Summary

This ministry is about meeting the needs of families at Evangel Assembly. There are two basic levels of ministry: The Care Shepherd and the Care Pastor. Care Shepherds oversee five Care Pastors, and the Care Pastors oversee five families.  This is about becoming love with skin on, so that every person will know that they are loved and cared for. This is the way that we help every person that attends our church, to feel that “the pastors and other members will know when I’m not there.”

Every person needs to feel:

•  Valued

•  Loved

•  Cared for

•  Made to feel like they belong

If they don’t feel these things they will walk out the back door, and not return.

Structure & Reporting Relationships

We identify, recruit, and train both Care Shepherds and Care Pastors. The Care Shepherds take care of the Care Pastors, and the Care Pastors take care of the family units in the church. At Evangel, we are starting with 7 Care Shepherds and each one of them will have 5 Care Pastors that relate to them, and each of the 5 Care Pastors is responsible for 5 families within our church. This will enable us to care for 525 people or approximately 175 families (the average family in America is comprised of 3 people).

Obviously as we grow beyond those numbers we will train additional Care Shepherds and Care Pastors, eventually adding a layer of Regional Lay Pastors to help care for the Care Shepherds. For now the Care Shepherds will report to our Administrative Pastor and Young Adult Pastor.

No matter how large a congregation is, the greatest need of every person, is to be loved and to love. It doesn’t matter if you are a church person or a non-church person. The Care Network can be effective in meeting these two basic needs – loving people and helping them to love Jesus!

If we can build a network to protect the people and make them feel cared for then we will be successful in growing our church, and most importantly reaching the lost!

Job Descriptions

Care Shepherd

The Care Shepherd is basically a mentor for five Care Pastors.  They provide pastoral care for Care Pastors and give them guidance in dealing with pastoral care situations that the Care Pastor might be faced with.

1. 1.Be available to teach new Care Pastors.
   

2. 2.Attend bi-monthly meetings.
   

3. 3.Receives and review weekly update forms from each Care Pastor.
   

4. 4.Meet with Care Pastors for mentoring and ministry leadership on a consistent basis.
   

5. 5.Ensure that Care Pastors are doing their forms and keeping up with their families.
   

6. 6.Conducts a yearly prayer visit to the homes of their assigned Care Pastors.
   

Care Pastor

1. 1.Care Pastors are assigned five families. A family can consist of one person living alone or a family of 10 people – it’s a family.
   

2. 2.Care Pastors are asked to have 5 touches with that family:
   

3. •Sunday morning: Every Sunday morning Care Pastors make contact with each of his or her 5 families. A contact does not necessarily mean going over and talking to that person. It doesn’t have to be verbal, it can be just a nod, eye contact, thumbs up, something on that order. If you do not see your assigned family in worship, please phone them. The goal is not to give them a hard time about not being in church, but to learn if they have any needs that we might be able to assist with. When they don’t turn in a Connection Card, they will also receive a postcard from the church office.
   

4. •Birthday: Whenever any one of the family members has a birthday the Care Pastor should call them or send a card.
   

5. •Monthly Care Call with the family.
   

6. •Emergency: if one of your contact families is admitted to the hospital, or has a crisis in the home, whatever, the Care Pastor visits them and notifies the church office.
   

7. •Yearly: a personal prayer visit to their home. You will be taught how to conduct this 20-minute visit. For many people, Saturday morning is a good time to schedule this.
   

3. 3.Care Pastors are trained. Then in a Sunday morning service, hands are laid on them by the Pastors and they are installed for ministry in front of the congregation. They wear their name badges at church.
   

4. 4.Occasionally Care Pastors might encounter issues, which they do not feel qualified to deal with. In these situations they should immediately call their Care Shepherd.