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• A new phase in Regional Transition begins ...
• Regional Assembly Presents: Disciples Network Gathering
• School for Congregational Learning
• Camps Begin for the Summer
• Jubilee: Jerry Crenshaw
• What We've Noticed from You ...
• Open Source: New Church Start in Rochester, MN
• Broadway CC: Wednesday Night Church
• Youth Worker Interchange
• Waukee Youth Taking Global Challenge!
• Quadrennial Note
• A Shared Spirit Story

Bill Spangler-Dunning
Lead Transitional Regional Minister and President

A new phase in Regional Transition begins . . .

Though I heard it before, I recently heard it again from a minister in this region; "If you want to know how and where you see God in the ministry of your church, simply look at your budget." This is as true for churches as it is for individuals. How I spend my money, my time, and my passion reflects my core beliefs and purpose. It illuminates what I value, both to myself, and to others.

I would add to this revealing phrase that how one structures a church will let you know what is important as well. We in the region have evolved from a time when individual congregations first decided to do ministry together and structures were created to help accomplish the ministry, –to- a time now when structures determine what ministry we will do together. As we move forward in this transitional time together, I cannot say that we have all the answers as to what we will look like or what structures we will need to help us ‘be church’ but I can say that the priority will be to ask, "To what needs and ministries is God calling us today and how can we best gather and support them?" I know that our foundation as Disciples Together is and will be the ministries that develop from each and every congregation as they join together. I ask for your prayers as we begin in this next phase of our transition.

May God continue to bring us together in ministry.

Your partner in ministry,
Bill Spangler-Dunning
BSD

We need congregations' help in hosting food booths for the "Disciples Network Gathering." Looking for a fundraising opportunity? Wanting to show off your cooking skills? Visit the regional website and download the food booth form and submit it.

The deadline for registering to host a food booth was previously June 1st, but was recently extended until June 25th. If you have questions, please call Connie Derby Dicks at 515.255.3168

The assembly will be held on Saturday, October 9, 2010 at the Christian Conference Center (located just outside of Newton, IA).

In the Spirit of Disciples Together, we've planned a day of fun activities. Some of the fun activities include:

• Food booths hosted by various congregations around the Region
• Horse-drawn wagon rides
• Tours of the Christian Conference Center grounds
• Outdoor games & activities for adults, youth & children
• Live music all day
• Team Competitions (get your team together!) such as these races:
• Communion cup filling
• Setting up & taking down chairs & tables
• Lawn mower
• Worship in the Outdoor Chapel
• Workshops & demonstrations
• The annual Region-wide business meeting

PS - Click on the image above to watch a YouTube clip put together by the organizers of the event!

Save the date for the School for Congregational Learning, Saturday, August 28th, 2010, hosted by West Des Moines Christian Church.

Registration forms and workshop announcements will be sent to congregations at the end of June, but until then, you can visit the regional website and watch videos from our keynote speaker: Jose Morales (the Transitional Regional Minister for the Central Rocky Mountain Region).

One of our flagship ministries as "Disciples Together" is our summer camping program, primarily hosted at the Christian Conference Center in Newton, IA.

Please pray for the campers at:

June 10-11, 2010     Grandcamp #19
June 11-12, 2010     Grandcamp #20

June 14-19, 2010     Junior Camp #2
June 14-19, 2010     ChiRho Camp #7

June 14-19, 2010     Equestrian Camp #1
June 21-26, 2010     ChiRho Camp #8
June 21-26, 2010     CYF Camp #15
June 28-July 3, 2010     Junior Camp #3
June 28-July 3, 2010     ChiRho Camp #9
June 28-July 3, 2010     Equestrian Camp #2
July 5-10, 2010     ADAM Camp
July 6-8, 2010     PeeWee Camp
July 8-10, 2010     Junior Camp #6 Mini
July 9-11, 2010     Adult Canoe Camp
July 10-11, 2010     Grandcamp #21

Want to send letters to campers? Write to them at:

Full Name - Camp Name

5064 Lincoln Street

Newton, IA 50208

Jerry Crenshaw
Retiring? Read on!...

After 19 years in ministry at Indianola Heights Christian Church in Des Moines, IA, Jerry Crenshaw is closing his ministry. Sunday, May 30th was his last Sunday preaching and presiding at the Lord's Table at Indianola Heights.

Such a transition could easily burden a minister with melancholy and sadness. After all, Crenshaw is losing a church family he led for nearly two decades. But while he will definitely grieve in the coming months over this transition, he also prepares for his next step with fervor.

Jerry Crenshaw is starting a "church without walls." Actually, to call it a church - at this point - is a stretch. Crenshaw wrote to his current congregation: "To put it simply, I am going out to relate to other children of God." The Indianola Heights CC leadership wisely told Jerry he had to tell people himself -- they couldn't be the messengers.

