February 2015

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FLORIS UNITED METHODIST CHURCH PREPARED FOR: Church Council PREPARED BY: Executive Director DATE: 02/13/15 FEBRUARY 2015 COUNCIL REPORT MEMBERSHIP & ATTENDANCE Worship attendance was strong in January, continuing a trend of increased worship attendance that began in December. We expect attendance to remain strong through the season of Lent and Easter as the Lenten worship series is linked to the Lenten study for small groups developed by Tom Berlin. It should be noted that our weekly worship attendance data is derived from the following:  Sunday services at 8:00, 9:15, and 11:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.  Livestream participants who register attendance at the 9:15 and 11:00 a.m. services  Restoration Church Sunday service at 10:00 a.m.  Celebrate Recovery service on Tuesday evening

Sunday 01/04/15 01/11/15 01/18/15 01/25/15 02/01/15 02/08/15

WORSHIP ATTENDANCE COMPARISON Change from Prior Year Comment +362 Restoration Launch +165 +82 3 day weekend +153 +125 +138

MEMBERSHIP AND ATTENDANCE STATISTICS JANUARY JANUARY 2015 2014 Weekly Worship 1436 1245 Attendance (JAN average)

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New Members

23

2

YTD New Members (through JAN) First Time Guests UNIQUE Attenders

23

2

19

34

2143

2038

YTD Average Weekly Worship Attendance (through JAN)

1436

1245

KEY ACTIVITIES & EVENTS BY MINISTRY AREA Worship Ministries  The January Sermon series, Real Happy, was well received. To encourage and help the congregation invite friends and family to church, we provided take home invitational post cards. We will continue to encourage the congregation to take ownership of evangelism.  Ward Ferguson, our Contemporary Music Leader, has decided to vacate his position effective April 30 in order to pursue other career opportunities. This decision was reached after much discussion, thought and prayer. We will begin the posting process for this position in February.  With the departure of our Contemporary Music Leader at the end of April, we have an opportunity to evaluate the future role of this position and the worship services currently supported by this position.  The worship team is focusing on Lent and Holy Week, looking for ways to be invitational and inspirational. Grow Ministries Winter program kick-offs were the focus of most of our program areas as we welcomed back our children, students and adults from the holiday lull in activity. Key areas of discipleship launched in January include Confirmation for our 8th grade students and the church wide Lenten study. Administration was also a January focus as 360 performance reviews, final goal evaluation and budget were completed. The Floris UMC Preschool Director and her assistant are being included in our annual 360 performance review and goal setting process for the first time. This will ensure further alignment of overall church goals throughout our educational programs. Children’s Ministries In January our focus was on evaluating where we’ve been and starting the new year strong. We are anticipating the completion of the programmatic school year and gearing up for our summer curriculum and events. Highlights for Children’s Ministries:  

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In January our monthly theme for Kid Nation was “A New Beginning.” The focus of our curriculum was baptism, Jonah’s reluctant call and Zacchaeus’ renewed commitment to follow Jesus. Our monthly theme for February will be “Heart Health.” We will discuss the different types of love (Storge, Agape, Eros, and Phileo). Our stories this month will be The Good Samaritan, Joseph Forgives His Brothers, David and Jonathan’s Friendship and John 13:35.

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On Sunday, January 11, we held our first Winter Art Day. Approximately 20 children in grades K5 participated in this event and enjoyed a variety of artistic experiences such as painting, collage, drawing and 3D art. They also learned how art can be used to worship God. Our F.I.S.H. (Fifth In Service for Him) event in January was a Progressive Dinner. Seventeen 5th graders participated and enjoyed appetizers in the Hangar, main courses in the Gathering Space, and desserts in rooms 223-224. At each location students played fun games, each with a food theme. Their service project was to donate packaged desserts for the Floris Guest House in February. In looking ahead, February will be a busy month including two events for MOPS, a Valentine themed Preschool Bible Time and registration for Vacation Bible School and Kids Quest. On the evening of February 27, our first ever Floris Family Challenge will take place. The Floris Family Challenge will be a great event for kids in grades K-5 and a parent or other special adult to join together to complete 24 various challenges – physical, mental and team building. Trophies will be given to the winning team in each grade category. Upcoming spring events will include: o FISH Missions Madness on March 6 (for 5th graders and their families) o MOPS on March 9 and 23 o Preschool Bible Time on March 18 o Family Easter Festival on March 21 o Parenting With Heart Parenting Seminar on April 11 o Preschool Bible Time April 22 o FISH Movie and Parent meeting on February 24 o Spring Art Day on February 26

