What an amazing year of ministry it has been in the life of Christ’s Family Church! God has done so many things in and through our Family that we look back on with rejoicing; we had our first immersion baptisms at the Rock River and where 4 individuals professed their faith in Jesus and got baptized, we grew by 13 new members so far, we saw youth come to know Christ at Quest Camp, and have not only said that evangelism is our goal, but have put action behind it.
Reaching out, this year we have found new ways to be in the community and share the Good News of Jesus! From our Easter Experience Walkthrough, to our Fourth of July event where we handed out hundreds of free lemonades and invites to church, to our Halloween Hubs where we went into the city to reach our community via free hot dogs for families, our commitment to the Quad Cities has been on display in this cultural moment, and we have seen God do incredible things as a result.
Within our own walls, we launched several new initiatives including our Beyond Sunday Bible Reading plan and a new and fresh youth ministry. We ran one of our best VBS experiences yet, and continued to create in-house curriculum for our Family Groups. These are just a few of the efforts we have taken to continue to grow our congregation as followers of Jesus.
My favorite thing that we did this year, however, was our 31 Days of Prayer series and movement in October where we asked God to grow us further into people of prayer. From our Daily Prayers booklets we produced to praying for 24 hours straight each Wednesday in October, many of you committed to growing closer to God through the practice of prayer, and our church’s capacity for intimacy with the Holy Spirit grew as a result.
Thank you for being a part of the work of God in and through Christ’s Family Church this year. Thank you for investing in life change. Thank you for making a difference and volunteering hours for God’s Kingdom and Glory, and thank you for your prayers and intercession.
Looking back on this year, my heart is filled with joy and gratitude, and as you look through our Annual Report, I hope that you are filled with the same.
May God’s Grace and Truth ever be our focus and foundation,
This year in Christ’s Family Youth (CFY) has been one of exciting changes and extreme growth. Over the course of 2023, we have nearly quadrupled our weekly attendance with average attendance going from 8-10 between January and March, to 28-30 by November. With the hire of our new Youth and Connections Director, Spencer Conner, CFY has seen changes including a nearly (and still in process) entire makeover of our youth room, the introduction of a new series of events including Graffiti & Car Smash Nights as well as CFY’s first Halloween Party which hosted it’s highest attendance ever with 33 youth, and The AfterThirty - a 30 minute hang out time where youth recap the sermon given in main service at Christ’s Family Church.
CFY has also experienced major spiritual growth over the course of the year as well. This year at Quest Camp in Baraboo, WI which hosted 18 of our youth and served as a major catalyst for our youth ministry, we saw 3 students give their lives to Jesus. The ministry has also seen a further deepening in discipleship with the addition of a Youth Leadership Team, and the use of pre-written small group materials which follow our weekly teaching times and are aimed at deepening middle and high schoolers knowledge of the taught content and their personal discipleship.
We can’t wait to see what God does in this ministry over the course of 2024!
This year has brought a lot of changes to our children’s ministry. Becky Schuetz retired after a record breaking tenure and Kendra Caulkins took over as our Children’s Ministry director. The nursery has grown with so many babies on Sundays that we had to move downstairs to the kids area. We also have implemented a new check in system which has increased our safety with the children entrusted to us!
It has been a record breaking year for our Family Groups! Statistically, we have 114 people involved in our Family Groups, which is about 73% of our Sunday attendance and up from our previous years numbers! We have 13 total groups, 4 of which are men’s specific groups. We have one new Family Group that started, creating space for new members to join. We started using Planning Center Groups and the Church Center App in August of 2022 to coordinate our groups and that program is still working well to manage our groups. The budget for the adult education is needed related to the materials required to create the study books and for RightNow Media. We hosted our first annual Family Group Wars in August which helped create a space for all Family Groups to come together to compete for a trophy! The dinner was a huge success and a lot of fun! We would like to create a Family Group room in 2024 at the church so that groups have a place outside of their home to meet if necessary.
Missions Committee members are Kristen Andringa, Bill Carter, Richard Price, Sharon McElhinney, and Ron Fischer (CFC staff). Dave Schafer joined the committee in October. Sharon became the new chair of the committee on January 1 after Byron Baxter retired at the end of 2022 after many, many years of faithful service.
