March 2015

---

FLORIS UNITED METHODIST CHURCH PREPARED FOR: Church Council PREPARED BY: Executive Director DATE: 03/13/15 MARCH 2015 COUNCIL REPORT

MEMBERSHIP & ATTENDANCE Worship attendance remained strong in February in spite of inclement weather impacts. We expect attendance to remain strong through the season of Lent and Easter as the Lenten worship series is linked to the Lenten small group study developed by Tom Berlin. We can attribute the increase in worship attendance to a confluence of the following factors:  Restoration Church launch in January.  Strong sermon series leading up to Lent.  Lenten sermon series and church wide small group experience with materials developed by Tom Berlin.  Significant increase in worship participation via our livestream option.

Sunday 02/01/15 02/08/15 02/15/15 02/22/15 03/01/15 03/08/15

WORSHIP ATTENDANCE COMPARISON Change from Prior Year Comment +125 +138 +149 +94 Inclement Weather Impact (-90) Inclement Weather Impact +132

MEMBERSHIP AND ATTENDANCE STATISTICS FEBRUARY FEBRUARY 2015 2014 Weekly Worship 1309 1183 Attendance (FEB average)

1

New Members

13

9

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

36

11

24

22

1948

1914

YTD Average Weekly Worship Attendance (through FEB)

1372

1214

KEY ACTIVITIES & EVENTS BY MINISTRY AREA Worship Ministries  We posted the Contemporary Music Leader position and have received a few resumes for review. We will adhere to our stringent hiring process to screen, interview and select the best candidate for this position.  We have had a challenging Lenten season because of inclement weather on multiple Sundays. While many Sunday worship services were impacted, worship attendance remained strong primarily because of the livestream option we are now able to offer on a weekly basis.  The worship team is focusing on Lent and Holy Week, looking for ways to be invitational and inspirational.  Approximately 70 persons come together one Saturday evening per month for the Saturday Latino gatherings. These gatherings offer a time of prayer, music, scripture and community. We want to extend an invitation to the rest of the congregation to attend these Saturday evenings once a month for a lively faith experience. Grow Ministries Flexibility and patience were needed during the month of February as multiple inclement weather events impacted small groups, student events and children’s morning programs. The church wide Lenten study has been a major success in terms of participation. Confirmation is in full swing and both Children and Student Ministries are in the midst of planning and preparing for a spring full of events, retreats and programs. Children’s Ministries  



2

In February our monthly theme for Kid Nation was “Heart Health”. We discussed the different types of love (Storge, Agape, Phileo) and our stories centered on how we can show love for each other, how much Jesus loves us and how we can love different people in different ways. On February 8 we held our F.I.S.H. (Fifth In Service for Him) Valentine’s Party. Fifth graders made mosaic crosses for their mothers or another special person, played games, enjoyed a fun and colorful snack and made paper chains to be used as decorations for the Chocolate Festival. The boys and girls had a fun contest to see who could make the longest paper chain and when finished, they combined their chains to make one very long chain. We held our first ever Floris Family Challenge on February 27. It was a huge success with the participation of 24 teams. Kids and parents had a great time working together to solve physical, mental and team building challenges. All participants received a participant ribbon and trophies were awarded for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place finishers in each grade category.

  

