The Church Office

In this podcast Gavin and Penny share their thoughts and takeaway points from the recent UCAN Cutting Edge Conference. The theme this year was all about Doing More with Less. With fewer financial resources, fewer staff and fewer volunteers delivering “business as usual” has never been more challenging.

Gavin had the opportunity this week to chat to Joel Morris the Executive Director of Union.  Joel serves behind the scenes co-ordinating and leading administration and operations. He has a very interesting back ground in engineering and nuclear power, as he shares a little bit about his story.  It was lovely to hear his heart to serve and equip the church in all the aspects of their work.  If you have not hear of Union they exists to grow leaders through their School of Theology, supporting church planting through their Mission network, as well as helping believers delight in Christ through their Publishing initiative.  You can find out more about their work by visiting www.ust.ac.uk  

Ever wondered what a Church Administrator gets up to in the week? Gavin and Becky share their to do lists on the podcast, encouraging each other and enjoying the huge diversity of the tasks ahead. On the podcast Gavin and Becky mentioned two UCAN events for those in the UK to get involved in. PLEASE SEE THE LINKS BELOW. Cutting Edge Conference Bench Marking Survey

This week we had the opportunity to speak to Jonathan Carswell, the Founder and CEO of 10ofThose. 10ofThose is a book ministry that hand picks the best books from across a wide range of publishers; ensures that they hold to the Bible; and then discounts them so that more can go out. Their profits are then used to support missions around the world. We loved Jonathan's heart to help everyone in the church to read books that excite them about Jesus and to give away books that point others to Jesus. There are numerous ways that churches can partner with them- check out their website for more information at www.10ofthose.com  

In this Podcast Phil Swann the Pastor at Llanelli Free Evangelical Church in West Wales, shares a little bit about his experience of partnering with the church office. Gavin completed what he calls a " Back Office Review" looking at the work that happens behind the scenes and hopefully offering some support and advice to improve the running of the church which we pray will ultimately serve the gospel. The second half of the podcast focussed on caring for our Pastors or Church Leaders. It was great to talk to Phil and learn more about some of these pressures and how we as deacons and operational staff can serve and care for our leaders better.   We hope this video is a blessing to you and your Pastor. To find out more about what a back office review looks like please click here www.thechurchoffice.co.uk/services During the Podcast Phil mentioned a conference that he is involved in to find out more please follow the link below. The Affinity book link is https://www.affinity.org.uk/challengingleaders/ The Affinity conference link is https://www.affinity.org.uk/challengingleaders/events/

Gavin had the opportunity this week to chat to Gaz Sim's one of the staff members behind Newday, tasked with organising this brilliant event for young people. We love his passion for the local church and the gift of administration. In the podcast he talks about his calling and describes it as "facilitating people to meet with Jesus.' Love that Gaz! If you have not heard of Newday it is one of the largest Christian events for young people that takes place in the UK every year. Thousands of young people aged 12-18 descend on Norfolk Showground, near Norwich to join hundreds of churches from all over the UK and Europe to learn about and worship God, camp out together and soak in the summer festival feeling, leaving Newday further along in their relationship with Jesus.   Newday take place this year between Monday 31 July - Friday 4 August 2023. For more information please check out the following links below. Website: newdaygeneration.org Bookings: bookings.newdaygeneration.org Be on team: newdaygeneration.org/be-on-team Contact: bookings@newdaygeneration.org 020 3488 5241

In this podcast Gavin talks to Andy Bagwell one of the Executive Director of UCAN who has helped launch a new HR Support Service for Churches in the UK. Andy is passionate about creating healthly church cultures and wants our churches to be excellent employers. To find out more about the HR Support Service that UCAN offer please check out the link below.    www.churchworkers.net  

In this video Gavin got the opportunity to talk to Tim Wyatt about Managing Church Finances and provided some practical examples around budgeting and forecasting. Gavin and Tim also discussed deficit budgets and the challenges that some churches are facing over the next couple of years . A big thank you too Wyatt and Co for giving the time for Tim to share his experience and wisdom with our viewers. Here is a link to a helpful Finance Procedure Document and further videos that Tim has recorded to support churches in the area of finances. https://www.thechurchoffice.co.uk/blog/church-finance-procedure-document https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqpRatRvipg  

Whether documented or not, we all likely follow some type of work flow. Sometimes they can be a bit random or inefficient, other times they can work really well. But in order to effectively carry out the vision of our churches, we need to be reviewing them- from our newcomer welcome process to how we process our orders and deliveries. Join us as Gavin talks to Mark Parsons from Christchurch Bristol about a really helpful seminar he did on work flows behind the scenes.

Gavin recently sat down with John Truscott to discuss the opportunity January presents to look through how things are going in your church. John has developed a fantastic tool on his website that supports leadership teams to review the health of their church.  He has cleverly broken it down in to 5 key themes with 9 questions to work through under each theme. John is passionate about the local church and offers loads of great tips and insights. Very helpful tool Here is the link to the church office website where you can download the tool for free.  https://www.thechurchoffice.co.uk/blog/church-health-review-part-1 https://www.thechurchoffice.co.uk/blog/church-health-review-part-2