Annual Rector's Report -- January 2019

Epiphany 3A 2019

Rector’s Annual Report

            Rev. Adam T. Trambley        

January 27, 2017, St. John’s Sharon

This morning’s readings are good ones for an Annual Meeting Sunday.  Today we will hold/have held our parish annual meeting between services.  At the meeting we elect vestry members, receive reports and the annual budget, and take care of any other necessary business.  Rather than squeeze it into the meeting, I want to take this time to give my annual report to the parish.

In Luke’s gospel, we hear Jesus lay out his mission statement.  Reading from Isaiah, he proclaims his vision of the year of the Lord’s favor. The good news is preached to the poor. Captives are released.  The sick are healed.  The oppressed go free.  Jesus begins by saying that the Spirit of the Lord is upon him, and Jesus finishes by saying that this great vision of God is now fulfilled in his life and work.  If we are following Jesus and living into his vision, than we too should be anointed by the Holy Spirit to bring good news and healing and freedom while letting people know God’s favor and love for them. 

Saint Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians takes this vision of Jesus, that Jesus fulfills just by being Jesus and doing his Jesus’ stuff, and helps us operationalize it in our own lives.  He talks about being part of the one body of Christ, while we each have different gifts.  The Spirit of the Lord is upon each and every one of us, just as it was upon Jesus. As Paul says, in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, a body that has not one member, but many members.  We are to take the gifts we have as a metaphorical hand or eye or spleen or pituitary gland and use them to benefit the body as a whole.  In just this way, with each of use using the gifts we have to build up our parish, our community, and the greater Body of Christ, we can see glimpses of the fulfillment of the Kingdom of God that Jesus was talking about.  The Lord’s favor breaks in upon us and upon those we love and serve.  People’s lives are changed.  People are healed.  Good news is shared with the poor in a myriad of ways.  And we, the Body of Christ at St. John’s, are increasingly blessed as we live deeply into the life of Jesus.

Our purpose statement that describes the particular way that God calls us at St. John’s to use our gifts to live out his vision is Worship God, Care for People, Grow as Christians.  We live into this purpose week in and week out in a variety of ways based on the different gifts that we as members of this parish have been given. 

Overall, I would say that this past year has been one of focusing back on the basics.  Two years ago, we celebrated our parish’s 150^th birthday with a couple of celebrations and the proclamation of St. John’s Day in the City of Sharon.  Last year, we undertook significant upkeep and updates on our building facilities, as well as initiating a new accounting and database software package.  This year, we have lived into being a congregation with such a meaningful history and beautiful, useful facilities.

The first part of our purpose statement is Worship God, and worship continues to be at the center of our parish life.  We gather every Sunday morning at 8:00am and 10:00am, as well as on Wednesday evenings.  Many of you work to make our worship life possible.  I want to thank all the ushers, greeters, Eucharistic Ministers, lectors, acolytes, oblationers, and those who help decorate for our special services.  The altar guild sets up and takes care of the many of the beautiful items we use in our worship.  I want to thank Linda Houk, Ada Ehrlich, Flo Bett, Marilyn Callahan, Tony Kropp, and Ron Gracilla for their work, and Linda wants me to let you know that the altar guild is looking for new members.  Thanks, too, to Gerry Bricker, Vicky Barletta, and Donna Stamoolis who regularly take communion to our parish shut-ins and bring our worship life out to them.

Special thanks for their role in worship goes to Ron and the choir.  As people have come and gone over the past few years, Ron has done a great job of retooling our hymns and anthems for worship.  He has also done a great job incorporating special musicians for Christmas and Easter, and for working with our musical scholars.  We are grateful to our musical scholars for being with us.  We have about a half dozen students in the Sharon High music program who join us for choir rehearsals and worship, as well as for an hour of formation during the week.  Thanks to Jane Trambley for working with them, as well, and to the supper group that meets after our Wednesday service who have welcomed them for dinner before their class.

Our parish has marked a higher number of life events in worship than we have over the past few years.  We have had more weddings than any time in the past five years and we celebrated a dozen children’s baptism and one adult baptism.  We have also commended many of our loved ones to God again this year.  Some of those deaths have been people who were very involved in our parish life for a long time, and we as a church continue to feel their loss in many ways.  Thanks to Robyn Sherman and all who help with lunches after funerals for the families of the deceased.

While we Worship God, we also Care for People.  Those ministries reaching out to others touch lives in many ways.  The Episcopal Church Women had a successful Winterfest this year, and they had a great time baking cookies together.  Thank you to Connie and all the ECW members for your work, and for your generosity with the funds you raise.  Our Family Kitchen completed its seventh year, and served 8,512 meals last year!  Thank you to all those involved, especially Madge and Ron Tamber, Curt and Cleo Myers, Donna Billioni, and Paula Ference, Sherri Lowery for her work with the children, Katherine Huff for her prayers with our guests, Rob Ridgeway who handles the fifth Saturdays with his and Gary’s extended families, and so many others that donate, cook, clean and volunteer.

Our food pantry, Episcopal Community Services gave out over 1,700 bags of food to 278 families last year.  This could not be done without the 60 volunteers who do everything from pick up food from grocery stores, unload the truck, pack bags, register clients, carry bags up the stairs, staff the bread room, clothing closet and Doddy’s pantry, and who take care of the administrate side of the food pantry.  Thanks to you, and to those in our parish who contributed over $8,000 last year to support the ECS.  Thanks, too, to Matt Wertz who has taken over as ECS President this year.  At this time, I’d also like to recognize Bob Edeburn who served as ECS President for the past decade, and has just transitioned out of that role.  He has also recently retired from the financial roles he served with precision and wisdom in our parish since the 1970’s.  This parish has been rich blessed by his many contributions, and, on behalf of the parish, I want say “Thank You.”

