Newsletter: September 2025
Serge Partnership
Our partnership with Serge:Grace at the Fray continues to be strong. As we develop a partnership at the global Alliance level, Marc Davis, Associate Area Director for Renewal offered two registrations to their Discipleship Lab at no charge. As the UMV network and global Alliance continue to work toward a discipleship program, we believed this was an excellent program for us to be involved in. This was facilitated by our good friend Colin Thornley from Serge who has attended our last two annual meetings (keynote speaker in 2024).
Alliance Executive Director Greg Alderman asked the UMV network to find two people within our ranks that would be interested in attending this six month deep dive into discipleship. Katie Smith, a deacon from New Life Coralville, IA, and JT Bean, Lead Pastor at Ebenezer Reformed in Morrison, IL agreed to serve for the UMV.
They will continue to come alongside Serge as a partner and they are also willing to help the UMV with future discipleship program planning for our churches. We are thankful for their willingness and service!
TAP/CLICK FOR DISCIPLESHIP LAB REGISTRATION
Church Creativity Grants
We continue to award Church Creativity Grants to assist churches to "think outside the box." The grant focuses on re-tooling leadership and congregations to re-think how they do outreach and spread the gospel. So far 8 churches have received grants! This is an investment of $34,700 into the gospel in our churches!
New Life Community (Coralville, IA): Youth Intern initiative and development
Dumont Reformed (Dumont, IA): Strategic Assessment of Church by VitalChurch
Christ's Family Church (Davenport, IA): Small Group Initiative at Local Colleges
The board is committed to doing this again next year in 2026. We will keep you posted.
If you are interested in learning more about the Church Creativity Grants, email Ron Fischer, ronfischer45@gmail.com
Equipping Cohorts for UMV Churches
Last year, seven individuals from seven different Upper Mississippi Valley Network churches took part in a Coram Deo equipping cohort and reviews were VERY positive, just ask Larry Sailer, Brandon Schipper or Kent Landhuis among others.
The UMV paid the $500 registration fee for any individual that wanted to attend, they only needed (the individual or church) to pay for any textbooks or materials. Well, we're at it again!! If you or anyone from your church wants to attend the below cohorts, we will pay the $500 fee!
It's even better than that though! For the $500 fee that the UMV will pay for, up to three persons from the same church can attend for no additional fees.
SO, the UMV pays and up to three people can attend!
Check out the cohorts below:
Evangelism for non-Evangelists, starting in October/Nov. if we get 3-4 churches to express interest and register.
Developing Local Leaders next cohort starts Sept 18 at 9 am CT.
Multiplication Accelerator starts September 24 at 1 pm CT.
Generosity and Fund Development starts Sept. 18.
Each person from the UMV will be required to submit feedback on the cohort and what they learned and how they will put it into place in their church. That's all we ask!
For more information on the cohorts, contact Ben Ingebretson at ben@coramdeoassociation.org.
To register, please email Network Leader, Ron Fischer at ronfischer45@gmail.com.
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