So We voted "yes!" Now what??
At our Annual Meeting this past Sunday we voted a unanimous “YES” to the Articles of Agreement to share a settled pastor with the Atkinson Congregational Church. Atkinson voted unanimously in favor at their Annual Meeting in January.
Here’s what happens now:
Each church will appoint members to the "Covenant Team” to work on the details
related to what the compensation will be for the settled full-time shared pastor and how those expenses will be shared by the two
churches. Additionally, this Team will also settle on the final details around worship times, office hours, and other details of how the sharing will ‘work.’
Each church will appoint four members to a joint Pastoral Search Committee. We will need to develop our Church Profile, and we will search together with Atkinson for a settled, full-time, shared pastor.
After a few months, when both churches are ready, we will move to a
model of a shared full-time Interim Pastor, so we can begin to live into
this new reality, working out the kinks, while we prepare to actively
search for our settled pastor. The Rev. Paige Besse-Rankin, our interim
in Hampstead, is expected to fill this role. This transition will be
coordinated with the retirement of Jim Thomas.
Our Transition Team will continue to work on our Interim Goals to help us prepare fully for our new shared pastor.
MO will add to their work on the bylaws adjustments that will reflect this new relationship.
When all the pieces are ready, we will begin an active search, as the
joint search committee receives pastor profiles, reviews them, and
interviews possible candidates. Once the committee has settled on a
candidate, the candidate will lead a joint worship service for both
churches, after which each congregation will separately vote on the
candidate. An affirmative vote by both churches would result in a call
to that pastor to serve both churches.
Please keep our churches in prayer through this transition!
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