What are Ministry Teams?

 A Ministry Team is a small group of people called together by God, who covenant to care for one another, while using their diverse gifts and abilities to address a heartfelt need.

 A Ministry Team is more of a visioning/administrative arm of the ministry.  The Ministry Team defines the purpose or vision of their particular area of ministry.  The Ministry Team sets the goals for the ministry for the year making sure that these goals fit with the Mission Statement and Vision Statement of the church as well as making sure these goals are biblically centered and spiritually driven.  The team holds people accountable for achieving those goals.

 The Ministry Team delegates the work of the ministry to the volunteer workers and empowers those workers to do their ministry. They develop the job descriptions or roles of responsibility for each person based on his or her gifts.

What do the various “Ministry Teams” do?

All of the Ministry Teams take on the administrative area of the ministries of our church. There are lots of volunteers who volunteer to do individual ministries like usher, scripture reader, greeter, etc., but each ministry team needs to have members who can organize all of those who signed up to do individual ministries. For example, we have a lot of people who sign up to be greeters, but without a Greeter Coordinator, who would do the schedule and remind the volunteers when it is their time to greet. We cannot organize our ministries without Ministry Teams. Below is a description of the work that each of our Ministry Teams is assigned to do.

Evangelism Ministry Team: 

This team plans and carries out programs and projects that help bring newcomers to our church, welcomes them, and acclimates them to how things happen at Bonsack United Methodist.

The various ministry areas under Evangelism are:  Community Outreach, Greeters and Parking Lot Greeters, the Mug Ministry, New Member Reception, New Member Luncheon, Fellowship Friends, New Member Classes, and the Welcome Center.  The Fellowship Friends see to it that new members are acclimated to the church within their first year of membership.  They keep the new members in the know about church happenings and have regular contact with the new members to see if they have questions about anything at Bonsack UMC.

Parish Care Team: 

The Parish Care Team is responsible for carrying out projects and programs that help our members to feel cared for especially in time of need.  The various ministries that fall under Parish Care area:  Bereavement Ministry, Flower Ministry, Prayer Chain, Shepherding Ministry, In-active Member Ministry, Card Ministry, Shut-in Ministry, Special Needs Program and Homebound Communion Ministry.

Currently this team has enough members to do the ministry of Parish Care effectively, but Shepherding, Card Ministry, and In-active ministry Coordinators are needed.

Stewardship Team: 

Lots of people have the mistaken idea that Stewardship is only about getting money to run the church.  This is not all that it is.  When we join the church, we promise to uphold the church with our prayers, our presence, our gifts, and our service.  This is the holistic Stewardship that the ministry team is concerned with.  Sure the team heads up the Campaign in the fall to identify members who wish to pledge an annual gift to the church, but it is about so much more.

The Stewardship Team wants everyone to know that a steward is one who cares for something that has been entrusted to him/her.  We are all stewards of all that God has given us and we are to care for all God has given us in a way that supports the Body of Christ.

The Stewardship Team wants to help others find their gifts and talents, and be empowered to use these gifts and talents for the ministry of Bonsack UMC.  The Team wants the membership to know how important it is to pray for our church on a daily basis and to support the ministries of our church with their presence.

The Early Church was founded on holistic stewardship. They pooled their resources, cared for all, did their ministry, and grew Christ’s church.  As years went on, the church lost sight of its original design of holistic stewardship.  Now the churches are trying to regain their original purpose as God set for the Body of Christ.

Worship Team: 

The Worship Ministry is behind the scenes planning for worship, so that every detail has been taken care of.  The Altar Guild makes sure the Sanctuary is set up for worship.  They clean up the Sanctuary each week and put the paraments in place according to the church year colors.  The Acolyte Coordinator trains and schedules our acolytes.  The Praise Team plans Praise Music for worship on an every other month basis and once a month on the third Wednesday of each month.

The Children’s Message Coordinator gets individuals and church staff to give a message to the children at each service.  The Sound Tech Coordinator trains and schedules the Sound Techs for each Sunday.  The Communion Steward makes sure that bread and juice are there once a month on the days that we serve Communion.

The Banner Ministry creates inspiring banners to grace our sanctuary and enhance our worship experience.  The Head Usher schedule the ushers to do their weekly duties.  You probably never realized that so much was going on behind the scenes so that worship can be an inspiring and meaningful experience.

Currently this team needs someone to be the Sound Tech Coordinator and the Children’s Ministry Coordinator.

Missions Ministry Team:

The Missions Ministry plans and carries out our mission endeavors.  We send a group down to the Trinity Community Outreach program once a month to serve supper.  We have an annual Mission Trip for our youth each year.  This year the youth will be going to Mississippi to a Native American Reservation for a week.  We sponsor a church member who is a missionary there.

Each year we support Habitat for Humanity and the National Rebuild Day with workers.  We have an “Auction for Missions” each year to raise money for various mission endeavors.  These include Camp Alta Mons, Trinity Community Outreach, Roanoke Rescue Mission, Turning Point Shelter, etc.

Family Life Ministry: 

This ministry plans events for the entire church family to be a part of.  This is an intergenerational ministry.  Traditionally, this ministry has an event about every other month.  Some of these events are our annual church picnic, “Hanging of the Greens” and at least one community event each year.