Greetings to our Century family, from your Pastoral Search Committee. This will be the February 2025 edition of our monthly communication. We, as a committee, are meeting twice each month, the 2nd and 4th Tuesday. Several weeks ago, you received communication from our leadership that we are about to enter Phase One of our Lead Pastor search. This will include calling an Interim Pastor. We are still on track for Phase One, however, we will not be able to contract with the company, Interim Pastor Ministries, as planned. We did have a candidate targeted, but he had a family medical emergency to attend to, and IPM does not have another candidate for us. We are now in communication with Vital Church Ministries and will likely partner with them for our interim pastoral needs. Below is a link for VCM’s website for more information. One of VCM’s best practices is a very comprehensive Assessment Phase, which will include a survey, provided to all Century Baptist members, regular attenders, staff and leadership. We are striving to hear as many voices as possible during this process, we value your feedback.
A question that has been asked of many of us “why do we need an interim pastor? Based on the results of a survey conducted by Best Christian Workplaces (link to BCW’ website below), we know that Century Baptist Church is faced with a real need to improve what we call “organizational health”. This survey was taken by 13 individuals, including Pastors, Directors (Melanie Kost and Danelle Schlichenmayer) and CBC staff. Century has endured a lot of growth and change, in the past ten years, from Pastor Gordon passing away, Pastor Dave passing away, and the departures of Pastor Paul Nather, as well as Middle School Director, April Wahl. These events, and the growth of our congregation, have led us to a clear understanding that we need to improve communication and team trust within our leadership.
Rachel Johnson sent this article out to our committee several weeks ago. It really spoke to us, and we would ask that you all specifically pray for the four needs listed at the end of the article… unity, spiritual strength, wisdom and endurance.
Listed at the bottom of this letter, is a reminder of our committee members.
Sincerely,
Lead Pastor Search Committee Chair
Lead Pastor Search committee members:
Pastor Jason DuPaul
Melanie Kost
Mike Pitkin
Charlie Young
Andrew Weixel
Andrew Delzer
Rachel Johnson
Barry Schumaier
Angie Gallagher
Vaughn Rhodes
Ryne Jungling