Nate Dreesmann brought greetings to Synod 2017 from the Covenant Order of Evangelical Presbyterian Church (ECO), a five-year-old denomination of 120,000 members in 340 churches.
Dreesmann told synod delegates that congregations coming into ECO are asked to shift from being clergy-centered to an unleashed laity, from safety to risk-taking, from homogenous to preparing all God’s people for a post-Christian culture, from attractional to missional attractional.
“We did not know how to fully equip our churches for these shifts,” he said. “We are beginning to cultivate relationships. We desire to share what we’ve learned and be in the posture of learners from those who do better than we do.”
He noted that strategic partnerships with the Christian Reformed Church and World Renew makes sense for them, to work together to have a great impact.
“We ask for your prayers for what we are doing and to hear how we can pray for you as co-laborers . . . to work together to accomplish our mission of making disciples for Jesus Christ.”
Synod 2017 is meeting at Trinity Christian College in Palos Heights, Ill., from June 9-15. For continuous coverage, download the Banner app on your mobile device or follow The Banner Magazine on Facebook or @crcbanner on Twitter. You can find more tweeting by following hashtag #crcsynod. News stories will be posted at thebanner.org several times daily. For CRC Communications releases and the webcast, please visit crcna.org. Unless noted otherwise, all photographs are by Karen Huttenga.
About the Author
Gayla Postma retired as news editor for The Banner in 2020.
