Doug Hughes (pastor at Third, New Castle) found the following on a sermon illustration web site:

From the Rocky Mountain Synod newsletter. There was a short article in it adapted from Herold Percy, "Good News People," which makes a contrast between "maintenance" and "mission".

1. In measuring the effectiveness, the maintenance congregation asks, "How many pastoral visits are being made? The mission congregation asks, "How many disciples are being made?"
2. When contemplating some form of change, the maintenance congregation says, "If this proves upsetting to any of our members, we won't do it." The mission congregation says, "If this will help us reach someone on the outside, we will take the risk and do it."
3. When thinking about change, the majority of members in a maintenance congregation ask, "How will this affect me?" The majority of members in the mission congregation ask, "Will this increase our ability to reach those outside?"
4. When thinking of its vision for ministry, the maintenance congregation says, "We have to be faithful to our past." The mission congregation says, "We have to be faithful to our future."
5. The pastor in the maintenance congregation says to the newcomer, "I'd like to introduce you to some of our members." In the mission congregation the members say, "We'd like to introduce you to our pastor."
6. When confronted with a legitimate pastoral concern, the pastor in the maintenance congregation asks, "How can I meet this need?" The pastor in the mission congregation asks, "How can this need be met?"
7. The maintenance congregation seeks to avoid conflict at any cost (but rarely succeeds). The mission congregation understands that conflict is the price of progress, and is willing to pay the price. It understands that it cannot take everyone with it. This causes some grief, but it does not keep it from doing what needs to be done.
8. The leadership style in the maintenance congregation is primarily managerial, where leaders try to keep everything in order and running smoothly. The leadership style in a mission congregation is primarily transformational, casting a vision of what can be, and marching off the map in order to bring the vision into reality.
9. The maintenance congregation is concerned with their congregation, its organizations and structure, its constitutions and committees. The mission congregation is concerned with the culture, with understanding how secular people think and what makes them tick. It tries to determine their needs and their points of accessibility to the Gospel.
10. When thinking about growth, the maintenance congregations asks, "How many Lutherans live within a twenty-minute drive of this church?" The mission congregation asks, "How many unchurched people live within a twenty-minute drive of this church?"
11. The maintenance congregation looks at the community and asks, "How can we get these people to support our congregation?" The mission congregation asks, "How can the Church support these people?"
12. The maintenance congregation thinks about how to save their congregation. The mission congregation thinks about how to reach the world.

Response to question sent to CI

Question: "I am about to input responses to the Listening Leader questions for our congregation. On the heading in FF there is no space to input the "M" information, that is the number code for length of membership in the church. Also, not important for us, but there is no place to enter the race code. What do we do about the "M" information?"

Answer: "If you put the information into the first window for the first quesiton that would be a fine place for it. Just put in the information like so: Length of Membership: # and Race: "

Where Do I Input the Results of the Congregational Timeline Event?

This is a great question, that is not covered in the CFF User Manual (at least not completely spelled out). When your congregation does the timeline event (appendix xix in the notebook) you will end up with a lot of information that you will want to include as part of your CFF study. You will need to add this information as an "Additional Resource"- the instructions for doing this are on page 77 of the User Manual. (You can also use this option to add any additional resources that you think might help with your study- annual report, photographs, etc.) CFF will accept documents in any format, but CI recommends that you use a PDF format, so that anyone can access them (ex. your CFF person may have Excel, but your pastor doesn't).

The information that you upload in this section WILL NOT automatically print out as part of your final report. You will have to download each document separately. The list of "Additional Resources" will appear in your final report.

Question About Decimal Numbers

We've had a couple of churches run into problems with the Population and Demographics questionnaire, mainly the use of decimals. I've contacted Church Innovations, and found that the information printed in the manual is incomplete. The user manual states that you cannot use commas, dollar signs, or percentage signs. In reality, you can only use whole numbers - the system will not accept or save anything else. You will need to round up or down accordingly in each instance where you have a decimal to enter.

Problems with Mission Statement Appearing

A couple of people have contacted me about problems with the Congregational Information section of CFF. Basically, after typing in their mission statement, it does not appear in the report. I have contacted Church Innovations about the problem, and once I hear back from them, will post the answer so everyone can see it.

CFF Questionnaires

Hi Everyone,

The Questionnaires on Church Future Finder have been activated, and are ready for use. So far, we have 5 churches that have signed on and begun their work with CFF. Keep in mind that while we have until the January cluster event to complete this work, the holiday season is fast approaching and you could save yourself some stress by getting a head-start in this process.

As always, if you have any questions, just let me know.

Next Steps in CFF

Everyone should be receiving the User’s Manual this week. Look it over, concentrating mainly on Part III (page 18) – the actual instructions for using Church Future Finder. I went through an hour of training yesterday afternoon over the phone, but it honestly was not as helpful as reading the manual. I’ve detailed the next few steps in the CFF process below, and you can read more about them on the pages I’ve noted (there are also plenty of illustrations of the various windows). Also, skim through pages 99-125. This section will give you an idea of what your CFF Report will look like, and may help you to understand this part of the process a little better.

Step One: Sign Up and Log In (page 20) – When you go to http://www.churchfuturefinder.org you will see a screen with a box in the lower right corner that says “New Users” with a button that reads “Sign Up”. Click on this button. (If you are a returning user, use the box on the lower left.) You will be taken to a new page with a registration form. Choose a username and password that you can easily remember, and complete the rest of the form. Click submit and accept the user agreement that appears. When you have complete the registration process you will receive an e-mail containing your username and password. Go back to the main page and sign in as a Returning User. (You can logout at any time by clicking the “Logout” button at the top of the screen.)

Step Two: Join a CFF Group (page 27) – Everyone needs to join a group (your congregation). To do this you will need the group name and code that were e-mailed a few weeks ago. When you log in you will be taken to your “dashboard”. The second section is labeled “My Groups”. Click on the link that says “sign up for a group”. You will be taken to the group sign-up page. Enter the Group Code you were assigned into the appropriate field and click “join”. (Remember that the code is case-sensitive, meaning that it is important to enter capital and lower case letters appropriately.) Once you have successfully joined, your congregation’s name should appear under the “My Groups” heading.

Step Three: Create a Congregation Study (page 29) – Everyone needs to create a congregation study. (Note: you cannot create a study without joining your group, so make sure you don’t skip step two.) The bottom section of your “dashboard” is labeled “My Studies”. You will need to click on the link that says “Create New Study”. This will take you to the “Choose a Group (for your study)” window. Select your congregation’s name (It should be the only group listed). DO NOT click the “Create a study outside of any group” link. Next, you will need to create a name for your study (ex. PMC_LMC_Cluster1_Church Name_2006_Your last name), click submit. Next, select your congregation from the list by clicking the “select” link at the end of the corresponding row. You will then be taken to your congregation study’s table of contents.

Step Four: Become Familiar with the CFF Windows (page 34) – The congregation study table of contents is where you will spend the majority of your time. Clicking the “Go” button beside any of the sections will take you to new windows dealing with that particular section. Each section has areas for you to complete – this is where you will work with census data, enter results from the listening team interviews, etc. DO NOT declare a section complete until you are sure that you have entered all of the information that you need to. The manual will contain more information on each section, with instructions and special notes (like do not use commas when entering data – you’ll receive an error message if you do).

If you have any questions during this process, let me know. If I can’t answer it, I will find someone who can and get back to you.