BMC Leaders Meeting Saturday 26 October 2019 A BMC Leaders Meeting was held at Bryanston Methodist Church on Saturday 26 October 2019 at 9am. The meeting was chaired by Rev. Themba Mntambo REGISTRATION Attendees: Refer to the Attendee Register. Apologies: Eleanor Wardrop, Elaine Bezuidenhout, Kerry Wetton, Lisa Moseneke, Nadia Atkinson, Keith Hendry AGENDA Registration Devotions ( Dalene ) Attendance Figures ( Ashley ) Financial Report ( Jan ) Heart Talks Feedback ( Themba ) Ministers Stationing Feedback (Dalene) o Farewell HR Report ( Namhla ) o Report on Voluntary Retrenchments o Restructuring & New Organogram (Brian) o New Job Descriptions o New Positions / Vacancies (Kedibone) Notices ( Stewards ) o Carol Service o Christmas Services o AGM Closing DEVOTIONS : Rev. Dalene Jordaan Dalene read the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. It is the difference between ego and relationship. The Pharisee was all about ego, about self and wanting to be praised. For the tax collector there was a deeper understanding of his own need to be restored. As we deliberate on our issues, we need to ask ourselves “Are we in ego or are we in relationship?” If we want to be in relationship with God, we need to pray. Rev. Themba: Welcome to all. The registration form has been completed. Apologies have been recorded. 1 | P a g e
BMC Leaders Meeting Saturday 26 October 2019 ATTENDANCE FIGURES: Ashley Roberts [4 slides – attendance 2019 – 7h00 4 slides – 8h30 4 slides – 1015 4 slides 12h00 4slides – Children’s Church 4 slides - Youth] Graphs on slides show attendance figures over 4 years, service by service and quarter by quarter. The gaps in children’s church are because of holidays. There are a few positive year-on-year figures. [Total Adult Total Youth Total Children] Year by year is shown all in one graph. [slide?] New members - July 28, August 23 and September 18. Questions: Martin: Have you done a comparison done with other churches in terms of attendance. Might be useful methodology. Ashley: It is possible. If you could suggest churches you would like to see, I will wait a week for feedback and add those to the comparison. Dalene: I have chatted with some ministers: Randburg down in numbers significantly, Trinity is holding stable, Gracepoint down a little. Question: What about other Methodist Churches? Ashley: I can add those to the comparison. Thanks to Ashley: That was much more understandable. Themba: Report to be completed and submitted to the Society Stewards. A report can then come back to this meeting. FINANCIAL REPORT: Jan Van Staden [tithe YTD September 2019] Large loss YTD September because of retrenchments. The cost of the retrenchment packages is just under one million. 2 | P a g e
BMC Leaders Meeting Saturday 26 October 2019 Our expenditure is fairly stable. We still have large one-off donations coming through. These have been quite random over the past few months. We got approval from the last meeting to approach MCO to take from our Property Reserve to fund retrenchment packages. There will be a cost saving of around R150K per month due to reduction of staff. Still need to aim to increase monthly tithing by R200K/month. We are looking at maintenance of premises. We have done some Capex over the last few months but are keeping costs to the minimum. After using the property reserves, we looking at replenishing the balance. We are preparing the budget for 2020. This will be presented at the AGM. We have 3 ministers instead of 4 which will be a cost saving. [segmented deposits – EFT] EFT’s are stable for the year. We are looking at implementing debit order runs to further stabilise our EFT income. {Tithe YTD Expenses YTD] Staff costs are significant YTD due to retrenchments packages. [Balance sheet 2019] We have a good balance sheet at the moment. The property reserve is in decline due to retrenchment packages. Some cash in Rhona which can lead to income. Need to follow governance process. Keith Hendry leaving due to retrenchment at end of October. We have employed Keith Viljoen to assist with bookkeeping services on an ongoing basis. He will assist a few days a week. This will be a cost saving. Keith has experience with similar churches. Questions/Comments: Stan: Question asked around property reserve fund. Jan: The R1.6 property reserve is kept separate from our money in a money market account. Our bank account holds the R539 property reserve. It was clarified that we do receive interest on that money. Martin – to clarify cost saving impact. The aim is to achieve a R200K saving/month. We will achieve that by moving from 4 ministers to 3. We have the obligation of re-paying the fund. We have streamlined the organisation by restructuring – the next goal is to consider reducing ministers from 3 to 2 in the future 3 | P a g e
BMC Leaders Meeting Saturday 26 October 2019 Q: My understanding is that circuit assessments are based on the number of ministers 2 years ago. That then is derided by the circuit and the various societies. As I see it, even though you reduce the number of ministers this year we will not feel the benefit until 2 years down the line. Jan: There is some immediate benefit in the reduction of allowances. Joan: Some of the staff were retrenched without a pension or provident fund. Now is the time to look at the lay staff pension fund. Dalene: Our entry level staff are on a fund - they are most vulnerable. For other staff it is voluntary, and it is available. Jan: Financial guidance with a financial advisor has been arranged with all the leaving staff to ensure responsible use of their money going forward. Maabo: I’ve been here 8 years, I have no pension fund and I’m being retrenched. Question: Taking into account the trends with the attendance and finances, what does this mean for us as a community? What about all the ministries that were ongoing and how are we going to sustain those? Themba: We will cover some of your questions with the HR Report. As regards professional ministry, we will need to consider extending our volunteer base quite significantly and moving tasks to volunteers. Themba: There is a bigger question here - how we can improve our giving. How we can encourage and inspire our members to give in order that ministries can continue? We should move away from the worry of not having money or robbing Peter to pay Paul. At a Stewards meeting we need to propose a more focused and deliberate focus on giving and tithing. Stan: If I own something, I will make sure that it is funded properly. We are a professional church and we as congregation tend to pay staff to do the work. If we own the ministry – we will pay for it. We need a far better PR within this church. Let’s have good stories and hear what’s happening so that we can feel part of what is happening. Martin: When we right sized that was one of the first things we looked at. Lay people are no longer involved in ministry except for feeding of the hungry which involves a lot of running around. The only other structures that have been kept are gardening and hospitality. The ministers will now do ministry – not lay people. Brian: The music ministry is entirely volunteers. We have gone from 40 to 20 volunteers. There are deeper issues – why do people not volunteer for the ministries that are available. There is something stopping people from volunteering. We need to have honest conversation around this. John: The two that are on my heart are the prison ministry, which we don’t hear much about, and missions. How we can support and know about them – there is not much information anymore. Lula: I want to support Stan – we need some good PR to encourage people to volunteer. There is a lot talent and people who can contribute their talents. 4 | P a g e
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