Ararat Friends Meeting was established in 1924 after petitioning Pine Hill Meeting for permission to fill the need for a more convenient meeting place. While our membership has grown over the years, we are still blessed with some descendants of the original petitioners who established Ararat Friends Meeting. We continue to look at our strengths and weaknesses, some of which continue to be the same that have blessed and plagued the Meeting throughout its existence. We also are continuing to expand our opportunities.
This year’s Spiritual Condition Report comes from the input of our members who expressed their thoughts and concerns in written form to be consolidated into the following report.
There is a strong sense of family at Ararat, a continuing, accepting and warm Christian fellowship within the Meeting. This fellowship is wonderful, honest and sincere. It creates a special feeling in the Meeting House and the touch of the Holy Spirit has often brought us to tears of joy. As one member commented, “A sense of ‘God in the Midst’ one Sunday in the late summer last year when members testified of God’s greatness in their lives and others they loved. I felt at that particular time there was no other place I had rather be than the ‘little white church on the hill’ in Ararat.” Our Meeting continues to be diligent in helping each other through our spiritual journey with a strong Prayer ministry. Our membership is generous and always gives whatever is needed, keeping us financially sound and paying our commitments on time. We continue to meet our Yearly Meeting askings and give spiritual and financial support to local, national, and international missions. We continue with the ongoing and effective support of numerous local charities including an increase of quarterly donations to the Foothills Food Bank and the sponsorship of local blood drives. There is a strong sense to give immediate financial and spiritual support to individuals and families in need in the community. The sponsorship of the Sharon Goins house project working through Friends Disaster Service to complete the house of her family is an example of putting our concerns into action. Our Sunday School is small but has a strong spiritual sense, driven by discussion and a hunger to learn. Vacation Bible School continues to grow. In 2009 we had the largest attendance in recent years, concluding on Friday evening with a family outing and an opportunity for outreach to new families. Our Business Meeting is held monthly with good attendance and participation. Attendance at Quarterly Meeting is substantial and we have a growing presence in the Quarter. Our Website is updated weekly and includes a warm and open invitation to visitors, as well as access to our Meeting’s historical archives and current events. We have a diversity of talent for a small Meeting—piano, guitar, duets, trios, a wonderful choir, and Choir bells. We are blessed with a pastor who gives us progressive and knowledgeable pastoral leadership that focuses on God’s transcendent and immanent role in our lives. We have strong representation on the North Carolina Yearly Meeting’s Peace and Social Concerns Committee. With the publication of his book, “Where Christ Presides: A Quaker Perspective on Moral Discernment”, Jack Ciancio had contributed to the spiritual growth of not only the meeting’s but also to Quakerism’s understanding of ethical decision making. This book is being used for Christian ethics study session in other meetings and was chosen for workshop study at the Mid-Year Gathering.
Although we feel we have a lot of strengths for a small meeting, there are some areas that we are not as strong as needed. Being a rural meeting, it has been difficult for us to attract new members and increase attendance. The responsibility of advancing the work of the Meeting is shared by too few members, thus creating a challenge to get all our members involved.
Realizing that we have weak areas, it awakens us to opportunities. Although the Sunday School we have is strong and energetic, there is a need to create a new class for the smaller children of our congregation. Each of us needs to be led to realize the need for growth in membership and accept the call to reach out to those in our lives who need to accept the call of our Lord to follow Him and join us in His worship. Our meeting is blessed with a variety of talent and we need to incorporate more of our talent in our worship services. The use of a worship leader in Sunday morning worship would be a way to incorporate more of our membership into the role of actual leading and involvement.
The greatest practical fear for our Meeting is our aging membership and the lack of new members over the last few years. We need to explore how to correct this as a Meeting, as a whole Meeting with the entire congregation concerned and involved with relevant input in how to improve the ministry to all people. A visitation program with in the community or to those the members have a concern about should be considered. We hope that through exemplary Christian behavior and an openness to explain our belief in a loving Father, who sent His only Son to reconcile everyone to Him, and that we are guided by His Holy Spirit in our lives, others may come to realize the blessing of the Religious Society of Friends. By demonstrating that we worship a living God who continues to be active in the world and our lives and wants an active personal relationship with each of us, then maybe the public will begin to understand what the Quaker belief is all about.