Crenshaw plans a seven-year ministry where he will gather young adults together who are not necessarily affiliated with or involved in a congregation.

"I just can't sit back. I have problems with the "foxhole" mentality: 'drop in sometime and if you become like us, you're welcome.' We have to go out - and find out their values - and meet them!"

People recommend he find young adults in some of the funniest places: weekend softball leagues, the local bus system in Des Moines, even the Harley Davidson shop. "I didn't expect that, but apparently the youngest and fastest group of Harley Davidson fans are young women under 35."

His goal is to get them to work together at service projects and see what the group starts looking like as the fellowship grows.

Crenshaw decided to "get out and go" before he worked out all the details. He doesn't know if it will just have one group or will have multiple small groups (that he would get to interact somehow). He humbly admits: "this segment of the population is the best at networking and structuring themselves. I'm going to suggest a church without walls and let them build it. We're not building a building unless it's in Haiti. We're not building an institution."

How financially can this happen? After a lifetime of ministry where churches paid into the Pension Fund, he's now drawing a pension. "What better way to spend it than on young adults?!?"

This Sunday, June 6th, Crenshaw will receive the "retired ministers pen" at IHCC. (He even offered to sell it to any minister who wanted it at a cheap, bargain price). The afternoon of June 6th there will be a commissioning service and the start of Jubilee.

Where: Indianola Heights Christian Church, 3139 Southeast 8th Street, Des Moines, IA
When: July 6th, 2010 - 2pm

Can't attend? "Chime in" virtually by clicking here or by sending Jerry an e-mail (jubileelite@gmail.com) with prayers and encouragement. You can also chime in to receive ongoing e-mails about the ministry of Jubilee.

Every month regional staff members Connie Derby Dicks and Adam Frieberg skim the bulletins and newsletters from congregations across the region. These newsletters are a great way for us to notice trends and momentum building in congregations. Here is what we've noticed:

• Congratulations to Carlisle CC as the congregation prepares to celebrate their 150th anniversary this September!
• Highland Park CC recognized Harriet Stewart at a recent choir rehearsal for 60 years of service playing the piano and organ!
• FCC Panora is hosting a fundraiser entitled, "Blooming/Quilted Gardens" where you can tour gardens, enjoy lovely flowers, quilts, and a High Tea Lunch on June 26. The charge is $12 per person.
• FCC Sac City pastor, Sharla Hulsey, increases interest in her congregation with intriguing sermon titles printed in the church newsletter i.e., "They’ll Know We are Christians by Our Wooliness" (Jesus the Good Shepard), "The First Christian in Europe" (Christianity on the move), and "Singin’ hymns When You Oughta Be Singin’ the Blues" (Christian faith put to the test by extreme hardship).
• Norwalk Christian Church celebrated the end of the school year for the Dinky Disciples with a frisbee golf outing and for the JYF group with a fun day at an inflatable jumping park. Their Chi Rho and CYF groups will still meet this summer with several pool parties and the Adults will meet to talk about Faith and Politics.
• First Christian Church in Ft. Dodge has a booth at the Hillbilly Flea Market the first week of June at the Webster County Fairgrounds. The displays and church presence are to remind people that the church prays with and for them, offers assistance and can act as a referral service for social services.
• First Christian Church in Keokuk is moving their local youth ministry / coffee shop / community center - "Common Grounds" - to a new location in the Keokuk mall with more space and better facilities. At a recent dinner, 10 youth raised their hands when Pastor Matt Hunt asked them who wanted to be baptized.
• A small group from First Christian Church in Minneapolis and Spirit of Joy Christian Church are partnering with the Minnesota Council of Churches to provide settlement assistance to a refugee family over the next four months.
• The Drake Avenue Christian Church began a new project within their congregation to reach out to their members in need.  "Are you in need of a ride to the store or to the doctor?  Are you in need of someone to run some errands for you?  The Volunteers in Action are here for you, simply call the church office or someone from the Action Team." They currently have a list of 14 members who make up the Action Team! 
• A striking amount of congregational newsletters from across the Region are lifting up prayers and support for their members, family, friends and ‘all persons’ who are currently serving in the military.  Examples include:
• FCC Davenport recently made several goals for outreach, one of them was, "Provide Bibles for the Military and send them overseas in the Military boxes you can get from the Post Office."
• Runnells CC "Prayer Concerns" asks for prayers by name for "All military personnel including: Jason Adkins, Greg Bartelma, Patrick Feeley, David Funk, Corbin Hays, Aimee Wells, and Michael Waltz."
• Plymouth Creek CC "Prayers for our Church Family" asks for prayer for their pastor Shane Isner’s brother-in-law Joe as he is being deployed to Iraq.
• Mount Ayr CC recognized Yelena Naumova who graduated in the top 10% of her class at U.S. Army Field Artillery Training Center in Fort Sill, OK.  She is the daughter of Lana and Neil Hartman, who attended the ceremony. 
• The nephew of Lynda Carlson, minister at Albia FCC is serving in Egypt, please keep him in your prayers
  

