Annual Meeting
President's Report
In 2023 the Church Council initiated a plan to celebrate where Bethany has been and to imagine and embrace where God is calling Bethany now. This culminated in six “Tell Me More” meetings which offered an opportunity for collaboration with the congregation.
At the Tell Me More meetings, the Church Council presented on the vision of our campus, where it has been, where we are now and where we hope, with congregational support and collaboration, we are going.
Where have we been? We’ve been around for nearly 100 years in three different buildings, with our current building doubling in size since we first moved in.
Where are we now? For the over the past 2 years, we have collectively been working on our mission and vision. We believe our building and campus, in its current form, is not maximizing the opportunity for spiritual formation and community engagement.
Where are we going?
Replace, Relocate and Renovate. We want to strengthen our building in order to better embrace our values. That is were we think He has us going.
Replace current barriers and inefficiencies in our building. Namely the narrow hallways, empty spaces and empty classrooms, disconnected church lobbies, better security with less entrances, the lack of adult learning spaces, especially on Wednesday nights, space constraints for Bethany First Steps childcare and deferred maintenance to several parts of the buildings interior and exterior.
Relocate Bethany First Steps Child Care Ministry
- Options on the campus that includes a new wing to the west
- Council is engaged in a feasibility study to determine how that would look architecturally and how that would work financially
- Church staff and council are working on an agreement where First Steps Childcare will become part of Bethany Church
Renovate Preschool Journey Kids & Nursery (newborns to five year olds on Sunday morning)
- This is the most important space for young families and the space is currently disorganized, disjointed
- We want to recreate a dedicated space just for them
How is this church going to do this?
A picture says a thousand words, so let’s take a sneak peak at what a new church lobby might look like.
At the conclusion of every Tell Me More meeting, a short, 4-question survey was handed out to all those in attendance.
The results of those surveys showed overwhelming support for the Replace, Relocate and Renovate projects.
As for the when, we are planning a formal congregational vote in the Fall of this year to approve the development of the new First Steps wing. We need to build First Steps a new home before we can begin renovating the lobby. When we meet again in the fall we will provide the latest information on the lobby and have an opportunity to receive more formal feedback.
He hasn’t revealed all of His plans to us just yet, there is more work to be done.
We believe in this Vision Statement with all our hearts. And with the hard work and dedication this church council, staff and congregation have already invested and know will continue to invest in, we will soon realize His plans for our future.