Our parish cares for people in many other, less structured ways.  Our alms fund distributes thousands of dollars annually to those in need. Our youth had a hat and mitten tree to collect winter items and distribute them.  Sherri, Katherine, and others responded to the fire down the street.  Numerous parishioners also work or volunteer in different organizations dedicated to caring for those in need in a variety of capacities, and I am proud of the way this parish puts our mission and our values into practice.

We also live out our purpose as we Grow as Christians.  Certainly worship and service help us live out Jesus’ Way of Love.  We also have a number of opportunities designed for learning and growing.  Sunday between services we have an adult class that looks at a variety of books, films, and other resources, as well as two children’s class that have studied everything from songs and bible stories to writing icons.  Thanks to Laura Peretic, Sherri Lowery, and Heather Ulan for their work with Sunday School, and to Donna Billioni for sharing her icon skills, as well as to Barb Lipinski and Madge Tamber who have taken a lead in both our adult Sunday school and our Wednesday fellowship meal.  Our Kettle Corn brigade, led by Kettlemeisters Dick Steingrabe and Frank O’Stafy, have both raised money to send our young people to camp and popped for community events.  They upped their game this year with a new automatic stirrer.  We also have a parish library with numerous books on various spiritual and religious subjects that Barb Bogolin does a wonderful job curating. 

Over the past two years our Natural Church Development Team has helped our church grow corporately in the area of loving relationships.  This past year they continued their work of increasing the sense of love and affirmation we show one another by spot-lighting a person of the month and through our thank-you box in the lounge.  Anyone can note someone who did something they are grateful for in the parish, and a note will be sent from the parish.  Thanks to Cleo Myers, Hannah Hancock, Katie Tingler, Tracy Schiep, Ron Gracilla, Debbie Gibson, Sandy Geiwitz, and Michael Wachter for their NCD work this year.  Next week we will begin the next NCD cycle by beginning to gather information about where our parish’s health could improve.

We also grow as Christians by connecting with and learning from brothers and sisters in other churches.  We gathered Ash Wednesday with other congregations for a service at First Methodist and hosted the area’s Good Friday service and a joint Easter Vigil.  To commemorate the 50^th Anniversary of Martin Luther King’s entrance into eternal life, we held a special Sunday service with guest musician James Willaman and readings from Dr. King’s writings.  Some from St. John’s joined our new church plant in Hermitage, Church of the Resurrection, for their official public launch in September.  Members of St. John’s also participated in our Diocesan Convention in Niagara Falls, where we decided to formally enter into deeper cooperation with the Diocese of Western New York.

All of these activities couldn’t happen without significant work behind the scenes.  I am so grateful to Tina for all that she does to keep things running smoothly.  Ron does a great job with our music programs, but also does many other things that just need to be done.  We also have a dedicated vestry.  I am grateful for all that they do.  I enjoy our vestry meetings and feel like we are all working together to do what is right for the future of the church.  Thanks especially to Keith Rowlands, Nick Baron and Al Seladi as they finish their three-year terms.  All of them served as vestry officers.  Thanks, too, to Robert Barletta, Linda Houk, Frank O’Stafy, Donna Stamoolis, and Matt Wertz for their work on vestry.  We have gone through a full year with our new accounting software, and it is working well.  We are still hoping to incorporate a number of features, such as on-line giving.

We have been blessed with wonderful, beautiful facilities, but we have to keep them clean.  I am grateful for Fred Dickman who retired after a number of years as our Sexton, to Eric Hanson who filled in for a few months, and for Woody Raymer who just took over the job as the snowpacylpse hit last week.  He’s still getting the hang of things overall, but he knows how the snow blowers work now.  Over the past year, we’ve replaced the lighting in our parking lot, and the outside landscaping was redone by the generosity of Mary and Bud Polonus’s family.  We have also received an anonymous donation that will pay for a new sound system in our sanctuary in the coming months and help with the remaining work to be done as part of our Believe and Prepare capital campaign.  I am incredibly grateful to all who have contributed and are still making their pledges.  We hope to replace the discolored plexiglass on our stained glass windows to protect them better and let a little bit more light in, while also taking care of one of our windows that is bowing a bit.  I would also note that our facilities were highlighted this summer in a community screening of Tiger Warsaw for its thirtieth anniversary, a film that featured our church bells as well as Patrick Swayze playing basketball in our former gym.

On a personal note, this year was significant for me in a number of ways, in addition to sending off one of our young choir members to New York city for college.  This spring, I completed and defended my doctoral thesis about taking community leaders on prayerwalks.  I also co-edited a book that looks at chapter eight of the Acts of the Apostles as a template for mission and evangelism.  I just found out Thursday that our book won an Illumination Book Award silver medal in the Bible Study category.  I also got to help lead a pilgrimage to the Holy Land for high school students with young people from our Diocese and the Diocese of Western New York.  I know that what I’ve learned has seeped into various sermons and other work here, and I hope you have found benefits from these experiences, as well. 

Next year, I look for us to continue living our purpose out more and more fully.  We will gather weekly for worship, for loving service, and for formation opportunities  Starting next week, we will spend a few weeks looking at the Presiding Bishop’s Way of Love.  A new NCD team will invite us to grow and change in some helpful ways later this year.  We will take advantage of opportunities to pray and minister with other churches in our diocese and our community.  We will all use our individual gifts to Worship God, Care for People, and Grow as Christians together, and we will invite others to join us as we share with Jesus’ love in word and action.