Zion Small Group Visitation Ministry We have completed our training and are actively visiting Zion’s homebound, available for hospital pastoral call visits, distributing communion and holding our group support meetings bi-weekly in the lounge. We coordinate our visits with Pastor Steve, and are visiting as frequently as weekly and no less than monthly, averaging more than 30 home and telephone visits each month. If you find yourself unable to attend church due to illness or injury and would like a friendly visit or have communion brought to you, please contact Pr. Steve, John Krehbiel or Ethel Olson.   

The small group implementation team has settled upon the way we will become “more fluent in the Word, the first language of faith.” The team has selected a foundational study from the Book of Faith initiative, Making Sense of Scripture. The author, David Lose, offers “high hopes and a warning” for this study. 

“First, I hope that after reading this book you will understand enough about the Bible to help you penetrate through the years and cultures that separate us from it. I hope you will be absorbed by the Bible’s stories in a way that will touch and move you, and maybe even transform the way you look at yourself, the world, and God. Second, I hope that you will discover that you can bring both your mind and your heart to the enterprise of reading the Bible. I hope you will feel free to think, wonder, question, and even express doubt as we discuss issues and explore the claims the Bible makes. And I hope and pray that through all the thinking, wondering, questioning, and doubting, you might also find the capacity to hear God speaking a word to you. 

I should offer you a warning, not unlike those offered by the Surgeon General: reading the Bible can be hazardous, not only to your health, but also to your wealth, reputation, and even your very life. Seriously. Over the centuries people who have read the Bible have been led to do things beyond their imaginations. Examples are too numerous and wide-ranging to name in detail, but a few possibilities come immediately to mind: -making peace with someone who had formerly been an enemy; -giving away one’s wealth or security for the sake of another; -leaving the comforts of home to reach out to others; -changing careers to respond more fully to a sense of God’s call; -staying in one’s career to do the same; or –putting one’s reputation, and even life, on the line by taking a stand for justice.” 

Small Group Sunday is scheduled for September 19, 2010. 

Small Group Ministry—Proposed Vision & Mission Statements:

Zion’s Implementation Team: Mark Supiano, Heather LeVan, Pastor Steve Klemz, Diana Robertson, Denny Gross, Liz Prystas and David Robertson. Please pray for these members.

Vision Statement: “Through our community of small groups, the body of Christ is built up in Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church.”

Mission Statement: “With an attitude of openness and acceptance, we come together to build and enhance our community of faith

• becoming fluent in the Word, the first language of faith

• forming one body in loving fellowship

• praying for one another connecting with and serving others”