United Church of God, an International Association

Council of Elders Quarterly Meeting Report

Milford, Ohio

Thursday, August 15, 2013

The morning session of the final day of the quarterly meeting was called to order by Council chairman Robin Webber just after 9:00 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time. He then called on Rex Sexton to give the opening prayer.

Mr. Webber outlined the day’s agenda, and then asked Council secretary Gerald Seelig to report on a recent action by the Executive Committee of the Council (which is a rapid-response committee to deal with urgent or time-sensitive matters). The committee had passed a resolution, which satisfied the requirements of the U.S. Postal Service for providing UCGIA classification for reduced rate mailing of the Las Buenas Noticias (the Spanish language version of The Good News).

Roles and Rules Committee—Roc Corbett

Mr. Corbett described the Expelled Elders Appeals and Procedures, a Role and Rules project that has been on the committee’s docket for some years, and on behalf of the committee asked if the Council desires the committee to restart the review and development of the project. During discussion, committee member Rainer Salomaa asked Church legal counsel Larry Darden to comment on the status of the project. He said that the current policy needs considerable improvement to facilitate, among other things, a swifter processing of appeals. After discussion, the Council unanimously approved the following resolution:

Whereas, the Council desires that the documents entitled “Suspension and Expulsion from the General Conference of Elders” and “Appeal of Suspension or Expulsion from the General Conference of Elders” be updated,

Now therefore, it is hereby resolved that, the Council remands to the Roles and Rules Committee the responsibility to prepare draft documents (Policy, Guidelines and/or Procedures) based on the above-named documents, to be presented to the Council before the February 2014 meetings for review, editing and possible approval. The Roles and Rules Committee will consult with Legal Counsel Larry Darden, Secretary Gerald Seelig, the Expelled Elder Appeal Committee, and other advisors as deemed necessary.

Mr. Corbett then asked for Council’s permission to build a Council library of forms, records, official documents, etc. that pertain to work of the Council and its committees to help facilitate all the committees’ work and to rapidly orient new Council members. Mr. Salomaa described a similar notebook library that the Canadian National Council routinely uses. Mr. Corbett then read and the Council approved the resolution:

Whereas, the Council approves the development of a “library” of documents pertaining to the work of the Council and its related Committees, to include items such as “Scopes and Responsibilities,” policies, procedures, guidelines, forms, timelines and other documentation,

Now therefore, it is hereby resolved that, the Council delegates the development of the aforementioned library to the Roles and Rules Committee, and instructs each committee chairman to assist in the gathering of all forms pertaining to his Committee, and

It is further resolved, that the Council directs that this aforementioned resource of documents be preserved, with appropriate technical support, on a password protected website accessible to the COE and as new documents of this nature are approved, or existing documents revised, it will be the responsibility of the Roles and Rules Committee to see that the library is kept up to date.

At that point the Council moved into executive session for ordination discussions. Open session resumed in late morning when chairman Webber introduced Peter Eddington to lead a discussion on the General Conference of Elders (GCE) and other media plans.

GCE Planning and Kingdom of God Bible Seminars—Peter Eddington

First, Mr. Eddington asked the Council to approve the dates for the 2015 GCE as May 2-4. The Council so approved.

His next item was the Kingdom of God Bible Seminars. Several international areas are scheduled to do their seminars in August of 2013, and we are now preparing for the November round of seminars. Well over 6,000 people have attended the first five seminars, and we have had dozens of baptisms as a result.

Reviewing the survey from pastors about the seminars, he reported that 80 percent thought the seminar format worked very well, and 78 percent said it had a very positive impact on their congregations. Most congregations who decided to advertise their event sent a letter to The Good News (GN) readership in their areas.

The Kingdom of God Bible Seminars were designed by Ministerial and Member Services (MMS) and Media and Communications Services (MCS) as a joint project to bridge the gap between media and the congregations and to help encourage our readers and viewers to visit one of our services.