We are heavily involved in the planning of the programmatic portion of the upcoming Family Easter Festival. During the festival we will have inflatables, games, crafts, snacks and lots of egg hunts. We are still taking registrations and recruiting volunteers for Vacation Bible School (VBS) and Kids Quest. Upcoming spring events 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 Middle School:  Confirmation small groups and mentor sessions are in full swing as our 62 confirmands take important steps along their faith journeys. These students volunteered at the Chocolate Festival and are making plans to volunteer in other ways along with their mentors.  Our 7th grade girl’s leaders ran a Sunday night program from beginning to end that focused on the topic of what love looks like in the modern age using a scriptural foundation.  A peer-to-peer Sunday evening program was organized as a platform for a 7th grade student to speak directly with peers and provide a unique perspective on the topic of respect.  Our service opportunities this month included writing letters to guests who joined us during the Floris Guest House, as well as packaging more meals for the Help Hungry Kids program. High School:  FaithWorks!, our high school service group, had a role in volunteering at the Chocolate Festival as they set up, organized and facilitated the Help Hungry Kids portion of the event. The following weekend, FaithWorks! worked with Krew to assemble kits for the Easter basket ministry.  Navarone and 2 other leaders accompanied 8 students as they participated in the 30 Hour Famine in late February. During the event, they had the opportunity to participate in the 30 hour fast, engage with other students in the district and participate in worship and other service opportunities.  Initiated by Karen Berlin, we started a sign language class taught by Dave and Mary Eelman. Ten to twelve students on average attend this class.  Wednesday afternoons have been designated "Open Hangar.” This is an afternoon option that provides our students an opportunity to come to the Hangar, connect, do homework and spend time in their church.  Morning prayer breakfasts have been resumed as Breakfast on the Bus. Students are able to join Ashley on the bus at each of the 4 major high schools in our area for doughnuts and a prayer.

3

Adult Ministries The focus for Adult Ministries has been Lent. We previously made the decision to delay the start of new groups launched in January in favor of a focus on Lenten group participation. The strategy worked and resulted in record participation in the Lenten study. Administratively, we launched a new system to track curriculum purchases by group and by type of curriculum.    

 

Over 800 Lenten study guides were sold throughout the congregation. This year we took orders for the study guide from some of our livestream participants. Over 700 participants signed up for the small group portion of the church wide study. With 43 groups across Floris and Restoration, as well as high school and middle school groups, we started 13 new small groups. We trained 40 leaders for the small group Lenten experience. The training included Tom’s preview of the video portion of the study as well as a focus on the self-examination opportunity that is unique to this particular study. Weekly questions related to the self-examination opportunity are being provided through the web and direct email. These questions follow John Wesley’s accountability group format as well as the St. Ignatius Prayer of Examen. This has been a popular feature of the Lenten study experience and has provided a unique way for group leaders to interact with their members. Looking ahead, we are planning to launch several small group curriculums that will afford those who joined short-term Lenten groups an opportunity to continue in a group experience after Lent. We continue our efforts to develop a new on-boarding process/curriculum aimed at new members. We are looking at combining elements of both the Alpha course and the book Making Sense of the Bible by Adam Hamilton.

Serve Ministries  The second Floris Guest House occurred the week of February 15-22, from 5 p.m. to 7 a.m. each night. Up to 46 guests were served during the week. More than $11,000 in donated goods and services were provided to the guests and FACETS through this ministry. Inclement weather provided us the opportunity to hold our Guest House open during the day for a couple of very cold days in addition to the evenings.  Funds from the 2014 Christmas Eve Offering were disbursed to Helping Children Worldwide to support their programs. Additionally, Floris provided a donation to Hutchison Elementary School in support of their running club program.  In late February, leaders from the Easter basket ministry and Student Ministries partnered to prepare 800 basket kits for distribution in March.  Upcoming ministries and programs for Serve Ministries: o Easter Basket Ministry o Hurricane Sandy Relief and Cuba Missions o Rebuilding Together o Camp Hutchison