The committee held eight meetings in 2023. The 2023 budget was $73,000. We have supported 10 different national and international missionaries or organizations throughout the year. (This is the first year that local missions were placed under the deacon’s oversight). Thus far we have used unallocated funds to support the following: 1. World Renew in their response to the Turkey/Syria earthquake 2. Kids Against Hunger 3. Allie Sepanski summer internship in Brussels 4. Samaritan’s Purse in their response to the Mississippi tornado. The missions committee sponsored a mission trip to Romania with Dave and Beth Jolly (Reach Beyond) to help Fight for Freedom assist Ukrainian orphans and refugees. This took place August 4th-18th and six CFC members participated.
The committee held a missions festival October 7th and 8th. Six missionaries participated. These included Jon Opgenorth (Words of Hope), Jake Moss (Grace Covenant Ministries), Dave Jolly (Reach Beyond), Tim Brand (Many Hands for Haiti), Remy and Angi Ngumbu (Wycliffe), and John Pfautz (CMTP). A potluck dinner with international food was enjoyed on Saturday evening. We heard from the missionaries through speeches and a Q & A time. Jon Opgenorth with Words of Hope preached on Sunday and then all of the missionaries spoke in different classrooms during the Sunday learning hour.
In an effort to focus more intently on our local community, we began establishing “hubs” in the Alliance of Reformed Churches and implementing the deacon role of compassion for the local community, the deacons have taken over the oversight of local missions. Local missions have been divided amongst deacons, which have responsibility for initiating a relationship with and act as a point of contact for that mission.
Local missions supported in 2023 include Youth Hope (Sandy Ver Meer), Hope at the Brick House (Richard Madsen), One Eighty (Ron Hessel), Pregnancy Resources (Dave Wright), Camp Shalom (Sandy Ver Meer). The deacons also obtained a portion of the unallocated missions budget with which they used to support Fellowship of Christian Athletes (Sandy) and an additional amount given to One Eighty to provide assistance to those who lost their homes in the downtown Davenport apartment complex this summer.
Outreach to our community is at the core of everything we do. Our mission from Jesus is to make disciples and if we stay in these four walls here at CFC, we are not fulfilling the Great Commission. We have expanded our interaction and involvement with One-Eighty, Hope at the Brick House, Pregnancy Resources, Youth Hope and Camp Shalom. Each ministry has recently visited the church during worship and given opportunities for members to volunteer in the community and also get more information about these critical local missions. With the deacons overseeing each local mission, they are becoming engaged in our community and serving with care and compassion along with Pastor Ron.
Our events this year included providing a safe resting place for Ends of the Earth Cycling after Ragbrai and as a shelter with the Red Cross after an accident at a local apartment. Pastor Zachary, Blair and other members staffed an outreach at the 4th of July Bettendorf celebration handing out information on our church and the best lemonade at the celebration, all for free! We also shifted gears and went out into the community during Halloween, providing Halloween Hubs in Bettendorf and Davenport, handing out free, high quality hot dogs and invitations to church to Trick or Treaters during a very cold Oct. 31st. Six CFC families participated in the outreach and it was well received by the communities; we are hoping God continues to plant seeds and that we will be there to reap His harvest.
During 2023, the Fellowship Team organized several church wide events. During Kids Against Hunger in February, 6500 nutritious, life-saving meals were packaged to be sent to starving and malnourished children and their families in developing countries and the United States. The Celebrate Spring & Much S’more was held at Scott County Park in April with grilled burgers, hot dogs, potluck dishes, a bonfire, s’more’s and great fellowship. In July, the Fellowship Team assisted with Baptism Sunday by reserving the Backwater Gambler’s site and providing hot dogs. During the Pizza & Raptor event in September we had a speaker from the Wapsi River Environmental Education Center. We learned about the raptors God created and saw amazing live owls up close! Over 150 adults and children attended the annual CFC Thanksgiving meal in November. We shared delicious food and fellowship as we remembered all the blessings God has showered on us.
Each week this year we have delivered 30 bags of backpack snacks to Bettendorf Middle School. The program runs each year from September through May, and so far there are over 30 people participating in the program. 2 volunteers from our church pack the bags weekly and delivered to the school on Fridays. We are thankful for each person who is part of this ministry and for the families we get to serve in our community.
Our ministry to men, led by Greg Vermeer, Steve Keller, Dave Schafer, Ron Fischer and Don Rheinhart, had a solid year that actually began in the fall of 2022. We had four small groups commit to meeting weekly and focusing on a series of books, videos and discussions around the heart of a man and our efforts to be true men of faith. This fall, three of the groups decided to continue with a new set of studies and materials and a new group of men began another group doing the previous material.
