Revisions to the Constitution & By-Laws EXPLAINED

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Revisions to the Constitution & By-Laws EXPLAINED

Revision of the Constitution and By Laws of Sun Valley Community Church ~ December 2009

As Sun Valley approaches its 20th anniversary, we are amazed at the growth and health of our ministry.  We are thankful to God and to our leadership through the years for all that they have done to make us who we are today.  In recent years we have experienced unprecedented and rapid growth that has caused the Board of Servant Leaders to examine our Constitution and By-Laws.  As you might have guessed, the governance needs of a small church plant and that of a large established church are very different. As such, for the past three years the Board of Servant Leaders has strived to discern and project on necessary adjustments in our governance documents that will serve our church in the present, as well as in future generations.

This document is an attempt to explain these much needed changes that will allow for appropriate governance practices in our future, as well as protect the necessary checks and balances that good organizations must have. Below is a description of these proposed changes with some explanation of why we deemed them necessary to make such changes. 

Our research on these changes was extensive, studying the leadership/governance structures of several large local churches and their leaders (Cornerstone – Linn Winters, Mission – Mark Connelly, Central Christian – Cal Jernigan, East Valley Bible-Tom Shrader,  Christ Church of the Valley-Don Wilson, Grace Community in Tempe). Scott Ridout also had extended discussions with several churches around the nation who have embraced a multi-site model (Mars Hill (WA) – Mark Driscoll, Sea Coast (SC) – Greg Surratt, North Coast (CA) - Larry Osbourne).  We are grateful to these leaders for sharing both the positive and negative sides of their leadership structures. 

Please note that no changes were made in our identity and organization, articles of purpose, or statement of faith.  We find those things to be as central to our function today as they were when we began.  All proposed changes have to do with form and function, not doctrine.

Please read the proposed changes and their explanations.  If you have questions or concerns, contact a member of the Board of Servant Leaders.  A meeting will be held on the weekend of January 9-10 for you to discuss any concerns.  We look forward to making these much needed changes and moving ahead in God’s future for Sun Valley.

The Board of Servant Leaders

  • Scott Ridout
  • Brad Olbert
  • Greg Priem
  • Russ Myers   
  • Bob Voelker
  • Tim Poet
  • Luke Dale

Explanation of Proposed Changes to the Constitution and By-Laws

Article V – Qualification for Membership

This section has always required members to be believers who have been baptized by immersion, agree with our statements of faith and purpose,  participate in active fellowship with believers at Sun Valley, serve in ministry and give financially to Sun Valley.  The only adjustment is to clarify “active involvement” not as weekend attendance but as “life on life” involvement ,such as in a small group.   The phrase “actively involved in meaningful Christian fellowship with a small group of believers” gives more clarity to the kind of fellowship we believe results in true life change.   Our membership covenant states such requirements and our membership application already requires the signature of small group and ministry leaders.

Article VI – The Servant Leaders

In this section we make a major adjustment, changing the make up of the Board from a “balance of Staff and Volunteer Servant Leaders” to the Lead Pastor and 3-9 Volunteer Servant Leaders.  The motive for this change revolves around the change of roles of a Board as the church gets larger.  In a church our size with so many ministries, it is impossible for the Board to be informed of the day-to-day activities of the church.  They no longer play an implementer role, but a “protect and project” role.  The Board role is redefined to ensure that the vision of the church is being communicated, the plans are being followed, the truth of God’s word is being taught and preached, and that the people of the church are being protected from false doctrine, divisive entities and poor leadership. In making this move we accomplish several goals:

  1. The Board becomes the protectors and the staff become empowered implementers of the vision of the church.
  2. The Board can now spend all their time looking at the major issues of the church and not be caught up in minor (day-to-day) issues.
  3. The Volunteer Servant Leaders now become the large majority of the Board, ensuring a strong representative voice of the members.

Other changes in this section include:

  1. Board members tithe. Spelling out the expectation of all Board of Servant-Leaders to tithe (give 10% of their income to God’s ministry at Sun Valley. )  Throughout our history this has been a requirement - we are just formalizing it.
  2. Hire/Release of employees. As always, the staff team members work for the Lead Pastor, not for the Board.  However, in the old by-laws, in order to hire or fire a staff, the pastor must submit a request to the Board.  This change allows the hire/release of a lower level employee to be done without Board approval.  The hire/release of senior level staff will continue to be under Board control.
  3. Term Limitation. In the past, Board members who served well could serve on the Board indefinitely.  We had two concerns about this. First, if Board membership is limited to 3-9 lay leader, then it is possible that the same people could be on the Board for decades.  In our observations of such churches, we found this to be very detrimental to the health of the church.   A second concern was that with unlimited terms, there is no incentive to raise up new leadership.   Terms limits will solve both of these issues.  The term of service for future Board members will now be limited to two three-year terms.  This will ensure that new leadership will have to be raised up regularly and new people and fresh perspectives be brought to the Board.
  4. Family members of high-level staff cannot be on the Board.  This was a huge concern of all the churches we interviewed.  Many of them have had major issues as a result of an employee whose spouse/family member was on the Board that oversaw the Lead Pastor (in essence the Lead Pastor is their boss, but their spouse is the Lead Pastors boss).We have focused this limitation to people whose spouses are directors and pastors.
  5. The function of preaching, teaching and appointing.  While Board members need to accurately handle the word of truth and be able to teach, at Sun Valley we have placed this responsibility of preaching and teaching of God’s word and appointment of ministry leaders to the staff.