Was there something missing from these that is worth sharing? Make sure to send electronic copies of your newsletters to Adam Frieberg amfumw@gmail.com or send your printed newsletters to Connie Derby Dicks - 5064 Lincoln St, Newton, IA 50208

Editor's note: this comes from Stephen and Rebecca Haney, who are starting a new church in Rochester, MN. To subscribe to their newsletter, e-mail Rebecca at rebecca@opensourcerochester.com

On Wednesday May 12, 2010, we had our first Beer and BIble Night at Kathy’s a downtown bar, with a rooftop open space area. Kathy’s is very popular among the Mayo Clinic Crowd with its 5-7 PM Happy hour. Several people committed to coming. And they showed up, and some of them even brought friends!

Here’s a story:
Danielle, manages a downtown business, is engaged, plans to get her fiance involved, and has minimal church involvement over the course of her lifetime. She currently commutes to Rochester but they are working on buying a home closer to Rochester. Danielle brought a friend, and within 48 hours posted stuff we talked about at the event on her facebook page. Think she’s coming back? We do:)

On Sunday Night starting In June we have a bible study staring at our house. We also have people committed to coming to it. It’s a separate crowd, but we're still excited!

Someone also donated a Canon Digital Rebel camera, so now we can take pictures and short videos of what's happening up here in Rochester, MN. Thank you all for your prayers and support!

Submitted by: Nancy Brookhardt

At Broadway Christian Church in Council Bluffs, IA we have a potluck meal, available to any and all every Wednesday night. It began in 2004 with 20-30 in attendance and we just served soup and crackers, but we got tired of making soup, so now there's a great variety of foods. Some are made by our members, some by folks who were our guests and have become an integral part of our church. Some is pre-made foods from the local food bank or grocery stores.

The meal is advertised by setting a wooden sign on the church lawn. Folks from all walks of life come. Some are employed, some are not. Some have homes, some do not. Some have much, some do not. Some need a meal. Some enjoy good health, some have permanent physical and mental restrictions that require them to have full-time caregivers. Some need company. Some need a place to belong and a way to serve others. Of the 80-100 people who come each Wednesday, only about 15-20 are the folks who also come to Sunday morning worship.

This past month we have baptized two people who attend on Wednesday night and will be baptizing two more in the near future.

What we discovered is that this is not "Soup Supper", but rather this is Wednesday Night Church. We pray, we gather around the table for fellowship, we break bread together. We have a Bible study following the meal. We began kid's activities last fall.

The other amazing thing is that no matter how many people come, we always seem to have enough food. God provides and there is enough (the parable of the fish and loaves)!

Do you want affordable youth worker training? What if it was friendly and appropriate for volunteers, lay leaders, casual youth leaders, or anyone else who even talk with youth?

Midwest Youth Worker Event

Who: Mark Riddle (http://www.markriddle.net/) speaking, ANY youth worker should attend
When: September 10-11, 2010 (Friday, Saturday)
Where: Christian Conference Center in Newton, IA
How much does it cost?:

• $20 if you just want to attend Saturday’s sessions ($20 includes meals)
• $45 (for Friday night extended learning time, hotel room, meals, event registration)

Mark Riddle is author of "Inside the Mind of Youth Pastors" and "The (un) Official Church Staff Manual: Youth Pastor Edition."

Please direct questions to Dan Mayes (dan@spencerdisciples.org), pastor of First Christian Church, Spencer, IA and member of regional youth unit; or, Melanie Van Weelden (melanie4399@gmail.com), Regional Minister for Youth Ministry.

Waukee CC, Pastors Larry Squire and Nancy Thomas

August 4-7, WCC youth from 6th grade up will head to Arkansas to the Heifer Project’s powerful global education experience at "Heifer Ranch". In a complex world of nearly 6.8 billion people, how can we find solutions to the challenges of hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation? Through this two-day immersion at the Heifer Ranch, each participant will begin to answer that question personally. They will randomly be assigned to experience an evening in a home in Guatemala, Zambia, Thailand, Appalachia, an urban slum or a refugee camp. Resources are divided based on the relative wealth of the "family," or part of the world represented by their assigned home. The participants may have to trade labor, barter food, or figure out other ways to acquire what they need if they are to have a full meal for dinner. The group will engage in a range of activities to challenge and strengthen their problem-solving and communication skills.