Men’s breakfasts have been a staple of men’s activity at Christ’s Family Church for many years and between 25 and 35 men normally attend for a quality breakfast, fellowship and a brief teaching on a semi-monthly basis. We have some amazingly skilled breakfast cooks (Dave Schafer and Rocky Getting) and really good teachers. We recently headed out to Crave for some food and axe throwing too! Our Helping Hands Ministry was able to do work around the church, do projects for elderly members and outreaches to those who do not know Christ. Lastly, our Men’s Retreat was held at Sunstream Retreat Center in Ogden, Iowa with 14 men attending. Our time away focused on solid teaching from Pastor Zachary, Spencer Conner and Pastor Ron, times of quiet and solitude, activities and a fun corn hole tournament!
During the year, our major programs/events included the annual intercessor shooting re-qualification accomplished in October with six intercessors successfully re-qualified on the Iowa Police Pistol Qualification Course.
In November, the Safety and Security Ministry grew by two members; in February, it grew by 3 members.
The team accomplished a few stated strategic goals which included equipment and facility initiatives like additional radio headsets, replacement batteries for radios and a notebook for better communication. After many years of dedicated service, Don Reinhart and Reg Shoesmith stepped down from the Safety and Security team into training roles and Director of Operations, Ron Fischer, is currently leading the team.
Grief Share is a program designed to help those who are grieving the loss of a loved one. The program consists of video series’, group discussions and participant homework. Our spring session (February-May) hosted 12 participants, 3 of whom returned from our Fall 22’ session, and 1 new participant from Christ’s Family Church. All participants were very pleased with their experience. They felt the program was very helpful and felt comforted to know they were not alone in their grief.
Margaret Baxter “retired” after the Spring session. Margaret helped to start the Grief Share program at Christ’s Family in the spring of 2020 and was program administrator for 2 years. We very much appreciate Margaret for her loving dedication to the Grief Share program! Sandy Ver Meer has taken over the program administrator position and Sandy Ross has joined the Grief Share team for our Fall session. This Fall we offered a one-time session called “Loss of a Spouse” with 7 attendees, and we started the fall Grief Share season with 8 participants. We will end our fall session this December with a celebration lunch for participants. As leaders, we feel we are as blessed as our participants to be a part of this ministry. It is extremely encouraging to watch grieving individuals grow and get stronger in their relationship with Jesus as they progress through the 13 week session. Thank you for your commitment to the Grief Share program!
I want to start by saying thank you for the opportunity to serve in this position. I am blessed and honored to be apart of a loving body of believers. I want to give a special thanks to all of the volunteers involved in leading musical worship on Sunday morning (instrumentalists, vocalists, tech, etc.). Leading others in Christ-centered worship is a high calling and takes much responsibility. I am so thankful for all of the willing hearts that God has placed in this ministry.
Each week we have had the opportunity to play with slightly different styled and musical expressions due to the musicianship that our volunteers have to offer. Our practices have allowed us to bond together. This year had its challenges for a few of our volunteers and our gathering together has given us the opportunity to pray for each other and grow closer in our relationship with the Father and each other.
During our Thursday evening rehearsals we got the chance to prepare musically and spiritually for our Sunday morning gatherings. Outside of these and other musically centered gatherings, I am grateful for the opportunity to meet with Pastor Zachary weekly to prepare spiritually for each Sunday gathering and to discuss how worship can be incorporated to best glorify God as we gather as a body of believers.
2023 has been a blessing and I am looking forward to more worship with you in 2024.
Blessings,
Jake Soltow
Worship Director
Our Women’s Fellowship had a great year this year - we met 4 times over the course of 2023, starting in March. Throughout the year we got to hear from ladies from our church as well as special guest speakers. We’ve gathered and talked about a wide range of topics from “Making Your Home Work for You No Matter What Stage of Life You are In,” to “A little bit of coffee and a whole lot of Jesus.”
In September we had the joy of making cards of encouragement for others - It was a fun time for all the ladies in our fellowship. This December we celebrated Jesus’ birth with Women of Promise, and their program “Light up your World.” Each meeting we have studied God’s word together, prayed for onr another, and enjoyed each others company and the fellowship of Christ.
We look forward to another year together in 2024!
