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Transforming Leaders Initiative Pilot Class in Ohio prepares for October launch
Fifteen churches and their pastors have signed on for our TLi Pilot class to launch October 19-23 at Trinity Lutheran in Ashland. This inaugural class will meet each other in a webinar in July, and come together online for preparatory work in August and September. Online assessments and webinars on Personal Visioning and Coaching will lay the foundation for our week together with Sandy Mitchell at Trinity. Pastors in the TLi Pilot Class come from each of the three Ohio ELCA Synods, from Indiana, Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Peer-Coaching Triads will form our first week, and monthly peer coaching will continue the three years of the learning journey. Team-building and coaching skills will be combined with visionary leadership and missional Bible study in experiential settings as our learning community forms during the week together. Our pastors will recruit Lay Learning Teams, four to five lay leaders who will commit to joining their Pastors in this three-year learning journey. The Pastors will meet monthly with the Lay Learning Team to share learning, readings and learning podules from the web. This team becomes the incubator for the DNA of discipleship and mission, and a collaborative leadership style. Each spring, Pastors will bring the Lay Team and join their Triad for a Partner Learning Site visit to a healthy mentoring church.
A partnership with Willow Creek-Reveal will allow our Pilot congregations to take the Reveal Survey this fall, to set a base line for each of our churches. Then, each year of the journey, churches will take the survey again, to measure any progress. Pastors are preparing for this now, sharing the Reveal book with leaders and laying the groundwork for a fall survey. This Reveal research has shown four stages of Spiritual Maturity, and found the catalysts that people say moved them from one stage to the next. So, Reveal will give us a spiritual pulse of the congregation.
Spouses will be invited to one event each year: Spiritual Disciplines year one, Holistic Health year two, International Mission Experience year three. On February 5-7, our Pastors and spouses will be coming together at the Procter Center in Ohio for a Spiritual Disciplines Event led by Kai Nilsen, Senior Pastor at Peace ELCA Gahanna, and board member of Renovare. From noon Friday to noon Sunday, we will go deeper into the spiritual disciplines that are our wellspring.
The October First Year Conference, the February Spiritual Disciplines event with spouses, and the Spring 2010 Partner Learning Site visit with the Lay Learning Team are the three gatherings of the First Year Class. Similar cycles will run through year two and year three, complemented by monthly peer coaching and web delivery of learning.
The TransformingChurch.org (501C-3) Board gathers July 9-10 in Chicago to finalize plans for the Pilot Class, funding strategy and to prepare for launching another class in 2010. Thrivent is considering our grant request, and we seek support from across the ELCA. See our website at www.TransformingLeadersInitiative.org, and, as you feel led, give online to help fund our mission of Equipping Disciple-Making Leaders for a Missional Church.
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