardCAST, a monthly
e-newsletter that regularly includes inspirational stewardship material and listings of stewardship resources for subscribers.

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