Student Ministries In January our focus was to bounce back strong from the holiday hiatus with the kick-off of winter programs and student ministries volunteer recruitment. Highlights for Student Ministries: 

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Krew and CrossRoads came together for a kick-off night of fun, music and worship with guest artist Keith Elgin and his band on January 11. The 2015 Confirmation program began with a retreat at Camp Highroad in early January. This year’s program serves 62 confirmands and utilizes 75 adult leaders/mentors. Our high school service ministry, Faithworks!, engaged 15 students and their leaders in serving breakfast to the homeless at Charlie’s Place in Washington, D.C. on January 24. The student ministry team began a new process of interviewing leaders who have expressed interest in joining one of the three student mission trips this summer. This has been a fruitful process of familiarization with our volunteers and to share expectations, discuss responsibilities and provide general information about student mission trips. At this time, we have only 2 remaining adult volunteer spots. As we move into spring we are looking to accomplish the following things as we continue to establish the identity and growth of the Floris student ministry program: o Completing the Lenten study with our Sunday morning small groups and freshmen Lunch Bunch small group. o Developing engagement activities related to the new basketball court that will be installed on the Floris Herndon campus property in April or May.

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Creating a more intimate setting in CrossRoads to encourage community building between our 6th and 7th grade students while our 8th graders are engaged in Confirmation. Visioning for the coming year, which includes the identification of essential ministry elements and the development of a theme for the 2015-2016 program year, small group goals and volunteer needs.

Adult Ministries In January the major focus in Adult Ministries was the upcoming Lenten study, Mess. We made a strategic decision not to host a small group fair in January so that the primary focus would be on Lenten small group participation as the series begins early this year. Focus over the next few months is on Lenten group participation and upcoming book sales. Transition from Lenten groups to other small groups for new participants is the primary goal and we plan to offer several new groups that will begin right after Easter. Highlights for Adult Ministries:   

Lenten small group sign-up started on January 18 and continued the following 2 weeks. Initial numbers were strong with over 600 persons signed up to participate in a group. The Lenten Participation Guide and Leader’s Guide were proofed, edited and printed. Leadership training was developed for our 50 Lenten small group leaders. In concert with Serve Ministries, we established new guidelines for the purpose of determining the status of affiliate groups/ministries at Floris. Through this process, MOPS and MOM2MOM are recognized as full ministries of Adult Discipleship and have been fully integrated into our small group system.

Serve Ministries  Volunteers assisted with a packaging event at the inaugural Restoration Church service on January 4 to benefit students at Forest Edge Elementary School. Serve Ministries staff members are assisting Restoration with upcoming projects such as additional packaging events and the Cornerstones Rapid Rehousing program.  Recruiting for Cuba missions and the Floris Guest House continued in January. The Guest House will utilize approximately 300 volunteers.  These are upcoming ministries and programs for Serve Ministries: o Floris Guest House o Easter Basket Ministry o Sandy and Cuba Missions o Rebuilding Together o Camp Hutchison

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Serve Ministries by the Numbers – January: Ministry Activity

Dates

Volunteers

Volunteer Hours

People Served

Grace Ministries

1/2 & 3

74

232.00

497

Embry Rucker

1/17 & 24

10

30.00

160

FACETS

1/6

13

50.50

85

SOME

1/17

6

24.00

300

ESL

1/, 13, 20

24

114.00

140

Hutchison PALS

Daily

32

72.00

64

NC Hypothermia

1/6, 13, 20 & 27

39

81.00

100

198

603.50

1346

Totals

Connections Ministries  The Bi-District Training day was held at Floris on Saturday, January 10. Floris hosted 500 persons from churches in the Arlington and Alexandria Districts. Floris provided 35 volunteers to assist with greeting, breakfast/lunch service, A/V support, Cokesbury Bookstore support and offsite parking accommodations.  Coffee with the Pastors (CWP) was held on January 14 with a record number of young adults in attendance. Twenty-two out of 46 participants at CWP were young adults. Connections staff assisted with refreshments, collection of membership data and cleanup.  These are upcoming events for Connections Ministry: o Chocolate Festival on February 14 o Coffee with the Pastors on March 10 o Easter Festival on March 21 Congregational Care Ministries  Fifteen persons attended a support group offering on “Thriving While Living with an Autoimmune Disease,” hosted by Stephen Taylor, CEO of the Sjogrens Syndrome Foundation.  We held a volunteer recruitment event for the newly named Family Support Ministry (formerly called Respite Care). Fourteen new volunteers signed up for this ministry and will attend an orientation meeting on February 10.  We started a Congregational Care Ministers (CCMs) training class for two staff members who will be helping with congregational care.

