| God is good all the time and all the time God is good! God is at work in, through and among us at Faith Lutheran Church. There are so many examples of the work the Spirit, let me call your attention to a few of them. Although our membership and attendance decreased in 2008, it was good to see people grow deeper in their faith and commitment. It was good to see a new generation of leaders step up and take responsibility. God is good! We had hoped when 2008 began that we would be able to do a major fund raising campaign to finance needed building improvements. We hired Kairos to do a resource assessment to see if a building campaign was feasible. Between the times that we signed the contract with Kairos and the interviews began there were a number of developments that influenced the results. First, the economy fell apart. Second, some faithful members left Faith for other churches. These two events raised the anxiety and frustration level among Faith members and that clearly ruled the day. As a result there was insufficient support for a financial campaign and some wondered if it was time for a change in leadership. Some of our members took it upon themselves to get the lounge cleaned up and painted. It looks great as does the nursery (upstairs – the old choir room) and the elementary class room (the old youth room). The youth painted the new youth room in the basement (the old nursery). God is good! It is the plan of the leadership team to continue to move ahead on building improvements on a cash basis. The resource assessment identified Faith’s strengths as contemporary worship, small groups and ministry to the community. I would have to concur. The recommendations encouraged us to build on these strengths. At the same time we are committed to offer the best traditional worship that we can. God is good! I am so proud of the things that Faith accomplishes in our community: Fine Arts Camp, Black Hawk partnership, Socks for kids in District 186, food baskets, Fair Trade Fair (2008 was the first one and it was an outstanding success). This is just a sampling of the many great things we do in the community. God is good! We had some great worship experiences on 2008: Easter, Revival at synod assembly led by our musicians, the healing service, the Thanksgiving Eve ELCA worship, and our fall worship celebration and party. God uses the gifts of our musicians. God uses music to move our hearts. I am so thankful to God for the talented, dedicated musicians we have at Faith – both staff and volunteer. God is so good! We have a very faithful staff: Kim, Jan, Judi, Cory and Caroline. God is so good. Unfortunately we had to let go of two staff members: Jeff Moulton – youth director and Dennis Elston. Volunteers are picking up the youth work and we have hired a service to cover the cleaning duties. We look forward to improving our communications with the congregation in 2009 and make greater use of electronic media. We plan on a congregation wide study similar to the 40 Days. This is a time for accelerated spiritual growth as the entire church focuses on the same theme in worship, Sunday School and small groups. We also will begin laying the foundation for a congregation wide renewal weekend retreat in 2010. God is so good! Faith has many good to excellent things in place. We are friendly. We serve our community. We have some great worship. Our small groups are places where some real depth of spiritual growth occurs. So what is missing that keeps our church from growing? If we are serious about Faith growing, we need to become committed to fervent prayer – not just a few, but all of us. Second, we need to be committed to regularly and consistently asking our friends, neighbors, family and co-workers to worship with us. Churches grow as members invite people in their sphere of influence. Faith Lutheran Church is you. Faith is God’s church. Faith is our hands doing God’s work. Our congregational health and growth depend on each one of us doing our part to focus on the positive aspects to build up the Body of Christ. We all need to be careful not to fall into Satan’s traps of negativity and sarcasm. In a healthy congregation, people do not leave because the pastor stays and people do not leave because the pastor leaves. We need to build that healthy Christ-centered environment. Thank you for the continuing privilege to serve with and to you. I am proud to be the Pastor of Faith and look forward to what God is going to do in, among and through us in 2009. Your Pastor, Glen VanderKloot | 