There is a strong sense of family among the members of Ararat Friends. It can be seen in the story of a three year old grandson brought to worship by his grandparents. When he returned home he began talking about how much he liked Papa’s church and when his mother asked him why, his face lit up and he quickly responded, “The people”. We pray that this sense of family will be seen by others and attract new members as we begin to explore how to get the word out about this marvelous family of God. Ararat Friends seeks unity in Christ by seeking the guidance of that “Light” within.
Ministry and Council Clerk ------------------------------------------------- Eddie Reeves
Monthly Meeting Clerk
North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends 2010 Mid-Year Gathering Report New Hope Friends Meeting, Goldsboro, NC March 12-13, 2010
“Bringing Peace”
Friday, March 12
Judy Ritter, Presiding Clerk NCYM brought the Representative Body to order. The theme for this year’s Mid-Year Gathering was “Bringing Peace” and the clerk opened by declaring 2010 as the Year of Peace and read excerpt from George Fox’s 1660 Declaration for Peace.
Regrets were received from Billy Britt who could not attend due to medical reasons.
Creative Aging—Archie Creed announced that they are planning a trip to Amish Country in June.
Program Ministries—Darrin Allen gave an update and report on the mission at MOWA, Mexico, the Intern Program, Young Friends, and Quaker Lake. Progress was noted in all areas but also that the economic conditions are impacting negatively on growth. Mission revenues have been reduced by half.
Jamaica- Myra Brady reported that the continuing emphasis will be on JBS becoming more self-supporting.
Spiritual Life Commission -- Request monthly meeting Spiritual Condition Reports be completed by April 1. The 2010 Spiritual Life Conference will be held at Back Creek Friends on Saturday, April 17. The theme will be "natural church development".
United States Friends Women – report was given by Peggy Baxter about the ongoing work of the USFW.
Evangelism – Planning for another NCYM Revival.
Yearly Meeting Ministry and Counsel – next meeting will be August 7, 2010 at Plainfield Friends.
Yearly Meeting Program Committee – The 2010 Annual Conference will be held at Black Mtn., NC Sept. 3 – 6, 2010.
Friday Evening Worship:
Following worship service David Wolfe presented a fascinating program describing their 18 months spent in Iran studying Farsi and getting an in-depth look at the social structure of life in Iran and of the Christian faith as practiced by the Iranian Christian Community.
Saturday, March 13:
After the Representative Body was called to order John Porter presented his report – copy enclosed.
Other reports
Share the Blessing – a total of $84,612 has been received so far.
Christian Social Concerns Committee – Clarence Mattocks gave a superb presentation on the work of this committee on preparing for the 2010 Year of Peace Project throughout the NCYM. He described the essay contest, and presented the George Fox poster the committee created; individual copies are available to each of the monthly meetings. Sunday May 2, 2010 has been designated as a day of peace and all monthly meetings are asked to make peace a focus of worship that day.
Structure Evaluation Group - Mike Fulp Sr. presented a proposal for reorganizing the Yearly Meeting’s Committee structure. A lengthy discussion of the proposal followed.
He also requested consideration of having all members participate in an online spiritual qualifications assessment. This generated an intense discussion concluding in approval by the representative body.
Askings - . 85% of askings was paid in 2009, which was only 87% of 2008’s receipts. Through March, 2010 17% has been received.
Workshops - Two workshops were presented on Saturday afternoon. The first was Mediation Skills, presented by pastors Daniel Thames and Tom Barton. This was based on a week-long training presented by the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center that Daniel, Tom, John Porter and Jack Ciancio attended last November. The second workshop was facilitated by Jack Ciancio focusing on ethical decision making as discussed in his book Where Christ Presides: A Quaker Perspective on Moral Discernment.
Saturday Evening:
After worship David Wolfe and Linda Kusse-Wolfe presented a slide show and further discussion of their time spent in Iran. Following their presentation the 2010 Mid-Year Gathering was formally ended.
