Dear NT-NL Leaders:

We are already a month into 2023 and I can already see it will be a continued year of opportunities and challenges for us as church and in community. There are a great many things happening in our church that we celebrate. We graduated six new Parish Lay Ministers (3 English, 3 Spanish). We have celebrated the installation of new pastors. And we have done the hard work of closing two ministries.

The reality of the coming years is that all our congregations and ministries are going to have to take seriously stewardship of their facilities and their mission. How best the assets we have been entrusted with can be used for the work of the church. As synod two of our ministries are having to have those hard conversations. With the death of SAWL Dan Lund the Church of the Damascus Road board has had to and continues to do hard work regarding the future of ministry behind the walls as well as the sustainability of the Jay’s Place residential facility. The Briarwood board has been honestly assessing the hundreds of thousands of dollars of deferred maintenance work that needs to be done, potential partners to help us in this work, along with the ongoing expense of doing ministry. Reminding themselves and us that Briarwood’s constitutional mission first and foremost is to develop leaders and provide experiences for our communities, and proclaim the gospel. A facility may or may not fulfill that mission and leader formation can continue in many ways.

Your synod council will meet this weekend on Saturday online to do important work of your synod. Please pray for these leaders as we engage in that work. And if you are a voting member, please get registered for Synod Assembly April 28-29th in Shreveport!

In Mission Together,

Bishop Gronberg