This Funding Initiative is investing in congregations’ and people’s lives.
Why does your donation matter?
We are excited to share with you just a few of the ways that your
donation has helped change people’s lives.
Thanks to you, we are deepening congregational vitality
- By offering congregations the opportunity to conduct missional assessments, which catalyze a conversation and help congregations move forward.
- By offering support to congregations through events like the Energizing and Mobilizing Your Congregation series.
- By helping 12 congregations participate in stewardship training.
Thanks to you, we are enhancing local and global missions
- By hosting Better Together Food Packing events, which help to build community by building bridges among different cultures and fighting hunger together. You have helped fund 465,000 meals for food- insufficient people in Southwestern Minnesota.
- By helping 5 young adults receive scholarships to visit our Companion Synod in South Africa.
thanks to you, we are developing servant leaders
(and growing the Ministerial Excellence Fund [MEF])
- By providing education opportunities for rostered and lay leaders. You have helped 29 people attend the ReCharge Event, a ministry of youth leaders. You have helped fund Equip Grants for Teens in Mission (TIM) Teams and lay ministry courses.
- By providing pastors with grants, funded by the MEF, to reduce their education debt and free them to lead. Pastors have also received medical emergency and retirement equity grants.
You have helped:
– 54 pastors receive Education Debt Reduction grants totaling $199,936.
– 15 pastors receive Medical Emergency grants of up to $1,000 each.
– 10 pastors receive Retirement Equity grants (for those compensated at less than synod guidelines or who participated in the Challenge Grant) totaling $8,011.
– 16 first-call pastors receive scholarships for a financial literacy and planning retreat.
in the first two years of the Funding Initiative, congregations, church organizations, special fundraisers, and individuals in the Southwestern Minnesota Synod have contributed more than $1,140,000!
We have been dividing gifts given to the initiative into these three strategic areas. The percentages of where we share resources and make investments may change as we learn and experiment.
The synod invites you to think about, pray about, and consider contributing financially in a way that fits your capacity and passion.
Send your gift to: SW MN Synod, PO Box 499, Redwood Falls, MN 56283.
Make check out to: SW MN Synod. In the memo line please write: “Funding Initiative.”
