Purpose
The Home of Christ Church in Fremont was established 40 years ago by a group of families. By God’s blessing, it has grown into a medium sized church with many fellowship groups and multiple congregations with a diverse membership from many backgrounds. From time to time, an adjustment to our governance is needed to reflect the changes that have occurred and that we expect may happen going forward, as well as to account for our experiences with the current system. These changes are what we have tried to reflect in this proposed update to our bylaws.
To accomplish the revision, the Joint Board of Elder and Deacons appointed a bylaw revision committee in March, 2019. From that time, a large number of discussions have happened both by the bylaw revision committee and various other sub-groups of the Joint Board of Elder and Deacons. There had previously been a bylaw study group established in 2006, and these earlier discussions were considered and some proposals were incorporated.
The primary objective of these changes was to make adjustments to make it easier to raise up elders that reflect the broad background of our church and are committed to our church and to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. An additional objective was to adjust the balance between pastors and elders in a way that is consistent with our Biblical understanding that pastors are elders.
The growth of our church has also added complexity and created a very heavy burden to the members of the Elder Board, who are involved in most of the activities of the church, as well as most of the contentious issues, and expected to provide spiritual leadership, counseling and fulfill other roles as well. There is a need to add some flexibility to the Elder-Pastor system to account for this and to facilitate efficient delegation of duties. As part of this, we have proposed a two-level system (Elders and the Elder Board) where elders are appointed and given significant responsibility within the church. The Elders and Pastors are then rotated onto the Elder Board for a time, along with the Senior pastor, to set the overall direction of the church and deal with critical issues that cannot be delegated.
Other minor changes were made to reflect technological changes or changes in society. For example, meeting notices are no longer provided in printed bulletins, but done electronically. It is no longer common for membership transfers to be documented when someone moves from one church to another, and members move back and forth from overseas locations much more frequently than before. Some sections were reorganized a bit to make for a more consistent presentation of the articles. Others had some more detail added if they seemed vague.
With the growth in the English side, an effort was made to make the English and Chinese versions of this document much more consistent in their meaning. The Foreword and Appendices II and III had previously not been available in English and are now included in this proposed update.
Procedure
Our current bylaws provide a process for updates.
1) The first requirement is that the bylaws should not be changed for at least three years. Given that the last bylaw change was in 1997, we meet this requirement.
2) Once the bylaw revision proposal is settled, it is sent to a vote by the Joint Board of Elders and Deacons. This current version passed this vote in the September Board meeting,
3) So it is now being provided to the entire congregation to collect members’ opinions. A two-month period is allowed for this.
4) During the review period, the Joint Board of Elder and Deacons will consider any changes and decide if they should be included or not.
5) The resulting version is provided to the congregation for approval at an amendment meeting.
Given the impact of COVID-19 related regulations on this church, we will need to do this process largely on-line, rather than using paper and face-to-face meetings. Please send your feedbacks about the bylaw revision to: bylaw2020feedback@hoc3.org.
Schedule
Please refer to the following schedule for more details about the procedure:
- Publication of the proposed revision: Sep 27th
- First round of feedback collection cut-off date: Oct 10th
- First town hall (Zoom) meeting for Chinese congregation: Oct 17th 1-3 PM
- First town hall (Zoom) meeting for English congregation: Oct 18th 3-5 PM
- Second round of feedback collection cut-off date: Oct 24th
- Second town hall (Zoom) meeting for Chinese congregation: Oct 31st
- Second town hall (Zoom) meeting for English congregation: to be set up if needed
- Completion of the final revision and approved by the Joint Board of Elder and Deacons: Nov 29th
- Final approval by the amendment meeting: in Dec (will be published once settled)
Summary of Significant Changes
- All voting involving the number 2/3 is worded as “at least two-third”.
- Addition of the English Foreword and Appendices II and III.
- Adjusting language specifying the church organization to allow for more flexibility to account for multiple congregations. (III)
- Changing requirements for nominating new Elders from unanimous agreement of the Elder Board to “at least two-third”. (VII.A)
- Elders and Pastors are given the same consideration for nomination to the Elder Board. (VIII.A)
- Once nominated to the Elder Board, at least 2/3 vote of the Joint Board of Elders and Deacons is required for the nominee to become a member of the Elder Board. (VIII.A)
- Elder Board number of seats and actions to be taken if the number of seats cannot be filled. (VIII.A; VIII.B.3)
- Elder Board chairman can now appoint a substitute. (VIII.B.1; XI.B.1)
- Elder Board terms (up to three years) and term limits (up to two terms). (VIII.B.2)
- Adding long term direction to the list of Elder Board duties and making this the first item on the list. (VIII.C)