I was very, very encouraged when I received this email from Pastor Tammy Swanson-Draheim from First Covenant Church in Mason City, Iowa.

I am so proud of Tammy and the congregation for following through on the Veritas challenge to create a behavioral covenant.  She prefers to call it a “relational” covenant, which is a wonderful adaptation to the concept.   This is the “stuff” of compelling Christian community.

Thought I would share with you what we did here at First Covenant.  We worked on a relational covenant, then I preached on those guidelines over the summer… sermons on gossip, criticism, complaining, conflict (3 sermons on that topic), negativity, excellence, honoring leadership, and binding it all together… love.  It was a very popular and practical series.  At the end of our series we had a banner made with the covenant on it and the overarching Scripture we used at the bottom.  In the mid section it was blank and that part draped over our communion table.  During the service we invited people forward to sign (with indelible markers) their commitment to living out community life according to these guidelines.  It was a wonderful way to express our commitment to doing life together in a way that honors God and each other and is a tangible witness to our world.  It was very moving.  Now it is displayed on a stand for all to see and be reminded.  - Tammy

If you are interested in speaking with Tammy about her church’s experience or would like to see her sermon manuscripts and adapt them to your ministry setting, you may email her at mstammyk@aol.com.

Please keep those stories and resources coming to encourage the whole church.

Posted on October 27th, 2009 under Uncategorized • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback