“Greetings from the State Office and the Executive Board!
I hope that you are having a good autumn and finally able to start enjoying some weather that better matches the season. We have a few announcements and reminders for you, followed by some information we hope is useful for many of you.
First off, a reminder that next year’s State Meeting will be hosted by the Lakehills FWB Church in Cedar Park; the specific date of the 2020 meeting will be announced when details are finalized with the host church, but it is tentatively scheduled for the first week of June. We have also accepted the gracious invitation of the First FWB Church in Duncanville to host the 2021 meeting, so we will look forward to returning to the Metroplex the following year.
Next, we want to share some advance information with you about Anthony and Lea Edgmon. Their family will be in the States for stateside assignment June 16, 2020 – January 3, 2021 (approximately). In the next few months Anthony will begin working on their schedule. If there are specific meetings, services, conferences, retreats, or other events that you would like for either or both of them to speak or attend, they would be glad to take it into consideration. Please send me an e-mail (or contact Anthony directly) if you would like to get on their schedule.
The 2020 D6 Conference has been announced for September 24-26 in Orlando. For more information, you can visit www.D6conference.com. Randall House has also announced a new resource for family ministry called “Recalibrate”; details can be found at www.D6family.com or on the recent related post in the Texas Challenge.
We continue to see a variety of news items, announcements, and thoughtful articles coming through the Texas Challenge blog site (https://texaschallenge.net/), and we are appreciative of Kyle and Beth Howell embracing this new role and keeping us informed. New posts appear on the blog site, in your e-mail inbox (if you subscribe to the updates), and on the TSAFWB Facebook feed. If you have news items to share, please contact Kyle at fwbtexaschallenge@gmail.com. You can also visit the blog site at any time to see stories that have been posted previously.
On a similar note, an additional reminder to our state boards and committees (along with any others who may be planning statewide or even districtwide events): as you are conducting your advance planning for 2020, please share the dates of your events (even if tentative) with the State Office so that we can coordinate the calendar and minimize schedule conflicts in advance of the 2020 All Boards Meeting, which is scheduled for January 23-25 at Fellowship FWB Church in Bryan.
Switching gears, I’ve received several comments and requests for information about the best way for churches and districts to send their dues and their gifts to ministries (missionaries, colleges, etc.) each month. As we have natural turnover in treasurer positions throughout the state over time, it is useful to share this information with those who may be new in those positions and to refresh the memory of those who may have been treasurers for a long time. To that end, I would like to offer a brief set of tips and advice to those who may find the information useful. The best way to see that your church’s dues and gifts get to their intended destinations (and receive appropriate credit for it) is to send those funds to your district treasurer each month, along with a specific listing of what amounts are designated to each purpose; that way, your district treasurer can directly compile all of the giving from the district and account for where it originated and where it should be sent. Once those funds are recorded and accounted for, district treasurers then send a similar set of funds and listings to the state treasurer each month for distribution to state and national ministries, as well as processing of church dues that keep each church, each district, and the state in good standing within the denomination. Sending donations each month helps our missionaries, colleges, boards, and ministries meet their financial obligations and plan their budgets more effectively. To help reduce the processing time between the initial donation at the church and the final recipient, the State Treasurer has the ability to send and receive payments electronically, as do some districts. For church treasurers, your bank may also offer this service (in many cases for free) so that you are able to send money securely and quickly; you can check with your district treasurer about the best way to set that up between your church and district. You can also contact the State Treasurer, John Davis, if you would like more information. The faithful giving of our churches and our people are what allows our ministries to function; we thank you for that, and we want to make it as easy as possible for those gifts to get to their designated recipients.
This is also a good time to provide another reminder that state and national dues will increase beginning on January 1. Delegates at the 2018 National Convention approved a recommendation to raise representation fees to $175 in 2020 and $200 in 2025. These are the per-church fees that are sent through the State Office to the National Office. In addition, our state representation fees are set to be equal to the national fees, so the per-church fees for state dues will also rise accordingly. Thus, beginning January 1, 2020, the national dues will be $175 per church and the state dues will be $175 per church (a total of $350 per church per year). Those dues do not have to be paid in a single transaction (they can be spread out over multiple months if a church’s budget or financial condition requires smaller payments), and you can contact State Treasurer John Davis or me if you need more information on this.
Finally, we remind you to please visit the State Association website at http://www.texasfwb.org/churches.shtml and review your district’s and church’s information in the directory. If you see any information that needs to be changed, please send updates and corrections to me at the State Office. In particular, if your church is currently without a pastor, or if you have recently called a new pastor, please make sure the contact information for your church is current, so that we have the best information available for prospective pastor candidates.
We appreciate all that you do for Texas Free Will Baptists and for the work of God. As always, you can contact us with any questions at stateoffice@texasfwb.org.”
Marcus A. Brewer – Moderator/State Office Coordinator
P.O. Box 2716 – Bryan, TX 77805-2716
Phone/Fax: (979) 774-3125 – E-mail: stateoffice@texasfwb.org
texaschallenge.net 