05 Mar The Church – End Times RESPONSE

The Church – End Times Response.

Church response to be Four fold. General overview.

1. Inventory of Church Facilities for End Times vulnerability
2. Logistics of helping the nuclear church family, those able to help themselves.
3. Logistics and policy for setting aside resources to provide for those of the church family who are unable to provide for themselves.
4. Logistics and policy for allocating resources to provide help to those outside the nuclear church family as an evangelistic outreach.

Church Response Specifics; Policy.

1. Take inventory of Church facility infrastructure that is vulnerable to End Times.
   • Determine contingency plans for vulnerable areas.
   • Budget accordingly for resources for contingency plans.
2. Determine the information sequence needed to inform congregation of End Times.
   • Have workshops, information booths, etc, for raising awareness. Stress breaking this process down to small manageable units.
   • Hand out Home inventory worksheets for members to fill out. Deal with Panic issues, making it something we can ALL do TOGETHER as a FAMILY Emphasize COMMUNITY, COMMUNITY, COMMUNITY!!!
   • Hand out, at later date ( 1 to 2 weeks ), Inventory Solution worksheets with notable options for each problem area. ( Can best be done in larger groups ).
   • Have feed back times, where people can give their own solutions if different. There is no corner on knowledge in God’s kingdom. We can all learn from each other.
   • Have special contact /coordinator person for those who are financially / emotionally unable to prepare. Anticipate and prepare for these people.
3. Determine resources and policy that Church will operate under helping needy members who are unable to help themselves
   • Catalog members who are at risk, from elderly to mentally challenged, to financially challenged.
   • Determine on a case by case basis what needs will have to be met, and can best be met by the Church proper.
   • What is the best allocation of resources for this care and preparation?
   • How much can each member being helped, help him or herself.
   • Have a coordinator for this group of people as a contact person.
4. Determine the extent of help the Church will provide to the community.
   • How to keep resources separate for congregation and general public so that charity to public does not threaten well being of church members?
   • At what point do you turn needy people away and with what force do you do so?
   • If resources are stored at church building, after charity stores are exhausted, how do you dispense stores to congregation when needy are at doors watching, and/or belligerent. End Time scenarios count on society turning very ugly?
   • Should Church keep preparations secret to avoid End Time scenarios?
   • Should a security force be present at facilities to protect resources, and to what extent should they protect.
   • Should force be used to protect resources if Police are not available? If so, how much force shall be used?
   • It is felt that the Church’s behavior through this time will chart it’s course for the next 50 years in society’s eyes.
   • Have a coordinator for this group of people as a contact person.

Rough & Ready NOTE……

It is felt that the best way to approach this Dilemma is to separate congregational resources from Charity resources, keeping charity at the Church facility and congregational elsewhere, perhaps at each recipient’s home or at Commercial storage places, packed in innocuous looking boxes. If storage places are used, care must be taken in making sure cold and humidity do not exceed what the stored items can handle.

It is felt that if resources are separated then when Charity resources are gone, it can be shown to designated representatives of needy groups, so they can see for themselves that all resources are gone from the Church buildings.

The Church leadership needs to contemplate the drastic reduction of funding to the Church by members if events are severe. This means a drastic change in lifestyles of paid staff. Essentially they will be mostly out of a job as far as pay is concerned, yet their skills will be needed ever more to shepherd the flock and bring in the harvest. Their Spiritual and mental preparation will be critical to the functioning of the Church during this time and the aftermath following.

A last note is that it is very important that the Church members, starting with the staff, take time to contemplate the Worst Case Scenarios before the time arrives. In doing so, mental sorting of certain issues, such as how to meet force brought against each person or a group of members, can be brought to an accommodation in thought and reconciled with each person’s world view. It is felt that each believer should sort out their feelings before events happen that are traumatic. This will give the believer the decisiveness he or she needs to avoid problems, rather that be caught up in something before they know it and then just react in a way no different than raw society. We are called to be the salt, so we need to be ready.