Calvary Church Annual Report AnnualReport-201617-web | Page 5

deacons We are encouraged to see Calvary members and at- tendees answer God’s call to give and support the numerous ministries that make up Calvary Church. Each year we step out in faith that we will be able to support and fund the ministries to which God has called us. And every year, we are in awe of the provi- sion that God gives Calvary through the faithful giving and obedience of our congregation members. We did experience lower giving during our time away from the building. And though this was anticipated, we did a mid-year budget alteration to reduce our annual budget for this past fiscal year by $660,000. This was not easy but many made great efforts to see this happen. In fact the staff worked so hard that ac- tual year end expenses came in even just a bit below our altered budget. This is truly incredible. A church of this size with some many active and fruitful ministries is a big undertaking and our worldly thinking would lead us toward being nervous about how to make it all work. But each year God provides, congregants step out in faith, and God is glorified through it all. As we look forward now to our new space, fully oper- ational ministry areas, and our first year in managing and maintaining this space there are still unknowns that remain. This will be our first full year back and I am sure we will learn what it takes to care for this location and all of the ministries inside of it. When we budgeted for this past fiscal year we cer- tainly had more unknowns than we have had previ- ously. Grace Beyond meant a move out of our current facility for almost an entire year. It was incredibly en- couraging to see the level of support from volunteers and the way in which our Calvary community rallied around the challenges of moving our services, but what impact would it have on attendance and giving? We simply did not know the answer but stepping out in faith through Grace Beyond was something we knew God was calling us to do as a church. Our budget for this coming year is staying pretty fairly stable with an increase of about 2.5%. This will con- tinue to take a lot of diligence and wise decisions by our ministry leaders but we are confident that we are moving in the right directions and that God will again provide for all the needs and ministries of Calvary Church. Jeff Rogers, Deacon Chair 5