Church of God Network’s 4 Year Anniversary!

This week we celebrate 4 years of Church of God Network! It has been such an exciting year. There have been openly promoted cross-organizational fellowship events in Northern California, Michigan, Oregon, and New York and more are in the works. It is so encouraging to see the willingness to come together across the Body of Christ. It’ll take everyone’s effort and participation to affect the positive change we all want to see!

We want to give a shoutout to our team of over a dozen volunteers! Their assistance is invaluable and helps us accomplish way more than we otherwise could. A big thank you to all of the other organizations, ministers, and brethren working to make a difference throughout the Church of God as well! Whether it’s the 1% Initiative Participants, UCG addressing mental health struggles through the  Light of Hope Helpline, COGWA’s Hilltop Outreach Program helping to promote good works, or websites like Feastgoer.org, HWA Library, and Friends of the Sabbath that provide great informational resources to brethren, we applaud everyone for engaging in meaningful work and having a heart for service. You all are great examples to the Body of Christ!

We also want to acknowledge and thank Church leadership for their feedback and support over the past four years. It has been vital. Many have offered help, constructive feedback, and encouragement, and for that, we are incredibly grateful. Some remain skeptical of Church of God Network, and we completely understand the hesitation. Addressing the Church’s divisions is an extremely complex issue. A lot of damage has been done inadvertently over the years in the pursuit of “unity”, but we don’t want to fall into those same pitfalls. We greatly desire the input of, and partnership with, the ordained ministry to ensure this mission is guided by love, respect, and wisdom!

Whether you are a minister or member, please let us know if you have any ideas or suggestions for how we can improve what we do or if you have any concerns about our approach. We do not pretend to have all the answers nor all the skills needed to help the Church of God address its divisions. But we do know for certain that each one of us has our own gifts and abilities! Let’s harness our collective energy and skillsets to serve each other and help build community within the Church of God!

We are excited to continue building community along side you all in the coming year! Here are some highlights from CGN’s fourth year:

• We went on networking trips to: 1) New Orleans, 2) Atlanta, and 3) Long Island, NY. Thank you to all the brethren and leadership for your hospitality and love!
• We added Jean Marie De Veaux to our Board of Directors.
• We’ve added four new team members and will be adding at least 3 more before the calendar year ends, including a new Director of Research!
• We awarded 8 grants this year between our Ephesians 4 Project and COG Development Program.
• A new grant component was added to our Within Your Gates program to encourage good works projects.
• We created two new ways for everyone to get involved in the community building process:
  • CGN Local Contacts
  • 1% Initiative
• CGN Board Members gave a seminar at the Common Faith Network Winter Family Weekend.
• The International Centre for World Peace (ICFWP) invited CGN to speak at two of their events.
• CGN was invited onto Vic Kubik’s “the Kubik Report” – check out the episode here.
• CGN was invited back onto Church of God, International’s Prove All Things program.
• We now have 20 episodes of the CGN Podcast and there are more to come!
• Several new blog postsfrom Gary Petty.
• Multiple updates to the Congregation Map and the COG Resource Center. We are also in the process of a COG Marketplace overhaul. An easier user interface with customizable pages is coming this year!