Article VII  - Officers

A few minor changes were made in function.

  1. The Offices of Secretary and Treasurer were permanently separated.
  2. A staff member may serve in the office of Secretary or Treasurer even if they are not a voting member of the Board.  (At present, that person would be Bob Bedsun, our church administrator.)
  3. The Chairman may choose to moderate meetings of the Board or appoint a moderator, taking that responsibility from the Vice-Chairman.
  4. Financial reports are not presented to the entire Board during Board meetings.  Instead the financial reports are presented to two Board members appointed to oversee the finances. They then present a report to the Board. (Walking through the line items in a meeting takes too long and keeps the Board from focusing on vision and direction.)

Article VIII – Corporate Records and Reports

We struck the words “documents of every kind” from the explanation so that no one would misconstrue that phraseology as the ability to look at counseling documents, etc. Our goal is to protect the privacy of individuals involved in counseling and other sensitive issues, but maintain the right of members to corporate records.

Article X – Meetings

We renewed our commitment to communicate annually about our vision, ministry opportunities and names of members of Board of Servant Leaders, as well as confirmation of such leaders. (At present we communicated the vision at least twice a year.) We deleted the requirement that this meeting must be done between October and December. 

In addition, we propose moving away from the confirmation of an annual budget by the congregation.  In growing congregations, annual budgets tend to be very limiting.   For example, at the beginning of 2004, our budget was $480,000 and we had weekly attendance of 650.  By the end of 2004, we were averaging 1000 in attendance and $770,000 had come in for the year.  In our present practice, we base next year’s budget on this year’s income (The budget in 2010 will be the income of 2009).  However we also practice what we call “trigger point” budgeting – that when the giving gets to a certain level, we will be able to do certain things.  We will continue to create fiscal year budgets, controlled and overseen by the Board, as any responsible organization would. We are asking the congregation to trust their representatives (the Board of Servant Leaders) who see the details of the budget on a regular basis to make decisions about budgets. Records of such can be requested by membership at anytime as affirmed in Article VIII.  We will continue to inform the congregation of our financial needs/goals and vision for the future. (We have addressed this issue three times in 2009).  Members will find their voice on such matters in the confirmation of Volunteer Servant Leaders.

Article XI -  Disposition of Church Property

Two issues came up in this area that are on opposite ends of the spectrum – dissolution and expansion.

Dissolution

Should Sun Valley ever have to close its doors, the Board wanted to be more directive in where the assets of the organization would go.  In such a case, our desire is that Sun Valley’s assets go to expanding the church planting movement in Arizona.

Expansion

This was our toughest assignment and we depended on the churches that have pioneered the multi-site model to give us the greatest input on how to re-word this section.  In the wording of our now existing document, acquisition of any property cannot be done without a 2/3 vote of membership. If we have money in hand to purchase property, at present we cannot do so without congregational vote. The way that the By Laws are written, even if someone were to give us property, we could not receive it without a 2/3 vote of membership. In the proposed change, if we are offered property free of charge, or if we have the means to purchase property without taking out a loan, the Board of Servant Leaders would be able to acquire such property with a 2/3 vote of the Board, not membership. We believe our membership has and will continue to confirm leaders of sound judgment who would be able to make wise decisions on such things.  In the next paragraph, we will explain why this is such a significant issue.

The most difficult scenario to think through was the membership vote for property that required a loan.  Certainly we want the support and active involvement of the membership for the expansion of our ministry.  At the same time, the vision to be a multi-site church makes membership votes very difficult.  For example, imagine that Sun Valley had three campuses in Gilbert, Tempe and Payson, with membership at all three.  Suppose the leadership sees an opportunity to start a new campus in Florence or Casa Grande, yet members at the Tempe campus would rather spend the money on improvements to their campus or the members in Payson would rather expand their campus.  There would be a tendency for all to see only what they have experienced.  In addition, does it seem more logical that members of all those campuses cast a vote on a campus in Florence? It would be easy for each individual campus to get caught up in a number of thoughts.  We feel it would be more logical that their representative(s) on the Board speak for them in their casting of a vote.

In the new document we reserved the right for the Board of Servant-Leaders to call for a confirmation vote when thy deemed it responsible and right (for example when significant debt would be taken on that might affect other campuses).  Our goal in the revision was to reserve the right, but taking away the requirement to do so as written on our present documents.