United Church of God, an International Association

Council of Elders Videoconference Report

Monday, January 9, 2023

A special meeting of the Council of Elders (Council) was conducted via video conference. The meeting was called to order at 12:30 p.m. Eastern and opened with prayer. All 12 Council members, President Shabi, Secretary Dunkle, and the Reporter were present.

This special video meeting was scheduled by the Council during the December 2022 Council meetings to follow-up and discuss the progress of the Strategic Plan in preparation for the next Council meeting in February 2023.

Chairman Martin opened the meeting by reviewing the agenda and added that if time permitted they would also discuss establishing a nominating committee to review, and if necessary, recommend changes to our current nomination process as allowed per Bylaw 8.1. He then immediately turned the meeting over to John Miller, chair of the Strategic Planning and Finance Committee (SPFC).

Mr. Miller then began a discussion concerning the progress on the proposed 2023-2024 Strategic Plan that will be presented to the GCE. He mentioned that the document that will be presented in this meeting was based upon the concerns, comments, and suggestions that were received in the December 2022 meetings.

Mr. Miller continued by presenting a digital version of the document to demonstrate what was changed in the “Truth in Love” section. At the conclusion of Mr. Miller’s presentation, Darris McNeely, Brian Shaw and Dan Dowd took turns discussing the changes and updates made to the remaining sections.

Mr. McNeely covered the updates and changes that were made to the “Ephesians Framework” section of the proposed 2023-2024 Strategic Plan.

Mr. Shaw then lead a discussion on the “Strategic Directives” section, explaining there was no change in content, just in font size and ease of reading.

Mr. Dowd then discussed the changes to the “Mapping the Way with the Metron of Christ” section. He discussed the reasons behind the major changes, the removing of the numbers from the graph, the simplifying of the font, and the added appendixes in the back for further explanation. He also explained why the term Metron is used to title this section and its use throughout the document.

At the conclusion of the Strategic Plan discussion, Mr. Miller then transitioned to the Operation portion of the plan and asked President Shabi to give an update.

President Shabi refreshed the Council on what was discussed in December and commented that no changes had been made. However, he mentioned that certain sections of the operation side of the plan still need to be completed before the February Council meetings. President Shabi noted that meetings were scheduled this upcoming week to finalize the details of those sections.

Mr. Miller ended the presentation by giving an update on the status of both “Appendices A & B” sections of the Strategic Plan. At the close of this section, Mr. Miller turned the meeting back over to Chairman Martin.

Chairman Martin then opened the floor to the Council to further discuss the Strategic Plan and offer input to the SPFC. Many comments and suggestions, both of support and concerns were made about the entire document.

Chairman Martin suggested that each Council member take time over the next couple of days to go over the document and then email their suggestions on what they thought should stay, what should be combined with other sections, and what information should be eliminated. He requested that this be done by the end of the week. He will then combine the information in one document and send it out to the Council to decide how to proceed with Strategic Plan. This was agreed upon by the Council.

Due to the length of time it took to discuss the first item on the agenda, it was decided that the second item on the agenda could wait and be covered in the February meetings.

At 3:03 p.m. the Council closed with prayer and adjourned.

-end-

Ryan Hall

[These are not the official minutes from the Council meeting. Elders can find those at the Home Office with the Council Secretary.]

© 2023 United Church of God, an International Association