Highlights from Hope

In early June, my sabbatical began with a trip to Hope Lutheran Church in West Des Moines, Iowa. In addition to being centered in a very fast growing neighborhood, Hope is also blessed with energetic, creative leaders. This synergy has helped Hope to be the fastest growing ELCA congregation in the country. They’re in the midst of building a 2500 seat worship space, but know that this will max out their current campus. Thus, they’ve begun looking at the “multi-campus” model to help fulfill their future mission. Their first campus expansion is in Ankeny, a suburb 30 minutes to the north. I conducted interviews with several staff members, in addition to worshipping at both campuses (while I stayed with Becky and Doug Hoyng, kids of Larry and Cindy Hoffsis). Below is a quick report I shot off to some of the Epiphany staff from the Des Moines airport:

Quick background on 2nd campus: They (Hope NorthBranch) worship in a school now. School is available to them all day. Worship at 9.30 w Sunday School after.
Asked for 100 people to commit to worship and ministry life for at least a year. They can decide what they want to do at the end of that period. Ensures that sense of critical mass vitality we were talking about.
Neat idea: Behind band in school, they use several “contemporary” banners of different colors. Very helpful in transforming space from “lunch-room” to “sacred space.”
Neat idea: coffee, juice and donut station set up in back of cafeteria, available throughout morning. People free to bring coffee with them to seats.
Neat idea: Welcome center tables as people go in. Full of brochures about what’s going on. Easy for visitors to Also selling T-shirts w church logo on them.
Neat idea: several live hospitality leaders. People greet you at the door. People greeting you at welcome/info station. People greeting you at refreshment center in back of church.
Neat idea: For communion, one person holds bread at station, the 2nd both grape juice and wine, one in each hand, each in a very simple glass chalice. So they only 2 people at each station, instead of 3, as we did it the first Sunday of the new system in SB.
Neat idea: Lanyard nametags worn by all “regulars.” Plenty of sticky nametags with markers, available for whoever else wanted to put one on. Really helped in talking with folks—which is a value for smaller crowds.

Right now, attendance is just under 300.
Observation: overwhelmed by how their worship band rocks. All worship that I experienced at both campuses was guitar based, louder, and edgier than what Epiphany is currently up to right now. Even their Saturday night. Besides an early Sunday morning traditional service, all is very contemporary, with full rock band, and good mix of ages. I think we need to give ourselves “permission” to crank it up a bit in terms of volume. Let’s figure out how to really hear John Silliman and guitars. We’ve been doing better w that lately, and think we should keep going. Eager to explore Scheus’ proposed worship schedule change, where at least for one service, we can really crank up pace and volume of worship. (It’s amazing how many young people they have, which I think is related to their decision-making in music).
Related observation: (this is sort of unfair to just toss out without being there for a live face to face conversation, but . . . . . . . ) We’ve got to brainstorm quality of worship band in SB. Either through stronger recruiting or small stipends to bring in quality folks, I walk away from Hope strongly opinionated that we’ve got to seriously ramp up to a high energy, full sounding worship experience that will energize and draw community. Current volunteers have great hearts, but we’ll be wasting time if we don’t come up with plan how to take things quickly to next step.

Other info for later discussion:
Hope NorthBranch started w mix of 50% DVD and 50% of live preaching. They thought it was way to transfer DNA as well as to free time of campus staff to ramp up leaders.
They’re definitely committed to “face with place” using campus pastor. Started with 2 current staff who went to get things going; then turned it over to called campus pastor. Beyond that, different model than what Epiphany has articulated thus far. They share resources in terms of administration, media production, and periodic preaching. But besides campus pastor, they don’t anticipate anyone else on staff traveling to 2nd site to oversee responsibilities. Staff at ‘original’ campus agrees to mentor lay leaders and new staff that 2nd campus is able to hire, but nothing more.
Related reality: Hope’s vision is to start several campuses in next 10 years.
They want to use Woodale (MN) model. “Primary campus” identifies area for expansion and new campus. A few staff prepare launch site with initial work for about 6 months. Bring on campus pastor and fund him 100% first year, 50% 2nd, 25% third. Campus pastor for new site gets to take 100 people from original campus to start initiative. They get training. Each of the 100 expected to find one new disciple to bring on board as well. Either new campus initiative succeeds or it doesn’t. But have started 9 new sites this way. Can’t have one staff involved in 9 different sites, so commitment to each “birthing” process is limited and defined.
Hope adopts this Woodale model. 2 campuses, one church—yes. But doesn’t want whole staff to become involved, because they feel it will limit the number of campuses they can support. So they use a more independent, model that challenges self-sufficiency quickly. They support the new start with initial organization, initial membership, administration, communication, etc, and mentoring with campus pastor and new staff as it evolves.
Hope expects 2nd campus to be financially self-sustaining in 2 years. (They already are after 18 months). New campus gets to expand staff and budget based on their own offerings. As offerings at 2nd campus expand, so can staff and program.
Right now, no plan to buy land, surprisingly! But they think buying land at this point will divert their energy from outreach to community and focusing serving.

Enough for now. God bless you guys. Talk to you later. f