Three Month Report...
That's our worship leader, Mike Dyment, practicing before service three weeks after we launched THE WELL.
Figured we'd give you an update on our progress in our first three months together and ask you to partner with us as we head for year-end.
A CHURCH IS STARTING TO EXIST
That's a very cool thing. THE WELL was just an idea twelve weeks ago. This sunday (week 12) we will finish up our third sermon series (CHURCH/JESUS REDISCOVERED/CULTURE WARS) and get ready for four glorious Christmas weeks with our CHRISTMASTIME series. We had six (6) new people with us last Sunday and if everyone who's come more than once came on the same Sunday we'd be closing in on 55 people with us on an average Sunday.
IN TERMS OF NUMBERS
In our first eleven weeks THE WELL has averaged 46 people (adults and children) and $713 in tithes and offerings on a given Sunday. With the statistics being that most North American churches don't pass 100 in weekly attendance until their fifth (5th) year in operation I think it's safe to say we're on our way, all thanks and glory be to Jesus.
--WEEK 15 UPDATE--
As of last week (Dec 20, 2009) we've hit the 70-mark in attendance and our web stats for the first four months of operations are as follows:
Page views= 7,896
Unique visits= 3,497
1st time visits= 2,343
Returning visits= 1,154
IN TERMS OF A 'SPIRITUAL SENSE OF THINGS'
Anecdotally, THE WELL is largely made up of families. This is different than our first church, where the population was largely single young adults. We're not surprised by this as THE WELL is located in suburban Burlington ON and FREECHURCH TORONTO was planted in the heart of downtown Toronto ON.
Of the families that are currently with us, most are starting to give faithfully and about half of them have family members attending with them for whom THE WELL is really the first church where they've ever felt really 'engaged'.
A sense we're already getting from people who visit or attend is that our dedicated 'kids space' in the sanctuary where children are encouraged to play quietly during worship and stay (if they're old/mature enough) for the sermon is a welcome addition in a culture where some churches are sometimes less than welcoming of kids in their services. It's our hope to continue to make THE WELL a truly child-welcoming place.
Our worship style continues to be heavy on hymns and very simple. In December we'll be adding an additional guitar and backing vocals and hope to introduce a full band in the new year.
Our preaching seems to be settling in to what we'd expected it to be, which is passionate expository preaching that surveys a book of the Bible for a month at a time, looking to connect the truth of scripture and the timeless story of Jesus to our modern culture and context in a way that transforms the hearer (us) so that we are inspired to live for Jesus, serve Jesus and proclaim Jesus (when given the opportunity) in our average everyday lives.
We've noticed an intensifying sense of God's presence with us by the Holy Spirit in the past three weeks and it's our hope that that authentic intensity continues to ratchet up.
WEBSITE
Our website is beginning to get significant traffic in the days following Sunday. We are now seeing between 150-300 downloads of Sunday's sermon on the Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday immediately following our weekend services. We are beginning to get feedback from listeners from as far away as Europe, South America, India and Asia who are blessed by the preaching they're able to podcast from THE WELL.
EVENTS
We are beginning to deploy a few events to help us mobilize in community to love Jesus, each other, and our city.
We are running, then hanging out every tuesday night in downtown burlington as a way to casually build relationships while inspiring our people to fitness.
We have started a once a month 'family movie night'.
We are planning a major Valentines Day (2010) event.
FINANCIAL NEED
As you can imagine, there were significant start up costs undertaken to get THE WELL off the ground. From signage to promotional materials to space rental to purchasing sound gear, projector & screen, musical instruments, software and getting this website up and functioning a lot of money was spent to get THE WELL started.
It is our hope to end 2009 with a zero balance owing ie: it's our goal to have all our start up costs paid off by the last week in December so that we can start 2010 with a clean slate ahead as we enter our first full calendar year as a church.
We need to generate $9,000 in the next five weeks to cover off all our remaining expenses. We currently have $2,000 in the bank so if we can hit $1,500 per week in tithes and offerings for the next five weeks ($7,500) that'll put us totally in the black by year end.
DECEMBER 2009 UPDATE:
See that request above?
You met it.
That's right. We finished 2009 with a whopping $480 SURPLUS in our bank account! On the one hand this is beautifully humble 'cause it's such a small number. On the other hand it's very encouraging because we now OWN all the gear we bought at start up.
Due to God's grace and your faithful giving.
Thank you, and well done.
We look forward to continuing this journey together and thank you very sincerely for obeying Jesus as He calls us, together, to leverage our time, talent, energy and financial resources to build a new church from scratch, for the sake of His people and His glory.
In Him,
Todd Cantelon
Founding Pastor--THE WELL
