Together January 2025

January 2025 L.A. Fire Update Since the fires broke out last Tuesday night, I have been in touch with Fellowship Community friends and colleagues to assess the damage and discern ways we might pray, give, and serve. The Palisades and Eaton fires have brought tremendous loss of property and livelihood for churches and pastors. Below are brief highlights of what’s happening in three presbyteries in the L.A. area with pastors and presbytery leadership in parentheses and links to relief funds below.   Pastor Matt Colwell at Knox Presbyterian Church in Pasadena lost his home along with nine church families. Six additional pastors lost their homes in the San Gabriel Presbytery (Wendy Tajima).   The Pacific Presbytery (Linda Culbertson) lost Pacific Palisades Presbyterian Church (Matt Hardin). Bel Air Church (Drew Sams) is under mandatory evacuation and rallying members to bless other churches. I attended the First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood (Clark Cowden) worship and prayer service Thursday night to bring hope and healing.   The San Fernando Presbytery (Juan Sarmiento) has had around 20 households in congregations that lost their homes, mainly from La Canada Presbyterian Church (Ross Purdy). This is a long-haul effort to walk alongside our Angeleno brothers and sisters while they rebuild their lives, homes and churches. Consider giving directly to Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, which is working through each presbytery to meet both emergency and long-term needs in each presbytery with gift cards, emergency unmet needs, and the long-term recovery, or partnering with a specific presbytery, church or organization listed below. As part of our regional network, The Fellowship Community will continue to support L.A. churches and leaders through this next season of healing and rebuilding. Please join us is serving, praying and giving generously. If you are personally impacted by the fires, please let us know how we can walk with you. Together in Christ, Mike McClenahan Links: Presbyterian Disaster Assistance Knox Presbyterian Church Deacons Assistance Fund Pacific Palisades Presbyterian Church Fire Relief Fund San Fernando Emergency Recovery Growing Together Fund 100% goes to people who have been directly impacted La Canada Presbyterian Church fire relief Fuller Seminary Emergency Fund for students, staff and faculty   2025 National Gathering National Gathering March 25-27, 2025 with a pre-gathering for pastors starting on March 24 First Presbyterian Church Lakeland, FL Featured speakers include ECO's Kaitlyn Wood, as well as Jim Davis & Michael Graham, co-authors of The Great Dechurching. Register by Feb. 15 for early bird discount More info Regional Connections Opportunities to Connect with TFC and our Partner Organizations Zoom Gathering Third Thursday of each month 10:00 - 11:00 am eastern Link to Zoom meeting Zoom Gathering for DFW area leaders Third Thursday of each month 2:00 pm central Email for Zoom link Winter Leadership Retreat Led by John Chaffee January 30-31, 2025 Summit Grove Camp & Conference Center New Freedom, PA Registration closed Zoom Gathering Second Thursday of each month 1:00 - 2:00 pm pacific Link to Zoom meeting If your region is not listed, we are working on plans for something in your area. If you'd like to help organize a TFC event in your area, please email us at office@fellowship.community. Trust This is perfect. Just perfect. By the time you read this, it will likely be mid-to-late January 2025, and you will have already failed at most, if not all, of your New Year’s resolutions, and are ready to think more seriously about the year stretching out in front of us. I just preached a sermon on Deuteronomy 11 to start the year. It was good to spend some time remembering Moses and the Israelites poised at the edge of a new day, at the border of the Promised Land near the Jordan River. Behind them are the 400 years of slavery in Egypt. Behind them are 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. Even though Moses won’t see the new day to completion, he sees it coming. And even as he is training up Joshua to lead them to Jericho, he takes one last opportunity (most of Deuteronomy) to preach a sermon of reminders to the people. Former TFC Board secretary Dan Baumgartner reminds us to trust. Read more New Board Member Spotlight Jon Tony serves as Senior Pastor at Hackberry Creek Church in Irving, TX. For two years, Jon taught World Geography and Cultures at the southernmost middle school in Texas. In order to legally cross the border into Mexico, he had to drive north. Tell about a time when you felt lonely or discouraged in ministry. In what ways did a community of believers or other pastors lift you up? About four years into my first call into ordained ministry, the best way I can describe how I felt was lonely and discouraged. Our church was growing, I felt loved by my congregation, my family was healthy and well, but I was exhausted spiritually and emotionally. I called a close friend from seminary and said I told him about what I was feeling, and he said that he felt the same. We formed a covenant group with another friend who was pastoring near him, and we met together for three days in far southwest Texas. It was a renewing week for me, to get away from the routine, to ask tough questions, to answer tough questions, and be encouraged by friends and partners in the gospel who were enduring their own challenging seasons. We prayed for each other, and just committed to keep meeting together, and we still do. God used these friends to remind me of his steadfast love that endures forever.   What excites you most about the future of TFC? What excites me most about the future of TFC is the renewed commitment to the gospel that we are being afforded by our denomination. In spite of all the machinations surrounding the new overtures being debated and voted on, TFC provides a community for congregations to remain committed to the gospel and reveal that the foolishness of the cross is the very power of God. Welcome, Jon! Thank you for serving TFC! Thoughts on Presbytery Voting from Board members Cynthia Betz-Bogoly invites you to show up for your presbytery's vote. Paul Cunningham reflects on the importance of maintaining the Big Tent philosophy. Preparing to Vote on the Amendments The following is an article written by founding TFC Board Member Jerry Andrews. An earlier version was posted and distributed this spring at our National Gathering when the then Olympia Overture was sent to the General Assembly. This article, rewritten and revised, was published in the most recent issue of Theology Matters. Several other articles on the subject can be found there as well. This essay is meant to help us all consider what is now a proposed amendment coming from the General Assembly. It is written in several short parts lending itself to form the basis of several two-minute speeches for your presbytery as it prepares to vote. It has served well as an interpretive piece for Sessions and Congregations.  Thank you to Theology Matters for giving us permission to reprint this article. Read Jerry's article here The full issue of Theology Matters can be found here Find a call TFC is committed to helping churches find compatible leaders - and vice versa! To that end, we invite you to check out the "Find a Call" page on our website, where you can see a variety of open positions throughout the country. We have received quite a few new postings recently, so be sure to stay connected! If you would like to post a position on our site, please send us an email. We are also looking for ways to improve this feature, so please think about how we might serve best in this area and send us any ideas or feedback. Find a call   Prayer by William Barclay "Give to your Church your blessing and your protection. Guide her in her thinking,  that she may be saved from the heresies which destroy the faith. Strengthen her in her witness, that she may bring no discredit on the name she bears. Inspire her in her fellowship, that those who enter her may find within her your friends and the friendship of their fellow humans." Connect with us! Do you have an idea for a future story? Are you involved in a ministry others need to know about? Let us know, and we'll include it in a future month's Together! Are you interested in learning more or becoming part of the Fellowship Community? Click here for more information.

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