4

Serve Ministries by the numbers - February Ministry Activity

Dates

Volunteers

Volunteer Hours

People Served

Grace Ministries

2/6 & 7

104

326.50

805

Embry Rucker

2/21 & 28

8

24

170

FACETS

2/3

13

40.50

125

SOME

2/21

6

24

391

ESL

2/3,10 & 24

24

143.50

140

Hutchison PALS

Daily

34

78.00

68

**Floris Guest House

2/15 - 22

340

1539.50

46

NC Hypothermia

2/3, 10, 17, 24

29

69.00

100

HHK Packaging Event

2/14

7

56

300

565

2301

2145

Totals

Connections Ministries  Floris held the 24th Annual Chocolate Festival on February 14, hosting approximately 500 persons. One hundred twenty volunteers, including 60 confirmands, supported this annual event. Proceeds from the event totaled over $10,000 and will be donated to the Help Hungry Kids program.  Connections Ministries started its collaboration with Kid Nation to host the 2015 Easter Festival. For this event, Floris opens its doors to almost 1000 persons from our congregation and the surrounding community. The event is targeted at families with kindergarten through fifth grade children.  Weekly meetings were held with facilities staff to assess and modify the current building usage model. Several policies have been added to ensure proper usage of space, including a fee assessment protocol.  Connections Ministries began the redistribution of Sunday hospitality tasks. Most recently they took on the parking lot volunteer assignments and shuttle service management.  Upcoming events and programs for Connections: o Coffee with the Pastors on March 10 o Clergy Meeting on March 11 o Training for the Episcopal Arlington Diocese and Kent Island UMC on March 19 o Easter Festival on March 21

5

Congregational Care Ministries  We plan to roll out a series of workshops this year for older adults and their caregivers. These monthly workshops will address such topics as dementia, Medicare and Medicaid, hospital system navigation, and pain and medication management.  We held our volunteer recruitment event for the newly named Family Support Ministry (formerly called Respite Care) on February 10. Twenty-two volunteers attended the event. For future orientation and training of Family Support Ministry volunteer caregivers, we videotaped the testimonies of families who have been supported through this ministry.  We are planning to offer a workshop in May, called “In It Together,” for the caregivers of persons with disabilities and chronic or terminal illnesses. The workshop will have an emphasis on massage and yoga techniques. Diversity Ministry  In his efforts to reach and build relationships with new persons in the community, Associate Pastor Nadeem Khokhar has connected with the group Indian Friends For Christ. This group meets on the third Saturday of every month for worship and fellowship at another location. Additionally, this group meets every other week for Bible study and Nadeem joins them when able. The goal of this effort is to build relationships and potentially have the group meet at Floris in the future. It is important to note that this group is not a church, but rather a group of persons meeting together regularly to grow in their faith and experience community.  Nadeem is leading a Lenten study group for our South Asian community in hopes that participants will become fully engaged on a consistent basis and experience the benefits of small group involvement at Floris.

Communications Ministry Herndon Campus  The Communications Team was focused on the Lenten sermon series, Mess, and the Chocolate Festival. Website statistics indicate successful engagement of the congregation around these initiatives. Both the current sermon page and the Lenten Study page, which provide other ways to connect beyond Sunday worship, and small groups were in the top fifteen pages. The top five pages this month were Livestream, Service Times, MyFloris, Current Message: Mess and the Chocolate Festival.  Livestream was heavily used in February, including Ash Wednesday. A number of families across Virginia and the Eastern seaboard joined us February 22 when their local churches were closed due to inclement weather. Despite the use of livestream, the media library is still used every day. The average number of loads in February was 56, with a low of 17 and a high of 174.  Blog activity increased in February with 1,399 hits, the most since October. Average daily views increased to 50. The most popular blog was “Reflections on Homelessness” written by one of our Floris Guesthouse guests.  Facebook was quite active the first few weeks of February with pictures of “Happy Hank” the stress ball as he traveled with members and friends of Floris.

6

Reston Campus  Restoration has a truly engaged Facebook community of persons who enthusiastically like and share posts. The most engaging post this month was the quote, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is waging a great battle.” There were 21 shares and 17 likes, resulting in 1,959 people reached.  Restoration had 3,557 views of the website homepage in February. The top five pages were Meet the Staff, Livestream (the page that went up when schools were closed, Sunday, February 22), Worship and Location, Who We Are, and Sunday Morning. Other Initiatives:  Daily texts based on the sermons are being sent to 201 persons Monday through Friday each week during Lent. Additionally, we are in the midst of a #40DaysOfMess engagement campaign focused on our Instagram audience.  Due to the rising number of people who access the web and eNote by their phone we are investigating mobile friendly formats of the eNote and developing a proof of concept for a Floris UMC app. FINANCIAL OPERATIONS February receipts were increased 13.82% from the same period last year. Year-to-date receipts are decreased 3.56% from last year. The weekly average receipts needed to support the budget are approximately $76,000 and the actual weekly average receipts are $69,700. The delta between the budgeted and actual weekly receipts is currently running around $6,300 per week. This negative delta has been decreasing since January. In the month of January, the negative delta was $27,000 per week. The current negative delta of $6,300 per week is a positive financial sign this early in the year because this tends to decrease dramatically as we head into Q4. With new financial data from the months of January and February 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.