Victor Kubik pointed out that some areas are discouraged about their local seminar results, but others very excited about their results—like the Philippines, where congregations have had very high seminar attendance, including a new small congregation comprised of just Kingdom of God Bible Seminar attendees.

Every 12 months almost 75 percent of our GN readers are new to the publication, so when local pastors send a letter to those in their areas, they’re writing to mostly new readers. Therefore, areas with low results may find higher responses in the future.

Discussion briefly centered on the theme of the Sabbath in the last round of Kingdom of God Bible Seminars. Some found it to be very effective, while others preferred to speak about the overview of God’s way and the future of the Kingdom.

Mr. Eddington presented Media and Communication Services’ recommendations for the next seminar series:

• We will keep the Kingdom of God Bible Seminars in our active media mix for the gospel proclamation.

• Individual congregations can use our online sign-up system to promote and conduct seminars whenever they wish and may send out letters to GN readers in their areas.

• As a new development MMS in conjunction with MCS will plan, promote and produce campaign-style seminars with guest speakers, choir performances, extensive local advertising, etc. in two major U.S. cities a year.

Mr. Eddington asked for the Council’s response to the new element of campaign-style seminar in selected cities. The response was positive with some insightful questions and suggestions. There will be a specified process for pastors to request the larger campaign-style seminar for their area.

Bill Bradford pointed out that Australia has a hold on seminars for a while since they are experiencing remarkably good responses of new people beginning to attend because of The Good News and Beyond Today television coverage—especially since they have fewer available TV stations with religious programming, which helps build an active audience more quickly than in the U.S.

The Council’s consensus was to proceed with the seminar program on a local basis and produce the campaign-style seminars in two cities a year.

Don Ward recommended advertising for The Good News and Internet readers to encourage people to get more involved in God’s truth, inviting them to contact our local pastors, etc. His comment was met with some enthusiasm. Mr. Eddington mentioned that our Beyond Today contact with the television coverage in Canada also recommends that we actively promote that we have local congregations, and our members and readers support the work we do. Consequently, plans call for doing so more often on the program.

Spiritual Gifts Discussion—Mark Mickelson

Mr. Mickelson began by citing the cautions expressed by chairman Robin Webber some months ago that we “carefully unwrap this subject of spiritual gifts.” This statement by the chairman echoes the Council’s original intent that we continue to monitor the impact of this biblical topic set before the Church at the recent GCE. Mr. Mickelson shared how one member asked him: “Shouldn’t we be primarily focusing on the fruits of the Spirit—conversion—rather than spiritual gifts?” Mr. Mickelson then cited scriptures about the purpose of spiritual gifts and that such gifts are about what God is doing, and that all glory goes to God alone. His concern is that we continue to build upon a strong and accurate biblical basis and that we all be speaking the same thing. He ended his formal presentation with a recommendation that the topic should be remanded to the Doctrine Committee for a deeper study and comment.

Dr. Ward asked various questions for clarification about Mr. Mickelson’s presentation, as to what might be considered a gift versus what might not be. Other Council members added thoughtful comments and reasoned concerns. Mr. Corbett expressed that he thought it was a sound idea to remand the subject to the Doctrine Committee.

Chairman Webber decided upon discussion to remand the topic to the Doctrine Committee. The Council then took its lunch break, after which it opened the afternoon session in executive session.

At 2:00 p.m. the Council returned to open session. Mr. Webber stated that the Council had been deliberating on the budget and addressing employee needs. It then passed the following:

Whereas, the Council desires to consider employee needs at this time,

Now therefore, it is hereby resolved that, the administration is authorized to spend up to $150,000 for improved salaries and wages to be implemented in October 2013.

After dealing with this bit of encouraging news, the Council returned to a brief executive session. During the final open session Mr. Webber called for meetings of the Council on Dec. 10-12, 2013, with a Council retreat to be held on Monday, Dec. 9, 2013. He also officially called for meetings of the Council on Feb. 24-27, 2014. After that, the quarterly meeting adjourned at 2:20 p.m.

-end-

Randy Stiver

Council Reporter

© 2013 United Church of God, an International Association