Spending the night in the Global Village will allow participants to experience lifestyles from around the world, explore cultural identity, examine issues of population, resource distribution, quality of life, and standard of living. By preparing their own dinner and breakfast, and participating in daily chores similar to those that Heifer’s Project Partners perform each day, it is hoped that everyone who participates will be inspired.

To learn more about this project; contact the Waukee Christian Church www.waukeechristianchurch.com or Heifer Project’s "Heifer Ranch" .

Hello ladies!

Are you attending Quadrennial this year? If so, please let me know so we can coordinate with you when our little mixer event will be and where so if you want to and are able you can attend! Also, do you have your t-shirt purchased yet? Saturday is the day to wear the shirt, so if you don't have yours yet, let me know via email and you can get one before you go. I will need to know very very soon as we need to send back the extra shirts before the event! Crew neck tees are $15 and can be mailed to your home....Polo styles are $20 also mailed to the home. If you live in the metro area of Des Moines and want to pick it up they are 10 and 15 respectively. Please don't wait, or you unfortunately will be out of luck and will need to purchase at the event, and I don't know what their prices will be! You can also contact me during the day at 515-210-1514 or in the evening at 515-282-5167.

See you there!
Wende Barrett
DW Unit Vice Chair
jwbarrett@q.com

Editor's Note: This story comes from a member of First Christian Church in Davenport, IA. Look for more stories in future issues of the DT Express or on our Shared Spirit page -- and, please submit your own stories

Author: Dennis Duvall

One Sunday this note was passed to Pastor Mike Armstrong:

Today Sunday April 25, 2010 for the month of May the Disciples Men’s Group, the Disciples Women and the Duvall family have combined to purchase (37) $ 10.00 gift meat certificates for the Sacred Heart Food Pantry 14th & Brady Davenport, Iowa.

For the year of 2010 to-date (86) of these $ 10.00 gift meat certificates, will have been given to the food pantry. Last year a record (96) of these certificates were given out. As you can see we are excited, that we are on course for another record year by far.

Thanks to the Disciples Women, Disciples Men, and all the known and anonymous individual donors

A Little Background

Many years ago Nancy, my wife and I were giving a gift at our anniversary, which is Thanksgiving time. Years married x our 3 children. One year we ask our pastor (at the time Fred Marsh) what else we could to help. He directed us to the local food pantry which at the time was at The Sacred Heart Cathedral, thus the name Sacred Heart Food Pantry. It seems there was a niche that was not being filled. They had very little freezer space especially during the holidays. The idea: gift meat certificates redeemable at local grocery stores was a need. At the time there we no plastic gift cards, only paper, and the food pantry could stamp the cards "meat only", and the cards took very little space at the food pantry.

Originally we used the Eagles just north of the church on East Locust, and we only bought a few at Thanksgiving. Later we included Christmas. A few years went by at we moved up to a quarterly basis, About this time Eagles, Hy-Vee and Fareway switched to plastic gift certificates and they would not designate meat only items. A change had to be made. We visited Ye Ole Smokehouse at Marquette & West Locust, a ma & pa type business. We made the switch. By this time we were up to $ 7.00 per certificate and purchased 6 every other month. A year went by and one day the business, they informed us that the owner (St. Ambrose University) would not renew their lease. The search was on to find a replacement. In our minds we still needed the old paper type certificates, because we did not want the recipients to be able to purchase tobacco, liquor, or pet products. We wanted to stay with the original thought of supplying meat products and still taking up no space in the pantries freezer.

In November of 2008 a new home was found to purchase these gift certificates Golick’s Meat Shop corner of East High & Bride, just to the S.W. corner of Genesis East Hospital here in Davenport. During that time the Duvall family had moved to 6 $ 7.00 every month, then 8 $ 8.00 certificates monthly. Last year 2009 the family moved to (8) $ 10.00 certificates sometime during the fall of the year. Just prior to the Thanksgiving Holiday 2009 word got out in a bigger way that this mission excited. Only a few in the congregation new of its existence prior to that. Since Thanksgiving 2009, the Disciples Women and Disciples Men Groups have each promised and are delivering in their promise of (50) $ 10.00 gift certificates each. Many individuals have purchased 1, 2, or more certificates. I have had anonymous gifts, which were left at the church office or other places.

From a humble beginning this mission, which was quite small in its beginnings may top more than (110) $ 10.00 gift Meat Certificates in 2010. I am grateful that the needy and hunger of Davenport, Iowa benefit, if only in a small way of our Gift Meat Certificates.

Respectfully

Dennis Duvall
Member
First Christian Church, Davenport, Iowa