Albany Presbytery

COM Strategy


	Rev. Chris Garrison, Chair I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit. ~John 15:5


Our Mission To intentionally and proactively promote the health and vitality - a faithfulness to calling, a fruitfulness in mission - of congregations within Albany Presbytery.


The Congregational Coaching Overview:

What Congregational-Coaching Is:

	A valuable process aimed at improving the health of congregations so that they may become more effective to the kingdom of God.

	A process of discernment in which church leadership enters into a brief covenant with a presbytery coach, with the commitment to work together for the benefit of the local church.

What Congregational-Coaching Is Not:
	Another program

	A quick-fix, silver-bullet solution

	Something only for churches in crisis

Congregational-Coaching Values:
	Jesus Christ is Lord and Head of the Church (G-1.000)

	The local church is the hope of the world; from which the gospel is embodied and shared

	Churches, no matter the size, can be healthy expressions of the body of Christ

	The Holy Spirit grants both the gifts and power for the whole Church and each congregation to do everything it is called to do.

	The disciplines of congregational transformation utilized in partnership will be (but not limited to):

> spiritual discernment of where God is leading the congregation,

> setting an action plan to achieve at least one thing that will bring the congregation to greater health and vitality.




	Congregational health is not defined by propping up the institution, rather seeking to serve God’s mission through a particular calling.

	Health and vitality will have different expressions in the different churches according to their community, their history, leaders, and their God-given DNA or calling.

	Health and vitality are defined and assessed more richly than mere membership and budgetary numbers:

Health can be measured by the great ends of the church:

		the proclamation of the gospel for the salvation of mankind;

		the shelter, nurture, and spiritual fellowship of the children of God;

		the maintenance of divine worship;

		the preservation of the truth;

		the promotion of social righteousness;

		the exhibition of the Kingdom of Heaven to the world.



	Norms, Goals and Mission Statement 2010

	Resources

	Covenant

	Intercessory Prayers from the New Testament