FEBRUARY 2015 FINANCIAL DATA FEBRUARY FEBRUARY 2015 2014 General Fund $286,717 $251,895 Receipts (FEB) Building Fund $52,839 $80,546 Receipts (FEB) Reserves 1.68 months 3.09 months Indebtedness $8,355,000 $9,990,000 2014 Net ($59,062) $143,395 Income (through FEB)

7

IMAGINE CAMPAIGN STRATEGIC INITIATIVE UPDATE Restoration Church  Tim Ward continues to meet with his multi-site strategist and coach. The coach is very encouraged about the progress at Restoration.  We packaged over 300 meals for Forest Edge Elementary School on March 8. Several new persons who have been visiting Restoration participated in this packaging event.  In the months of January and February we had over 40 different persons, including new guests, help with set-up, breakdown, greeting, ushering and parking lot. Over 150 hours of time were dedicated to this. These serving opportunities have been a great way for people to connect at Restoration.  Tim Ward has been invited to sit on the Reston Homeowners Association committee that reaches out into the community. Additionally, he is working through the Reston Chamber of Commerce to reach new persons.  On Easter Sunday, we will hold one service at 9 a.m. and one at 10:15 a.m. After the 10:15 service we will have an Easter egg hunt for the community around Forest Edge. The egg hunt event will include a moon bounce obstacle course, food and a gift for each child.  On Ash Wednesday, committed volunteers from Restoration went with Tim to the Reston metro station to offer ashes and invite people to church. They gave ashes to approximately 40 persons.  On March 14 we will be cleaning and preparing our first home in Reston with Rapid Rehousing, one of our newest serving opportunities. Additionally, we will provide volunteers for the Forest Edge Fun Festival on March 21.  We provided 7 volunteers to the mentoring program at Forest Edge. Our volunteer support doubled the size of their mentoring team.  We launched four life groups, which include over 60 participants. Many of our newer guests at Restoration joined one of the groups. We have groups that meet on Sunday morning and after worship on Sunday, as well as a Wednesday evening group that meets at La Madeleine in Reston.  We have identified two areas that need attention- guest services and the nursery. We hope to have solutions to a few challenges and opportunities in those two areas by Easter.  We are planning future social events for the entire group at Restoration to help people get connected.

Hutchison Afterschool Programs  Nothing new to report for the month of February. Young Adult Initiative  The Director of Serve and the Executive Director will attend a Fellows Program conference in April to learn more about this program that has the potential to dramatically increase young adult involvement at Floris and reach new young adults.

8

OPERATIONS/ADMINISTRATION  In late February, we were asked to host Singstrong, an a cappella event that was canceled at South Lakes High School due to inclement weather and school closures. From request to actual event, we had less than 24 hours to plan for this event that brought well over 300 persons onto the campus. It was a wonderful evening and we were grateful for the opportunity to host the event and share our hospitality.

90-Day Program/Events Outlook 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.

April       

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

May        

Saturday Evening Confirmation Service: May 2, 5 p.m. Sunday Confirmation Services: May 3, all services Kid’s Kingdom-Kid’s Night Out: May 8, 5 p.m. West Liberty College Concert: May 12, 7:30 p.m. Coffee with the Pastors: May 13, 7 p.m. UMVIM Training/Recertification: May 16, 9 a.m. Young Adult Dinner: May 29, 6:30 p.m. FISH Celebration: May 31, 12:30 p.m.

9