Diversity Ministry Floris has named diversity in the Floris community as a key operational and strategic long-term goal. Associate Pastor Nadeem Khokhar joined the staff in July 2014 to lead this significant and ambitious effort.

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In January, Nadeem held a review and planning meeting for the South Asian families who were instrumental in providing the Christmas Day service. This group debriefed the event and talked about ways to bolster the event for next Christmas. A New Year’s “Watch Night” service was proposed to the Floris pastoral team for consideration. This service would be another great opportunity to invite our South Asian neighbors to a culturally familiar event at Floris. In addition to the two culturally traditional services, Christmas Day and New Year’s Watch Night, the South Asian group working with Nadeem proposed having an afternoon Good Friday service in addition to the Floris traditional Good Friday service or Cantata at 7:30 p.m. Many of our South Asian families travel to a South Asian church in Maryland to attend a culturally familiar mid-afternoon Good Friday service and would be grateful if Floris would offer the opportunity for this Good Friday experience at Floris, their home church. Nadeem continues his work extending invitations to the South Asian community to serve in different roles and ministry areas here at Floris, including ushers and greeters, scripture readers, communion servers and on various ministry teams and committees. Nadeem devotes time to essential follow-up work with new families who visit Floris. His goal is to build relationships with new families and get them connected into community life at Floris. We have had a number of new South Asian members sign up to participate in group life experience here at Floris. This is the first experience with small groups for many of these persons.

Communications Ministry Herndon Campus  Social Media engagement was high in January as folks expressed enthusiasm around the Real Happy sermon series. A clip of the pastors tossing stress balls into the pews was shared 20 times and liked by 60 people. As a result, 3,072 people were reached (by comparison, in 2014 only the Join Us for Christmas post reached more people at 3,572). We posted a video clip that incorporated our members, including the pastors, singing and dancing to the Pharrell song Happy, and this post reached 2,110 individuals. A post of the Philippians 4:8-9 scripture was liked by 41 people and shared by 20, reaching 1,160 people. Communications engagement related to the Real Happy series continues into February as people send pictures of their “travels with Happy Hank” for us to post on Facebook.  The website continues to be a hub for information about events and activities. We had 61,657 user sessions in the month of January. The most viewed pages include Live Stream, Preschool – About Us, Meet the Staff (church), Service Times and My Floris. Visitors to the Floris UMC website stay engaged for an average of 27 minutes. Reston Campus  The website had 6,685 user sessions in the month of January. The most viewed pages include Worship and Location, Meet the Staff, Who We Are and Current Series. Seventy people viewed the Media Library, which is where previous sermons can be found. Visitors to the Restoration website stay engaged for an average of 12 minutes.  Restoration has 452 Facebook likes and engages its audience with events and activities in and around Reston. The most active post in January was the Launch post. That post was shared 13 times and liked by 76 and as a result reached 1,200 people. The second most active post was the 6

call to send pictures of Happy Hank, which was liked 44 times and shared 33 times, reaching 876 people. Other Initiatives:  We are gearing up for even more communications engagement. During Lent we plan to share, on Twitter and Facebook, daily scriptures that correspond with the Participants Guide for the Lenten study. We also plan to share 40 days of pictures on Instagram. This is an intentional effort to increase engagement on Instagram and to increase our Instagram audience. (Note: Over 90% of the 150 million people on Instagram are under the age of 35. Read more at http://www.businessinsider.com/instagram-demographics-2013-12#ixzz3RRnOyIhV). There will also be opportunities to receive weekly texts during Lent and a weekly email with questions to help our members through a Lenten season of personal examination.  Six writers signed up to capture the stories of Floris. The goal of this initiative is to tell the stories of transformation that are happening every day at Floris but often go untold. Look for their articles in the eNote and on the Today I Saw God blog.

FINANCIAL OPERATIONS January receipts were decreased 17% from the same period last year. This decrease was expected based on the annual estimate of giving provided by the congregation in support of the 2015 general operating budget. Revenue projections for the year have been difficult to finalize based on the estimate of giving cards received after the annual stewardship drive last October/November. The general operating fund annual stewardship campaign generated 616 estimate of giving cards, which is 44 cards short of the goal. Based on the traditional estimate of giving card formula we have used in the past to determine revenue projections, we are projecting a budget deficit this year. In consultation with our Horizons Stewardship consultant, Joe Park, we are utilizing a couple of different formulas to analyze a number of financial data points to help with revenue projections. Additionally, the staff worked diligently to reduce the proposed operating budget by over $72,000. With new financial data from the month of January and recommendations from the stewardship consultant, our current model for revenue and expense projections indicates that revenue and expenses will line up closely for the year. We will continue to closely monitor revenue and expenses on a weekly basis and our forecasting models will become more predictably reliable toward the end of the second quarter when we reforecast the budget.

