All in the name of Jesus                                                                                

Under God’s Grace and the leadership of Pastor Steve Lyle, HSUMC began 2025 by focusing on how we make our “Vision for Tomorrow” become reality.  As a congregation, we reviewed the survey results of our strengths/weaknesses and stated what we wanted to see grow.  Our Leadership team began by streamlining how we worked together to “get things done” and build our accountability to the church and to each other.

All progress reported here is a result of many hours of planning, hard work, prayer, and caring on the part of many lay leaders and volunteers.  All the while, we kept careful attention to making the best use of our resources to connect people to God and each other, to Walk with Jesus through service and outreach, and to Experience the Holy Spirit in our daily lives while we Make Disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

The focus areas we set for 2025

  • Become a more welcoming Church: We have name tags now and really, really, try to remember to wear them. We realize how helpful it is to visitors and to new members to have a name with our faces.  Every Sunday we have designated greeters/ushers/acolytes on a monthly volunteer basis.  We make sure to offer Visitors cards.  We know the love and Spirit in this church. We want to show it and share it.
  • Have even better communication for our church and the community: The discontinuation of web hosting by the UMC because a blessing in disguise when the new Host, Tithely, included online giving, a church calendar, and Sermon postings. We transferred to the new hosted site, made improvements to the content and prepared for online giving live in October during Pastor Steve’s “Giving with Grace” sermon series. Tommy Starnes and April Hardy moved electronic mountains to now have each week’s sermon recorded and loaded to the site. Our Weekly Newsletter and Bulletin announcements continue to be the primary source of church information.
  • Develop more ongoing small groups and fellowship opportunities: We held monthly Wednesday dinners or special Sunday dinners with a different model of selecting a menu, with volunteer cooks, designated setup and cleanup teams which gave more opportunities for people to volunteer. We’ve had some great meals and the opportunity to get to know one another better.
  • Become more involved with our ministry partners: We continue to have special offerings and UMW fund-raising to support Wesley Woods, Murphy-Harpst, Cherokee County Homeless Vets, Never Alone, UMCOR and Goshen Valley. This year through our own Rebecca Farabaugh, the UMW were able to tour the Goshen Valley Boys Ranch to see first-hand what they are doing and to learn what we can do to help. Our MUST Ministries food donations have grown so large that we have started making deliveries to them twice a month, also allowing more opportunities for people to volunteer. Through our UMW, we have provided “morale” support for the Tippens Education Center faculty and staff with an end of school year and a beginning of school year appreciation breakfast and snacks for the day.
  • Prayer Focus:  A dedicated group of volunteers has cleared out (no small job) the old nursery and are preparing to create a dedicated Prayer Room. We share our joys, concerns and grief with each other for prayer during each service.  We maintain our Prayer List and publish it in the Newsletter and weekly Bulletin.  During 2025 we have also shared stories of the power of prayer with each other and the comfort it brings.
  • Church Facility Repairs: Major repairs this year were to the Church roof and Steeple, repainting the Sanctuary ceiling, replacing the kitchen refrigerator, adding electricity to the pavilion, repairing the front church metal railings, tree removal at the church and the parsonage, and countless other work done to the church property.
  • Build our presence in the community: Our Trunk or Treat Festival was a tremendous success as a community outreach and Fellowship event. Our Almost World-famous Yard sale and our Christmas Bazaar were successful fund-raisers and a Community/Fellowship event as well.  The Fellowship of these event comes from being a part of the hard work of planning, organizing, preparing, and holding the events.  At each event we had this year, we had a prayer request table and offered a bifold pamphlet that explained who we are and what we do.  At each fund raiser event we also had publicity for the ministry partners we support with the money we raise.  
  • Use our Church building and facilities to support our community: The Recovery Organization of Cherokee County (ROCC) lost a great deal of their funding in 2025 and had to move out of their building next door to the church. The HSUMC Trustees have approved providing our Fellowship Hall for an hour on Sunday afternoons for one of their AA meetings.  They bring their own coffee and set up and clean up after themselves.  In other words, perfect house guests.

These are some focus highlights of 2025.  We have been blessed as a church community and continue to work together and care for each other– All in Name of Jesus.

 

      (11/02/2025 - Judith Reece, HSUMC Lay Leader)