The Convener's Corner
A newsletter for conveners by Rev.
Bill White
July 2004
CONVENER'S CORNER
Ideas from the 2004 North American Conference
We had a very informative meeting with a sizeable number of conveners at the North American Annual Meeting at Glorieta, NM, in June. About 35 of us met in a conveners’ meeting to discuss the work of conveners, problem areas, and what we need to do better. One area where conveners may help the OSL is in the retention of old and new members.
In the business meeting, Julabeth Cardin, OSL Office Manager, said that the membership roles have been pretty constant over the past years, with 6,842 members in 1985 to 6,944 members in 2004. While we have been adding new members each year at a good rate (1,300 the past 12 months), we have been losing about the same amount each year.
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One of the suggestions was to check with the business office to see that all of the people attending the chapter meetings were currently paid up and, if not, to encourage them to do so. If you will provide Julabeth with zip codes for the area covered by your chapter, she will furnish you a list of current members.
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Another suggestion was to make a real effort to nurture, involve, assign responsibilities, and encourage members to participate in the chapter work – programs, prayer teams, outside activities, healing missions, visitations to nursing homes, hospitals, and prisons ministry. A busy person will be one that will stay.
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Another area is in the teaching and training of new Associate members so that they know that you are interested and care about them and their progress in becoming Full Members. They need to be nurtured and monitored as they proceed with their study and training.
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The Rosemont, MN, Chapter has developed a “13 Week Basic Curriculum for Associate Member Training” that is excellent. This curriculum brings together the newcomers and regular members as a group with sharing and prayer. They meet weekly during the first 3 months with a retreat day and biweekly after the scripture study is completed. The time for the meetings usually runs about 2 ½ hours. Where two leaders are available, one will do mostly the scripture study, while the other will handle prayers and sharing. As the newcomers read their three books, they are encouraged to discuss important parts with the group, so that everyone may gain a basic understanding from all books. New members are invited to join in prayer (silently at first) with full members at church services in order to feel comfortable in praying.
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Another guide that should be valuable is the OSL Tract on “How to Attract and Hold Members.” It has a lot of good information and suggestions about keeping members interested and involved.
The point of all this is: What can we do about it as conveners of a chapter? Think of the result on the overall OSL membership totals if we can reduce the number of those leaving each year by half.
May the Lord bless each of you.
Bill White, Convener Liaison
e-mail: 2wmwhite@netex.quik.com