JANUARY 2015 FINANCIAL DATA JANUARY JANUARY 2015 2014 General Fund $270,666 $326,075 Receipts (JAN) Building Fund $78,679 $23,145 Receipts (JAN) Reserves 1.67 months 3.00 months Indebtedness $8,415,000 $9,990,000 2014 Net ($48,366) $373,374 (not Income yet adjusted (through JAN) for accruals)

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IMAGINE CAMPAIGN STRATEGIC INITIATIVES Restoration Church  We met with the leadership team at Forest Edge Elementary School to develop a plan for a mentoring relationship between Restoration and Forest Edge students. We are currently recruiting members for the program.  We are launching six Lenten study small groups. After the first week of sign-ups we have 57 participants and leaders in groups. Many of these small group participants are new to Restoration Church (and Floris) and the objective for these groups is to help these new persons get connected.  We have new individuals and families every week joining us for the first time. We give first time guests a small gift bag when they come and then follow up with an email that includes a welcome note and a Starbucks gift card. Tim meets individually with all new guests if they are open to that visit. Many of these visits are done on Sunday afternoons after the worship service.  We will offer two services on Easter Sunday, one at 9:00 a.m. for the volunteers who will be serving at the 10:15 service and during the egg hunt that follows that service. The Easter egg hunt following the 10:15 service will be at Forest Edge. The surrounding community is invited.  We packaged more than 400 meals for the children at Forest Edge at our packaging event on January 4. We continue to collect donations every week for Embry Rucker Shelter. The relationship with Cornerstones and the Rapid Rehousing Project will officially begin with our first home in March.  We are excited to see new individuals and families stepping up to serve on Sunday morning.  Our Facebook likes have doubled in the last two months due to a great campaign by our communications team. Additionally, we have added 50 new subscribers to the Restoration eNote in the last two weeks.  We are working on a plan for a summer camp in the Forest Edge neighborhood for this summer.

Hutchison Afterschool Programs  The Director of Serve Ministries met with key volunteers and administration from Hutchison Elementary to begin planning for afterschool programs. Planning will begin in February with a stakeholders meeting.  Research into financial sustainability began in January with research into potential grant makers and foundations that give to childhood development and education programs. Young Adult Initiative  Dinners for young adults began in late January with 58 participants. Dinners are scheduled for February and March and we plan to schedule April, May and June dinners in the near future.  There is a tentative conference scheduled for the Fellows Program in April. The Director of Serve Ministries plans to attend.

OPERATIONS/ADMINISTRATION  The Trustees Committee met in January and selected Roger Frost as the 2015 committee Chairman. The Trustees have a full plate of substantive projects planned for this year including a reserves study for facilities, emergency preparedness planning and the creation of volunteer

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work teams that will attend to the grounds and miscellaneous painting, maintenance and cleaning projects. Staffing Update  The staff is in the final stages of the annual performance review process. Employees are meeting with managers to discuss the results of their 360 performance feedback surveys, their 2014 goal review and the drafting of 2015 goals. The entire process will be completed by March 10.

90-Day Program/Events Outlook February  FISH Valentines Party: February 8, 12:15 p.m.  Chocolate Festival: February 14, 11 a.m.  Floris Guesthouse: February 15-22  Ash Wednesday Service: February 18, 7:30 p.m.  Lenten Communion Service: February 26, 7 p.m.  Young Adult Dinner: February 27, 6 p.m.  Floris Family Challenge: February 27, 6:30 p.m. March          

Easter Basket Distribution: March 1 and 8, all services Lenten Communion Services: March 5, 12, 19, and 26, 7 p.m. FISH March Madness Family Night: March 6, 6:30 p.m. Parenting with Heart: March 7, 9 a.m. Coffee with the Pastors: March 10, 7 p.m. Kid’s Kingdom Kid’s Night Out: March 13, 5 p.m. MOPS Family Picnic: March 14, 11 a.m. Family Easter Festival: March 21, 2 p.m. Easter Basket Return: March 22, all services Young Adult Dinner: March 29, 6 p.m.

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Holy Thursday Service: April 2, 7:30 p.m. Good Friday Service: April 3, 7:30 p.m. Easter Eve Service: April 4, 7:00 p.m. Easter Sunday Services: April 5, 6:15 a.m., 8:00 a.m., 9:15 a.m., 11:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. Empty Bowls Event: April 10, 5:30 p.m. Parenting with Heart: April 11, 9:00 a.m. FISH Movie Night: April 24, 6:30 p.m.

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